Swanpride wrote:

But Mary is not a totally bad person either.

I still think that there would be way less discussions about it if the victim of her "surgery" had been random racist ex-con, or Magnussen himself. It's mostly because it was Sherlock we even think about it so much. It's not that Mary shoot someone...but that she shoot someone whose dead would really hurt John.

To me it's that Mary killed someone we love and furthermore didn't really show any sign of remorse afterwards. Quite on the contrary, she went to the hospital, stood by his side and threatened him not to tell John. And a bit later she comes to meet him at Leinster Gardens, brings a gun and again threatens him. She shoots him and just carries on in the same vein. And never says sorry.
 

Swanpride wrote:

But Mary is not a totally bad person either.

I still think that there would be way less discussions about it if the victim of her "surgery" had been random racist ex-con, or Magnussen himself. It's mostly because it was Sherlock we even think about it so much. It's not that Mary shoot someone...but that she shoot someone whose dead would really hurt John.

 
Well, naturally! 

John killed Jefferson Hope, a complete stranger to us who was likely to kill Sherlock, whom we love, any second.

Sherlock killed Magnussen, a near-stranger to us who had great potential to destroy John Watson, whom we love.

Mary killed SHERLOCK, our protagonist, whom we and John LOVE. 

I have no problem admitting that I'm angrier at Mary than I am at John and Sherlock.  If I were Jefferson Hope's sister, I'd hate John for killing him.  If I were Magnussen's granddaughter, I'd be furious and vengeful and want Sherlock punished deeply.  But those people aren't our heroes, and they're not our connection to this fictional world.  Sherlock is. 

Killing Sherlock or killing John Watson are the two unforgivable sins for guests to the Sherlock universe. 

Sherlock's alleged forgiveness of Mary seems rushed and unbelievable to me, as does John's eventual Christmas reunion with her.  Now, this could be because the producers plan to flesh this story out next season, letting the chickens of Mary's past come home to roost.  Or it could be because the producers wanted Sherlock to sacrifice himself bravely and unselfishly at the end of HLV, and want us to accept Mary, so they've written Sherlock to forgive her (and serve as a role model for us).  I hope it's the former and not the latter, which feels sloppy and illogical to me.

Fillyjonk wrote:

Swanpride wrote:

But Mary is not a totally bad person either.

I still think that there would be way less discussions about it if the victim of her "surgery" had been random racist ex-con, or Magnussen himself. It's mostly because it was Sherlock we even think about it so much. It's not that Mary shoot someone...but that she shoot someone whose dead would really hurt John.

 
Well, naturally! 

John killed Jefferson Hope, a complete stranger to us who was likely to kill Sherlock, whom we love, any second.

Sherlock killed Magnussen, a near-stranger to us who had great potential to destroy John Watson, whom we love.

Mary killed SHERLOCK, our protagonist, whom we and John LOVE. 

I have no problem admitting that I'm angrier at Mary than I am at John and Sherlock.  If I were Jefferson Hope's sister, I'd hate John for killing him.  If I were Magnussen's granddaughter, I'd be furious and vengeful and want Sherlock punished deeply.  But those people aren't our heroes, and they're not our connection to this fictional world.  Sherlock is. 

Killing Sherlock or killing John Watson are the two unforgivable sins for guests to the Sherlock universe. 

Sherlock's alleged forgiveness of Mary seems rushed and unbelievable to me, as does John's eventual Christmas reunion with her.  Now, this could be because the producers plan to flesh this story out next season, letting the chickens of Mary's past come home to roost.  Or it could be because the producers wanted Sherlock to sacrifice himself bravely and unselfishly at the end of HLV, and want us to accept Mary, so they've written Sherlock to forgive her (and serve as a role model for us).  I hope it's the former and not the latter, which feels sloppy and illogical to me.

 
I fully agree iwth you, Fillyjonk

@Filly if its the latter...to make us accept her...then fail...huge fail.

Tinks wrote:

I think it'll be the latter though - I think Sherlock's forgiveness of her is symbolic of "our" forgiveness of her.
And I don't mean to offend anyone when I say that I don't like what the writers have done here - I KNOW they're brilliant writers, but that doesn't mean they won't sometimes write something that some people won't like; they can't please everybody always.
I just don't like that they've had a character do something really awful but tried to present it as excusable when it's neither excusable nor comparable to anything Sherlock has ever done.
I don't like that they reduced Sherlock to someone who had to kill in cold blood to resolve a situation - especially when nothing about Magnussen's story actually made sense.
I don't like that several times in this episode we had women being violent towards a man and it being presented as though it was somehow acceptable - for me it's no more acceptable than if it had been the other way around, and that's a problem for me.
Like I say, I'm honestly not looking to offend anybody, but I do have many issues with the way this episode was written.

I completely agree with you on all points. 

I agree entirely that we care for and about the two central characters; after all, that is what has made the Sherlock Holmes stories so popular for so many years to vastly differing generations across the world.

I really cannot see Moftiss departing from canon sufficiently to turn Sherlock into a plaster saint who nobly forgives his enemy and expects us to do the same; it's just not him. The Sherlock Homes and Dr John Watson of canon would not abandon a pregnant woman to her enemies, even if those enemies had good reason to want to see her dead. But one of the recurring motifs in Sherlock is that actions have consequences; our wish for justice is echoed by Sherlock's acceptance that he must pay the price for his actions.

Chickens will, therefore, inevitably come home to roost in S4, and Mary's past will catch up with her; I do not believe that writers like Moftiss believe that, for example, they could write a Mycroft who accepts that Mary killed (almost) his brother but is prepared to let her carry on shooting anyone she thinks is a threat. Even if they could turn Sherlock into a plaster saint they can't do that to Mycroft because he would not tolerate that possibility. On the other hand, Mycroft  probably wouldn't abandon a pregnant woman to her enemies either, but no pregnancy lasts forever.

Mary isn't the mirror image of Sherlock; she's his opposite. She never takes responsibility for her own actions and she seems to be motivated solely by what she wants. Moftiss are not going to write a Happy Ever After for someone prepared to kill anyone who gets in her way, and they most certainly are not going to write a Happily Ever After for someone who did a very good job of killing (almost) Sherlock. After all, it might encourage other people to think that killing Sherlock's a good idea, since if they fail he'll forgive them...

lil wrote:

Tinks very likely correct.
I would guess though a large majority of people that watch Sherlock.dislike her and want her to go, and that is encouraged by the writers.
The writers are what...idk...playing a kind of sick game with all of us who look forward to her exit...and will then provide a horrifyingly tragic Mary and baby deathbed for us all to feel like guilty shi....uh people that omg we wanted this?




Sounds like Moftiss.How darkly brilliant.
The jokes on us again...the baying crowd.

Well, dark, but not very brilliant; that one has been done so many times that it's difficult to see what fresh spin they could put on it. They don't write plaster saints just as they don't write Mary Sues; on the other hand they are very well aware that Sherlock has a romanticised view of motherhood, since they wrote him like that.

It will be extremely interesting to see what they have up their sleeves, but I'm prepared to wager folding money that it won't involve the 'Mary dying a tragic death and not a dry eye in the house' route. That would be almost as hackneyed and boring as 'John and Mary with their beautiful daughter living happily ever after in suburbia' which I'm fairly sure is not on their to-do list either...
 

Swanpride wrote:

....There is also a true love conquers all element in all this.

...

 
And this is exactly what I don't want to believe. At least not in Mary's case. True love for herself maybe.

Last edited by Mattlocked (March 1, 2014 7:27 pm)

besleybean wrote:

He only forgives her because of John...nobiody else would have that luxury.

When it comes to the question of Sherlock forgiving Mary, I personally will wait and see. At this point I am not truly convinced that his forgivness is genuine. The game is on.
 

Who does Sherlock say he loves?