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January 5, 2017 11:06 am  #361


Re: First impressons and discussions

 
That's amazingly funny!


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"The posh boy loves the dominatrix." Context matters.
 

January 5, 2017 11:15 am  #362


Re: First impressons and discussions

It is. 

I have to say, what surpised me the most in this episode, was Sherlock going to see a therapist.

I had suspected that there might be a falling out between him and John, and that Mary would possibly die - but I had never anticipated seeing Sherlock go visit Ella. One of the most shocking things in this episode to me.


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January 5, 2017 12:38 pm  #363


Re: First impressons and discussions


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I cannot live without brainwork. What else is there to live for? Stand at the window there. Was there ever such a dreary, dismal, unprofitable world? See how the yellow fog swirls down the street and drifts across the dun-coloured houses. What could be more hopelessly prosaic and material? What is the use of having powers, Doctor, when one has no field upon which to exert them?

 

January 5, 2017 12:48 pm  #364


Re: First impressons and discussions

Vhanja wrote:

I had suspected that there might be a falling out between him and John, and that Mary would possibly die - but I had never anticipated seeing Sherlock go visit Ella. One of the most shocking things in this episode to me.

Same here.
Sherlock is so used to rely on his intellect. Even if Ella is just MP, I think it's very poignant that Sherlocks admits he needs help with this puzzle...


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"The posh boy loves the dominatrix." Context matters.
 

January 5, 2017 1:13 pm  #365


Re: First impressons and discussions

Maybe he is starting to understand that emotions are a complex area and even he, the genius, needs help navigating those silly things called sentiments. The charachter development is amazing !


 

January 5, 2017 1:21 pm  #366


Re: First impressons and discussions

Yes.  I wonder if maybe he's seeing Ella not so much to deal with his own grieving, but to help him understand human emotion - realising that he needs to, in order to save John. 

Norbury was a mis-step - all his deductions were right, but he seemed to miss the main point (that Mary understood), that he was riling her up into killing him, and she ended up killing Mary.  He didn't anticipate the emotional side of what was he was doing. 

Interesting to see how this leads into TLD.

 

January 5, 2017 1:30 pm  #367


Re: First impressons and discussions

Liberty wrote:

Norbury was a mis-step - all his deductions were right, but he seemed to miss the main point (that Mary understood), that he was riling her up into killing him, and she ended up killing Mary.  He didn't anticipate the emotional side of what was he was doing. 

When Norbury stopped her speech and suggested they let her go, Mary almost jumped at her in anger.
Norbury brandished a gun at her.
That´s when Sherlock started to deduce her unmercifully, with a clear intent to crush her with this harsh speech, or to at least direct her attention on him, not on Mary. He succeded with that.
His only misstep was that he did not predict that Mary will take the bullet for him, when Norbury shot at him. But how could he predict that? He is a detective, not a clairvoyant...


-----------------------------------

I cannot live without brainwork. What else is there to live for? Stand at the window there. Was there ever such a dreary, dismal, unprofitable world? See how the yellow fog swirls down the street and drifts across the dun-coloured houses. What could be more hopelessly prosaic and material? What is the use of having powers, Doctor, when one has no field upon which to exert them?

 

January 5, 2017 1:57 pm  #368


Re: First impressons and discussions

Yes I don't see Sherlock making mistakes on the contrary he is being better than ever.

I don't see how the death scene could have happened the way we are shown at all. Realistically Mary would have taken old lady Norbury down before she got the handbag open 

Sherlock blaming himself seems something in line with the She shot me to save my life line.


"Man may not be degraded  to being a machine by being denied to be a ghost in the machine."
It's just transport. The virus in the hard drive . However impossible .Must be the truth.
 

January 5, 2017 2:08 pm  #369


Re: First impressons and discussions

Mothonthemantel, I agree. I think it's very likely that this death scene never happened as it has been shown to us - just like CAM's death never happened as it is shown on the doctored footage. It simply looks too openly unrealistic and physics defying. Why would they show it in such an unrealistic way? And if you look closely at the footage it's quite possible that Mary was shot from behind and we see an exit rather than an entrance wound. The force of the shot from behind could've thrown her in front of Sherlock. In TAB we have been lectured about the physics of getting shot - maybe for more than one reason?
I'm just not ready for jumping to the conclusion that John must've shot her. But obviously it must've been someone present in the aquarium, and it certainly wasn't the jellyfish.

 

January 5, 2017 2:32 pm  #370


Re: First impressons and discussions

There were a few allusions to good old Agatha Christie in that episode. That was one of the things I liked about the episode. I'm a big  fan of the Queen of Crime. "By The Pricking Of My Thumbs" which is quoted by Sherlock,  is not only a line from Shakespeare but also the title of an Agatha Christie novel about elderly people caught up by their criminal past and their former spy activities. The murderer turns out to be an old and slightly gaga lady with an astonishingly long criminal record. Virtually nobody suspected her. Then there's this other Agatha Christie title "Appointment With Death" which could also have been a fitting title for TST. I wonder if we will be treated to a murder mystery a la Agatha Christie in connection with Mary's death.  All the setlock talk about alibis and guns thrown into the Thames might hint at a more old fashioned murder mystery. Would be nice.
Btw, in connection with the narrator's perspective which we have discussed lately:  Agatha Christie also wrote the groundbreaking novel "The Murder Of Roger Ackroyd" where the whole plot is narrated by the murderer himself,  culminating in a posthumous confession of the narrator in his diary - but unlike in Columbo episodes where we know right away who has done it,  the reader isn't in on it all. It's done extremely wittily and skillfully by Christie. The end catches you completely by surprise. First reaction is always that this is unfair towards the reader. But it's done so skillfully that you cannot even call it a case of an unreliable narrator. Nothing of importance is withheld from the reader. You have a fair chance of solving the mystery. But of course the narrator manages to give everything a spin which throws you totally off the scent. Christie never repeated this. It's something which can be pulled off successfully only once.

 

January 5, 2017 3:06 pm  #371


Re: First impressons and discussions

sherlocked wrote:

....Christie never repeated this. It's something which can be pulled off successfully only once.

 
I just read the wiki entry on "unreliable narrator". Interestingly "The Murder Of Roger Ackroyd" is listed as a famous and controversial example of an unreliable narrator. It's well worth looking it up, because Christie has done a lot things we suspect Mofftiss have done with TST.
And I have to correct myself. She has done it again decades later in "Endless Night", a novel where a husband kills his newly wedded wife because he has a lover, although deep down he loves his wife. It's also brilliantly done. It's done so differently from Roger Ackroyd that again the reader doesn't suspect a thing.

Last edited by sherlocked (January 5, 2017 3:08 pm)

 

January 5, 2017 3:22 pm  #372


Re: First impressons and discussions

Sorry, if I bore some people with my love for Agatha Christie. But  for what it's worth: according to Wikipedia "The Murder Of Roger Ackroyd" has been voted in 2013 as the "best crime novel ever written". Now, that sounds like something Mofftiss might definitely be drawn to. Amanda Abbington said at Comicon that TST tries to do something which has never been done before on tv. Now, what could that be? Could it be that Mofftiss tried to channel Agatha Christie's famous novel with it's devillishly unreliable narrator? I'm not sure if I like this idea at all, but I wouldn't put it past Mofftiss. That would certainly pull off the rug under our feet as they threatened to do in S4.
The only hints we have are the hints at Agatha Christie and the mounting signs that in TST a very unreliable narrator was at work.

Edit: the more I'm pulling at this thread, the more I discover: the murderer of Roger Ackroyd was a nice and respectable doctor - not unlike the Dr. Watson of Doyle's novels. And he was the ASSISTENT of the detective - which in this case is Hercule Poirot, Christie's version of a great and enigmatic detective...
I still refuse to join the voices who wisper that John has killed Mary...seems to be a development too extreme....

Last edited by sherlocked (January 5, 2017 3:39 pm)

 

January 5, 2017 4:10 pm  #373


Re: First impressons and discussions

lol and interesting Sherlocked. I do think we have unreliable narrator and a bit of a Who dunnit!
The more I think about the episode - the more I like it ☺


"Man may not be degraded  to being a machine by being denied to be a ghost in the machine."
It's just transport. The virus in the hard drive . However impossible .Must be the truth.
 

January 5, 2017 4:50 pm  #374


Re: First impressons and discussions

Sherlocked, would you mind putting the details of The Murder of Roger Ackroyd in spoiler tags?   It's a fantastic book, and I was lucky enough to read it without knowing "whodunnit".  I agree with all you say there, but it's a huge spoiler if anyone hasn't read it!   I know it's an old book and a classic, so most people probably already know, but there might be people here who haven't read it and would like to!   Thanks in advance .

I don't think the unreliable narrator works quite so well on film.  For instance, I felt The Remains of the Day worked better as a book, for that reason.   But there are some examples.  500 Days of Summer is the one which is springing to mind at the moment!

Last edited by Liberty (January 5, 2017 5:02 pm)

 

January 5, 2017 4:58 pm  #375


Re: First impressons and discussions

nakahara wrote:

Liberty wrote:

Norbury was a mis-step - all his deductions were right, but he seemed to miss the main point (that Mary understood), that he was riling her up into killing him, and she ended up killing Mary.  He didn't anticipate the emotional side of what was he was doing. 

When Norbury stopped her speech and suggested they let her go, Mary almost jumped at her in anger.
Norbury brandished a gun at her.
That´s when Sherlock started to deduce her unmercifully, with a clear intent to crush her with this harsh speech, or to at least direct her attention on him, not on Mary. He succeded with that.
His only misstep was that he did not predict that Mary will take the bullet for him, when Norbury shot at him. But how could he predict that? He is a detective, not a clairvoyant...

I think Sherlock deflected attention at first, but he seemed to genuinely miss that she would kill him.  She said herself that she could still suprise him.  I think in a way he gave into a bit of arrogance, a bit of showing off, and possibly his own feelings about Norbury's actions.    He does something similar when he smashes the bust to reveal the black pearl, and gets it wrong - he does get carried away with how clever he is.   Now in this case, once he'd got Norbury's attention away from Mary, there might have been a better way to handle it and calm her down.   Mary knows  it ... she asks him to stop, but he doesn't listen.    He couldn't have predicted Norbury shooting, yes, but she had a gun, she was cornered, she possibly was going to be tried for treason, so prison for murder wasn't much of a deterrent - he could have guessed that it wasn't a good idea to rile her. 

I'm not blaming him - but I think this is something he's recognising as a failing, hence the comment to Mrs Hudson. 

 

January 5, 2017 5:02 pm  #376


Re: First impressons and discussions

I don't know it's all quite amusing - Norburys motive for shooting seemed to be Surprise!


"Man may not be degraded  to being a machine by being denied to be a ghost in the machine."
It's just transport. The virus in the hard drive . However impossible .Must be the truth.
 

January 5, 2017 8:37 pm  #377


Re: First impressons and discussions

Liberty wrote:

Ha! Took me a while to get that one, Vhanja!

Porlock ... hmm.  Lady Smallwood was Love, wasn't she?  Did we find out who the others were?  Very interesting - it could be that Norbury was working for Moriarty, as part of the game - although that would be a very long-term setup, going back years ago.  I'm not sure how Moriarty could orchestrate John and Mary getting together, even if he had a way of putting her in his path. 

But it looks like Norbury didn't have a codename in that room, so Porlock has to be one of the others, and not Lady Smallwood.  Yes, Antarctica seems to be Mycroft, but that might be misleading us!   And the other guy isn't terribly exciting so I don't want it to be him, so that leaves Mycroft or Sherlock as the "agent of Moriarty" (or the other guy, but that would be too boring).

I was never in doubt that Mycroft is Antartica. Also because he is the iceman.
 


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Normal is not something to aspire to, it's something to get away from!


 
 

January 5, 2017 8:43 pm  #378


Re: First impressons and discussions

would have been funny if Mycroft would have been revealed to be "love" though


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We balance probabilities and choose the most likely. It is the scientific use of the imagination.    
 

January 5, 2017 8:46 pm  #379


Re: First impressons and discussions

Aw...


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http://professorfangirl.tumblr.com/post/105838327464/heres-an-outtake-of-mark-gatiss-on-the
 

January 6, 2017 12:42 am  #380


Re: First impressons and discussions

Liberty wrote:

I think Sherlock deflected attention at first, but he seemed to genuinely miss that she would kill him.  She said herself that she could still suprise him.  I think in a way he gave into a bit of arrogance, a bit of showing off, and possibly his own feelings about Norbury's actions.    He does something similar when he smashes the bust to reveal the black pearl, and gets it wrong - he does get carried away with how clever he is.   Now in this case, once he'd got Norbury's attention away from Mary, there might have been a better way to handle it and calm her down.   Mary knows  it ... she asks him to stop, but he doesn't listen.    He couldn't have predicted Norbury shooting, yes, but she had a gun, she was cornered, she possibly was going to be tried for treason, so prison for murder wasn't much of a deterrent - he could have guessed that it wasn't a good idea to rile her. 

I think Norbury would shoot somebody anyway - that´s why she brought a gun in the first place. Because she works for a government, she certainly does not carry a gun around during normal circumstances - her handbag is searched numerous times during her normal working day...


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I cannot live without brainwork. What else is there to live for? Stand at the window there. Was there ever such a dreary, dismal, unprofitable world? See how the yellow fog swirls down the street and drifts across the dun-coloured houses. What could be more hopelessly prosaic and material? What is the use of having powers, Doctor, when one has no field upon which to exert them?

 

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