Even a ‘’nuisance’ threat could be expensive and time consuming. It’s worth keeping all this in mind when we look for answers. Note: THE THREE GARRIDEBS IS STILL UNDER COPYRIGHT.
Throw a plethora of other films/books at the plot and make it all so unrecognisable that it confuses all who watch it. Sum it all up by placing Holmes and Watson right back where they have always been; who you are doesn’t matter. It is what it is, and it’s shit. Sounds like a pissed off statement to me.
Something changed with BBC Sherlock. Series 4 was very different compared to everything that preceded it, even TAB. The direction, the tone and dare I say ‘soul’ of the show drastically altered. Something occurred that rocked the boat and changed it’s essence. I would suggest that it happened in the summer of 2015.
In February that year there were rumblings that Ben Stephenson was leaving the BBC. A key person in the development and backing of BBC Sherlock. In March 2015 the announcement came that Stephenson was leaving to join Bad Robot in LA. Ben was replaced by Polly Hill in May of 2015 who stayed at the beeb for a year before being poached by ITV. In June 2016 Piers Wenger took over the job. By the time Ben Stephenson left, s3 had aired, TAB was written and filmed. So it was during Polly’s tenure that series 4 was written.
Looking at the three people involved in this chain we go from Ben Stephenson a gay man who clearly recognised the gay/bi goals of BBC Sherlock, to Piers Wenger who championed Cucumber [the LGBT drama that was explicit and very real in it’s depiction of LGBTQ life in the UK] for Channel 4 and who had previously worked on Dr Who with Steven Moffat. Polly Hill in the middle is the more conservative of the three. In the Royal Television Society Journal she is cited as: “If you are Jimmy McGovern, Tony
Jordan, Kay Mellor, Billy Ivory – or,
now, Hugo Blick – it is fine. She gets
popular drama, but she has quite a
closed mind.” The majority of the writers in that list write gritty working class drama, strong women, and historical dramas. Not much LGBTQ stuff. Mark and Steven would have been writing s4 during Polly’s tenure at the BBC. Piers came in just as setlock was in full swing and the handover between Polly and Piers wasn’t complete till TFP filming had finished. I did notice at the BFI event that Steven was uncharacteristically physical and emotional when he was introduced by Piers. [Huge man hug and story of how close they were..a slight air of relief from Steven] We also have to look at the big picture too, and one event under Polly Hill’s tenure: In Jan 2016 Steven Moffat quit Dr Who. Plus don’t forget the cryptic tweet from Mark at the time that Steven was now free from tyranny.
Basically I am theorising that due to the leadership of the Drama Controller at the BBC the direction of s4 changed. But the fuckery clearly continued on Piers Wenger’s watch. As evidenced in the weird to and fro following SDCC.
The change in rhetoric concerning the end of the show. We went from Steven correcting the press over Benedict’s statement of ‘good time to pause’ with the ‘it is not the end, we never said that’, to an official party line of ‘series 4 could be the last we ever do’.
Reduced PR, both before and after s4 airing, for the two leads, including official photographs, appearances at events, joint interviews
Limited press exposure of Ben and Martin when attending an episode screening
Lack of interviews from the cast post airing of s4. Well in all honesty it’s only being Mark out there in the press
Announcement of the closure of John’s blog [announced pre screening] and direction that Sherlock would now be tweeting. But he didn’t, well only in the Kermit event.
Arwel told to explain the ‘elephant’ tweets with a clear statement that they did not tie into johnlock [TJLC]
Ben Caron exiting Twitter
Sue and Steven cancelling the Oxford University appearance
The BBC’s defensive and closed shop replies to complaints about s4
Is it damage control? Is it just one big fuck up and Sherlock got caught in the middle of it all? Let’s face it, this type of thing occurs all the time in corporations, especially if in-house politics are in play and there is rapid turnover of key people. You can’t change administrations without some backlash, back peddling, and backing out of difficult decisions that you see as screw ups. And one thing that clearly is evidence that a corporation is in turmoil is the actions of the employees as they scramble to adapt, correct, salvage, vent, and fudge their way around forced changes that they cannot admit occurred and very clearly pissed them off.
when mild spoilers leak: take this down. we will track your ip address and arrest you if this is not taken down in the next hour.
when the chess promo was leaked: already on your blog demanding a take down in the first 15 seconds of its leak
when an entire series finale is leaked: aww shux. thats a shame. guys! please dont watch this! [link to episode] you’re all good children and we know you wont watch it!!
they announced rosie’s birth in a right wing newspaper and it wasn’t sarcastic
It would have been inconsistent not to have used a right wing newspaper. The entire show takes place in an alt-right vision of London where all the following things are so normalized that most of the world-wide audience accepts them without question:
1) almost all white;
2) women who largely depend on men for agency [yes, even Mrs. Hudson who got her property by remaining in an abusive marriage until her husband died, and yes even Mummy Holmes who gave up a brilliant career to stay home and keep house];
3) foreigners being dangerous and scary [Did you notice that when Mary was acting like a villain she was deduced to be foreign but when she decided being a good wife was everything she became “that English woman”?];
4) LGBTQ+ characters who are all, every single one, untrustworthy and/or weak and/or substance abusers and/or villainous [A broad range of such characters including lesbian, gay, trans or gender-fluid or gender-nonconforming “cross-dresser”, bisexual, pansexual];
5) admirable/decent people who are all straight, so much normalized that the very idea of any of them being involved in a single-sex romantic relationship is a ridiculous joke;
6) governments that cutely spy on and lie and attempt to control citizens without much regard for law or truth and without being seriously criticized for it;
7) a barren prison atmosphere without affection or stimulation for the mentally ill, even a child.
Yes, queerbaiting is cruel and inexcusable, and the show reeked of it. But I wonder whether if more people had made the entire far-right universe of the show the focus of their complaints to the BBC, rather than only “The showrunners made it seem like Sherlock and John would eventually be in a romantic relationship but they never were,” the BBC might have paid more attention.
All great points. And every single one of these were bones I had to pick with Season four, and with the show in general. And many of these criticisms had been brought up as far back as S1.
Though, to speak to your last paragraph, I’m not sure if the BBC would have been more receptive. I know I complained about the treatment of mental illness, the show’s handling of female characters and the queercoding of villains, and got the same copy/paste response as everyone else. In fact, I heard of some folks who wrote in just to complain about the declining quality, and how far S4 diverged from the heart of ACD’s stories, and got the same copy/paste response about John and Sherlock not being in love.
I honestly think the BBC just didn’t care, and they responded to every complaint, no matter how articulate, with the exact same script, so they could just clear out their inbox, and report that they had responded. It was extremely unprofessional, imo.
according to someone else it’s been closed to the public for over a year now X X are you saying they made that up .
It is closed
This is what it says on the BBC website – copy and pasted
“BBC Shop London & Media Café BBC Broadcasting House Portland Place London W1A 1AA Website: Broadcasting House
We’re sorry but the tour of BBC Broadcasting House in London is no longer operating.Tours of other BBC buildings at BBC MediaCityUK in Salford, BBC Birmingham, BBC Bristol, BBC Newcastle, BBC Broadcasting House Cardiff, BBC Scotland and BBC Northern Ireland are continuing. Please find more details here. The BBC Shop at Broadcasting House remains open as normal and is accessible to the public.The BBC Shop is located in the Media Café at New Broadcasting House. The Media Café is off main reception and is fully accessible to the general public. It is also open to anyone attending a recording in the Radio Theatre and sells drinks, light meals and snacks. There’s a great view of the BBC Newsroom from the Café. Our BBC Shop kiosk sells BBC branded products, as well as a small selection of merchandise relating to popular BBC productions like Doctor Who and Sherlock. The Shop is open to the public Monday to Saturday from 11.00am (closed bank holidays).”
This was posted by the ContactSH twitter a few hours ago, and it just hit me after a random thought and I’m not a Londoner, but I’ve been there and isn’t this the exact view from the BBC Broadcasting House?????
Even the angle fits, because we can see the London Eye in the background. I don’t think someone not working for the BBC or with the BBC could get that picture, right????
Excuse this, if someone already mentioned it.
Tagging some people under the cut, because otherwise I would scream into the void.
The Inspire Pro is listed as part of BBC’s aerial photography fleet!
This is the image of it from the front:
I am almost positive that this is the same bird that is shown above.
Note, I know the front lights are red but it is normal for drones. Red lights are warning lights from the front to let people know the bird is headed towards them.
After reading this postI’ve been investigating a bit cause that photo was haunting my soul. And, in my opinion, it could only be done from the BBC building. i am gonna explain why.
– This is the photo on that twitter. We see the clock in that tower thing, and that semicircular building at right. Keep that in mind.
– The photo could be taken from this 4 places. Place 3 and 4 are impossible because from 3 we couldn’t see the semicircular building. and 4 doesn’t match the clock view from the tower.
– So, 1 & 2 (which is BBC) I initialy though it was taken from 1, but I used google Maps a bit more and saw this:
– The building attached to that round tower is shorter so we couldn’t get that clock perspective, clearly from higher a place. So I think it’s from the BBC, exacly from spot 2. Also if you look at the first pic (the twitter one) you can see at left a wall with a pattern that looks exactly like this one in the BBC.
Please let me know if you think it was taken from any other place and why. This is driving me crazy. I am 99% sure it’s from the BBC building.
Signal boosting for less drunker folks to look at and figure out.
Spot two is in fact the only place you could get the shot from.
But- doesn’t ContactSH canonically own a drone? This picture could easily be taken by a drone. I’m not sure of London’s drone laws however, so whether or not this would be allowed- I don’t know. It is however another possibility.
Though to slightly counter my own point, he does immediately tweet after “I’m not going to jump”, so the Sherlock associated with the acc is canonically on the building, however, the person behind the acc may not have been.
Thanks for getting in touch about ‘Sherlock’ episode The Final Problem
recently.
We note your concerns regarding the portrayal of the character Eurus and the
subject of mental illness as featured in this show’s storyline.
While we appreciate your feedback, it’s important to recognise that this is
a fictional drama. Our characters aren’t intended to be representative of all
people with similar conditions, and any individual characteristics and
personality traits are specific to the particular characters and storyline. Although we don’t always condone the things our fictional characters do or say,
it’s important for the sake of the drama that they be allowed to express these
behaviours.
That said, we’re sorry if you were unhappy with the portrayal here and thank
you again for your comments. We’ve put your complaint on a report that’s made available
to all members of the BBC, including the production team of ‘Sherlock’ and
senior BBC management. This ensures your comments and others we receive are
considered across the BBC.
Kind regards
BBC Complaints Team
Ah, so when one complains about the portrayal of mental illness it at least gets taken a Bit more seriously. Of course they Defend their Show, but at least they acknowledge that some people find it difficult. This is a way more proper Response than the others concerning queerbaiting. Quite telling…
I’m concerned that they think some of us may be unaware this is… a fictional drama? No shit there Sherlock (writers), our critiques are that representation matters and strangely enough mental illness doesn’t get the best representation in television. Or LGBT people for that matter.
‘We can only reiterate that the BBC does not accept any of the allegations levelled at ‘Sherlock’ or its writers, and we wholeheartedly support the creative freedom of the writers to bring their vision to the screen…
We do not believe your complaint has raised a significant issue of general importance that might justify further investigation.’
They really don’t think there’s a problem. It doesn’t matter that we’ve complained in our thousands about their poor treatment of lgbt people, the bbc truly wholeheartedly don’t give a shit. so.
I got the same answer. I wholly doubt they’ve read my letter. This is bs.
lmao why the fuck did they ever do that report on lgbt audiences then jesus christ I hate them so much
“Kind regards” my ass
I’m fucking gonna punch them with John.s foot I got back from the well.
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