BBC Sherlock Fan Forum - Serving Sherlockians since February 2012 / we don't see the pavement where Sherlock lands....

**Posted by beekeeper** March 27, 2013 4:41 pm

just a thought

I've rewatched the video and we do not see the pavement where Sherlock falls.

This means it would be, I think possible for someone to place a landing cushion on the pavement

He'd still be injured I would have thought, and cartoon physics would be required because he'd still have landed at around 40 mph which is not something I'd have thought a thin crash mat would solve but hey.

So the truck puts out the mat, Sherlock falls onto the mat, rolls over (generally, when you've fallen 70 feet I don't think you are in a state to roll over), off mat, mat is pulled up by the truck which drives away.

The only problem is that this requires some kind of a magic crash mat.

**Posted by beekeeper** March 27, 2013 4:48 pm

oh no there is another problem

I can't do screen grabs really, but I think he falls into the frame and rolls from the building side not the truck side.

My goodness this is a brainscatcher! you have to hand it to them, they've kept us amused for months with this.

**Posted by AndyO.** March 27, 2013 4:49 pm

beekeeper wrote:
The only problem is that this requires some kind of a magic crash mat.

And time to take away that mat. We see the truck leaving just after Sherlock hit the ground. There was no time to hide the mat.

**Posted by beekeeper** March 27, 2013 5:02 pm

No we really don't see the truck leaving straight away!

We see Sherlock's body fall to the bottom of the frame and we don't see the pavement

Then we cut to John and get him for a bit, running toward Sherlock and then with the cyclist and the rest. And somewhere in there we see the head of Sherlock and the truck.

And then we get an overhead shot of the body outside the rectangle with people rushing about and at this point, the laundry truck has pulled away.

(I'll tell you what else, I've watched that clip way too many times now and that cyclist is Sherlock, I'm convinced of it, Or his twin brother Have we consdered that theory ;-) ?)

**Posted by AndyO.** March 27, 2013 5:42 pm

beekeeper wrote:
No we really don't see the truck leaving straight away!

I mean that it's not enough of time to hide the mat. Such crush mat should be something big after all and it's not that easy to move something like this so quickly.

**Posted by besleybean** March 27, 2013 5:51 pm

Possibly something other than a mat, then...

**Posted by AndyO.** March 27, 2013 5:57 pm

The only thing I can think of is that truck. What else can be moved away so quickly?

**Posted by besleybean** March 27, 2013 5:58 pm

We'll see!

**Posted by Cabear5** March 28, 2013 4:09 pm

And taught sheet pulled tight by homeless network to catch him then the sheet thrown on the back of the truck after they roll Sherlock onto the ground?

**Posted by besleybean** March 28, 2013 5:18 pm

hmm...

**Posted by beekeeper** March 29, 2013 12:17 pm

"And taught sheet pulled tight by homeless network to catch him then the sheet thrown on the back of the truck after they roll Sherlock onto the ground?"

yk, when I think of other denouments in the Sherlock universe-like that the murders were committed by a 7 ft fairy tale golem or that in fact it was all hallocenogenic gas-that doesn't seem that implausible,

I just think we needed to have seen some suggestion of this-a Checkov gun-beforehand.

I don't think this works, I'm throwing this off the top of my head but one thing we see throughout the episode is that, effectively, Sherlock cannot die. The assasins or whatver they are will actually save him. He believes in this enough to step in front of a lorry-and it works. Could that possibly have been what he was relying on? He stands up there for ages chatting away, in full view...plenty of time for these henchmen-who are stalking him, and of whom I think there are two left-to asssemble. I've never completely understood what those assasins placed round baker street actually do for the plot and they are not Jim's henchmen,

And , yk, at this point, there's no reason for them to believe Sherlock doesn't still have the keycode.

And it clears up another small plot point which is that, using the laundry truck/cart or even crash cart theory, half of Barts is conspiring to ensure Sherlock is alive-and keep this from John who a. has friends there (Stanford) and b. trained there and is a doctor.

And final random thing-and I don't think the casting actually allows for this now but I'm throwing it out there.I'd say that the female assain actually looks remarkably like the new female character introduced in season 3. Mainly in the hair and make up.

Last edited by beekeeper (March 29, 2013 12:24 pm)

**Posted by tardislass** March 30, 2013 12:01 am

I still think he jumped into the lorry which in TV land means that all the trash will cushion the fall. It is odd how the truck/lorry pulls away so quickly. Wouldn't they mostly likely want to go and have a look?
Add to that the magical bicyclist that could get behind John without him noticing and it all points to distracting John long enough so Sherlock can get off the truck and move in position with the fake blood and the amazingly quick posse of medical staff. And how quickly he is put in the gurney (with no other medical equipment and just wheeled off.

**Posted by beekeeper** March 30, 2013 11:18 am

problem with lorry is twofold from what I can see

First, the pavement is just too wide for him to fall there. Its a 7 m wide pavement iirc-not just irl but onscreen its wide enough for half Barts to come out to "help" so he'd have needed to really leap and he doesn't, he falls.

Second, I think more importantly, he doesn't fall into the final scene from the truck side but from the side of Barts.

I think the better theory is that someone used by the laundry truck, like a laundry bin, cushioned the fall.

**Posted by anjaH_alias** March 30, 2013 5:48 pm

Who says, that the truck was standing on the street during the fall? We don´t see the groung during the fall, we have the last cut, the last metres more or less, then another cut, and only after that we see the whole situation, with Sherlock on the pavement and the truck driving away. Theoretically it could have been on the pavement during the fall.

Last edited by anjaH_alias (March 30, 2013 5:51 pm)

**Posted by AndyO.** March 30, 2013 5:50 pm

I think it could be standing on that rectangle.

**Posted by anjaH_alias** March 30, 2013 5:51 pm

AndyO. wrote:
I think it could be standing on that rectangle.

For example. The cuts allow that.

**Posted by beekeeper** March 30, 2013 6:29 pm

"Who says, that the truck was standing on the street during the fall? We don´t see the groung during the fall, we have the last cut, the last metres more or less, then another cut, and only after that we see the whole situation, with Sherlock on the pavement and the truck driving away. Theoretically it could have been on the pavement during the fall."

ok here is the main reason I disagree. Take a look at the fall again. He falls from the Barts side, not the truck/rectangle side.

The other reason is actually more a practical one. If Sherlock fell into a strategic laundry truck with open sides, the snipers would see. That's why I think the role of the laundry truck is to conceal another object he is falling onto, such as maybe a stack of laundry about to be added to the truck.

**Posted by anjaH_alias** March 31, 2013 12:39 am

beekeeper wrote:
ok here is the main reason I disagree. Take a look at the fall again. He falls from the Barts side, not the truck/rectangle side.

The other reason is actually more a practical one. If Sherlock fell into a strategic laundry truck with open sides, the snipers would see. That's why I think the role of the laundry truck is to conceal another object he is falling onto, such as maybe a stack of laundry about to be added to the truck.

.

Your first point I don´t really get. I mean, I was at St. Barts, I saw the rectangle, the small house which protects John´s view and everything. So I don´t understand: He could jump from the rooftop, land in or around that rectangle, not to be seen by John. Everything looks in reality like in TRF - so, why not?
Your other point - "the snipers would see": Exactly that happened in ACDs The Final Problem, as explained in The Empty House. Sebastian Moran saw that Holmes wasn´t dead. Why not so in Sherlock?

Last edited by anjaH_alias (March 31, 2013 12:53 am)

**Posted by besleybean** March 31, 2013 7:22 am

Because surely that defeated the whole point of him jumping? The snipers had to believe he was dead, to save his friends...and thi is b----y Easter!

**Posted by beekeeper** March 31, 2013 8:44 am

Anja I'm not sure what is unclear, could you clarify?

What I'm saying is that without the laundry truck there to conceal the fact his fall was broken (and physics says it must have been), both the sniper and John would have seen that his fall was broken. So that is the purpose of the truck-concealment. But I think it has a secondary purpose also, perhaps, which is to provide a reason to have laundry bags or whatever it was out on the ground to cushion his fall.

The second issue is that if you watch the dvd you see he falls from the left (Barts side) into the frame. The truck is on the right(pavement side). Unless there is some seriously nifty driving going on, he must have fallen from an object on the Barts side not the pavement/road.

Re the sniper, yes he saw Holmes survived in canon, agreed, but it was a different set up entirely. Holmes was the one the sniper was pointed at (and he was the one shot at) not John. So he was risking his own life. I think thats really just a point of difference between the films and canon, tbh, or else there is another sniper (Moran?) aimed at Sherlock.

(oh and agree its bl--dy easter! Luckily my kids are still asleep owing to the hour change!)

Last edited by beekeeper (March 31, 2013 8:46 am)