shenanigans, wow, your find about Turing and the poisoned apple. And the show being aired in the beginning of 2012, the 'Turing Year'!
The decoders of Bletchley Park have been mentioned before in Scandal, when they alluded to the Coventry dilemma.
One more thing to Prof. Grimm: if you go through the second document, shenanigans linked for us, you find, that he apparently touches safety issues of mobile devices in his teachings. He mentions, that iphones can be tracked and thus compromise the privacy of the carrier. Now think back again to 'Study in Pink' : The cabbie can be tracked by the 'mephone', the lady in pink planted on the cabbie, as Sherlock deduces so brilliantly in my favourite scene (it's a drug's bust), but only after Anderson turned the other way, lol! Now, it's quite possible, that someone like Prof. Grimm is an advisor for a show like this. I know university teachers, who were advisors for 'Star TreK' and loved it. It's pure speculation, but contacts like that are not so strange.

Last edited by sherlocked (April 3, 2012 9:26 pm)

Isn't the 'don't hit me' part just him playing the part of poor innocent Jim actor paid by Sherlock? Doesn't it also suggest that Sherlock has violent tendencies that, perhaps, he has already witnessed or been subjected to?

(I posted this thought in another string...apologies if someone gets it twice)

I hypothesize you've hit the nail on the head when you say the rooftop Moriarty/Sherlock handshake is the pivot...but I suggest you've got the wrong "handshake" precedent.

How many times in this series have we collectively gasped at a handshake?  There have been several  (including the assassin handshakes you point out...) but the BIG ONE was the final one in Scandal between Sherlock and Irene.

Sherlock moves in close, takes her hand, and says softly, "I took your pulse."  (Right? How could we forget? *swoon*)

SO... on the rooftop, first time Sherlock is on the ledge and asks for a moment of privacy, Moriarty must think, "What is Sherlock up to?"  but he says "Of course" because it's all a game and he wants to see SHerlock's next move.  However, he turns with a smirk that says he doesn't care how clever Sherlock is, gravity is gravity. But Sherlock laughs and Moriarty nearly screms "What did I miss?"  Sherlock tells Moriarty he can save his friends and not kill himself. 

And the writers set us up for the handshake:  "You want me to shake hands with you in Hell?  I shall not disappoint you."

THIS is when Moriarty gets a terrible notion of how Sherlock can save his friends and live, that Sherlock is going to fake his own death. To confirm his theory, Moriarty very, very pointedly offers his hand to Sherlock....

AND TAKES HIS PULSE.    Bam.  Sherlock already has no pulse through some mechanism.   

Moriarty realizes that he's been beaten.  That's why Moriarty kills himself and Sherlock proceeds with his plan to fake his own suicide.

[No spoilers express or implied, I'm just theorizing...]

My thought is: Keep in mind that both these characters are like top chess players; they only make their move knowing what the next five or ten moves will be.  They know their opponent is doing the same.  So, to Moriarty, if Sherlock has no pulse, standing on the roof of St. Barts, then Sherlock must have figured-out a way to fake his suicide.  If Sherlock can and will fake his death, then all of Moriarty's moves up to that point, to cause Sherlock to kill himself, have been a mistake on Moriarty's part.