Hanka wrote:

Mrs.Wenceslas wrote:

CAM might have deserved it. but it was still a murder...

I'm with you about the murder thing, but the first part of your statement is to be seen very ... carefully, imo. Problem here is that none of us, nobody on this entire planet, is intelligent and objective enough to tell if somebody deserves to be killed or not. We are all extremely subjective. And therefore, it is not upon any of us to decide whether somebody should die, or if they deserve to. Murder/Death is fatal, you can't just go and get somebody back from the dead because, oh, sorry, you made a mistake. Therefore I think nobody deserves to die (sorry, had to throw that in).

miriel68, you're not really contradicting me here. I'm okay with people murdering others on TV, it happens, it should be shown on TV/in literature. I am just very unhappy with the way it is dealt with: not at all. Sherlock kills somebody, then there's about a minute of people being shocked, and then, surprise, three minutes later, Sherlock just comes back to solve yet another crime. Mycroft is over it. John is over it. Nobody even implies that this is wrong, a murderer not facing justice because he is oh so intelligent and needed (why? He just 'solved' a problem in the worst possible way). The characters are joking again already, and apparently ready to go 'back to business'.

sj4iy, and what does that tell me? That fiction isn't real. Did I say fiction was real? No. I claimed that it's not the purpose of fiction to ignore ethical standards (which you implied beforehand). And your quote, wherever it may come from, doesn't say anything about that.

 Couldn't agree more with your post! I have nothing to add.

of course mycroft has to say Sherlock was a murderer.  If he doesn't it's bowing to familial tendencies and M accuses him of.

However, I think Mycroft after viewing the show again gives Sherlock 6 months in "time out" as it were to learn his lesson.  I believe the plan was always to bring Sherlock back before the terminal part of the mission set in.

Just one thing, Hanka - we do not know if the murder will not be dealt with in series 4. I do not believe that they will get back to business as usual without addressing this in any form. 

SusiGo wrote:

Just one thing, Hanka - we do not know if the murder will not be dealt with in series 4. I do not believe that they will get back to business as usual without addressing this in any form. 

 I agree with you there. I feel, it will get adressed. And, maybe, there is more to this business, than we can see right now.

In canon Sherlock comes across to me often as symbol/dispenser of Justice.
We see this in the Milverton case as mentioned..on another occasion he walks away from a murder saying.,,"I see no crime only justice...."
There is also the occasion he becomes enraged attacking the lout hitting a woman in the street with his cane/riding crop.

So in justice three defences for murder are allowed , self defence, defence of anothers life..but also crimes of passion...an example might be the long term abused wife snapping and killing her spouse.

So Sherlocks defence might be ... it was a crime of passion.
Looking at the shooting..for Sherlock..it is quite emotional , as mentioned , the dog and the young Sherlock crying.

Also what was his motive.... I think it actually was to protect Mary and John and to keep his vow..in line with the title. I think he see's shooting Magnussen as the only way out..snaps..realises it means his probable exile and death..hence the dog comment..they are going to put me down one day..is reflective of Mycroft sending him on the suicide mission..putting him down.
So maybe...a crime of passion.

However this is uncomfortable for a few reasons..Mary didn't deserve his protection..he made the vow before he knew that..and ultimately she gets away with her crime..while Sherlock pays.

This may be resolved in the future though...say someone Mary hurt in the past finds her and shoots her in a similar crime of passion  .. Mary pays and justice is measured out equally balancing karma, lesson learnt.

Further were the baby killed also..it would add a ... look what happens when you take justice into your own hands message. Innocents get hurt.
This scenario also adds much scope for charcter growth ref. Sherlock @John.


For a woman on the run supposedly keeping a low profile...Mary's selfish decision to marry John is not looking so clever.

Last edited by lil (January 15, 2014 9:23 pm)

The difference between Mary and Magnussen is that Mary is being loved.
She doesn't deserve protection but is gifted with it.
By John's and Sherlock's decision.

sherlocked wrote:

I have to say, I belong to the faction, which has a lot of problems with Sherlock's action. Yes, CAM is particularly loathsome, but that doesn't give anyone the right to murder him. I believe in the integrity of human life. To take a life, you better have a very good justification, like self defense or saving another life. Sherlock's justification of saving the marriage of his friend to a freelancing assassin, seems to be an extraordinarily bad justification, IMO.  If nothing new transpires in season 4 , which throws a new light on this business I really hate, what they have done to Sherlock's character with this plot development.

 
I agree that it is a very important thing; I think the sheer amount of time it took Sherlock to make the decision and shoot CAM reflects that fact.

However, I do not think that Sherlock killed CAM to save John's marriage or to save John's wife; if that were so then much of what led up to the scene would be entirely meaningless. I think an important part of it is a reflection of the central meaning of 'His Last Bow', where Holmes has devoted years to his undercover work pretending to be an Irish American feeding (false) information to the Germans so that Britain would not lose the war; it's about patriotism, or love of his country, which is perhaps a less loaded term in 21st century.

CAM himself recognises this; he exults that Sherlock has not only failed all those people he holds dear but destroyed the things he holds dear. And the things he holds dear most certainly include Britain; there's a nice echo of the scene in an earlier episode where he says that Mrs Hudson cannot leave Baker St because the nation would fall. Admittedly that also involved Sherlock violently making reparation for the act of attacking Mrs Hudson; his selective amnesia as to how many times the villain had fallen out of the window is one of my favourites 

I have no doubt that Sherlock knew that CAM was striking at Mycroft through him; the blackmail chain, or 'pressure points' as CAM liked to put it, was complete. Sherlock may be disposable but Mycroft isn't; he's the clever brother, upon whom depends the safety of the free world, and, occasionally, potatoes.

Sherlock warned John before they boarded the helicopter that the risks were very high, and that even if they survived they had a significant chance of ending up prosecuted for treason. Once the trap was sprung it was obvious, beyond reasonable doubt, that CAM had set it up; he intended to trap Mycroft so that he could blackmail him for anything he wants, including access to every State secret of Britain and other countries.

Sherlock could not let that happen, and the only way he could stop that happening was to shoot CAM himself; I really don't think he found it morally easy, Part of the delay was establishing, beyond reasonable doubt, that all of the info was solely in CAM's head, but part of it was his reluctance to shoot someone who wasn't physically attacking him.

The two last straws appear to be CAM attacking John and Mycroft arriving in his helicopter; then, and only then did Sherlock grab Martin's gun and shoot CAM. No matter how much he turned his stomach, Sherlock accepted the humiliation inflicted by CAM in Baker St in the hope of helping his client; someone prepared to do that for someone he hardly knows is likely to move up a gear when it comes to his family and his friends. And so, in the end, he did...

Harriet wrote:

The difference between Mary and Magnussen is that Mary is being loved.
She doesn't deserve protection but is gifted with it.
By John's and Sherlock's decision.

Matter of perspective. Mary being loved is understandable in my opinion since she wasn't the one blackmailing in the first place...and well, soon-to-be mother....

I feel the same, anja. There are no easy moral solutions here which makes the scene tragic and moving. 

Willow, you have some points here: Sherlock might well have done it for his country and Mycroft. Mycroft's words : 'Sometimes this country needs a blunt instrument' seems to lend some support to this view. And I really think, more will transpire in season 4.
Interesting observation, that Sherlock only shot CAM, after the helicopter arrived and he had  plenty of witnesses, for what he did.