I'm not team "Disappointed" either. Everything has actually been said and I agree with all of you.
Series 3 was a risk but I'm glad that Moffat and Gatiss were willing to take that risk. And since S2 was all about crime in my opinion, it was good for the show to take the characters on personal adventures this time. HLV is an unusual episode because it's not about a murder or something but deals with personal threat. And I'm glad that it exists. For god's sake, I'm thankful for any episode of the new series, I love them all. 

I love season three so much. Can't even say what I love most...
Wouldn't it be a tiny bit boring if they only went on solving cases (though I love the cases) and there were no development of the characters?

TeeJay wrote:

I also think that a lot of the criticism is what we call "high level whining" in Germany. All things considered, Sherlock is still quality television. But when you're constantly raising the bar as a series creator/writer, the viewers start to expect a constant or even increasing level of quality. When it falls short in one or more aspects or doesn't meet viewer expectation in terms of story resolution, the internet gives everyone who is even just slightly disgruntled the perfect outlet for their outcry. This may be what we're seeing here.

I'm so gonna steal that 'high level whining' phrase. What's the German word?

And I agree with the raising the bar, because of the way it's perceived, the writers are constantly challenged to improve. Imagine that, in an alternative universe, the first episode of the fourth season will be TBB. Same storyline, characters are a bit further, Sarah is Mary. People would be tremendously disappointed. But it worked fine in series one. And disappointment with TEH is not strange given the fact that they basically created the cliffhanger of the century in TRF and then pissed off for two years.

(I loved TEH, btw, and I'm totally fine with the fall solution.)

Hubby wants me to mention that according to acient Greeks (and probably Romans, too)  you should always show three dramas and then one comedy in your theatre. Motfiss sticks to that, too, and hubby is impressed with that.

I love how much I was surprised by each of the episodes. None of them was what I have expected, and that is a very rare experience on TV.

Predictability brings up a whole other point I wanted to mention. Because I think the fact that many people were disappointed in series 3 also has a lot to do with expectations. Moffat and Gatiss created a doozie of a mystery in TRF, which basically kept fans guessing for two whole years.

Of course everyone had expectations when series 3 finally came around the corner. Everyone wanted to know if their theory had been the right one, if Mofftiss were going to pop the magic bunny out of the hat and do something that would surprise EVERYONE because no one on the internet had thought of that yet, or if the episode was going to be about something else altogether. And I think a lot of people also had very specific expectations as to what series 3 would be showing.

Expectations were VERY high, and naturally that can only lead to a number of people being disappointed.

I must say, personally, I didn't even have many expectations for series 3, other than hoping for more quality entertainment, more Sherlock and John goodness, a halfway reasonable solution for The Fall, and hopefully a Sherlock & John reunion that was emotionally charged and didn't disappoint. And I got all of that--and more. I am happy, but I can see how others might not be when they were expecting something else entirely.

I was lucky that my expections weren't that high. Because I actually joined the fandom only mid October, and also started racking my brains about everything concerning Sherlock then, I didn't had to pass much time.
Tried to stay neutral as possible and it worked fine. As I said before there were a few points that I'm still not certain of. But I'm far far away from being "disappointed" of anything.

Last edited by gently69 (January 16, 2014 10:31 am)

Maybe I should add: I didn't even expect them to follow certain storylines, and I didn't have a theory about The Fall that I favoured, either. My expectations and hopes went more in the direction of emotions. I wanted them to blow me away, I wanted them to make me cry they way I cried at the end of TRF, I wanted them to make me feel totally desperate and lost. It didn't happen to the extent I had hoped for, but that's my problem, not theirs.

Well, I guess that's the thing about emotions, you can't really explain them. All I know is that at the end of TRF I sat on my sofa and cried like a baby. We're always talking about our shock blankets, and I'm telling you: that was as close as I ever got to being in shock because of a tv show. It started with the scene on the rooftop and went all the way through to the cemetery. And then, when I saw Sherlock I just went "OH MY GOOOOOOOOD...!!!!!". 
I guess the thing is that you just can't do something like this every single time, so I probably shouldn't have expected it. Yes, I was shocked when Sherlock shot CAM, the whole scene with CAM flicking John's face was so hard to watch and take, I felt so, so sorry for John. But for me it was still easier to take than the end of TRF.
Btw, what really, really got to me in S3 was the whole sequence with Mary, John and Sherlock, all the way from Sherlock's Mind Palace, The Empty Houses to the scene in 221B. Wow. Just wow.

Expecting the same as TRF, high expectations indeed. It was the best cliffhanger I've ever seen. It wasn't even a cliffhanger, it was a cliff-falling-off-er. 

People are different. As we see here. What Mofiss wrote... did it for one side perfectly but didn't satisfy the other. I think what they wanted first... satisfy themselves.
They worked out for Sherlock what and how they wanted it to see. Though it is proven that they also used one and another fan suggestion... somehow.