I think at that moment he's just mad about Mary keeping more stuff from him...but they sort it out.

I think that even if you want to leave someone, you would still grieve if they were shot to death. Not to mention that I think he isn't just feeling grief, I think it's mixed with guilt, shame and regret - which he redirects as anger towards Sherlock as he can't handle to face it himself.

I don't think he wants to leave at the end at all.  It's sorted out.  When he says he used to like "Mary" it's while he's angry that Mary has lied to him and absconded.  But I definitely see a different atmosphere between them at the end.  After all, Mary did give him the chance to find out about her past, but he chose not to take it.  And she absconded because she had to, and to protect him and Rosie.  I think he comes to understand that in TST, in the same way he comes to understand Sherlock in TLD.  Before Mary is killed, John is about to confess to the texting (partly because Mary says it's difficult because he's perfect), and John encourages Mary to go to meet Sherlock while he sorts out childcare - he's definitely caring about her and wanting to do the right thing by her at that point.  They just get so little of that time before she's killed. 

And I think it's similar in TLD - the issues between Sherlock and John are resolved at the end.  And we see how good and solid they are in TFP.  We don't get to see that with Mary exactly, apart from the brief moments leading up to her death.  But we do see John's attitude to her in TLD.  He clearly loves her deeply and is lost without her.  Unfortunately, he's been left with the guilt over the texting, which he didn't get the chance to confess.   But if he had, we know that it wouldn't have been a big deal - that it would just have helped to equalise things. 

As usual, I'm not wild about the violence in TLD, but I don't think John is going in that direction - I think that's supposed to be in extreme circumstances.  He goes to the lowest of what he can be there, then back up to the insightful, caring, assured, clever person we see towards the end and in TFP. 

I rewatched HLV a few days ago and remembered how hurt John was after he found out about Mary, and how frosty their "reconciliation" is when they spend Christmas together. Apparently they haven't really talked to each other for months, and she is very pregnant. I think John is being "a soldier" in that scene and doing the right thing. I want to rewatch TST soon to see if they really go back to a good place as a couple at some point, but for what I remember from the episode, "marital bliss" are not the first words that come to my mind. Mary lies again, drugs Sherlock and leaves them all with no sign of when will she come back, and John starts his Holmes affair (pun not intended).

About Mary's leaving, even if it's to protect her family, I think it's bound to trigger again for John the painful feelings about who she is, her lies, and the dangerous life he thought he was avoiding when he married her. So my point is not that Mary leaving was "bad", but that it hurt the relationship even more.

I personally never perceived a very strong romance between John and Mary, to begin with. Not when he proposes (you can see he's still devastated by Sherlock's death, he's obviously not ready to make a long life commitment), nor immediately after they get married, and definitely not at any point after he discovers who she really is.

I also see a pretty interesting mirroring/foreshadowing in John's conversation with Mr. Hudson in TSoT (I'm sure this has been discussed already but I found out by myself and felt very proud xD):

JOHN: Did you think you’d found the right one when you married Mr Hudson?
MRS HUDSON (smiling): No! It was just a whirlwind thing for us. I knew it wouldn’t work, but I just got sort of swept along.
JOHN: Right.
MRS HUDSON: And then we moved to Florida. We had a fantastic time, but of course I didn’t know what he was up to. (Whispering) The drugs.
JOHN (laughing): Drugs? (He grimaces at the pain in his head.)
MRS HUDSON: He was running ... um, oh God, what d’you call it? Um, a ... cartel.
(John props up his head with his fingers.)
MRS HUDSON: Got in with a really bad crowd.
JOHN: Right.
MRS HUDSON: And then I found out about all the other women. I didn’t have a clue! So, when he was actually arrested for blowing someone’s head off ...
(John’s eyes drift sideways, perhaps a little confused by the matter-of-fact way she just said the phrase.)
MRS HUDSON: ... it was quite a relief, to be honest.

(Source of the transcription -> http://arianedevere.livejournal.com/66078.html)

So... I totally agree with you, Vhanja: his grief is mixed with guilt, shame and regret. And maybe even relief, as Mrs. Hudson said about her own situation. But probably John will never admit that to himself because, again, he is a soldier, and he has to take care of Rosie. But if I had to bet, I would bet on a Watson's divorce sooner or later, had she not died in TST.

In my opinion, the anger in TLD and the complicated grief John is clearly into are more related to the convoluted nature of the relationship and his own conflicted feelings than to a strong loving bond between him and Mary. I actually perceive John as having a better relationship with his wife hallucination than with the real one, and let's not forget that's not actually Mary, but a creation of his subconscious that he needs at that point. He might be creating the Mary he thought he was marrying instead of the Mary he ended up with.

Again, I'll have to rewatch S4 before making my mind about this. But this is the feeling I've gotten so far.

(Edited to add the source of the transcription)

 

Last edited by Elemental (February 20, 2017 10:49 am)

Great post, Elemental. I think you have several good points. Consider this - if John wasn't married to Mary and they didn't have a child/she wasn't pregnant, would he have left her earlier?

Also, in HLV with their reconciliation, Mary promised that "any future problems are my priviliege" (paraphrased). And when future problems arose, she drugged Sherlock, didn't involve John and left. To me, that shows that a lack of trust in John and that she wasn't true to her own promise. Or perhaps more that this is a personality trait (maybe developed as a survival strategy because of her career) that she can't or won't change. John will always be left out.

I imagine that bit hurt him quite a bit, and contributed to his emotions towards her cooling off. 

I am not sure if John wanting to confess his "affair" to Mary meant that everything was ok again. Perhaps he just wanted to come clean so to break Mary's illusion of him as the perfect husband. 

Edit. As for happy times and feeling between John and Mary, I love the bedroom/bathroom scene in TEH. I think that scene, out of all scenes between them, show the most love and warmth.

 

Last edited by Vhanja (February 20, 2017 10:55 am)

Yes, I think so. Beautifully said, Elemental. 

Oh, I do not doubt that John cares deeply for Mary. And he grieves her just as deeply. But I think we see their relationship becoming rocky in TST: Stressed over the baby, some hints that John isn't necessarily happy over the dynamic between Sherlock, Mary and him, John "used to" like Mary, John having an affair-ish... 

That is quite a lot that is going on, more than just stress over parenthood, I think.

And we can always find a reason/excuse for what action we take. Mary could always find a reason for excluding John, even when that was one of his conditions for their continued relationship.

But I do agree that what we see from John is quite realistic (perhaps except the extreme violence).

Thanks SusiGo and Vhanja for your kind words. I'm happy to contribute to the debate

Vhanja wrote:

Also, in HLV with their reconciliation, Mary promised that "any future problems are my priviliege" (paraphrased). And when future problems arose, she drugged Sherlock, didn't involve John and left. To me, that shows that a lack of trust in John and that she wasn't true to her own promise. Or perhaps more that this is a personality trait (maybe developed as a survival strategy because of her career) that she can't or won't change. John will always be left out.
 

I totally agree with this.

And about this:

Liberty wrote:

I remember before S4 aired, thinking that HLV only really makes sense if you believe that all of them really did care deeply for each other.   And I think it's the same in S4. 
 

My view on this after rewatching HLV a couple days ago is that the force that drives the plot in both TSoT and HLV, specially the last one, is Sherlock's devotion to John. And for some reason that we didn't know yet in S3, Sherlock understands "taking care of John" as "make him stay with Mary". Pretty much everything he does in HLV is intended to accomplish that.

After she shots Sherlock, John is very pissed off and very concerned about Sherlock (both after the shot and after he escapes the hospital and has to call an ambulance from 221B). Sherlock goes out of his way to prove that Mary didn't want to kill him, that she "performed surgery" and "saved his life" (I'm not getting into whether this is true or not, but it's what we see Sherlock trying to make John believe).

Before S4 I didn't understand very well why Sherlock was so sure that Mary was what John needed and wanted, if even John didn't seem that sure himself. The scene where Sherlock tells John that "he chose Mary" is heartbreaking. Sherlock is almost dying, literally, and yet so committed with making things work between John and Mary, even if it means he and John will keep drifting apart the same way the had been before the start of the episode. Why? It would have been easier to just say "she is crazy, she tried to kill me" and uncover all the stuff she had done, or just step back and watch John distance himself form Mary, maybe forever. John was really angry and hurt with her.

But Sherlock doesn't. And my understanding after watching S4 is that, after Victor Trevor's death, he is so convinced that his friendship is harmful, that he won't be able to take care of John, that even a former assassin seems better for the task that himself. And he also knows John needs the battlefield, the adrenaline, so it seems like he sees Mary as some sort of his substitute in providing this for John.

So, I don't think they need to care a lot for each other for HLV to happen. What is shown (what I see) is that Mary does care about John (and herself), and that's why she wants to shoot CAM, but I don't know if she cares as in "I don't want to hurt the love of my life" or as in "I don't want CAM to threaten the semi-normalcy that I carved from myself". And Sherlock cares SO MUCH about John that is heartbreaking. And John cares a lot about Sherlock as well. 

But I don't see John caring so much about Mary. Not that he doesn't care at all, of course. Just not as much as he cares about Sherlock and vice versa, in my opinion. She is supposed to be his pressure point, but that's CAM opinion. He's smart, but he's not God. And Mary is carrying his child, so the pressure point could be that one, as well.

John shifts between uncomfortable and pissed with Mary the whole episode. Even when she tells him "It's a tiny bit sexy" when he goes to find the neighbour's kid, he makes a weird face and keeps walking. He doesn't smile, or kisses her with passion; I don't see chemistry. And it's Sherlock's idea to attack Appledore to save Mary and John. John follows through, but it seems like he is more motivated by the adrenaline, as he usually is with Sherlock, than for a burning desire to save his wife. It's Sherlock who has been thinking and scheming to save them both.

Bottom line: I think that Sherlock's devotion is the ultimate force behind HLV, and according to what we see in S4 it could be a misleaded devotion since it's based on the idea that he himself is no good for anyone, and less of all his best friend. Had Sherlock being emotionally more mature and processed better his past traumas, he may have told John: "yeah, mate, your wife is nuts, get a divorce and get custody of the baby and look for someone more trustworthy" 

I'm realising now S3 it's truly heartbreaking if you see it in the light of S4. All that loneliness. Poor Sherlock 

PS: Could anybody point me towards any scene of real chemistry between John and Mary after TSoT? Scenes of them being crazy about each other, being truly in love, trusting each other, laughing together. With real Mary, I mean. Because I can't seem to recall any, but I don't know if it's my own Johnlock bias here 

Last edited by Elemental (February 20, 2017 1:11 pm)

Elemental wrote:

PS: Could anybody point me towards any scene of real chemistry between John and Mary after TSoT? Scenes of them being crazy about each other, being truly in love, trusting each other, laughing together. With real Mary, I mean. Because I can't seem to recall any, but I don't know if it's my own Johnlock bias here 

Sadly, the most loving scene between them after TSoT seems to be her death scene in TST. Or perhaps you could count the short scenes where they sit together with Rosie. (In their apartment wien everyone is visiting and at the baptizing ceremony).

I think the lack of scenes between them partly comes from how the show is set up. They have very limited time (one season every three-or-so years with three episodes), and Sherlock is the main character. They can't spend too much time on anything that doesn't involve Sherlock.

I do think John cares a lot about Mary. But that their relationship was estranged and tense after the assassin reveal, and then again in TST. I don't think they ever fully recovered from that, actually. John doesn't seem too happy about his life in general, is the feeling I get. Yes, he loves the baby, of course, have some fun banter with Mary and goes on adventures with Sherlock - but he doesn't seem content with his life in general. Or maybe it's my turn to read too much into it. ;)

Haha, yes, that's true. John does seem to be a tad grumpy or disgruntled as a default state. 

What I think is interesting is that it seems that John is almost always missing something in his life, although he might not know exactly what. Or might not know how to get it. In S1 and S2, he was living with Sherlock, but missed women (love/sex/romance), but was never really successfull lin getting it. Or at least not keeping it.

At the start of S3, he had a lovely fiancè, a job and a house in the suburbs, but was still not happy - he missed Sherlock. At the start of S4, he has a wife, a lovely daughter, a job, a house, adventures with Sherlock - and he is STILL not satisfied.

It's like there is always something missing from his life, something that prevents him from being properly content.