There more I think about, the more what Steven, Mark, Ben, Martin, Amanda, Loo say – what any of them say – don’t matter. Just like what Sir Arthur Conan Doyle said didn’t matter.
Sherlock Holmes was a never ending nightmare for ACD. One he desperately wanted to get rid of. From his overall attitude towards the character, it comes off as if he genuinely hated everything to do with Holmes.
And yet he wrote through the eyes of someone who absolutely, unwaveringly and without any reservation adores Sherlock Holmes. John Watson’s love for Sherlock Holmes shines through every line of the stories and it is so obvious. Whether you choose to see it as romantic love or platonic love is up to you but it is undeniable that Watson loves his Holmes very deeply – in a way most of us will never be fortunate to experience. ACD could have easily made Watson less enamored of Holmes in his later work. He could have easily made Holmes seem unlikable even to Watson and yet no matter how much ACD might have disliked Holmes, he wrote a character who will adore Holmes forever. This is why I think the actual content – what it written and what is shown – matters a whole lot more than whatever the creators of the content say.
Steven and Mark say that they never intended for Sherlock and John to be in a relationship. But anyone with eyes can see the very obvious hints and subtext peppered through out the show. We see two characters desperately in love with each other and that is how I will always see the Sherlock and John from Sherlock.
ACD thoroughly disliked Holmes and yet gave us a character who adores every fiber of Holmes.
Moffat and Gatiss kept denying the presence of a love story and yet they gave us two characters who are unconditionally in love with each other.
Bottom line is, what is written and what is shown, is far more important than what the creators think or say.
Flawless.
Sometimes the characters themselves speak, and demand to be known.
Tag: important
Why Theorizing is Hard
(Inspired by this thread)
Back when S4 aired, I compiled pretty much every early meta on TST and TFP and made tables comparing what theories explained what issues. The result? No one theory could cover every problem. None even came close.
So why can’t we write a single unifying theory for all of S4?
After mulling this over for six months, I think there are three reasons why: the different types of problems each episode had, the abundant subtext, and the difficulty of combining partial explanations.
The first problem is that even though we generally agree that S4 was worse than previous seasons, each episode is bad in a different way.
TST is basically logical on a plot level. The subtler subtext (the dog, the boy in the car) fits Johnlock. It comes off as jarring because of the characterization–particularly that of Mary–and unexplained elements that, though they don’t affect the plot of that episode, make no sense in the context of the show. These include the glowing skull and the fact that The Six Thatchers is already a case on the blog.
TLD feels so much better because the characterization is closer to who the characters are. The plot is logical, though a bit hallucination-heavy. It’s also necessary for John’s character development, showing him at his worst in order for him to realize how he must change. The subtext is beautiful; with Faith as a mirror and Culverton Smith as a foil, it’s maybe the clearest in the entire show.
But despite The Hug and everything leading up to it, it still comes off as not-quite-right. Because this time, even though the episode makes perfect sense in the broad context of the show, there are parts that don’t make sense in the context of S4′s plot. Why introduce a hallucinatory drug, and never use it? Why suggest that John isn’t the blog’s author, then never bring it up again? Chekov is rolling in his grave.
TFP looks awful because the plot is a shambling mess. Ironically, the problem with a surface reading of this episode isn’t so much that the plot is bad as that the subtext is excellent. There are myriad scenes that, from John’s or from Sherlock’s perspective, give us insight into their characters. These include Sherlock’s choice between killing John (heart) and Mycroft (brain), or John being stuck in a well (of pent-up emotion).
TFP looks distant from not just most of the show, but also from the type of mistake made in TST and TLD. TST and TLD tried to provide logical plots. TFP didn’t. TST and TLD had surface-level continuity with earlier character development. TFP didn’t. TST and TLD had subtly odd elements. TFP had gaping logical fallacies.
That’s why when we make theories that explain one odd element, such as mischaracterization, plot holes, or continuity errors, we can’t explain the problems in another episode. For example, EMP explains all continuity errors and mischaracterization of Mary, but it erases John’s character development. TFP-as-mind-bungalow explains all problems in that episode, but it creates plot holes in TST and TLD in terms of explaining away Eurus. And Brechtian absurdism/blog theory explains the fact that we have excellent subtext but poor plots, but it doesn’t explain why TFP would even exist (unless Amy has more brilliant meta up her sleeve, which I suspect she does). These are my favorite three theories, all brilliant, but the fact remains that none of them explains everything in isolation.
@may-shepard has put it very well:
I’m comfortable, however, with a different explanation for each episode of s4. I don’t need it to be all tied up in a single grand theory, and, given the radically different tones and appearances of each episode, I don’t think we’re meant to, but that’s just me.
The second problem with developing a unifying theory of S4 is that we’re given so many loose ends and motifs to play with.
Just what I remember off the top of my head:
- Sherlock’s ability to go into a mind palace that looks like reality => EMP?
- TD-12 causing hallucinations and distortions => A distorted retelling?
- John as the storyteller => John’s blog or story?
- The suggestion that John isn’t running the blog/telling the story anymore => Sherlock’s or a villain’s retelling?
- Hints that everything is fake, such as the projectors and literal fourth-wall breaking in TFP => Completely made up?
- Ella’s comment on recurring dreams => A dream or mind palace?
- John being shot but somehow not getting hurt => Garridebs?
- Mary dying ridiculously => A distorted retelling?
It’s not that we don’t have any leads, it’s that we have too many. With the show hinting at a zillion different solutions, it’s impossible to find one theory that fits every hint.
The third problem is that combining the most logical theories is hard.
If we can’t find one grand theory, the next best thing is to have sub-theories that fit together to explain S4 as a whole. Unfortunately, all of our strong but incomplete ideas so far are genuinely hard to combine with each other without becoming ridiculously complicated. For example, a mind-bungalow-inside-EMP situation would explain everything, but half the general audience would walk out in annoyance. My personal favorite, reading TST and TLD under blog theory and TFP as Garridebs, would require some pretty impressive explanations to pull off.
The thing is, there are two standards our theories have to meet in order to be plausible. One is whether the theory makes the show logically consistent. The other is whether the theory can actually be done in the context of a television show, a story–not real life or a pile of subtext with no surface-level plot.
My question, then, is not so much “How is S4 fake?” as “How are Mofftiss going to explain how it’s fake?” How are they going to provide an explanation–an explanation that our various efforts have concluded must either be complicated or have multiple parts–and still keep the audience engaged?
From our perspective, how can we extend or combine our working theories into something that explains the whole season without alienating a normal viewer?
These are honest questions. I hope there are answers.
-soe
(Tags under cut)
Excellent questions! And a really beautiful summary of the problem(s) with s4. I agree wholeheartedly, that the solution will be limited by what can be accomplished in the course of a television series. I know some people won’t agree with this, but I think, in order to be successful, the explanation will likely be something somewhat accessible / non off putting to people who are only following the broad strokes of the plot. In the details, there will probably also be lots for us to unpack.
At least, that’s how they’ve rolled so far. In series 1-3, there were plots and solutions and resolutions, but simultaneously, lots of fodder for going deeper. I mean, people are still uncovering the ways in which they’ve worked aspects of canon, Doyle’s other work, the pastiches, and Holmesian scholarship into the show. None of these easter eggs have, as far as I’m concerned, jumped in and taken over the broad strokes plot, although we could all probably point to a place or two where the broad strokes plot seems a bit (or a lot) hand wavy.
Things that drive us bonkers (Mr. Blue Skull, for example, and some of the tonal shifts) might be left for us to figure out in retrospect, if at all, because they won’t matter to a casual viewer.
I guess what I’m saying is, I am not sure that a full, textual explanation for all of s4 is forthcoming or necessary. My guess is, we’ll get an explanation for tfp, definitive forward movement / resolution in the John and Sherlock plot–the single plot thread that’s been there since the beginning–and we’ll get a bunch of rapidfire details / images / whatnot that will help us work out solutions to the rest, about which there will probably be a diversity of opinion and fodder for much discussion.
OMG YES. Bless this post! I was just trying to say the same thing in this post about theatre of the absurd. I think they want to leave us trying to find the meaning of the themes adressed in the plot, the “broad strokes”
like @may-shepard calls it, instead of having a coherent explanation for the whole of S4.Sherlock himself invites the audience with this choice when he says:
“As ever, Watson, you see but do not observe. To you, the world remains an impenetrable mystery, whereas to me it’s
an open book. Hard logic versus romantic whimsy. That is your choice. You fail to connect actions to their consequences.”We have two clear options; either trying to apply hard logic attempting to make sense of every detail; or just discussing the metaphorical meaning of the themes presented. Our two main characters are in fact symbols of this contrast, you know, Sherlock the mind, and John the heart, even though we know Sherlock is very emotional and John is very clever.
But if you choose the latter, the “romantic whimsy”, the “poetry” instead of the “truth”, you end up turning on its head
the traditional misguided concept that the Sherlock Holmes’ universe was only ever “about the legend, the stories, the adventures.“ We end up questioning the characters’ motives, discussing their inner selves, their fears, their desires, and truly examine if we know “who they really are”. The topic of identity has been hammered all through the show, specially in this series, starting with TAB’s “Who
are you? I demand you speak! Who are you?” to Culverton’s banter questioning John’s medical profession. I just think they’re asking the general audience if they really know who these two iconic characters are. They’re inviting us to reconsider what we think we know from the canon, poiting towards
a deeper analysis of what lies underneaththe
unreliabilityof Doyle’s choice of narration.
Up until now, we could rely both on the story’s logical structure and its subtext in order to understand the characters. But this series exacerbates that
unreliability, just so we can only rely in the story’s subtext.
PSA: If you ship ____ you are NOT
JOHNLOCK/TJLC – a mofftiss-hating freak who fetishises gay couples
SHERLOLLY- a heteronormative homophobic straight woman who is ignoring the Obvious Love
SHERIARTY/ADLOCK – a supporter of abusive relationshipsI’m so done with these angry anons or salty screenshotting accounts. Seriously, if you have the time to send cruel, abusive anons to ANYONE, you also have the time to get off Tumblr and take a break to think about what you’re doing. If you have the time to sift through another ship’s tag, screenshot something that gives them happiness in some form, and repost it on your account with a salty comment to gain attention, ditto. Instead of letting you happiness rest on mockery of someone else, enjoy YOUR ship. The only excuse you have to mock people is if a hater angry-anons your page. I get it, ‘they started it first with their @________ account’ but leave them. If they want to do their harmful shit, ignore them or block them. Don’t sink to their level. I’m not pointing fingers at anyone, but honestly I have left so many of these ships because of the poisonous shit they’re saying about other ships. Thanks.
if y’all wanna have a good time and be educated about this supergirl cast mess and why it matters pls read @chloeniccole’s blog
After S4 disappointment I’m having a hard time watching any previous seasons and I really feel bad about it, like I failed as a fan. I’m still very grateful that Sherlock introduced me to such lovely actors like Benedict, Martin, Andrew – people I must admit I knew very little about before. Is it even possible to still call myself a fan if completely erasing S4 from my mind and pretending it never happened? Or does that make no sense? I couldn’t even bring myself to attend the Sherlocked Con.
Hi Nonny!
Jeepers, did I write this ask to myself while I was sleeping?? Haha!
Well, if that was the case, Nonny, then I wouldn’t be a fan either; I haven’t really watched a full episode since S4, and the only way I can even deal with S4 existing is assuming it’s fake. Just because you “didn’t go to Sherlocked” doesn’t mean you’re not a real fan, that’s so silly; Sherlocked was expensive AF. The moment you become a fan, you’re a fan forever, in my humble opinion. Just because I don’t write Sonic fanfiction anymore nor engage in the fandom, does that mean I’m not a fan? Hell no: I’ll still fork out money for the games if I have the system to play them because it brings me back to the good days and times and nostalgia of it all.
You’re still a fan, Nonny. Honestly, this stigma that “you’re not a real fan if–” is so ludicrous. You do you, Nonny, and you do what you have to to be happy. There’s no such thing as a “real fan”, just “people a little deeper into the fandom than you”. *hugs* Appreciate it for the GOOD things it gave you, Nonny ❤
Hey! I’m gonna throw in my two cents here even though no one asked lol. I’m feeling the exact same way. And what’s comforting to me is realizing that being a fan of something doesn’t have to be an all or nothing thing. You can like something and still criticize it. You can love a character and still recognize that they have problematic points without apologizing for them. You can love an actor and still say “yeah they did do that one shitty thing though.” Same goes with this show.
You’re not less of a fan just because you’re not throwing blind praise at whatever content gets thrown your way 🙂 there are people telling us to “get over it and move on if we don’t like it.” But I would argue that blindly stanning something no matter what happens isn’t what a true fan would do. True fans can still think for themselves and criticize and be upset etc (but maturely, of course ☺️)
And lastly, Id say that being a fan of Sherlock Holmes isn’t like being in just any fandom. Watching this show sparked an interest that made me go read the original books and watch other adaptations. I’ve learned so much from comparing and contrasting the different interpretations of these stories and characters. I love discussing them. These stories are about 200 years old. They’re not going anywhere. So saying that you hated s4, a series whose premise bore almost /zero/ resemblance to the canon mind you, is totally valid. Heck there are casual viewers who hated s4 for that exact reason. They’re not “less of a fan” now.
You’re completely valid in all of your opinions and feelings and you are certainly still a fan if you wish to be 😊 Lots of love 😘
ALL. Of this. SO HARD. Well spoken, Lovely!
Yes to this. I hate that you can’t be critical of things you love/loved. It’s okay to like something but still see it’s flaws.
I may never be able to watch any of the show again, but I can’t get enough of fan art/fics. And there’s so many versions of Sherlock Holmes. Lucky for us Mofftiss don’t own them 😊
for all my sad and confused followers out there…
theres-a-gay-wind-coming added: THIS, ALL OF THIS
shipping-only-reason added: You can be a fan of just one thing. From music to just the actor not the character. Hell just be a fan of 1 season or EPISODE! Where are these rules that you must love it all? And why would it upset you so much. It’s your opinion. Just own it. OWN IT.
k-s-morgan added: I also haven’t been able to re-watch other episodes, but I finally feel an urge to do it, so I think I’m finally getting over the terrible disappointment of S4. And yes, I absolutely ignore its existence because it was clearly made out of greed and boredom, not out of love.
I’m just glad that there are so many of us who feel this way – I mean, I wish s4 had been different, but because there are so many who were disasstified with it, we’ve been able to come together to enjoy fandom in a new way. And as @yorkiepug said we still have fic and art, and if nothing else, fandom has proven time and again to be cleverer and more creative than the writers of BBC Sherlock could ever hope to be! Keep writing and drawing and chatting and imagining all the different possible versions of Sherlock and John – they are what we make them and Moftiss cannot take that away from us!
Yes to all of this
I have Friday dinner-and-British-TV nights with two neighbours and last night they asked to watch Sherlock. I was really not into it–I haven’t watched any Sherlock since S4–but I was surprised at how quickly I was reminded of the things I loved about the show. I am going to go through the whole show with them and see how I feel once I get to TAB. But I am so happy that I can still enjoy the early stuff and the online fan works!
Fandom is not an obligation.
It is not a job. It is not school. It is not a contract. Participation in fandom is voluntary and it is not binding (commissions and paid work aside).
Yes, within fandom you should be bound by some sense of ethics or general decency: don’t steal art and fic, don’t willfully deceive people, don’t be a jerk or a garbage human, and so on and so forth. But everything else? The writing fic and the doing and the participation? It is voluntary.
So if you are writing a fic and you’re seven chapters in and you have eight chapters to go and you’re just tired and you don’t want to do it any more? You can stop. If you’ve been running a blog and writing about every single episode of every new anime show that’s come out and you can’t for three weeks? Don’t. If you told your 5 billion followers you were gonna post a piece of fanart and you’re just sick of it and you don’t want to do it any more? Give it up.
Sure, people will be disappointed and upset and some will complain. But life is disappointing and upsetting sometimes, and it goes on, and no one can sue you for not finishing a fic that they were enjoying the hell out of for free. No one can accuse you of not living up to the terms of your contract when you don’t post that fanart you mentioned three weeks ago. Because fandom is voluntary. It’s something that you participate in because it’s fun or fulfilling or important to you, and when it stops being those things, you should stop, too.
You are not bound by the asks in your inbox. You are not bound by comments on a fic or a piece of art. You are not bound, in fandom, by other people’s disappointments or their expectations.
Fandom is voluntary. Don’t let people pressure you into thinking that it is anything else.
I really need to let this message sink in.
Thinking…
Posts on my dash today about Moffat & Gatiss’s intentions vs. posts depicting scenes from the show with the actors in Sherlock, and the way they’ve played their parts made me think, at first – maybe there is something out of phase in how the writers think about these characters vs. how the actors do… but then I thought, no… that’s not likely.
As much as a it is difficult to place authorial intention at any one locus in a thing like a TV show, if they have always intended that this is a story about the best friends that ever lived, and that the story they’ve told is about how they got to be the men of legend that they are, then I think everyone involved must have known that. So, why is it that the whole story is so outrageously, undeniably romantic, and why is it that I am absolutely positive that Sherlock is in love with John, and that John, though he can’t perhaps embrace it, loves Sherlock, too, and that both of them loved Mary?
Then I thought: maybe the actors really were endeavoring to act friendship. Deep, self-sacrificing friendship, once in a lifetime friendship, and the way they show it on screen simply LOOKS like love. Maybe its that in the imaginations of those actors as expressed by their actorly instruments, those two relationships – deep, true friendship and love – simply express themselves similarly?
Maybe it’s not that there is anything out of phase, it’s just that friendship like theirs LOOKS a lot like love. Maybe the real revelation is how little air there is between the two? How little real distinction.
Just an idea.
Let me see if I can do this. I’ve been up and at it for three hours and I may be out of good words.
Maybe it looks like Sherlock and John love each other because they do. Love and friendship are two words that we expect to cover a lot of ground. Which is why you used so many lovely words to describe the relationship you are seeing on the screen. What if they love each other deeply, steadfastly, selflessly without whatever element is necessary to tip that into the realm of romance?
What would that element be? Sex? Physical affection? Poetry and flowers? An all-consuming desire for one or all of those things? Is it like porn? We just know it when we see it? Or not. If we are being shown all of the elements of a great romance without the actual romance, what does it mean that we are filling that missing element in?
Maybe it’s a gendered thing. I see women speak of their friends in terms that seem very romantic all the time. Maybe we aren’t used to seeing two men behave in the same way.
Maybe we’ve lost the language for romantic relationships that aren’t sexual.
Reblogged because I love these thoughts and want to think more about all of them.
Yeah, I love love love this discussion, and I’ve also been thinking about how to articulate my response. The older I get, the less obvious to me is the distinction between friendship and romantic/sexual love, and the privileging of one over the other (YES, HELLO, TOPIC OF NEXT NOVEL!). And the less interesting/productive/healthy/compelling is the defining and policing of that line. (What even IS that line? Is it, as I suspect, intimately tied to patriarchal imperatives to control women’s sexual behaviour? To own us?) What would our relationships look like if we hadn’t all internalized this, I wonder? What would my life look like?
Maybe that’s one of the reasons I love Holmes in the first place – that line is so blurry, and neither Sherlock Holmes nor John Watson really seems to have a problem with that lack of definition (at least, in my headcanon). And yes, I find this more novel in depictions of masculine relationships, so maybe that’s part of why it’s so compelling.
I agree so much. I don’t see the line so clearly as I once did, and I also I see no point in ANY of the policing. Things are what they are and no amount of policing can change them. Why do we always need things to be so rigidly defined and why are we so attached to reifying the codes that define them?
Also, this is the thing that, I think, makes me not have any problem with the ambiguous, in-processness of the relationship depicted on Sherlock. I love the blurry line and the lack of finished-ness and the uncertainty. I love the vulnerability of where they are with one another. I like that it’s hard to tell where their lines are. I’m not sure I’ve seen male friendship depicted in that way, and I love the sense that it could be both and it could be either. I like that they have refused to define it. It feels like something I recognise. Something a bit real.
I think you’re right, too, about the way we treat sexual relationships vs. friendships and about the policing of that line. I think it is a way of exercising control over what is happening between people. I feel like the whole project is so misdirected, because friendship, love and desire emerge out of our interactions without our control, and it’s pointless to deny their existence when they do. It just makes people unhappy to police themselves and others.
The world is full of tales about male friendships that make it perfectly clear that if it weren’t for sex, the men involved would have no interest in women at all. It’s not Mofftiss’ invention and their show doesn’t even count as a story like that.
The only thing that’s even remotely novel about the way Moffat and Gatiss write this once in a lifetime friendship is that it includes ugly violence and lots of it. Don’t know how you are capable of forgetting that but whatever. No policing intended.
If ambiguity is such a desirable goal and an admirable quality in a show, why don’t the writers and actors say they were being ambiguous about the relationship on purpose? Why do they say it was all gay jokes and fangirls’ imagination?
Also, you must have noticed that there isn’t anything romantic about Sherlock and John’s relationship in s4. Or give me examples of the scenes where Benedict and Martin act in a way that could be interpreted as “outrageously, undeniably romantic”.
I’d love to have an example of a scene where Sherlock does his romantic friendship thing with Mary too. I mean, if the relationships are all equal and similarly ambiguous, let’s see those two have a long staring session and Mary could lick her lips or something. And then John could kick Mary like he did Sherlock, and Sherlock could shoot John and to seal the friendship we should see John and Mary saving Sherlock’s life and being sent away to die as a thank you.
I don’t know what anyone intended, neither do you, but it kind of bugs me when fans try to give the writers depth they themselves never said they had. And when fans pretend that there isn’t anything wrong with the way this friendship is depicted in the show.
Maybe we’ve lost the language for romantic relationships that aren’t sexual.
There’s nothing wrong with shipping and/or wanting your favourite characters to get together in canon romantically and sexually. Nobody’s lost anything because of it. It is, however, possible that something has been lost if Sherlock and John’s relationship is considered romantic after s4.
Reblogging for the last comment.
Can you dislike a show (or the folks behind it) and do it as a good fan?
And more importantly: how?
The Sherlocked con has me seeing several people vocally, publicly express their frustrations both with the event and also the folks putting it on, how they’re doing that. And it’s not that I always disagree. It’s more that the best parts of fandom (the parts I’m most at home with) tend to take a live-and-let-live approach. If pro-Mofftiss and anti-Mofftiss were ships, this behavior would have me feeling more than a bit …. ehhhh?
Only they’re not ships, they’re existing people who have taken specific actions that has RL consequences, so I’m not sure the standards are quite the same.
Still, I do worry we’re keeping people from enjoying a show they can like in a way we once did. Which still leaves me feeling more than a bit uncomfortable.
So: any thoughts? How can you dislike a show (passionately!), even hate the creators, and still be respectful while doing it?
Oof. I’ve been staying clear of a lot of social media specifically because of how I feel in response to others expressing their distaste.
There is a huge differences between “This isn’t what I like” and “This is shit.”
When it comes to ships, I trust my fellow fans to use language consistent with the former. But since series 4, a lot of these same folks have been yelling “THIS IS SHIT” and it hurts to hear. It hurts my squee. It hurts too much to talk about.
Admitting I am still a fan of Sherlock feels like making myself vulnerable to the virulence behind of those more bitterly disappointed. My position doesn’t invalidate that disappointment, and I don’t want to force anyone continue loving something they have abandoned or grown out of. In the end, we don’t have to agree, but it’s appreciated when unhappy fans still leave space for my experience and enjoyment to exist.
I wonder if it’s helpful to draw a division between subjective/objective on the one hand and vitriol on the other? Let me try to unpack that a bit.
I believe objectively a lot about S4 is bad. Quite a lot is good, too; and a lot of people in fandom will disagree with me in that assessment – both in how good/bad it was, but also where certain parts fall along that line. For instance, that movie night-cum-clown horror show scene at the beginning of TFP? Loved it, thought it was really clever and well-done – but a friend who’s actually much more positive about S4 generally than I am, thought it was objectively clunky, just not very well written at all. (This isn’t about whether we liked it, it’s about whether we thought it was good …. cinema? whatever the TV analog is? – though since we’re talking aesthetics and art here, that line can get a bit murky at times.)
My point is: people can have disagreements over the show’s quality and all kinds of objective differences of opinions. I think they have to do it in the right spaces, and when people are more interested in squeeing, luxuriating in the things they did like, they need to realize that’s not directed at them. Squeeage is very subjective to me. It’s this-is-how-I-experienced-the-thing, not this-is-how-the-thing-is or this-is-how-you-should-experience-it. Which is fine, it’s great, subjective is no better or worse than objective. But it is different, and I think fandom is better off when we all make room for the first two (though the third, maybe we’re all better off avoiding?). The trick is context and making space for both, and I don’t think Tumblr really makes that easy.
Then there’s the vitriol thing. Let me be clear: even if you think Sherlock is crap, even if you think it’s so ridiculously crap that anyone who still enjoys it or isn’t burning Mofftiss in effigy is either a horrible person or has ridiculously low standards? Putting that out in such angry terms in mixed company is a really dangerous, tricky, and almost inevitably harmful thing to do. It keeps other people from enjoying the show or the fanworks, and just as a matter of neighborliness that seems unacceptable to me.
Think of it this way. Say someone puts a really controversial painting in a museum. Maybe it’s comething offensive like the piss christ. Maybe you think it’s just really bad quality and you find it ofensive it’s hung next to what you consider quality art. That’s your right. You’re free to talk about that with other patrons who want to have that discussion (though equally, everyone else is free to enjoy the painting without having to talk to you). But if you start yelling about how friggin’ awful it is (but in the best GOTG tradition you didn’t say friggin’), if you’re ruining the atmosphere for everyone and maybe other patrons are having to back off because they just don’t want to be around you? That’s not okay IMO. Even if you’re right. And ditto for fandom.
I’m blathering on a bit, but wat I really want to say (and to @pipmer as well – your comments are very much in mind, too!) is I hear where you’re coming from. I know it can be difficult, but lease know I approve of your right to get excited about a show you still enjoy.
I feel like there is a conflating of threats/bullying/harassment and people expressing anger, disappointment and profound frustration in fandom spaces. Though on some rare occasions those expressing their anger and frustration in fandom spaces may evolve into someone who is directly harassing and threatening those involved with the creation of the media they consume, the two things are not the same, and I think such evolutions are pretty rare.
Direct harassment and threats are never an acceptable way to deal with your anger over something, that is absolutely true. However, expressing anger, disappointment, disbelief or even profound dislike of media creators (Note I am not talking about fan creators here) in the privacy of fan spaces is not the same thing as threatening, bullying or harassing them.
Politely and articulately filing a complaint to a network about your disappointment with a piece of media they aired, and requesting that they do better is not bullying, threatening or harassment. Politely asking content creators to explain their writing choices, or actors on their feelings/thoughts on the characters they play at cons is not bullying, threatening or harassing. Speaking with your wallet and refusing to financially support media that did not meet your expectations is not bullying, threatening or harassment.
Now granted media creators don’t owe you answers, but if they give you answers and those answers suck, and you want to rant about that here, you have every right. And if stans run to twitter and drag those posts out of the privacy of fandom spaces, and bring them to the attention of their faves, the responsibility for any hurt feelings on their fave’s part is the stan’s fault, not the fault of someone venting their anger and frustration on their own blog, and who had no intention of it ever leaving fan space.
Excuse me, but there is plenty wrong about continuing to complain to creators about their work. If you don’t like the creative work they have offered, don’t partake of it. It’s no more okay to insist on “answers” from professional writers than it would be to badger a fan writer.
Why go to a convention to bother the writers about their work? You’re not going to teach them anything. They have no obligation to respond to you or explain their work. Nobody wants to hear your reasons why this or that is wrong-headed, stupid, senseless,or ooc. Nobody cares about your opinion. Enjoy the show or not. But stop harping on about it and trying to justify your rude behaviors.
Plenty of the so-called “constructive criticism” being offered recently in the Sherlock fandom has been thinly veiled insults against the creators and reveals a stubborn mind unable to accept reality. Lots of the “questions” are presented in a passive aggressive manner. The sarcasm and jokes aren’t funny or hip. You’ve created a toxic environment online and irl at cons that we all have to sit in now and I don’t appreciate it.
The show was made, it aired, it’s over. You’re not going to change it no matter how many tantrums you have. This attitude is entitlement at its worst.
Lastly, you are affecting the enjoyment of the show for people who did like it. Constant whining on Tumblr and Twitter for *months* wanting acknowledgement for your butthurt and sending out innumerable posts about how sucky it was ruins the pleasure for others. Why the sour grapes attitude? Why shit all over others in the fandom just because you didn’t get what you want from a television show?
Grow up. Let it go. Move on. You’re irritating the hell out of everybody.
Excuse me, but there is plenty wrong about continuing to complain to creators about their work.
@garunda-dreams-of-rain, firstly, this post specifically isn’t, in any way, about fans directly complaining to creators about their work. It’s actually about the opposite. It’s about fans venting their dissatisfaction in fan spaces, making their concerns about a network’s content known to the network, fans asking polite questions about creators about plot points and characterisation choices that confuse them, and choosing whether they want to support a show anymore or not.
Nowhere did I defend a person’s right to continually complain directly to the writers, producers or crew about the show not fitting their preferences. That would be harassment. This post was in response to people stating that fans venting their anger and disappointment here on tumblr needed to stop because that was somehow harassment of the people directly involved with the making of the show.
If you don’t like the creative work they have offered, don’t partake of it. It’s no more okay to insist on “answers” from professional writers than it would be to badger a fan writer.
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The most interesting tidbit from Arwel at Sherlocked USA
So here’s something I thought was incredibly interesting. Maybe everyone knows this already, but I’m going to say it anyways.
I asked Arwel at the drinks reception if there was some set design or symbol he incorporated into Sherlock that he thought no one had caught or cared about enough.
He gave a delightful answer.
He talked about how he repeatedly used the concept “Information is Power” in His Last Vow because it is exactly Magnussen’s threat. I nodded and mentioned that lovely billboard in HLV. He went even farther to say he’s created his own design to better illustrate the idea. He put the letter “i” and encircled it, like a power button. He said that symbol directly emphasizes “information is power”, like Magnussen and the core problem of HLV – but I quickly pointed out that I’ve seen that symbol in Sherlock, but NOT just in HLV. I told him I saw him put it in The Six Thatchers, too. He seemed surprised that I knew he used that symbol, and that I knew it was in S4.
So if anyone wants to take a look through S4 for more “i” power buttons, you might find some delicious meta there
But elephants are supposed to mean nothing at all, right? Hehe.
Exactly. He knows what those elephants mean. He picked out that “elephant glass” in TFP and put that elephant figurine in John’s flat. He created “information is the power to change 1895” on that billboard. He created that Speckled Blonde poster in ASIB for Papa’s Bubble Bath. None of these things are accidents.
What he *clearly* didn’t expect was some rando at the reception who knew exactly where he put his secret symbols. I said this months ago but yesterday confirmed it for me – Arwel (and maybe others) have genuinely no clue how MANY of us have noticed this stuff. There are tens of thousands of us on this site alone, and people who bridge between Tumblr and other social media sites. I know my stuff goes to Instagram, Reddit, and Twitter because I’ve seen it cycle back to me. Do they seriously not know how connected and devoted the Sherlock fandom is? Who do they think goes to their conventions? There may be only 1,000 people here, but as soon as someone says something interesting, tens of thousands of people are exposed to it online within minutes… because of us.
Guys, I don’t care what you believe at this point about the show, I really don’t. I’m not going to argue with anyone about this because I’ve got better things to do. But there are symbols in this show put there purposefully. This isn’t arguable. What I’ve been trying to do for the last 18 months is figure out what symbols matter and what they mean, and debate them with open-minded individuals. As far as I’m concerned, the time to complain is over. I’ve been very relaxed, letting anyone drag me or my posts for months now, while we threw a collective temper tantrum. So please, if you don’t want to read meta or have any hope for a vision in this show, don’t follow me. No hard feelings, I totally get it. But I’m not going to indulge anyone in debate over whether or not there are hidden symbols/meaning in BBC Sherlock, or whether or not you personally despise the people associated with this show.
Sherlock Fandom Archive 