BBC Sherlock Fan Forum - Serving Sherlockians since February 2012 / Possible "dark twists" in S4

**Posted by nakahara** July 4, 2014 12:40 pm

gently69 wrote:
Okay, then definitely Sherlock is the bad one.

Sherlock definitely needs to learn to be a real cold-blooded selfish narcissist. Because when he is helpful and self-sacrificing, people tend to scoff at him and blame him for everything that goes wrong.

If I was him, I would start by demanding fat pay-checks for consultations. Nobody values things he gets for free and nobody values pearls if he lives on the island where pearls are commonly found. If Sherlock´s help cost a fortune, people would quickly stop to take him for granted or to feel like they are entitled to have his aid whenever they whistle at him.

Then I would learn to leave people wallowing in their own shit and to only help them if I can also gain something from it. Obviously, noone condemns you if you are a self-serving b*tch.

**Posted by nakahara** July 4, 2014 2:28 pm

I´m trying to imagine "Mary shot Sherlock" scenario turned around:

Sherlock is blackmailed by his drug dealer who demands more and more money and decides to get rid of him permanently.
Just as he is about to shoot the dealer, Mary accidentally walks on him in the dark alley.

Sherlock: "Mary, is John with you?"
Mary: "N-no... I won´t say a thing to him, Sherlock. But, please, don´t do it, let me help you..."
Sherlock: BANG!

I´m curious if people would percieve it in the same manner: "Oh, he just did it for John´s love. John wouldn´t love him, if he knew the truth. But we all do stupid thinhs when in love."

I somehow doubt it.

**Posted by MartaSt** July 4, 2014 2:53 pm

I think drug addict and having a dealer chasing you because of a debt is somehow different than trying to bury your past to have happy and normal life in the future.

**Posted by besleybean** July 4, 2014 5:26 pm

Dealer chasing a debt?

**Posted by maryagrawatson** July 4, 2014 5:51 pm

Mary would have gone through some intense psychological programming to do her work for the CIA and whomever else she was answering to. I believe that her shooting Sherlock is a direct result of her conditioning. It's how she was taught to react in a situation like that and it wasn't until after the fact that she was able to understand that there are different ways to resolve problems than killing people. She's really quite a tragic figure.

Mary

**Posted by nakahara** July 4, 2014 7:02 pm

Intersting thought. Plausible too.
And yet it´s still no reason to not admit that Mary´s deed was wrong to the very core.

**Posted by maryagrawatson** July 4, 2014 7:14 pm

It's wrong to us, but in the world she was living in, that was acceptable behaviour. I suspect that Mary will be an antagonist in season 4, but I would much rather we get scenes where she realises that letting go of her old life means working on getting deprogrammed. I was really in the camp that thought that Sherlock is pretending to still like Mary so that she won't know that he's working at taking her down, but I've mellowed a bit and now hope that they are truly friends.

Mary

**Posted by nakahara** July 4, 2014 7:20 pm

Yes, Sherlock would fircely protect Mary, no matter what. She is the mother of John´s child and he would never want to make John unhappy and to see him loose his daughter.

**Posted by maryagrawatson** July 4, 2014 7:24 pm

There's a big gap between being protective of Mary for John's sake and actually loving Mary and I am being unusually romantic in my notion that Sherlock genuinely cares for Mary, that she's his girl, that he considers her a friend in her own right, etc.

Mary

**Posted by nakahara** July 4, 2014 7:27 pm

Well, Sherlock feelings towards Mary are hard to judge just from the scenes we have seen.
I´m really curious how they relationship will continue in S4.

**Posted by Schmiezi** July 5, 2014 6:59 pm

For me, a real dark twist would be to make John choose between saving Sherlock or Mary in some way. John would choose Sherlock, and Mary would die, and John would not forgive himself even though it has been his choice.

**Posted by SusiGo** July 5, 2014 7:20 pm

Yes, this would be terrible. I really do not want any more impediments between Sherlock and John. If there has to be darkness I want them to fact it together and not being torn apart by it again.

**Posted by SolarSystem** July 5, 2014 8:26 pm

I agree, Sherlock and John against the rest of the world, please.
Then again... I guess it can't get any darker than Sherlock and John being apart and maybe even one of them having to make a decision that would mean bad, bad things for the other one...

**Posted by Germansherlockfan** July 6, 2014 10:29 am

Schmiezi wrote:
For me, a real dark twist would be to make John choose between saving Sherlock or Mary in some way. John would choose Sherlock, and Mary would die, and John would not forgive himself even though it has been his choice.

Wow, that is actually a brilliant idea, very dark and profound and it would give the characters so much to work through, a real test for their friendship and their affection for eachother, I would love to see something like that.

**Posted by tonnaree** July 6, 2014 2:00 pm

I want Mary to do something so horrible that everyone sees her as a real villain. Then John can shoot her.

**Posted by Mattlocked** July 6, 2014 3:12 pm

tonnaree wrote:
I want Mary to do something so horrible that everyone sees her as a real villain. Then John can shoot her.

It's so easy, isn't it?

**Posted by tobeornot221b** July 6, 2014 3:31 pm

Mattlocked wrote:
tonnaree wrote:
I want Mary to do something so horrible that everyone sees her as a real villain. Then John can shoot her.

It's so easy, isn't it?

...but we'll have to wait for something like this - at least till the end of series 4.

Martin on Amanda being now a permanent cast member:

“Certainly yes for the foreseeable future. While we play fast and loose with the original stories, we generally follow the trajectory of what Conan Doyle did. So he gets married, and then Mary dies – so at some point presumably she’ll die! But she’s certainly in… at least the next one,” he says, carefully, alert to any amateur Sherlocking on my part. "
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/theatre/10920472/Martin-Freeman-interview-Shakespeare-invented-Gollum.html

(or does "at least the next one" refer to the Special, not series 4?)

**Posted by SherlocklivesinOH** July 7, 2014 1:13 am

I would say Season 3's twists (or at least HLV's) were pretty dark in themselves. I'm actually hoping for explanations that make everything not as bad, as we had with Season 2.

**Posted by stoertebeker** July 7, 2014 6:46 am

tonnaree wrote:
I want Mary to do something so horrible that everyone sees her as a real villain. Then John can shoot her.

Honestly? This is horrible.

I do not agree with what Mary had done in HLV and I am not really happy about the character twist they did to her. But I don't see Mary as a villain, I never saw her as one. To be honest, I miss the lovely, gentle, funny and supportive Mary from TEH and TSoT. I loved her character so much in this two episodes that it almost hurt to see the character developement in HLV.
I don't want to keep her forever in the show. I want our boys back together in Baker Street too. But I hope that Moftiss will manage to bring the lovely Mary back, the one we liked and loved. And then at the end of series 4 she might do something selfless, maybe saving John's and/or Sherlock's life by sacrificing her own. She'll die in John's arms and we all will be sitting in front of our TVs, crying for loosing her .

That's what I hope will happen to her character (I am clueless what to do with the baby issue though).

**Posted by SolarSystem** July 7, 2014 8:40 am

stoertebeker wrote:
I don't want to keep her forever in the show. I want our boys back together in Baker Street too. But I hope that Moftiss will manage to bring the lovely Mary back, the one we liked and loved. And then at the end of series 4 she might do something selfless, maybe saving John's and/or Sherlock's life by sacrificing her own. She'll die in John's arms and we all will be sitting in front of our TVs, crying for loosing her .

Sounds a bit like Disney to me...
Seriously, if Mofftiss really manage to convincingly turn her into lovely Mary again (although to me she never really felt all that lovely to start with, but that's another story) and explain her actions in a way that makes sense and that makes us understand why she did what she did - then chapeau. Just sacrificing herself certainly won't be enough though, a lot of explaining has to be done. And to be honest: At this point I'm not really all that interested in lots of explanations and background that revolve around Mary. If they can deal with that in one episode, fine. The rest of the time we get should mostly be about Sherlock and John.