Liberty wrote:

GimmeCat wrote:

I'd like to hear people's platonic interpretations of this part of the script of HLV:

MAGNUSSEN: Very hard to find a pressure point on you, Mr Holmes.
SHERLOCK: Mm. (John turns and walks towards the wall.)
MAGNUSSEN: The drugs thing I never believed for a moment. (John continues walking closer to the wall, staring at the footage with his mouth open.)
MAGNUSSEN: Anyway, you wouldn’t care if it was exposed, would you?
(Sherlock tilts his head, quirks his mouth and shrugs.)
MAGNUSSEN (looking at the screen): But look how you care about John Watson.

Why would Sherlock care if it was "exposed" how much he cares about John? Moriarty already knows John is the 'heart' to burn out of him, and by extension, that means most of the criminal underworld knows. So I find it difficult to read this as Sherlock worrying strictly about a matter of John's safety, because that ship has already sailed (so to speak). What's left to expose, then?

Magnussen doesn't say anything about Sherlock's relationship with John being exposed.    It's the drugs he's talking about there - he's suggesting that Sherlock would not be bothered if Magnussen printed a story about him using drugs, so he couldn't have used that as blackmail.  (Even though Sherlock had supposedly tried to push that as a pressure point to trick Magnussen - that was the point of being "on a case" at the beginning). 

Now with John, Magnussen isn't talking about exposing anything.  That's clear from him putting John in the bonfire - he wasn't thinking about threatening to print something but about endangering John's life.  Except he doesn't need to, because he has Mary, the next person in the chain, and can threaten to kill her instead. 

Now we know Sherlock is happy for people to know how much he cares for John.  He chooses to announce his love publicly, at the wedding.   We also know that he's not at all bothered about possible misinterpretations of their relationship - he doesn't bother to correct people who suspect they are a couple, he's not bothered by "bachelor John Watson" in the press and so on.   (In fact, at that time, he willingly allows all sorts of bad stuff to be printed about him, to help the case).    So I don't see how Magnussen could ever have blackmailed Sherlock by threatening to print a Johnlock story.  Sherlock would just have ignored it. 

But anyway, that's not what he's saying - it's the drugs he's talking about exposing, the "fake" pressure point.  Then he's talking about exploiting the fact that Sherlock cares for John - that that's his real pressure point.
 

But he knows that Junkie!Sherlock is only a cover, and he states very clearly that he didn't believe it. Magnussen was going to print a story even he wasn't buying?

besleybean wrote:

Well Sherlock murders CAM because he thinks Mary is John's pressure point.
Does he get that wrong too?

That would be Sherlock getting John's pressure point wrong, possibly because he believes CAM. And CAM might have got that wrong, partly because John appeared to have chosen Mary-- before he was put into the bonfire. There's your test of pressure points right there, and Sherlock proved it. But who did John go home to? Who did he marry? 
 

@ Raven Yes, Mary.

Last edited by besleybean (August 26, 2016 5:22 pm)

RavenMorganLeigh wrote:

besleybean wrote:

@ Raven Yes, Mary.

My point is, Sherlock has been wrong before. He assumed that Mary was the most important person to John-- when in fact -- it might actually have been Sherlock himself. 

Just think if his reaction when John asked him to be his best man. Sherlock completely missed that he was John's best friend. It is not that ooc that he got the pressure point wrong as well.

besleybean wrote:

(Sigh).
Again: nobody has ever said Sherlock doesn't care about John.
He loves him more than anybody on this planet.
But he's not in love with him, he doesn't want a relationship with him.
It IS a bromance.
The best friendship in fiction.
I like fun too, but for me it doesn't have to involve glitter.
Incidentally I seem to have missed the name calling: what names were people called?
 

Some people believe differently.  That's why this debate thread exists.  So that we can debate our thoughts and opinions.

Nothing HAS to involve glitter, but it often makes things more fun. 
 

I hope we all do.

I'm sure Sherlock would be a pressure point for John, but that's irrelevant for Magnussen because it would just lead him in a circle.  It's Mycroft he's trying to get at, so no point in threatening Sherlock to get at John. 

Drugs do seem to be a bit of a pressure point in TAB.   But before that, they're not a huge problem.   He uses them for Magnussen case, but shrugs them off pretty quickly.  And how would Magnussen use them, except by threatening printing a story about Sherlock being a user?  Hardly a huge scandal.   I'm surprised Sherlock expects him to fall for it at all - either he underestimates him, or he just wants to lure him in (he does find out what he think is information about the letters because Magnussen visits after the drugs are revealed), or he's actually setting that up as a pressure point to convince John, when in fact he knows Magnussen will do something much more personal and dangerous.  (He does hear him whisper Redbeard, after all).
 

Yeah, the way Magnussen's lines are worded, it's clear to me that the exposed line has to do with the drug use.

Vhanja wrote:

Yeah, the way Magnussen's lines are worded, it's clear to me that the exposed line has to do with the drug use.

 
How so, when Magnussen explicitly said that he knew Sherlock was faking it? (The hapless, addicted junkie undercover role Sherlock was playing)

I have honestly never seen anyone arguing against this. 
Yes indeed since the Pool, John has always been Sherlock's weakness.
For me it's only ever been the nature of that love that has been up for debate.