the_dancing_woman wrote:

I don't think Mary was in cahoots with CAM.
 I'm a bit uncomfortable with this tendency of turning her into the utter villain. I don't think she is, and I really hope I'm right there. I also think her love for John is genuine.
 

I absolutely agree with you. Again I think the hiatus is making things more complicated then they are. Mary is for me like she was shown on screen: she has started a new life, doesn´t want anybody to know about her past; she is indeed loving John; she absolutely likes Sherlock and he likes her (despite the desperate shot). Everything what turned out to be the truth about her was already hinted at in the first two episodes. She was too good to be true at first and purposely a bit boring. And now we know as much as we are supposed to know for the moment, and this is exactly the same like John knows. There is no secret anymore for me at the moment towards her person, and, more important, I can´t see any hidden hints pointing towards her future.
I think canonwise they have to get rid of her somewhen in the future, sooner or later, whatever comes to their mind in the next years. But for the time in between I really appreciate her as a figure. I find the love story between John and Mary very touching, and I love John´s Christmas reaction to her after months of thinking about her lying to him. I love that he never read what´s on the stick. And I also like the relationship between her and Sherlock and think there´s nothing wrong with it in the "Sherlock" universe. Maybe I am the only person here ....
 

the_dancing_woman wrote:

I don't think Mary was in cahoots with CAM.
 I'm a bit uncomfortable with this tendency of turning her into the utter villain. I don't think she is, and I really hope I'm right there. I also think her love for John is genuine.
 

I agree!

We can't put Mary in one extreme or another.  BBC Sherlock is full of characters that are morally ambigous, especially the main character, Sherlock, as well as in certain cases, John. I don't see Mary as an innocent victim nor do I see her as an evil villian. I see her as a woman who has a dark and complex past, a past she wishes to leave behind and start a new life with a new name and identity. I believe her actions in escaping such a life and actually loving John and Sherlock are completely genuine. But she was being victimized by CAM and CAM pushed her too far, which led her to go back to her old identity, an identity she hoped to bury. I hope Mary now understands that she can't totally forget this part of her. She tried and it almost cost her everything. I hope she now fully accepts both sides and become the better person we know she can be.
 

Last edited by LoveIsAViciousMotivator (June 6, 2014 8:22 pm)

I found this on tumblr. There are some interesting parallels regarding how villains are presented:

http://incurablylazydevil.tumblr.com/post/85164507598/every-fairytale-needs-a-good-old-fashioned

Hmm... a thread discussing Mary's character and motivations. Ok I'll bite.

Well after watching series 3 quite a few times I think Mary is fundamentally an emotionally abusive and morally bad person. Why do I think so?
__> She lied to John about her identity, and then never apologized, and actually blamed him for the situation ("It's what you like")
__> She shot and threatened Sherlock, his husband John's best friend so she can keep lying to him forever
__> She withheld vital information from John because she feared that he would leave her if he knew the truth.
Most definitions of “emotionally abusive” include manipulative behavior like that, especially as concerns other people close to one’s spouse. Lies of that magnitude are emotionally abusive even if the spouse never finds out. It’s just in opposition to “physically abusive.” It’s disrespecting one’s spouse as an autonomous human being, manipulating them, and treating them like a possession. It’s a form of denying a spouse’s freedom without literally shackling them: you take away their options without their knowledge. If I went to a therapist and told them Mary had done to me what she did to John, I’m pretty confident they would call her emotionally abusive — and probably a lot worse. Threatening a spouse’s friends alone would do it, much less threatening them with death, much less threatening them to keep one’s secrets.


Now there is some argument that Mary, Sherlock and John share pretty much the same personality and morality.
 
For example, Mary shot Sherlock. But then Sherlock shot Magnussen and back in ASiP John shot the cabbie. So why am I rebuking Mary and not Sherlock and John?

Because in case of John shooting the cabbie, as Sherlock puts it (before even realizing it was John, so he was not trying to protect him), “He didn’t fire until I was in immediate danger though, so strong moral principle”
 
So why did Sherlock shoot Magnussen? Was John in any immediate danger from Magnussen when he was flicking John's face? No. But was Mary in danger from Magnussen’s blackmail? Weren’t many people? He had already driven Lord Smallwood to suicide and Mary to attempted murder. He had placed John in a fire. And then he promised that he’ll take steps to tear John’s whole life down by contacting the people whose life Mary destroyed through her hitman career. So, yes, one could argue that Magnussen was dangerous. Sherlock’s motive was to protect people from Magnussen (the conversation with Mycroft before makes this clear) and, as he says to John before getting arrested that Mary is safe now.
 
And then there’s Mary shooting Sherlock. Was Mary in immediate danger at Magnussen’s office? Only from Magnussen, The person she DIDN’T shoot! Was Sherlock a threat to her? No, he was actually offering her his help! So why did Mary shoot Sherlock? What were her motives? Sadly, we don’t actually know all the facts and Mary seems pretty tight-lipped on the matter. We can only infer from what Sherlock explains to John. He says that she “had to” shoot him so she could escape. But if Sherlock was offering to help her, he obviously wasn’t calling the cops right? And at that time no alarm went off and no outside person was alerted of the break-in. So from whom was she escaping? I think it’s actually ‘what’, not ‘whom’. Mary was escaping from the truth. She shot Sherlock to keep her secret from John. I can’t find one single selfless reason for Mary to have shot Sherlock. She had the upper hand. If she just needed to buy a minute to make a run for it, she could have shot him in the leg or the shoulder and disabled him momentarily. But nooooo, she shot him right in the heart.
 
Let’s brush motive aside a moment and pretend Mary had some noble reason to shoot an innocent man who was offering her help. Sherlock tells John “Mary saved my life” and calls the shot “surgery” but I believe Sherlock is lying when he says these things. I personally think Sherlock wanted to appear to be in Mary’s good side so he can buy more time to covertly find more info about her background and true motivation. But his plan backfired when he was compelled to shoot Magnussen and was forced to be continents away from John. Anyways, that’s kinda off topic so I’ll stick to the shooting scene and Sherlock explaining Mary’s actions in a good light. We the audience can see that his words don’t match the things we’ve seen before. First off being the obvious: Sherlock DIED. Mary killed him. The sequence clearly shows that his heart stopped and the doctors gave up and left the operating table and then were astonished that he came back.

 
 
It never happens in real life but Sherlock Miraculously came back to life because he remembered that John was definitely in danger from Mary! This again proves that actually he does NOT trust her. And Mary certainly didn’t appear to want to spare Sherlock in the first place. She actually swore to him that if he even took one more step towards her she’d kill him. 

And sure enough, when Sherlock did take a small step towards her she immediately fired him right in the heart which did kill him!
 
On the other hand, some people are even arguing that it was actually Mannussen who called the ambulance. But for now let’s disregard that because even if she called the ambulance, it doesn’t change the fact that Sherlock’s heart stopped and he escaped death thanks to the writers. Writers do not usually have the “good guys” shoot and kill the titular protagonist of the show. So I would argue that Mary appears as a villain because the writers wrote her that way. And let’s not forget they also wrote these scenes:
__> Mary is sad to see Sherlock survived and said her name.
__> Mary goes to Sherlock’s bedside while he’s barely functioning and threatens him to keep quiet.
__> Mary hunts down the escaped Sherlock, with a silencer equipped gun.
__> Mary threatens Sherlock, again, that she will kill him to keep her past a secret from John.

So, no, I would not say Mary is supposed to be read as a “good guy” after these actions. I would say that reading her as selfish and violent is pretty spot on.  Motives matter, A LOT.
 
 
Another angle where Mary and Sherlock may seem similar is that Sherlock lied about faking his death and made John suffer for 2 years.
 
So why did he do it? We know that John, Mrs. H and Lestrade had snipers locked on them. Moriarty’s network needed to be eradicated before it was safe for Sherlock to reveal himself. So Sherlock’s motives, again, are to protect others from harm. And it’s not like he went through the plan happily. He even told John that he was almost in contact with him so many times but had to refrain himself. So he did what he had to do grudgingly. This picture is a nice reminder to that:

On the other hand Mary lies to John by letting him believe she is normal and just some nurse who cares about him and likes him. The motive? We actually don’t know yet. We can guess a hundred things. Maybe she’s just a CIA operative/ hitman on the run who happened to meet John and randomly fall in love with him and kept her identity hidden because that’s the only way she thought she could have a normal life. Who knows if David knew the real Mary. Or maybe Mary worked for Moriarty and was assigned to watch John to look for signs of Sherlock’s return. We don’t actually know anything for sure to properly judge Mary’s motive as good or bad.
 
Now let’s compare how long those two maintain lying to John. Sherlock maintains his lie until it’s safe to return. He shows remorse once he sees how upset John is. In fact, Sherlock apologizes to John on several occasions. Like:
--- “Bit mean springing on you like that, I know”
--- “Sorry, sorry again. Sorry!”
--- “Please John forgive me for all the hurt I’ve caused!.”
--- “John, you have endured war, and injury, and tragic loss - so sorry again about that last one…”
So I’d say that he shows remorse for his actions.  I’d say the writers made it clear that he shows remorse for his actions. Even though what he did was for morally good reasons and was his only option, he still feels guilty for lying to John.
 
Now for Mary. Her lie is maintained until Sherlock accidentally discovers it. So she shoots him, but he miraculously escapes death and decides to tell John the truth. Even knowing his life is in danger to do so, he reveals Mary to John.
 
Also looking back we can see that maintaining the lie had always been her number one priority. In TSo3 we see Mary getting a subtly threatening message from CAM on her wedding day. And at one time John was kidnapped by unknown people and almost burned to death. Who knows if that was CAM’s first message to her but I’d expect a smart and cunning person like Mary to put two and two together and realize that CAM was trying to get to her. Still she chooses to hope for the best and keep things under wraps and risking John’s life. She would rather have John dead than revealing the truth.  Mary never gives up the truth voluntarily.  It has to be forced out of her.
 
And now for the strangest part. Mary never apologizes or even says sorry for her actions!! And it’s not because she doesn’t know the word ‘sorry’ exists in the English language or something. She did say sorry for a lot for minor things. She laughed through John’s proposal and said sorry. She pointed out that Sherlock would need a confident to pull off faking his death and said sorry when she saw John wasn’t amused. When John learned that she actually didn’t like his mustache she said sorry. But lying to John since he knew her? Shooting and (nearly) killing John’s best friend? Not one single sorry or forgive me or I feel so bad or I understand why you’re so upset! Nothing! There was absolutely nothing keeping Mary from apologizing to John, and it would only help her situation, but she never, ever does. The writers made sure to leave out any semblance of apology. I think most people in Mary’s situation would apologize immediately or near to it, and many would go so far as to beg for forgiveness. Most people apologize to their loved ones even when they don’t think they’ve done anything wrong just to make them feel better because they hate to see them unhappy. At the very least they’ll apologize for having upset them. Being in pain to see someone else in pain is just part of what real love is. Then you’d think Mary would apologize out of guilt: a secret she kept and hurt the person she loves in the process. But she didn’t express any remorse whatsoever. If you ask me, her silence speaks volumes. No remorse at all. And it’s not like Mary doesn’t understand that John would be hurt from all this. She does tell Sherlock, “…it would break him and I would lose him forever”. So it looks like she only cares about John’s feelings insofar as they make him remain with her!
 
Ok now let’s discuss the ways Mary and Sherlock let John handle the emotional fallout of their lies.
 
Sherlock lets John beat him up without ever fighting back, despite being brutally injured and tortured perhaps not 24 hours prior. He lets John wail on him for as long as he needs to.  He then gives John his space and lets John come to him in his own time and when he’s ready. He says to everyone who asks about John that he is not in the picture or working with him anymore. Who knows maybe John might not have ever taken him back and so he would’ve just had to move on and try to make do without him. But then Sherlock is told John is in danger and he immediately drops everything to rescue him. But even after that he assumes nothing and lets John come to him at his own accord. He tricks John with the bomb at the end, after secretly switching the bomb off. He emotionally manipulates John into revealing whether or not he’s forgiven. But right after he finds out John does forgive him he reveals his lie.
 
And yet there’s Mary. She also, presumably, gives John his space as it seems they haven’t talked in six months and he may not even be living with her. The only scene we get is six months later so it is difficult to actually fill in missing scenes. What we do have to go on is Mary refusing to stand up when John asks her to come to him so he can speak his prepared words. We have her face and attitude looking put out. We have her tears only after John says he will stay with her. So we can tell she is happy to hear him say these things but we still can’t tell if she shows remorse or feels guilty for what she did. But what we do see is a lot of snark, “Oh! Are we doing conversation today? It really is Christmas!”

I mean what the actual hell! John has done absolutely nothing wrong to her. For all the awful things she did to cause him pain and never even apologizing, John has been a saint to even consider taking her back, and it’s beyond reasonable that he would need a lot of time apart from her to process it all. And still John’s first instinct when he sees her again is to be kind. But Mary’s first instinct is to be rude and sarcastic, not to make John feel at ease. She has no qualms about causing him further pain. After everything, Mary is irritated that John has had the nerve to not speak to her. She acts entitled to John’s love, and resentful that he would dare withhold it. And it’s not like it’s the first time we’ve seen this side of her. In the proposal scene she agrees with John that she’s the “best thing that could have happened” to John because  I think she sees her place in John’s life as someone for John to put on a pedestal. Mary liked being the rock in the life of a ruined, depressed man: she could do no wrong, and he adored her, and that was as it should be. But once John started pulling away, Mary became less kind.
 
The writers didn’t make these choices on accident. If they wanted to show us a sympathetic Mary, they could have. So I think we weren’t supposed to view her as a morally good person. In contrast to Sherlock, Mary comes off as selfish where he is selfless. This is not subtext or deep reading. This is just dialogue, plot and action clearly presented in the show.
 
As for whether she’s a sociopath, I think so. I think she feels like the objects of her affection have to belong to them at any cost. I think she is lonely but is too messed up to have healthy relationships. As for whether it’s nature or nurture, I generally don’t think those are completely separate anyway. I read several books on sociopaths and it’s not that simple. It’s more tragic for the characters if they have terrible backgrounds but the end result is the same. I’ll spare a tear or two for Mary if her childhood was awful but I still wouldn’t want her anywhere near John.
 
Anyways, that doesn’t mean I dislike the addition of Mary in the show or something. I like Mary in terms of being an interesting character. For example I love Moriarty as a character. But in both cases I understand that both are fundamentally morally bad characters and would never start thinking they’re morally equivalent to John or Sherlock. I doubt Mary’s story is over and I’m looking forward to know more about her.

EDIT: typos

Last edited by tykobrian (August 20, 2014 5:22 am)

I agree with Raven. Very well done. What I love most is that you don't just go on with endless Mary bashing. You give evidence for all your points and remain matter-of-factly where others would have started to rant.
Plus I share your point of view, especially on liking Mary as a (bad) character.

That was a very interesting read, Tykobrian, thank you! (Sorry, I haven't read through the complete thread.  I've only recently seen HLV and am trying to catch up on all the threads I've avoided, but I will read this properly later).

It bothered me too, that Mary says she's the best thing that happened to John and that seems to be accepted as fact.  In what way is John improved by being with Mary?   How is John in TEH better than John in TRF?  He seems miserable, and not just because of Sherlock.  He's bored senseless at work.   Mary and Sherlock claim that John was drawn to her because of who she was (an assassin), but I don't see her do anything to help him make his life more exciting and stimulating.  Quite the opposite. 

To be fair to Mary, maybe that's what she means.  John's craving for danger and excitement could be destructive.  Mary's been there and can keep it under control, and thinks she can help John to do the same.   But from everything we see, that doesn't work for John.  Right or wrong, he needs the danger and excitement to get to his "normal".  It's how he is happiest and most functional.  If Mary really was so good for him, she'd see that. 

I agree it's difficult to believe that Mary didn't mean to kill Sherlock (because after all, she did.  Or almost did).  I've tried to see it as an accident - she shot to incapacitate, but did more damage than she meant to.   But I don't think it works like that in these stories, does it?  And it's never explained (for instance, by Mary saying "I meant to hit x, but as you moved forwards, I accidently hit y" or whatever).  If Mary meant to kill (or at the very least, was prepared for there to be very strong odds that Sherlock would die), then Sherlock must know it and is covering for her.  Why?  Is he protecting himself, her, or protecting other people (John?)?  Sherlock often keeps his information close and has long term plans.  There must be a good reason for him to do this.  And for him to push John and Mary together.

I've wondered a lot about the big, showy wedding as well.  If Mary was really trying to escape her past why do that?  What message was she sending out, and to whom?

On the other hand, I am able to see Mary as somebody escaping a past (like in a witness protection programme) and trying to live a normal life, unable to tell even those close to her.  Maybe falling in love was an accident.  In HLV she's trapped in a corner.  It does seem as if there are people who would kill her, and she's clinging to preserving her life with John - what else could she do?   (Well, she could be a bit more understanding of John's point of view, I agree).

So many unanswered questions. It will be interesting to see what happens in S4. 

Thank you, tykobrian. A very detailed analysis which I absolutely second.
For me Mary is a different kind of villain and I can't see her only as a woman who just had a cruel past. IMO she never acted like a a loving wife should.
But nevertheless I like her character being part of the show and I wonder what will happen to her in S4.
 

Exactly Susi ... easiest way to express this would be to say "I love you" or "Sorry" to this person ... once at least.

To me Mary only is selfish...
"Because John can’t ever know that I lied to him. It would break him and I would lose him forever – and, Sherlock, I will never let that happen."
"Because you won’t love me when you’ve finished ..."
Always for her sake. When did she really show John that she loves him?

 

Last edited by gently69 (August 20, 2014 9:48 am)

Swanpride wrote:

Yes...how DARE Mary to be actually human and wanting to be with the person she loves.....

 
But.....nobody said she wasn't human. She's most human, so are Sherlock and John. And they are all three flawed. But there are different ways to handle (human) mistakes and different ways to show "love". As is shown in the very constructive and detailed analysis of the Christmas scene here. We should not try to convince each other, we will have to agree to disagree on that. For some fans this scene was ultimately romantic and Mary's mistakes are done. But there are also fans who really cringed and felt most uncomfortable here, feeling this was an unsatisfying solution. And they also might be done with a character that is shown without any remorse, not a bit of being humble after the pain she caused and are just sad that she got her way. For me it was after the Christmas scene that I was done with her.

Last edited by mrshouse (August 20, 2014 9:52 am)

Cheers, tykobrian! I enjoyed your essay very much, btw. I guess you know you made it on tumblr?