BBC Sherlock Fan Forum - Serving Sherlockians since February 2012 » the riding crop alibi

tehanu · March 3, 2015 11:26 am

Hello. Any idea how that would work? How can somebody's alibi depend on what bruises form on a freshish dead body twenty minutes after it is whipped? Thanks

mrshouse · March 3, 2015 11:29 am

I'm not into pathology, but that most probably has to do with different marks according to blood coagulation before and after death.

Vhanja · March 3, 2015 11:33 am

From what I've read, bruises don't from after death. So it seems it might be a mistake on the writers part.

tehanu · March 3, 2015 11:35 am

mrshouse wrote:
I'm not into pathology, but that most probably has to do with different marks according to blood coagulation before and after death.

Yes me neither (into pathology ). But? The guy is dead and "just in". Could Sherlock be trying to find out just how fresh the body is, with more precision than he and Molly can otherwise? Then if it turns out the guy died a little sooner rather than later, the window in which he died grows, and, assuming he was actually killed, that could invalidate some very time-specific alibi...? Or is something more interesting going on, logicwise?

tehanu · March 3, 2015 11:38 am

Vhanja wrote:
From what I've read, bruises don't from after death. So it seems it might be a mistake on the writers part.

Yeah I think I've read that too, but it doesn't seem to make sense. You are dead, the blood stops flowing, but it stays in the blood vessels for a while. You smash them, there is bruising. So, maybe they just don't form after a while after death, and Sherlock really is trying to find out the time of death precisely. It just seems unlikely that there could be such a precise line.

tykobrian · March 3, 2015 12:08 pm

That scene was a retelling of sorts of the follwoing scene from ACD's A study in scarlet:

“It seems to me, Stamford," I added, looking hard at my companion, "that you have some reason for washing your hands of the matter. Is this fellow's temper so formidable, or what is it? Don't be mealy-mouthed about it."

"It is not easy to express the inexpressible," he answered with a laugh. "Holmes is a little too scientific for my tastes--it approaches to cold-bloodedness. I could imagine his giving a friend a little pinch of the latest vegetable alkaloid, not out of malevolence, you understand, but simply out of a spirit of inquiry in order to have an accurate idea of the effects. To do him justice, I think that he would take it himself with the same readiness. He appears to have a passion for definite and exact knowledge."

"Very right too."

"Yes, but it may be pushed to excess. When it comes to beating the subjects in the dissecting-rooms with a stick, it is certainly taking rather a bizarre shape."

"Beating the subjects!"

"Yes, to verify how far bruises may be produced after death. I saw him at it with my own eyes."

"And yet you say he is not a medical student?"

Mattlocked · March 3, 2015 12:38 pm

Right. I understood it as an experiment for further cases.
A weird one; especially as that was his very first scene - that was how we got to know Sherlock.

Later on I saw something similar in another crime series. The guy there used a pig head.

SusiGo · March 3, 2015 12:45 pm

And there is another interesting thing about the above quote:

"I could imagine his giving a friend a little pinch of the latest vegetable alkaloid, not out of malevolence, you understand, but simply out of a spirit of inquiry in order to have an accurate idea of the effects."

So drugging John for scientific purposes is Canon, too. I did not know that.

tehanu · March 3, 2015 1:11 pm

tykobrian wrote:
That scene was a retelling of sorts of the follwoing scene from ACD's A study in scarlet:

...

Oh right. Thank you so much. You have all been very helpful.

tehanu · March 3, 2015 1:18 pm

SusiGo wrote:
And there is another interesting thing about the above quote:

"I could imagine his giving a friend a little pinch of the latest vegetable alkaloid, not out of malevolence, you understand, but simply out of a spirit of inquiry in order to have an accurate idea of the effects."

So drugging John for scientific purposes is Canon, too. I did not know that.

Great, and now I just have to ask. A while ago I saw a Sherlock fun meme made of Gatiss and Moffat's photos taken at some fandom convention, with those lines subtitled, very roughly:

Moffat (replying to a question from te audience): "Sherlock having a girlfriend? How do you imagine it would work? He would poison her at the first opportunity just to see the results."

Gatiss (laughing): "Yeah maybe he already has."

Sweet and all but did they (did Gatiss) actually make this joke, or were the subtitles innocently added by a (fellow) well meaning johnlocker? Because I saw it completely out of context .

mrshouse · March 3, 2015 1:21 pm

As I saw some gifs of this "joke" he actually said it, but I might be wrong.

SusiGo · March 3, 2015 1:34 pm

This is what I found:

"Sex for Sherlock, it happens up here," said producer Steven Moffat said, pointing to his head, according to the LA Times, at ComicCon last year. "Sex is brain work for him. Can you imagine romance with Sherlock? He'd poison his girlfriend just to see if it works."

tykobrian · March 3, 2015 4:27 pm

OT

Fun question, Which other character is introduced by being about to use a riding crop?

Last edited by tykobrian (March 3, 2015 4:29 pm)

tehanu · March 3, 2015 4:50 pm

tykobrian wrote:
OT
Fun question, Which other character is introduced by being about to use a riding crop?

Yes I know . And about the gif: it is lovely and strokes my inner johnlock to no end, but did it happen? I guess they could afford to be less tight lipped / denying about it if it's all in jest, but do you know if they did say that or the text was added by fans? (I can't read their lips. Moffat saying nearly identical words in an interview does not mean he wouldn't re-use them on another occasion, provoking the whole thing.)

Last edited by tehanu (March 3, 2015 4:52 pm)

Vhanja · March 3, 2015 5:18 pm

tykobrian wrote:
OT

"Now, John I'd poison..."
"He missed a whole Wednesday once..."

Lola Red · March 3, 2015 7:33 pm

If anyone is interested in where the gif came from:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YR3VC_ac0M
The part about romance starts at about 33:45, but the whole thing is pretty funny

tehanu · March 3, 2015 8:42 pm

Lola Red wrote:
If anyone is interested in where the gif came from:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YR3VC_ac0M
The part about romance starts at about 33:45, but the whole thing is pretty funny

Thank you, this is perfect.

Kittyhawk · April 6, 2015 11:58 am

Actually, bruises can form for a few hours after death (Forensic Pathology, Second Edition, Dominick DiMaio,Vincent J.M. DiMaio, M.D., on Google books). But Sherlock would need to know the time of death to decide whether it's worth beating the corpse, not the arrival time in the morgue. First mistake.

Second problem: We - and Sherlock - are in the 21st century. I'm sure that everything anybody would ever want to know about contusions - before and after death - has already been written about and stored in medical databases. And I would expect a 21st century Sherlock Holmes to have subscriptions to all relevant databases - and either being able to hack the other ones himself, or to have a hacker at hand to find obscure information for him.

In short: About 10 minutes into the show I was going WTF are they doing?! I I might have to get that printed on a T-shirt...

REReader · April 7, 2015 4:12 pm

They were bowing to the very first Sherlock Holmes book, where Stamford describes Holmes to Watson:

"He appears to have a passion for definite and exact knowledge."

"Very right too."

"Yes, but it may be pushed to excess. When it comes to beating the subjects in the dissecting-rooms with a stick, it is certainly taking rather a bizarre shape."

"Beating the subjects!"

"Yes, to verify how far bruises may be produced after death. I saw him at it with my own eyes."

It doesn't have to make sense scientifically in today's world, it's a transition from the original to the adaptation.

Last edited by REReader (April 7, 2015 4:13 pm)

Kittyhawk · April 7, 2015 5:10 pm

And that's the BIG question: Is the series supposed to be just a homage to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle? Full of references to the original and little insider jokes, written by fans for fans?

Or is it supposed to be a series of films that (also) work for today's audience, even if they have never read a single Sherlock Holmes story in their lives? I should think the second option would result in a much bigger audience for the show, i. e. a more successful show. (You may remember that Peter Jackson took great care to make LOTR films that would work for both fans and viewers ignorant of the original).

Frankly, I think one should either stick to the original - i. e. leave Sherlock in Victorian England. Or update completely, and that would mean Sherlock not just sending text messages, but also using a gas chromatograph for chemical analysis (instead of a microscope - another WTF moment, or rather several of them). You don't have to agree, but do you see what I mean?