BBC Sherlock Fan Forum - Serving Sherlockians since February 2012 / An imaginary sister? Sherlock = Eurus?

**Posted by Punch me in the face** January 11, 2017 5:41 pm

Ok, waiting for TFP is currently driving me mad, so I apologise if this sounds completely crazy. I guess I have a wild imagination...

Anyway, I was just thinking about the end of TLD. It ends with Eurus apparently shooting at John.

If Eurus is really aiming at John's head, I can't see her miss her target at that distance unless she's useless with a gun in her hand, but if she's a Holmes, she'd be too clever to shoot at someone without being sure to hit her target.

So what are the options?

>> John manages to avoid the bullet. Well, he would have to have very good reflexes, since it quite catches him off guard, but why not. I mean, if Mary managed to defy time laws and jump in front of Sherlock before the bullet hit him, then John can certainly avoids a bullet.

>> someone (most possibly Sherlock) has a good timing and arrives at that very moment and saves him. Sounds a little bit cliched... but it's a possibility.

Or maybe TFP will start with Sherlock waking up with a start. Waking up from a coma, an OD, an imminent death... I don't know. But Eurus shooting at John in his mind (and John's apparent imminent death) could have the same effect as Moriarty telling him that "John Watson is definitely in danger" in HLV. A trigger.

We don't see Eurus in TFP's trailer, and yet you would expect her to play a big part in it after TLD. Right, maybe that's just Moftiss trying to surprise us.

I thought at first that something bad happened to her when she and Sherlock were kids. That she died (or she was thought to be dead, at least) and that it traumatised Sherlock to the point he deleted her from his mind palace.

I've seen people speculating that maybe she was "mad" and did such terrible things as a child that the parents and Mycroft decided to lock her up in some institute and that Sherlock ended up forgetting about her.

And I find it so weird that she is named "Eurus" (east wind)... If she had existed, and that something really bad had happened, what kind of big brother Mycroft would have been to use the meaning of her name to tell Sherlock scary stories. Above all if he wanted Sherlock to forget about her and delete her from his MP. That wouldn't make any sense...

What if Sherlock made her up? You know, like all these kids who feel so alone that they make up imaginary friends, sisters, brothers, animals... and talk to them as if they were real. Yes, he had Mycroft, but there is a seven years gap. I doubt Mycroft played pirates with him when he was sixteen or something and Sherlock was under 10. And apparently, he and Mycroft didn't go to shool until late ("Both of us thought you were an idiot, Sherlock. We had nothing else to go on til we met other children" >> That means Mycroft was at least seven but he was more probably 10 or even much more because I guess that sherlock, to be called an idiot, had to be at least 4 years old). They had been isolated, and if Mycroft was reluctant to play with him, then Sherlock had no one to play along.

Maybe he imagined he had a sister (a twin?? It's never twins in real life. But it could be twins in imagination...) just as clever as he was. A sister named Eurus in reference to Mycroft's stories (. Maybe he developed a kind of double personality? Schizophrenia? Maybe Imaginary Eurus ended up ordering him to do bad things or to put himself in danger? And that he blamed her?

Which would be when the parents and Mycroft became aware of the imaginary sister and of the danger she was for Sherlock.

Mycroft managed to help Sherlock delete Eurus from his MP and then he was so scared that Sherlock could hurt himself (or others?) again or that he completely loses it again, that he became overprotective towards Sherlock and started surveying all his comings and goings (and now always agrees to play Operation when Sherlock is bored )

Maybe Eurus was a substitute for Redbeard when the latter died or maybe Redbeard was offered to Sherlock to help him forget about Eurus...

The whole thing would explain Mycroft's "Every choice you've made, every path you've taken, the man you are is the memory of Eurus" : because Eurus is Sherlock and Sherlock is Eurus. They're the same person.

Ok, that is completely twisted

Last edited by Punch me in the face (January 11, 2017 9:16 pm)

**Posted by Ichneumon** January 11, 2017 5:53 pm

I love that theory!
But how would you explain John and the woman from the bus? Sherlock imagining John meeting his affair after he deduced it or John told him?

**Posted by Punch me in the face** January 11, 2017 6:00 pm

Yes, right. Well, maybe it was in his head too... Or maybe that woman existed but has nothing to do with the therapist and/or a potential Holmes secret sister...

I have only seen the episode once. Does anyone remember if Mycroft looked concerned while tracking Sherlock and watching him on CCTV camera? Because we couldn't tell if Sherlock was with someone or not, and maybe Mycroft was worried if he saw Sherlock talking to an invisible person? Oh well...

**Posted by Ichneumon** January 11, 2017 6:10 pm

Punch me in the face wrote:
I have only seen the episode once. Does anyone remember if Mycroft looked concerned while tracking Sherlock and watching him on CCTV camera? Because we couldn't tell if Sherlock was with someone or not, and maybe Mycroft was worried if he saw Sherlock talking to an invisible person? Oh well...

Doesn't Mycroft always look concerned when he is looking at Sherlock? That is.. when he is not looking exasperated.

I believe we might see the memory inhibitor stuff again. When it was introduced in the beginning of TLD I expected it to be used on Sherlock (or John) at some point or play some larger role...
But maybe it was used and something happened in T6T or TLD (or even before that, we don't know for sure how long that stuff exists), that we haven't seen yet because the character does not remember it? What if it was Sherlock and while trying to retrieve that memory he also retrieves the memory of Eurus?

**Posted by Lola Red** January 11, 2017 6:35 pm

Punch me in the face wrote:
And I find it so weird that she is named "Eurus" (east wind)... If she had existed, and that something really bad had happened, what kind of big brother Mycroft would have been to use the meaning of her name to tell Sherlock scary stories.

A rubbish one. (sorry, couldn't resist)

**Posted by Rache** January 11, 2017 6:41 pm

Very interesting theory with Eurus=Sherlock. It kind of could make sense but it also would be a kind of chliche revelation, wouldn't it? Well, maybe cliche is ok, depending on how it is done in the end.

And I, too, expected the memory inhibitor to be used on Sherlock or John. Didn't the daughter say it was three years ago, since her father began using it? In the story time-line it would bring us back to a point near TRF. o.O

Last edited by Rache (January 11, 2017 6:42 pm)

**Posted by Ichneumon** January 11, 2017 6:59 pm

Rache wrote:
Very interesting theory with Eurus=Sherlock. It kind of could make sense but it also would be a kind of chliche revelation, wouldn't it? Well, maybe cliche is ok, depending on how it is done in the end.

I already found it a cliche revelation that it was not the secret brother, but the secret sister. It's not like half the fandom already expected Sherrinford to be female. I would honestly have even preferred a male Eurus (played by an androgynous looking male actor) disguising as the bus woman/Faith/the therapist. The reveal in the end would have been much more suprising...

**Posted by Lola Red** January 11, 2017 7:11 pm

Yes, but there is the fandom, and then there are the millions of casual viewers that the show depends on who should also be able to follow ;)

Last edited by Lola Red (January 11, 2017 7:12 pm)

**Posted by NicoleCollard** January 11, 2017 8:09 pm

Mmm, interesting theory, though it sounds too forced to me.
Following your train of thought, Eurus could symbolise one part of Sherlock's mind. Eurus = angsty Sherlock losing control. John said something like "East Wind is coming" referring to Sherlock's return. Could be a metaphore as well. But I think the woman is flesh and blood.

**Posted by Preceja** January 11, 2017 8:19 pm

But how would you explain "the other" mentioned by Mycroft?

**Posted by besleybean** January 11, 2017 8:21 pm

As Euros, this secret sister.

**Posted by besleybean** January 11, 2017 8:53 pm

No, it really wan't...
I just meant as in she is the other one, part of the family sentiment- or lack of.

**Posted by Schmiezi** January 11, 2017 9:04 pm

What an interesting theory!

**Posted by Preceja** January 11, 2017 9:10 pm

British goverment is informed about Sherlock's imaginary sister in childhood and her end ?

**Posted by besleybean** January 11, 2017 9:29 pm

Has she had an end?

**Posted by Punch me in the face** January 11, 2017 9:37 pm

Preceja wrote:
But how would you explain "the other" mentioned by Mycroft?

Well, there has been no proof so far that Eurus = Sherrinford. He could be another sibling, but a real one and not an imaginary one. I know it could also be Something else (we don't know for sure Sherrinford is another sibling)

I was thinking about it again, and some other things make me think that Sherlock tends to have "imaginary" friends (or at least, he talks to John when he's not even here, for example)

In SIB: he is talking to John until Irene makes him aware that John has left.

In TEH: Sherlock hears John mocking him in his head while investigating with Molly.

In TST: he was sure John was sitting in front of him while it was only a balloon.

And above all, in TAB, Mycroft says: "I was there for you before. I'll be there for you again. I'll always be there for you. This was my fault. A week in a prison cell, I should have realised. In your case, solitary confinement is locking you up with your worst enemy"

He can't be referring to drugs. I doubt Sherlock would have been able to take any while in a secured prison cell.

Maybe in Sherlock's case, his worst enemy is no one but... himself. And who knows? Maybe his worst enemy takes the features of Eurus... but also of Moriarty??? ("This is how we end, you and I. Always here, always together")

Eurus (and maybe moriarty) are the viruses in his brain.

Also, he felt unusually at ease with "Faith", you could have thought those two were familiar, had known each other for a long time...

Last edited by Punch me in the face (January 11, 2017 9:39 pm)

**Posted by besleybean** January 11, 2017 9:38 pm

Yes, on the last point.
I felt this, too.

**Posted by Rache** January 11, 2017 11:05 pm

Oh god, it sounds dangerously fitting.
Uhm and I've always understood Mycrofts line '...solitary confinement means locking you up with your worst enemy' as Sherlock being locked up with himself. Have some people been understanding it differently?

Anyway, even if this theory tzrns out to be wrong: I just love this fandom. :D
What an exciting time and all these endless ideas!

**Posted by WhoIWantToBe** January 12, 2017 2:33 am

Punch me in the face wrote:
And above all, in TAB, Mycroft says: "I was there for you before. I'll be there for you again. I'll always be there for you. This was my fault. A week in a prison cell, I should have realised. In your case, solitary confinement is locking you up with your worst enemy"

He can't be referring to drugs. I doubt Sherlock would have been able to take any while in a secured prison cell.

I think they also cut to a quick shot of young Sherlock curled up with drug paraphenalia and young Mycroft soothing him though? I readt that scene as being about the drugs, I could be wrong though.

**Posted by besleybean** January 12, 2017 6:45 am

He's very definitely talking about the drugs, it never crossed my mind that anybody would even think he wasn't.