I saw a post saying that if Sherlock didn’t mean the ILY, the scene loses all its significance. So here’s the thing: The tests Eurus put them through were supposed to be psychologically traumatizing.
There’s no way this applies if Sherlock really did mean the ILY. Sherlock telling the woman he loves that he loves her is as horrible as being forced to kill someone? Sherlock telling the woman loves that he loves her makes him furious enough to smash a coffin to bits? No.
The whole point of the test was that he didn’t reciprocate her feelings. And realizing that really only takes common sense:
PART 1: CONTEXT
Sherlock knows she has feelings for him. At first he was cruel to her, but around S3, he started being nicer- no longer shutting her down and instead politely ignoring her feelings because she’s useful to him and he owes her after the fall. Over time, he has grown to appreciate her as a trusted friend.
So when Sherlock forces out an ‘I love you’ to save her from being blown up, it hurts. She doesn’t know he’s trying to save her. She probably thinks that this is the only way she’ll ever be able to hear those words from him. Or maybe she thinks he means it, but he knows he’ll have to break her heart later for the umpteenth time. And the worst part is… it was all for nothing. There were no bombs. Sherlock is so furious that he smashes a coffin.
Those aren’t the actions of someone who realized in that moment that he loved Molly. That’s someone who’s had to reject her time and time again, but over the years grew to be kinder, and now just had to throw away all that progress and manipulate her in the most horrible way he ever has.
This even shows in his facial expressions. That first pathetic attempt is not the face of someone who’s going to realize he loves her 2 seconds later. She told him to say it like he meant it. The clock was ticking down and she wasn’t responding, so he ups his game and says it normally.
PART 2: AFTERMATH
As soon as it’s over, he’s relieved he saved her. The aftermath is the coffin smashing, because he’s furious he had to hurt her again when he’s grown from doing that… and it was all for nothing. I’d be pissed too.
Where’s the aftermath in his facial expressions or actions if he just realized he loved her? It’s not there. But all we get with Molly in terms of resolution is a split second of her in an ending montage where everyone is back to normal doing their thing. I really don’t think there’s any significance in the fact that she’s smiling. I suppose it just means we can assume she and Sherlock made up off-screen (which I think is an injustice to her.)
All the main characters were in the montage, that includes Molly. I mean, what were they going to do? Close the show with everyone else happy, but she’s over in a corner sobbing? If her importance was bumped up to that of a love interest for Sherlock, they easily could’ve shown that by having her do more than just standing there and walking in.
PART 3: MEANING
So no, if Sherlock didn’t mean the ILY, the scene does not lose all its significance. In fact, I think if meant it, the scene becomes cheap and senseless, and his actions before, during, and afterwards don’t make sense.
It’s because he didn’t mean it the scene is so emotional and heavy. It’s a cruel play on how much he’s manipulated her in the past and how he’s changed, but now had to do it again for no reason.
It’s powerful because at one point in time, Sherlock wouldn’t have cared if he hurt someone as a means to an ends. But he’s grown. He cared when he realized John was hurt by him faking his death. From that, he learned he can’t just fuck with people’s feelings, that includes Molly. And that’s why it hurts so much when he’s forced to play with her heart again.
I find this way more powerful than if he meant it.
This context and meaning is completely lost on Sherl0lly shippers who block everything else out and only focus on the fact that he said ‘I love you’ and she said it back. They believe it made their ship canon, even though if a ship is canon, it would be clear to every viewer, not just shippers on tumblr. And the creators would likely acknowledge it as well, not suggest Molly went and shagged someone.
Part 4: WAS IT WORTH IT?
While it is powerful and tragic and all, all this scene did was hurt Molly for no reason other than to show us that (as we’ve seen before) Sherlock has grown emotionally since S1.
On a totally surface level (which is how most viewers watch the show) Molly only existed in this scene to be a prop for a man’s emotional pain. On a surface level, she wasn’t treated with respect by the writers. The fact that Moftiss went in a room and whipped this out when they were told to change the scene should tell you that. I really feel like they didn’t give two second’s thought to what this would do to Molly.
The problem is that for 4 seasons, Molly’s most definable character trait has been her crush. Yes, we know she’s a pathologist, but she is still known first and foremost as the girl who likes Sherlock. They took that concept, dragged it out for way too long, and then threw it in her face by making her cry into the phone and admit something she wasn’t ready to admit.
I, for one, don’t think showing us Sherlock has grown up was worth emotionally destroying Molly. Especially since we’ve seen his growth demonstrated before, and she didn’t even get a resolution.
Even minor characters don’t deserve to be used as props so blatantly at their expense.
Why does the idea persist that John has PTSD? He demonstrably doesn’t have PTSD.
He has the opposite of PTSD. His characterization hinges on the fact that rather than needing to process fear and trauma, John needs more fear and trauma to be psychologically healthy. Mycroft diagnoses it in ASIP, Sherlock cures John of his supposed PTSD with danger and fear, and his supposed limp with running and jumping over cars. His symptoms only come back when he gets so bored and restless that he gains 7 pounds and takes up cycling (at least a bit of daily danger in an urban environment) to try and cope.
Why take it as read that John has PTSD?
Hmm I might have to question this a bit. Sherlock certainly improves his symptoms in a ideal way only fiction can possibly muster, but John does rather show a lot of traits commonly found in sufferers of PTSD, the ASIP night terror notwithstanding. It’s nothing so explicit as his breaking down into a non functional state, but his bouts of ostensible anxiety, irritability, aggression and yes the hand thing, the thing that is a clear giveaway everytime John is in a truly uncomfortable situation, one he doesn’t feel control in (unlike those moments with Sherlock in the face of danger where he does) are all, when together grouped easily as remnants of a mild to severe anxiety disorder likely stemming from, if not PTSD.
Given that away from Sherlock, his fictional stabaliser, his drinking increases (curly dad says: there’s a subtext with John’s drinking), depression, his night terrors return and his temper is shown to break quite a few times via shouting or violence, I’d say he is a right candidate for PTSD. PTSD doesn’t demonstrate in everyone in a universal fashion, and in this case in place of actual treatment we suspend out belief to allow Sherlock himself to be John’s medicine. John may very well not have experienced his trauma in the height of battle, which may be one theory as to why it manifests like it does.
See, the thing about this story: John did not have a night terror in ASIP. We thought he did off the bat, because that is how a normal person would react in his place and that’s what it looked like, but the story then corrects us.
John doesn’t cry after his dream because the dream scares him, he cries because he woke up. His current situation, alone in a bedsit with a limp, a tremor, nothing to do and no enemy to fight, scares him. Being awake is the terror, not the dream.
You say “his night terrors return”. His dream about Sherlock in HLV actually underscores my point; those aren’t night terrors, they’re happy memory reels. He dreams about the good times with Sherlock, then wakes up miserable and shouty.
Everyone thinks John’s traumatized by what he’s seen in the war, but he isn’t. That’s a major point in his characterization. Seen terrible things? Yes, dreadful, far too many. Want to see some more? OH GOD, YES.
John is not a normal person. He pretends he is, much the same way Sherlock pretends to be a sociopath, but neither of them are being completely honest. They both project what they wish they were, but cannot be.
I can argue that John doesn’t have PTSD because his characterization and the plot of the entire show demands it, but I don’t have to, because Mycroft tells us that John doesn’t have PTSD. And John agrees with him, which is why he stops seeing his therapist about it. When he does see his therapist again, it’s about something else. (Grief.)
John wasn’t traumatized by the war. He misses it. And now he’s addicted to Sherlock and his battlefield. That’s who John Watson is.
No PTSD …. Yes!!! By losing his job, John thinks he’s lost his utility too. That’s why he is depressed.
I agree. And I seem to remember that Martin does the “hand thing” in other films as well, so it is not necessarily to be read as a symptom of John’s PTSD.
And another aspect: John is a doctor and soldier, but I think in order to feel really useful he has to be a doctor under stress, under extreme conditions. This is one point of the Bainbridge shower scene in TSoT – John is back in his element, saving lives under dramatic conditions instead of diagnosing strep throats in his surgery.
Who remembers the series 1 fandom theory that it’s not Sherlock who has sociopathic tendencies but John?
Misses the war, hates being alone when he’s alone but thinks most people are arseholes, hugely impulsive, charming yet grumpy, puts on an act of being civilised and socially acceptable but calls his new friend all sorts of terrible things, coolly murderous at a moment’s notice…
Then there’s the mini episode, in which Sherlock made it clear that John’s friends don’t really like him.
The BBC version of John Watson cannot get unrehearsed words of sincere affection out, is drawn to an assassin, text cheats with another woman after becoming a father, rages against Sherlock to the point of beating him up, abandons his baby while grieving and giggles at crime scenes when nobody “ordinary” is looking.
It’s absolutely nothing like ACD Watson, and it’s an unpopular view, but there is a consistent line for BBC John’s character if you squint in that direction.
Yuuup, I’m in the very small camp that John beating Sherlock up isn’t /that/ out of character. (With what we’ve seen on BBC Sherlock). An over exaggeration maybe of what John should have done in that situation, if I was writing directing I would have toned it down a bit. Anyways, at the time of the episode airing I didn’t think it was off until I saw everyone on tumblr talking about it.
That is to say what John did was a load of hot garbage. All the pressure and other shit that was going on doesn’t excuse it. But yeah, it’s not completely unbelievable.
Remember in TGG when John and Sherlock are having a small argument after Sherlock shoots the wall? Then this would lead to Sherlock insulting John and his blog, and John would walk out to meet Sarah, right?
Here’s the fight as it takes place.
John’s face says it all. He’s pretty offended by Sherlock’s words, and he has a right to be. He ends up leaving for Sarah’s, and once he sees news of the explosion on TV, he races back to 221B to find that Sherlock is okay.
In fact, Sherlock’s talking with his brother Mycroft right in the middle of the singed living room.
After Mycroft leaves, Sherlock immediately takes a case from Lestrade.
The important line here, as ever, is the line that gets me every time.
“I’d be lost without my blogger”.
(Love it!)
But see, Sherlock is saying this after he’s basically trashed a bit on John’s blog. For him to say this is contradicting and doesn’t make sense, right?
Wrong.
When I first watched this episode, I didn’t quite catch it; I only saw it as a great line. This realization didn’t come to me until now, after a few times of watching the episode.
Guys, Sherlock was apologizing to John.
Some people say that Sherlock apologizes for the first time in the show to Molly, at the Christmas party in ASIB, but that’s only partly true. Yes, that was the first time he says sorry explicitly and openly to a person.
But this is his way of showing his seemingly nonexistent feelings,
i also love how chill modern john seems now like…he at least has a pretense of humility, you don’t see him dressing up much and such, but then shspesh john has his heavy lidded eyes and condescending eyebrow quirk and thumbs in pockets and pelvis thrusted forward, like we get it, your boyfriend is hot and so are you
“There’s a little joke in there about Nurse Cornish, who’s named after the Cornish boatman,” Gatiss revealed, “who famously, when Conan Doyle’s being rowed across a river in Cornwall, this man says ‘do you write Sherlock Holmes?’
“And he said yeah. And [the man] goes ‘he was never the same after he came back from the dead, was he?’ So he was the first kind of critic.”
“He was the first comment section in the world,” Steven Moffat deadpanned. (x)
John’s POV is like months flying by at a time in a blur with little detail and then you got Sherlock’s POV as 5 minutes of freudian self-reflection that feels like 90 minutes to the average human
Therapist: What about his brother? John: Mycroft? He’s fine. I mean, obviously normal and fine are both relative terms when it comes to Sherlock and Mycroft. Therapist: [Chuckles.] Obviously. But, I didn’t mean Mycroft. I meant the other one. John: Which other one? Therapist: You know, the secret one. John: Oh, that was just something… I said. I’m sure there’s… [He pauses.] How did you know about that? I didn’t tell you that. Therapist: You must have done. John: I really didn’t.
Images 1–5 above: From The Lying Detective, starting at approximately 1:02:58 Image 6: Zoom in on reaction of female agent in background when John first says the word “brother”
First of all, I need to make it clear that this catch—and it’s a great one—1000% belongs to @discordantwords. Not me. The only reason I’m building out a new post instead of reblogging the original is because when I saw the stills I went “Eh, maybe?” but when I saw the video I went “Woah, YES.” So this felt like something that needed a gifset.
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