Wow, so many great ideas, nakahara. Will have to think about them. 

I, on the other hand, hope that noone of our sympathetic cast dies. Sherlock balances nicely between a drama and a comedy and this would be definitely a pull towards a very dark drama. Since HLV was almost too dark for me, such random death of a character would be a bit of a turn-off for me.

But of course, one can never know with Moftiss.

I really want to know how they are going to deal with Sherlock being murderer. Because according to law he is criminal now. What producers will do about that fact? And I'm also wondering about both Sherlock's and John's feelings about this. We know that Magnussen was evil but that was all in all murder. I really want to know if Sherlock will have some remorse. I know that he is not like normal human being but we saw his change in season 3 so I wonder how this affect his life. Maybe this dark twist is Sherlock being haunted by guilt.

gently69 wrote:

That makes my very sad, Solar,  though nothing happened so far.

Oh, me too, gently, me too.
Don't get me wrong, it's not that I want Mycroft (or anyone else for that matter) to die. You certainly can make a show dark or show something totally unexpected without killing anyone off (maybe that's even more elegant, come to think of it). Everything always has to make sense, that's the most important thing. And if it would make sense, for example, to let Mycroft die... then that would be extremely painful, for us and for Sherlock. And I totally understand that for a lot of fans this would be too much drama and too dark. It's certainly a matter of taste, and maybe I'm just a somewhat morbid person (), but like I already said: I like it dark and painful and... I want to feel something when I watch a tv show or a film. 
 

Yes, I know.
Mark probably has far too much fun playing Mycroft anyway, so I guess he won't write himself out of the show.

OMG, please, no.   

I don't think that Mycroft will die either. I agree with you Solar that Mark has a lot of fun being his character. Also dialogues between Sherlock and his brother are one of the best thing in whole series so I don't think that producers will end them by killing Mycroft. I don't know why but I'm afraid that something bad may happen to Molly or Ms Hudson. Now that would be really dark...

I don't have a whole lot to add at the moment in a hurry, but just wanted to say love your post, nakahara!  So happy I finally caught up with the short stories to enjoy/appreciate the influence of it, and 'got' all the stuff you remembered/tied in.  Wow… thorough! 

The way you put 'Dancing' and 'Garridebs' together was one of my favorites, and nothing against Mary, but I agree it's poetically perfect from a storytelling point of view to have it be her past that haunts her, like in those mentioned, if something's going to happen to her, like canon.  Love to see that.

"The Devil's Foot" would be highly entertaining, but already sort of done in Baskerville? (hmm… was that even their intentional reference, now that I think about it?)  And unrelated, but just very curiously amused now that you've reminded me of that part of the story again - am I the only one who found it unintentionally funny (instead of completely Victorian 'oh my goodness, the horror!') when Sherlock is all 'ho, friend John, I found the culprit substance, let us experiment on ourselves and see what it does!'    I'd like to think Doyle was letting himself get a little goofy for a moment, with knowing his detective's typically infamous crazy methods.
(erm… that's not a spoiler of sorts, is it?  never sure, with just mentioning something from canon)

Erf…. and certainly don't want to happen, but agree that after the 'dark' stuff we've already had, a death might be inevitable.  But not to get morbid or ahead of selves… all our favorites will be fine, and it will just be 'twisty' dark like they love to throw at us, with pasts coming back to haunt and a sociopathic enemy wreaking havoc on all of them until they have to go in hiding for another two years…..  Right? 

I want to see everything you posted nakahara, it sounds so promising .

I am still stuck with Moffat's announcement that something will happen that we don't expect. First I thought this means that Mary won't die because this is what many of us do expect to happen in series 4. But what if Mary does die (perhaps together with the child) and it is somehow Sherlock's fault or John blames him for their death and both friends are ripped appart due to this incident? I do like some hurt, drama and feelings too, but I hope it's nothing to drastic that will happen.