I know Hartswood produce it, but they produce it FOR the BBC. The BBC are just as involved in Sherlock as Hartswood is and if they choose to make a statement about it, it can be considered official.

I'm not sure why you're getting so belligerently dismissive about it? I'll admit it's disappointing but at some point we need to accept the fact that there will be no more explanation and move on. It's a bit like those continuing to hang on to the idea that Moriarty might return.

The story is told. It's over. It's done.

Sherli Bakerst wrote:

But when the BBC are quoted as saying, "As far as the BBC are concerned..." that leads me to parse the statement as having at least a smidgeon of uncertainty to it.  That phrase--as far as xxx is concerned--implies that other people may have other opinions about whatever's being discussed.  In my mind, it does not signify "once and for all and that's an end to it."

Oh that's interesting! I haven't seen a quote that says "As far as the BBC are concerned" I've only seen the one in the link I posted. Do you know where the quote you're referring to is? I'd be interested in that, because yes, if they're saying "as far as we're concerned" then I guess that leaves it open to revisiting in Season 4, theoretically. 

Having said that, the quote I'm referring to is this:

“The final reveal was actually how he did it. That is the fall dealt with now and it will not be revisited in episodes two or three.”

Which basically means if it were to be revisited it would be in Season 4, and since by then the story will have moved on, it's unlikely to happen at all.

I do think it's disappointing and a cop-out that they've given us an answer that is so full of holes, but I think we just have to accept that it's all we're going to get.

I personally don't have the energy to continue theorising for another two years, but you guys are more than welcome to

Wholocked, it was in the Sunday Times article that I saw that phrase but I don't have time to search for the link now, sorry.  Maybe someone else can please post it again?

I do not have the source at the moment but wasn't there a BBC statement saying that no. 3 was how he really did it? 

I know I'm not the only one who has spotted many glaring errors (deliberate, of course) in Sherlock's description of how he faked his suicide. To me it's obvious that he was pulling Anderson's leg, and Anderson began to realize this before Sherlock even left the room.  Here's why the description is bogus.
 
In The Reichenbach Fall, the sniper is carefully prevented from seeing anything that would reveal the hoax, because his view of the sidewalk "landing area" is obscured by the low brick ambulance station between him and the sidewalk where Sherlock lands.  But in Sherlock's description to Anderson, the large air bag was inflated on the opposite end of the building from where John stood -- and this would be in plain sight of the sniper!  It was also taken back to that area to hide it from John after Sherlock jumped.
 
So, the whole air bag element is bogus.
 
I've been convinced for months that Sherlock was caught by a Browder Life safety net – the kind firemen have used for decades.  They work even for jumpers eight stories up, and Sherlock jumped from six stories up. The laundry truck brought it and carried it away.  It wasn't even hidden!  Neither we nor John ever get to see anything but the rear of the truck and the curbside edge of it.
 
The safety net could be taken out of the truck and then used to catch Sherlock in less than thirty seconds.  The team that held it walked toward the front of the truck to hide from John during the brief moment when John first sees Sherlock on the sideway.  After John is knocked down by the cyclist, the team puts the safety net back into the truck and it drives away before John even gets there.
 
Simple, quick, and entirely hidden from the sniper across the street.
 
Speaking of the sniper, Sherlock states that Mycroft's men "invited" the sniper not to shoot John.  But we saw the sniper casually pack up and leave after witnessing what he thought was Sherlock's suicide -- per Moriarty's instructions.  And yet, in Sherlock's bogus description we're shown a scene of the sniper on the stairway landing as viewed through another sniper scope behind him.  A rifle with a scope . . .  to shoot a man twelve feet away in a stairwell?
 
Nope.  Don't think so.
 
What about the time element? The air bag could not possibly have been unrolled, inflated, and moved into position in the time between the moment when John's cab drove past the end of the ambulance station and the time Sherlock jumped. Remember, they couldn't even start the job until John was in position on the other side of the ambulance station, because the team had to prepare the air bag without John seeing it.
 
Sorry, that wouldn't work either.  It would take too long.
 
And who did Sherlock say did all this skilled preparation for the hoax?  The people from Sherlock's homeless network? Really?  Where did homeless people get all those costumes (nurses and doctors uniforms, etc.), and where did they get the big air bag?
 
Did Mycroft provide all that?  Probably . . . but wait a second.
 
Sherlock told Anderson that he contacted Mycroft to set up the hoax. That I definitely do believe, but we know Mycroft hates to deal with people -- so how did he round up all those loyal homeless folks and get them organized in less than twelve hours?  Okay, Mycroft could have given orders to a whole team of trusted government agents to go out and round up the homeless people so they could –
 
-- Nope, that makes no sense.  If Mycroft already had a team of agents helping prepare the hoax, why bother with the homeless people at all?
 
It seems much more likely that Mycroft gave orders to his group of trusted government agents to set up and execute the hoax -- not a scattered bunch of homeless people. Also remember that Sherlock said the area was cordon off to make sure everyone there was part of the hoax.  But how could a group of homeless people close off a street that led to a hospital?  That was not exactly a back street in a London slum!
 
I think Mycroft would use his considerable official powers to order policemen to cordon off the area while his government agents conducted the suicide hoax. But according to Sherlock's questionable explanation to Anderson, this important task was entrusted to a group of people who have no permanent address, no financial resources, and no official status.
 
Sorry, but I don't think the homeless network was involved at all – even though Sherlock told John at one point that the work was done by twenty-five members of his homeless network.  I think Sherlock even fibbed to John about that, but I don't know why.
 
What about that highly unnecessary corpse which Sherlock claimed was thrown out a window?  Why use a corpse for those brief seconds, when all Sherlock had to do was lie down (which he did) and have blood squirted on him (which he also did) just seconds after he landed.  He told Anderson the corpse was needed to stand in for him while the air bag was removed.  That's nonsense, because (a) Sherlock could have immediately laid on the sidewalk himself, and (b) I don't believe there was any air bag anyway!  Just a fireman's safety net, quickly removed after it was used.
 
And exactly who was that convenient doppelganger that looked just like Sherlock?  Sherlock himself admitted he didn't know!  He told Anderson that Moriarty had located a man who looked "a lot like me," and used him to scare the kidnapped children. Then Moriarty killed the man, and Molly just happened to locate the body in a morgue. Sherlock referred to him as " . . . that man -- whoever he was . . . ".
 
Sherlock didn't even know the alleged man's name – two years after the suicide hoax?  Not likely.
 
So, there you have it folks. Sherlock was clearly pulling Anderson's leg – a bit of revenge on one of the people who had called Sherlock a fake.  The real suicide plan was undoubtedly similar, but much simpler and more efficient – without a huge, time-consuming blue air bag the sniper could see, a look-alike corpse which was conveniently "found", a team of amateurs to prepare the scene, and blatant contradictions to what we know happened in The Reichenbach Fall.

Last edited by Bruce Cook (January 14, 2014 4:30 pm)

Bruce Cook, I certainly like your theory much better than the given one, especially the detail about the firefighter's device, wich could've been brought and carried away by the van. A friend of mine, who works as a fire expert for the police, said the same. He said, one would NEVER use such a Big Blue Pillow to get someone off a high roof. And that really keeps me thinking: Otherwise your theory isn't even that different from theory 3. So, why the heck couldn't Mofftiss come up with a slightly more credible theory. It would've been so easy! Just change the device for breaking the fall, and  let go of this lookalike body. And if they felt, they needed a decoy body, so they could film a beautyful crash for us, any body or even a dummy would've been more credible that a lookalike body, who wasn't only a dead ringer of Sherlock, but ALSO willing to do Moriarty's work, AND was killed, AND was found by Molly. Moriarty would've destroyed such a body! And what do Mycroft and Sherlock think about coincidences? The universe isn't so lazy! A few adjustments  wouldn't have changed the story line at all. And Mofftiss are no fools. They would've asked experts about this.  Aren't we almost insulting Mofftiss, by thinking, they came up with something so implausible? And, yet, I cannot see a way out of it now. If they won't revisit it, they won't revisit it...

Last edited by sherlocked (January 8, 2014 7:10 pm)

Well, Bruce Cook, you've collected several points, why the "theory 3" wouldn't work. But what do you think, what's left, if the impossible is eliminated? For theorizing: http://sherlock.boardhost.com/viewtopic.php?pid=115756#p115756

So at the end Sherlock simply fell and survived. If Moffat, Gatiss und Co. want leaving it a secret for us, well...

Last edited by s.he (January 9, 2014 4:33 pm)

Perhaps in the 3rd episode (toward the end) John will say, "Are you ever going to tell anyone how you faked the suicide?" -- to which Sherlock will reply, "Actually I already told Anderson, but he figured out pretty quickly that I was blowing smoke and he got very unset."

"You told Anderson a complete lie?"

"No, I told Anderson an incomplete truth -- laced with lies that sounded plausible."

"Oh.  Okay. So, how did you survie the fall?"

"The same way people on high floors in burning buildings do.  A fiireman's net."  (Cut to quick scene of the actual event when Sherlock lands.)

"I see. And the blood?"

"Molly supplied it, and Mycroft's people doused me with it.  Everybody on the block belonged to Mycroft's little army of secret agents.  Except you.  And Moriarty's sniper in the window across the street."

"But .  .  .Sherlock . . .  you were dead!  You looked absolutely dead!"

"John, a man lying on a sidewalk with his eyes wide open and unblinking, surrounded by a pool of blood, looks absolutely dead.  I just played dead.  Dogs can be trained to do it -- even the stupid ones."

"So . . . that's all there was too it?  You jumped off the roof, landed in a net, had blood poured on you, and held your breath while you stared up at the sky?  THAT was your brilliant plan to fool the world?"

"Exactly. Did it work?"

"Well . . . yes."

"John, complicated plans look great on paper.  Simple plans works.  Words to live by, my friend.  Come on, let's go get something to eat."
_____________________________________

At this point, Moffat and Gatiss have allowed us all to pick apart the complex phony version of the hoax and we've figure out that in this case, less is more.  So, Sherlock will impress the fans the way he always has -- by taking something very simple and doing quite a lot with it. 

Last edited by Bruce Cook (January 12, 2014 2:01 am)

s.he wrote:

Nice words. But if there was no plan behind? Just fortune? Sherlock would have a legitimate interest keeping this a secret... hopefully not for John...

Either you misunderstood me, or I misunderstood you. (Gee, that sounds like a description of my second marriage!  ) 

My point was that Sherlock's plan did not need the elaborate and mostly unworkable embellishments we saw in his deliberately bogus explanation to Anderson.  Sherlock tacked on complete nonsense that made it more complex . . . and seriously flawed.

The simpler plan I proposed many months ago involves asking Microft for help (the "uncharacteristic thing Sherlock did"), and having Mycroft provide a team of government agents and policemen to cordon off the street and be ready to execute the hoax.  The laundry truck would  deliver a fireman's safety net and then sneak it out again.  The fake by-standers would assist Sherlock in playing dead with blood all over him, and the cyclist would knock John down so the fireman's safety net could be tossed back into the laundry truck before it drove away,

In short, a solid plan with much fewer things to go wrong.
 
But I have yet to figure out why Sherlock devised the plan in the first place!  He didn't know Moriarty had assigned snipers to kill his friends until Moriarty told him, right there on the roof.  Faking his death became necessary after this -- but why did he plan to do it before he knew it would be necessary?

And even if he had known about the snipers who where ready to kill his friends and planned the hoax to prevent it, how the hell did Sherlock expect to prevent Moriarty from looking down at the sideway below after Sherlock jumped, seeing him land in the safety net, and screaming out –
 
"Sherlock, you liar!  This was all a fake!  Your buddies are dead meat, dumbass!"

I suppose the easiest solution would be for Sherlock to knock the sh*t out of Moriarty just before he jumped -- a justifiable display of rage -- to give himself the thirty seconds needed to end up looking like a bloody mess on the sidewalk after the crack team of government operatives caught him in the net, stowed it inside the laundry truck, and allowed it to drive away.

This is yet another solid reason to dismiss the whole ridiculous Big Blue Air Bag description which Sherlock fed to the guilt-ridden, clueless Anderson.  The time it would take to tote the fully inflated air bag to the landing site, use it to catch Sherlock, and then remove it from sight would permit a parade of the Queen's Royal Guardsmen to march by, accompanied by a platoon of bagpipe-playing Scotsmen who would provide the music!

Last edited by Bruce Cook (January 12, 2014 2:53 am)

Bruce Cook wrote:

Perhaps in the 3rd episode (toward the end) John will say, "Are you ever going to tell anyone how you faked the suicide?" -- to which Sherlock will reply, "Actually I already told Anderson, but he figured out pretty quickly that I was blowing smoke and he get very unset."

"You told Anderson a complete lie?"

"No, I told Anderson an incomplete truth -- laced with lies that sounded plausible."

"So, how did you survie the fall?"

"The same way people on high floors in burning buildings do.  Fireman's net."  (Cut to quick scene of the actual event when Sherlock lands.)

"And the blood?"

"Molly supplied it, Mycroft's people doused me with it.  Everybody on the block belonged to Mycroft's little army of secret agents.  Except you.  And Moriarty's sniper in the window across the street."

"But .  .  . you were dead!  You looked absolutely dead!"

"John, a man lying on a sidewalk with his eyes wide open and unblinking, surrounded by a pool of blood -- looks absolutely dead.  I just played dead.  Dogs can be trained to do it, even the stupid ones."

"So . . . that's all there was too it?  Jump off the roof, land in a net, have blood poured on you, and hold your breath while you stared at the sky?  THAT was your brilliant plan to fool the world?"

"Did it work?"

"Well . . . yes."

"John, complicated plans look great on paper.  Simple plans works.  Words to live by, my friend.  Come on, let's go get something to eat."
_____________________________________

At this point, Moffat and Gatiss have allowed us all to pick apart the complex phony version of the hoax and we've figure out that in this case, less is more.  So, Sherlock will impress the fans the way he always has -- by taking something very simple and doing quite a lot with it. 

You should be writing this show.

Your theory is basically exactly the same as mine. I never believed in the unnecessary use of a rubber ball and had always favoured a fireman's landing net rolled up and tossed in the truck. So simple, but the simple solutions are always the best.

Solution 3 - the one they gave us - is just....well....lame.

I don't think we're going to get any further explanation and as a result, The Empty Hearse will always remain my least favourite episode with my opinion of their writing skills slightly lowered.