My immediate impresson was "You will have to go to hell and back to save John", so more of warning Sherlock how difficult and horrible this case will be than anything else.

Having that said, at this point, I'm open to anything. 

I have to say, though, I don't like how Mary and Sherlock keep talking and messaging each other without including John.

Again, there was noise so I missed so many fine details. But I'm in your boat Vhanja. I felt that 'go to hell' might have been out of context or a 'code' for something...

What is hell for Sherlock?

What if she said "Helen" (okay too far sorry.)

Could be, but the way she says doesn't seem to me as if she's giving him a location. 

I am glad that we only have to wait one week to find out. :-/

Just a short question: Isn't the threadtitel too spoilerish for to be seen by the entire board?
It's not a problem for me but maybe for people who haven't seen it yet it's quite too much of a giveaway?

When the video was played, I was afraid the entire time that she would admit that she was behind all the Moriarty-stuff, in fact, I was afraid her saying: 'And Sherlock: I was Moriarty', or something like that, and I don't want this to be. Actually, I don't want her to have any connection with him, if possible, but you're right, the entire thing seems rather sinister. And when they were following the dog to that slaughterhouse, Sherlock said something as in: 'it must be Moriarty' and it turned out that it was in fact about Mary instead, so... I really, really hope that it doesn't turn out the way I fear.
 

We didn't see this in TST did we so was it cut or will we being seeing more from Mary soon?

http://bolcia208.tumblr.com/post/154998307574/a-bit-better-quality-yall​

I found the episode to be fairly amusing, but Mary´s death scene was very bizzare, to say the least.

The trope of "one person takes the bullet/blade for another and dies in the other´s arms" is a cliche that was already old and tired one hundred years ago. Here is an example from the year 1909, from the book "The Hollow Needle":

Shears had picked up his revolver with his left hand and was taking aim at him.
A shot—a cry of distress—Raymonde had flung herself between the two men, facing the Englishman. She staggered back, brought her hand to her neck, drew herself up, spun round on her heels and fell at Lupin's feet.
He threw himself upon her, took her in his arms and pressed her to him.
"Dead—" he said.

Here is an example of the trope used in the movie Metropolis, filmed in 1927 (around 5:00 in the first video and in the whole second video):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3P6eHpDnmO8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2lxortJBUc

And yet this overtired cliche is used here in an absolutely straight manner, Mark Gatiss didn´t attempt to at least tweak it a bit. Not a very creative approach, IMHO.

Also, before being shot, Mary had the time to look around and to decide to throw herself in front of Sherlock.



So does the bullet really travel in slo-mo here? Because the bullet would already be in Sherlock´s chest the moment she did the first movement in the gif.

The writers keep forgetting that John is an army doctor. He didn´t even attempt to stop her bleeding. (??) Compare this scene with the Bainbridge scene in TSOT and you will see the difference. Also, Lestrade is trained to give some help to the victims of the crimes too, but here he was only interested in the arrest of Norbury and left John to tend to Mary alone. 

Mary´s long speech before her demise is another very common cliche.

Also, what was the significance of sharks and the aquarium here? Would it make any difference if the shooting took place in the meadow somewhere and the surrounding animals were sheep instead of sharks? Probably not.

Also, because HLV established in this show that fatal shootings are insignificant, I was not sure if I should feel moved by Mary´s fate. I kept anticipating that this shooting will be declared surgery and that Mrs. Norbury will be declared Mary´s best friend at the end of an episode.... 

Last edited by nakahara (January 2, 2017 2:17 pm)

I'm not sure I can change the thread title, but I think there are going to spoilers galore, in thread titles and other threads, after the episodes air.  I'll see if there's a way to change the top forum message (warning about setlock spoilers) to warning that there will be spoilers for all aired episodes.

Sherlock standing there looking at the bullet and Mary looking around and still having time to throw herself in front of him - yeah, that was very odd. Nobody can push a person out of the bullet's trajectory after the shot has been fired, not at such a close range, anyway.

Both Sherlock and John tried to stop the bleeding. Lestrade was useless, you are right. Mycroft at least called the ambulance after John had ordered him to.

The whole Mary business this ep gave me mixed feelings. While I am glad that it looks like Sherlock really loves her for John and she doesn't wish him ill, it's obvious that we are not done with Mary yet.

Well I don't believe in hell, so that couldn't work for me...