Yes, and that's the main reason why I'm done with her. Not the shooting per se but how it's handled afterwards. And sorry to get off topic, molly212, but that can't be separated IMHO.

True. You need the idiots to take her back in the inner circle of trust.

But don't you think she was really coldblooded there? She only softened a tiny bit when she realized it was John overhearing everything. She didn't give a shit about Sherlock in this moment.

I'm not sure the shooting can be explained just by logical reasons. I don't see any sense in Mary shooting Sherlock like that, I'm with you there, molly.
I think with choosing a blow on the head instead, we would have missed out Sherlock's brilliant mind palace scene. For me, Mary shooting Sherlock is an action put there for dramatic reasons, not so much for logical story reasons, but that's really just my opinion after still failing to understand why Mary did it, and simply based on my thinking that the mind palace scene is one of the best in HLV.
 

Liberty wrote:

She could have tried to talk to Sherlock - maybe a quick threat to kill him or John, to buy her some time until she could talk to him properly.  That may have worked.  It would have relied on Sherlock lying to the police too (which Magnusson does).

I would like to come back to this. There is quite a debate now on whether or not Mary would have been able to beat Sherlock in combat.
I would like to bring up the question of why she does not trust Sherlock. They appeared to get along very well before, and before watching HLV for the first time, I considered them to be friends. As I do not see a single proof for her to be brainwashed (eg she does not appear to be externally controlled or working on instinkt without conscious thought), she must have made the decision not to trust him and shoot him instead.

Why?

But I still wonder why she did not simply talk to him. I mean, he was not a stranger to her, but a friend.

Schmiezi wrote:

As I do not see a single proof for her to be brainwashed

Programmed or conditioned are better terms, but brainwashed is more commonly understood. She was conditioned to do a very special type of work by the government. She would have been programmed to see the world and stimuli in a certain way and respond specifically to them. Any decisions she makes are based on that conditioning.

John would have actually undergone a similar sort of programming to be in the army to learn respect of the chain of command. I came close to going into the army as a medic some years ago and spoke with soldiers about my fear of not being able to succeed because I didn't have the right mentality for the job (I don't like answering to so-called superiors). It was explained to me that one of the first things that happens in training is that you're broken down mentally and rebuilt to have the correct mindset. I know how that sounds and if there are any soldiers here, I expect to get pounced on, but I didn't see this as a negative thing at all, just part of the training.

I remember being told 'soldiers are made, not born' and I suppose the same thing must be true of government-sanctioned assassins.

Mary

Do you think something did happen afetr the wedding and before the start of HLV, that we don't know about?

bb: Hmh. No, I don't think so. I'm afraid Mary's just had her own agenda in the whole story.
What could Sherlock have possibly done to her? 

Last edited by Harriet (September 7, 2014 5:52 pm)

@Schmiezi I've been thinking that she shot him because she didn't feel she could take the risk.  But Sherlock does offer to help, and seems sincere.  She could have told him she did need his help, and to not tell John for 24 hours, and made her escape.  After all, later on she has a similar situation to deal with anyway - Sherlock is alive and could tell, and she ends up threatening him rather than killing him.    Why didn't she do that in the first place?