Brilliant discussion ladies.  I only have a couple of thoughts to add.

mrshouse: regarding your setlock spoilers remember, we have no context for the things we are seeing and hearing.  That's why it's so much fun to speculate.  You can interpret almost anything with the bits and pieces we're given!

Nakahara: I understand your love of the cases and frustration at the apparent dimming of Sherlock's skills, but Moffat himself has said, it's not about the cases.  However, I do believe we will get back to the cases eventually.  When the story has come full circle and the boys are back together in 221b Sherlock's brilliance will be restored and he will have the added bonus of being fully emotionally alive.  In any good story things get worse before they get better, we just have to keep calm. 

In general I don't fear the romcom idea simply because all the creators have talked about is how dark and devastating S4 will be.  I think they are going to gut us with this one.

PS. Susi, I think I love you. 
 

Is there a group hug in the air...?
As for the discussion: nakahara, just like tonnaree I can understand what you've written about the cases, although I have to admit that I personally love the show the most when it feels like "the show about a detective". Of course it's always good to have both, cases and the emotional aspect, but in general I'm a sucker for the emotional aspect.
And I hope that everything we've seen about Mary in S3 and TAB will eventually make (emotional) sense in connection to the boys, if you know what I mean.  

I will try and answer this since I suppose that your questions are not just directed at tonnaree.

a) No one called Sherlock a random hobo. He is brilliant. He solves cases even under stress. He finds the bomb in TEH and saves Sholto's life in TSoT. HLV is different, I think I do not have to explain why. Are you saying he should have stayed the way he was when he met John? A reasoning machine without deeper feelings? Not what I would care to see. 

b) I cannot remember a single episode without a shred of detecting.

c) Nobody has sworn what is going to happen and neither have I. This would be quite presumptuous. I am saying that based on what we have seen so far and what we have heard from the team this is not going to be a romcom slash family show. And I have no reason not to believe them. 

This is not Granada Holmes. This is not an episodic, case-centred show but a long, overarching narrative with characters developing, not remaining static. Therefore the writers are using terms like "climax" which refers to the well-known five-step dramatic structure with the climax being the turning point. And it is also a well-known dramatic element to show the hero at their highest and lowest to show their development. 

Last edited by SusiGo (April 11, 2016 11:26 am)

Nakahara, I completely agree that Sherlock needs to retain what's uniquely "Sherlock Holmes".  I just think, that the writers are still managing to do that while developing the character.  He was functioning well in TAB, despite being in a heightened emotional state - he managed to solve a crime without stepping outside his head.   I think his relationships with other people are important, and he used them in his mind palace to help solve the crime.  So I think they (so far!) do manage to tie the emotional/character development aspects into the detective/case side.   Even Mary, who apparently was just going to be John's wife, turned out to be a major plot line and a client/case.

If I'm honest, I would like, a little bit more of a chance to solve the crime myself, as a viewer, and it does frustrate me a little that we're not given all the clues and information.  (In fact, Setlock seems to be providing more chance for the viewers to be detectives than the actual show does sometimes!).   But I accept that they are not that kind of writers and it's not that kind of show.  I'd mentioned my favourite Doctor Who episode on another thread (Heaven Sent) - it had a kind of detective element (trying to puzzle it out), but was very emotionally driven.  The "solution" was hugely emotional in itself, and my view of the Doctor had changed by the end of the episode.   This is the kind of balance I want to see in Sherlock, and which I kind of think we've been getting.  I've had some concerns about Steven as show runner on Doctor Who, but his writing can really get to me, and I have faith in Moffat at the moment. 

Amen. 

Brilliant, tonnaree!!!!

Love it. This is great

I just recently re-read The Sign of Four for a third time.
What I had missed before, was the glowing picture painted of Mary and how much Sherlock pays tribute to her.

Holmes: She is one of the most charming young ladies I ever met, and might have been most useful in such work as we have been doing. She had a decided genius that way.

besleybean wrote:

Holmes: She is one of the most charming young ladies I ever met, and might have been most useful in such work as we have been doing. She had a decided genius that way.

This was probably before she married Watson. 

“The division seems rather unfair," I remarked. "You have done
all the work in this business. I get a wife out of it, Jones gets
the credit, pray what remains for you?"
"For me," said Sherlock Holmes, "there still remains the
cocaine-bottle." And he stretched his long white hand up for
it.” 

“The good Watson had at that time deserted me for a wife, the only selfish action I can recall in our association. I was alone.”