I really do hope they're going to explain the "surgery" thing in S4.  The only thing I can see that backs it up is that Mary didn't shoot Sherlock in the head.  Otherwise, she basically killed him (there was only the smallest change that he'd actually survive that), and Sherlock didn't give any explanation about how she might have made a mistake and not really meant do it.  If they're going to make us accept "surgery" then I do think they have to explain it, or I will be annoyed. 

Sherlock trying to convince Mary he believes that explanation is much easier to understand.  But that means he's bluffing, and I want to know how much he's bluffing about, especially as I do think there are signs that something is up in TSOT.

I think I'm going to have watch through S4 from the beginning and watch all Sherlock's interactions with Mary and try to work out he knows and when.   The fact that he doesn't guess it's her from the perfume is odd - even if he was completely innocent about her intentions, he knows that she's connected to Magnusson through Janine, so it isn't such a wild leap that she'd be there.   I'd think he was trying to fool John, if it wasn't for the fact that he seems genuinely surprised to see Mary.  Which suggests that he didn't suspect anything previously.  (Except, that I do find something slightly odd about the way he announces her name - it's a bit corny.  Maybe he just enjoys the drama of it, but still.  And would he really assume that Lady Smallwood, who appears to be somebody very important in governement, would break in with a gun when she'd already put Sherlock on the case?).

Mary and Sherlock seem open and even affectionate together before HLV.   But he seems natural with Janine at the wedding too - yet it turns out that he's using her to get to Magnusson (which possibly only occurs to him after the wedding, but doesn't explain why he acts differently with her than he has with any other woman or person in the past).

I also keep thinking that the Magnusson connection is established in TEH.  It seems as if Sherlock only gets involved after Lady Smallwood contacts him, but could he be keeping an eye on Magnusson in some way all along?  He's quite aware of him and sees him as evil, presumably not just because of Lady Smallwood's story.  And Sherlock's so involved in the wedding, checking out who the guests are and their backgrounds.  Does he wonder about Mary being best friends with Magnusson's PA?  Surely he does.  Does he put together all the little clues (Mary working out the code, no guests from more than five years ago, etc.), or do they really not mean anything until she shoots him? 
 

You have a point there, mrshouse. The interesting thing is that I cannot remember any other scene from the whole show where I get this feeling of disbelief. They all felt right in their way and this is not the case here. 

Oh, I must be the only person that liked the Christmas reconciliation and the tarmac scene. Or maybe it's just me wanting them to be emotionally genuine with all my heart...

Liberty wrote:

Mary and Sherlock seem open and even affectionate together before HLV. But he seems natural with Janine at the wedding too - yet it turns out that he's using her to get to Magnusson (which possibly only occurs to him after the wedding, but doesn't explain why he acts differently with her than he has with any other woman or person in the past).

I see a big difference though between Sherlock's attitude towards Mary and Janine. Knowing what we know from HLV and then re-watching TSOT, I always get the feeling that Mary was simply thrust upon Sherlock (by John) but then he was surprised to discover that John having a girlfriend and getting ready for marriage wasn't quite as horrible as he'd thought it would be, because it was Mary and not someone else. I find it interesting that during the reunion in TEH, Sherlock starts out by completely ignoring her, and then bit by bit acknowledges that she 1. exists und 2. really means a lot to John and 3. is actually a strong and clever woman in her own right, worth not only his attention but also his friendship. But there always seems to be an element of genuine surprise in it. 

With Janine, it's calculation from the start. Having seen HLV, can't you tell that from the first moment we see them together outside the church, he's very deliberately putting on his best Sherlock Holmes act ("Oh, emotion? Me?") for her and he does it for the sole purpose of making her feel like what we fangirls dream about all the time, that she is the one woman for whom he will change, that she is the one who will turn him from a heartless machine into a loving human being. He keeps playing that game throughout the wedding - being Sherlock Holmes at his worst but then telling her the "secret" about dancing, throwing his buttonhole flower to her - all designed to make her feel really special. It's not natural at all.  He's already being what Janine, much later, rightly and justly calls a manipulative bastard.

Liberty wrote:

And Sherlock's so involved in the wedding, checking out who the guests are and their backgrounds. Does he wonder about Mary being best friends with Magnusson's PA? Surely he does. Does he put together all the little clues (Mary working out the code, no guests from more than five years ago, etc.), or do they really not mean anything until she shoots him? ).

Well, that's one of those questions that we'll never get an answer to, isn't it? I can ponder it for hours and still not come up with a definite answer.

I like to think that he had all the little things about Mary, about there being more to Mary than meets the eye, filed away somewhere in his brain, but it didn't come to the forefront of his mind until it was too late. ("You were slow" is what Mary very rightly tells him in Leinster Gardens.) 

Which is something I can accept concerning the smaller hints (excellent memory, recognising skip codes), but find hard to believe when it comes to her connection with CAM. If he put that much effort into investigating David's link with Mary, he must have put as much time if not more into investigating Janine's link with her, and would have discovered what was behind it. He even mentions that connection to John on their way up to Magnussen's appartment, and he still didn't guess it was Mary he was facing only minutes later?   



Oh, here's another thought. What about Mary and Janine after the shooting, actually? "I'll give your love to John and Mary" is what Janine tells Sherlock when he's in hospital, but I can't quite see Janine and Mary's friendship continue as before. After all, Mary exploited Janine too, and knocked her on the head something fearful... but you can't tie up all the loose ends, I suppose.

Last edited by La Jolie (September 2, 2014 8:18 am)

I agree,  La Jolie, but some of the interaction with Janine actualy seemed genuine to me on first viewing.  Talking about dancing, Sherlock checking out possible conquests for her - it was rather sweet.  But unless I'm going to see it as the "new" Sherlock, it's out of character.   And anything out of character seems to be flagging something up.   It reminds me of Sherlock courting publicity at the beginning of TRF - we never go back and get told that he was doing that for a reason, but I think it's clear that he was drawing Moriarty out.   So it makes sense that he was drawing Magnusson out (or something along those lines) even before Lady Smallwood appears.  Could it really be coincidence that he was out-of-character nice and flirty with Janine, and then just happened to have to use her to get to Magnusson afterwards? 

Yes, I agree that he would have investigated Janine before the wedding.  And the friendship is odd.  How did they meet?  Where do they socialise?   They have quite different lives and don't seem as if they would be best friends.  I mean, obviously Mary has made them into best friends, but I think Sherlock would notice that it's not something that would have happened naturally. 

After the shooting, does Janine know about Mary?  She didn't necessarily see her face.   I suspect not, as Mary seems to want to control anyone who does know, and you'd think she'd go after Janine if she thought Janine knew. 

Oh, another thing about TSOT and Sherlock knowing.  He reads out the telegrams until he reads out CAM's one, then he speeds through the rest, as though they aren't significant.   He seems to know the CAM one is important. 
 

Now you made me sad again, Solar. 

SolarSystem wrote:

The way I understand Sherlock's behaviour towards Janine in TSoT is that he's not trying to manipulate her at all, but he's trying to manipulate himself. He is trying to be part of this whole wedding business - mostly for John, but maybe also a bit for himself because deep inside he knows that things will change and that it might be inevitable to 'do emotions' from now on. So the wedding is a good opportunity to start. At the end of the episode we see that the 'experiment' is over and has probably failed. He still is an outsider, he doesn't really belong. Janine is dancing with someone else and Sherlock is all alone.
I never saw him manipulating her in that episode. I saw him trying to be someone else (maybe the real Sherlock Holmes who's hidden underneath all that "Alone is what protects me" stuff?) - but for his own sake, not for Janine's. 

O God ... *sits in the office ... swallowing ...*

La Jolie wrote:

You would make me sad, too, Solar, if I agreed with you. Thankfully I don't. But isn't that what's wonderful about this show, that there are layers and layers of meaning and that you can read lots of scenes this way or that and never get to an end because you can never be sure there isn't even more behind it? I don't think I've ever been in a fandom before where any attempt at character and plot analysis has been as delightfully complex and as frustrating at the same time!

I couldn't agree more with you on this. And I guess without all those layers we wouldn't be able to survive the hiatus, because discussions would be over within three weeks, and then what? 
 

In my opinion, Sherlock didn´t manipulate Janine - it was just the opposite. Let´s look again at the scene at the beginning of TSOT (from the transcription of wonderful Ariane de Vere, of course):

=10pt=10pt=11pt=10pt=10pt=11pt=10ptJANINE: The famous Mr Holmes! I’m very pleased to meet you. But no sex, okay?
SHERLOCK (startled): Um, sorry?
JANINE (laughing): You don’t have to look so scared. I’m only messing. Bridesmaid, best man ... It’s a bit traditional.
(She gently punches his arm. He looks down with distaste.)
SHERLOCK: Is it?
JANINE (a little awkwardly): But not obligatory(!)
SHERLOCK: If that’s the sort of thing you’re looking for ... (he jerks his head towards one of the wedding guests) ... the man over there in blue is your best bet. Recently divorced doctor with a ginger cat ... (there’s a close-up of a ginger cat hair stuck on the man’s suit, and the sound of a miaow) ... a barn conversion ... (close-up of sawdust on the man’s shoes) ... and a history of erectile dysfunction.
(The close-up pulls out a little to reveal that the man is wearing cowboy boots. There’s the sound of a bullet ricocheting off something with a high-pitched ping, like in a Western movie. Sherlock blinks.)
SHERLOCK: Reviewing that information, possibly not your best bet.
JANINE: Yeah, maybe not.
SHERLOCK (looking puzzled): Sorry – there was one more deduction there than I was expecting.
JANINE: Mr Holmes ... (she takes his arm) ... you’re going to be incredibly useful.
(Again Sherlock looks down at her hand. He frowns.)

It´s pretty obvious, Sherlock was absolutely disinterested in Janine like she was thin air to him until she herself had iniciated and forced the contact between them. She was pretty aggressive about it, mentioning sex right away and taking his arm and practically kidnapping him for herself - as unsubtle as humanly possible. And she continued to do it not only through the rest of TSOT but possibly even before HLV.

So who manipulated whom, exactly?

We must remember that Janine can have her own hidden reasons for being CAM´s secretary and for befriending Mary and Sherlock. It´s really hard for me to see her as Sherlock´s victim and not as a skilled manipulator.

Yes, definitely Janine can have her own reasons ... after all, CAM has something on her, that we don't know about.  I agree with you that she's a manipulator too.   But the only good outcome for her in the end is escaping CAM.  During the process she has a best friend and boyfriend who are both using her for their own purposes.  I feel a bit sorry for, although I wish I knew more about her and her motivations. 

Aggressive, kidnapping, though?  I didn't see that.  She looks just like she's having fun and flirting a little (although I do agree that she might have another agenda).  I think she's genuinely attracted to him.   I don't think it's aggressive to show you're interested in a guy.   Whatever she's doing, Sherlock plays along (and vice versa?). 

Well, for one thing Janine might regard Sherlock as a challenge because he seems to be as attractive as unattainable. That may well stir her ambition. In the course of the reception her attitude towards him changes, she uses his entertaining deductions for her own purposes and he ends up alone on the dance floor. 
Of course there are other theories, especially concerning her and Mary being somehow in cahoots with each other and/or Moriarty which would change the situation very much. 

And I would not say the only good outcome for her is getting away from CAM (provided what he says about her at Appledore is the truth). After all she ends up with a cottage in Sussex.