When the Series 4 episode titles were first released, I was unsure what to think. Why would the creators of Sherlock name an episode after something previously mentioned in the series if not a direct callback to it. Hadn’t the final problem already been addressed on the rooftop of Barts Hospital? Was this somehow a clue into some sort of deeper meaning to that conversation before Sherlock fell? To be honest, it hadn’t hit me until this very moment what this episode title could actually be referring to.
I am a strong believer that TFP is occuring in John’s mind, there’s no way they would end on a cliffhanger with John being shot and then have him be totally fine, just having experienced a low level dart gun. The red rug that surrounded his feet in Eurus’ therapy office symbolized blood, and I don’t think that we should disregard that quite yet.
In The Reichenbach Fall, Moriarty says
Sherlock solves this predicament with the fall, but what if, at the end of TLD, John has the same problem.
The Final Problem is stayin’ alive and that is exactly what TFP is. John trying desperately to find a way to stay alive in his little old mind bungalow.
In His Last Vow, the thought of John pulls Sherlock up and back to life, in The Final Problem, Sherlock pulls up John.
It’s just Sherlock and John with a problem, the final problem, stayin’ alive.
do you ever randomly remember that Sherlock’s sister and Moriarty tried to dry hump through a glass pane and it was like a whole scene that was actually filmed and exists
Thought: It has been 7 months since S4 finished airing.
Now BBC ONE tweets a gif of John asking about the “color of mirrors” and tagging it “#thursdaythoughts.”
Remember how in S4, E2 we saw that billboard (being carried past) announcing a new series set to air “March 8″, and we waited for March 8, and it came and went?
March 8, 2018, is 7 months from now…on a Thursday.
EDIT: AND GET THIS SHIT…IT’S BEEN 221 DAYS SINCE EP4 AIRED.
What in the fuckery
Okay Now it’s 1am and I am thinking….In seasons past didn’t the show air in the US later than in the U.K.? But this year we got them airing on the same day. Could mean nothing, but it’s still interesting 🤔
I think it’s meant to be left open to interpretation by the individual viewer. For me ambiguity of is-he-or-not means their intent was NOT (especially with the Moffat denial, so…). John does return back to the flat with a briefcase, which means he goes there after work at least, perhaps having Sherlock babysit the baby, given the change of the furniture in the flat AND Sherlock’s comfortableness with her in the montage. I personally think, if taken at face value, John’s not living there (they’re watching the creepy mary dvd at John’s flat, and it still looks pretty furnished), but working his way up to it.
Tinhat me, though, believes that TFP is John’s TAB, and the ending montage is John’s “this is as good as it will get” imagining of their situation, to the minimum of what John desires for a relationship with Sherlock – solving cases, having friends, and raising a child together. John just wants a life with Sherlock, but he fears he’s never going to be allowed to have it ever again.
k-s-morgan said: Just to add – in the later interview Moffat said they do live together. So never pay attention to his words.
Oh absolutely. I’ve stopped listening to what Mofftiss have said about the show ever since they denied Johnlock LOL.
IMO the text itself implies that they live together– they’re rebuilding their home together, and raising Rosie together, whereas their friends are shown as guests. I know that Moffat and Gatiss will probably always deny this, but I just don’t care… They wrote it this way, and that’s what matters to me.
Also, the speech “now that I’m not here, I know what you can become, because I know who you really are” (followed by “but that doesn’t matter, what matters is the adventures etc etc” so it’s made clear that Mary is referring to a more private aspect of their relationship and not the “detective and blogger” public personae) is blatantly pointing to their romantic attachment.
Only the text matters, and they know what they wrote, no matter what they say now (maybe to keep the Conan Doyle Estate happy, maybe for other commercial reasons). It’s a shitty and cowardly way of doing it because they’ve validated the homophobic readings of their show, but it’s there, right there, and it’s canon.
tfw your kid has deep-seated issues with water since your other kid recently drowned his best friend but it would still be a shame to skip a beach holiday
EURUS: Oh! Have you had sex? SHERLOCK (continuing to play the tune): Why do you ask? EURUS: The music. I’ve had sex. SHERLOCK: How? EURUS: One of the nurses got careless. I liked it.Messy, though. People are so breakable. SHERLOCK (still playing): I take it he didn’t consent. EURUS: He? SHERLOCK: She? EURUS: Afraid I didn’t notice in the heat of the moment and afterwards … well, you couldn’t really tell.
there is so much to unpack here i dont know where to start, first of all ‘nurse???’ mary was a nurse, but you know who john called a nurse once? sherlock
second, the nurse got careless which means eurus/john took advantage of them. plus the fact that eurus/john didnt really know what gender they were which is also a dead giveway of how bad john feels about his bisexuality and his feelings for men and sherlock, he thinks he’s a demon who would break and hurt his lovers because he thinks it’s wrong to desire ‘bodies’ like that, deep down he hates himself for his sexuality, a depravity that makes no difference between genders because in the end, all that is left is pain and misery. eurus/john likes the act but the aftermath of the shame and the guilt makes it unbearable.
and finally, this is a very clear callback to culverton’s confession about loving to make ‘people into things’.
If Mycroft watching the film that devolved into a family video isn’t a
dream, and is something set up by Sherlock, then why do we see these
images spliced in?
Yeah, he could be pulling a major Shezza….
But that would mean he’d have to know all along about Eurus, and exactly who she was pretending to be. And he’d have to be keeping John in the dark about it…why? So John could be put in the well and Sherlock could have his heart-to-heart with Eurus? Every time I try to figure it out right now, my brain tries to fall into a hole, and I have to go to work. Wish I had more time atm.
I mean, of course this whole thing could be a dream and Eurus could just be a figure of someone’s imagination, but. Ugh…this stupid fucking series.
Ever since Sherlock series 4 came out, collectively we were like “what the HELL is this?!?! This doesn’t make any sense!” BUT after many months of tossing ideas around the fandom, we have made theories that could explain the weirdness, but nothing we can all agree on. Now, this meta here may be absolute garbage to you, but I believe, in my heart of hearts, I’ve solved it. Please read it in its entirety with an open mind before you reblog it just to tell me I suck.
Thanks in advance, you da best
Paige
Here’s the short version: Sherlock actually jumped at the end of The Reichenbach Fall, just as Doyle intended him to die. Gatiss and Moffat said they are correcting something in this adaptation that no one else has gotten right before. Many of us assumed the homosexual romance was the one thing they were changing, but we were punched in the face right after The Final Problem came out. Gatiss and Moffat are changing the sacrifice. Holmes was intended to die for his friends but Doyle needed more money and rewrote the series after “The Final Problem”. That turned Holmes’ sacrifice into a cruel joke against Watson. This is what BBC Sherlock is fixing, and we’re about to see it come to fruition.
I know many theorists despise the homosexual reading of Holmes and Watson, while many people in general despise theorists on this site. That’s fine, I don’t care how people feel about gay theories and/or TJLC and its followers. But I’m here to tell you TJLC, at its core as a concept, was right. You may hate Moffat and Gatiss, you may think Sherlock is a piece of shit show, and that’s fine, you do you. But hear this one meta out, please. I think even the hardest skeptic can at least apprectiate the thought and logic behind this.
@the-7-percent-solution What about John’s blog? It mentions the wedding, and Sherlock and John talk to each other in the comments.
I feel it would very complicated to explain the whole S3 if it was EMP as well… for instance, why would Sherlock ‘dream’ about Magnussen?
But that “open your eyes” bit??… I haven’t gone back to the episode to hear it and I have chills down my spine already. They told us, but we didn’t listen??!….
I was thinking about that, too. Why does the blog update.
But Paige, You’re awesome and it’s an awesome theorie
The blog, in my opinion, should be looked at like the original Doyle canon. The canon had flaws – like Mrs Hudson changing names or the fact that there were two James Moriartys. The blog, like the originals, are mostly written by Watson. There is no reason to believe the blog is absolute truth. This unreliable narrator was rampant in the originals (if that’s what you’d use to explain the major inconsistencies), therefore why should we assume the blog to be an honest representation of what’s happened, when the original text is not? We already know the dates are occasionally messed up. It’s just as flawed as Doyle’s version. And that’s the whole point. You can read the blog as symbolic – which i think you should – meaning the cases are mostly 2-leveled metaphors. “Happily Ever After” and “The Geek Interpreter” take on a whole new meaning symbolically.
It’s just like in Doyle’s canon.
/Perhaps one day the real story may be told/
Also, @sherlocking-out-loud Magnussen is a representation of the media – can you IMAGINE what would happen if the media got news of Mary’s true identity? Can you imagine what would happen if the media knew of Sherlock Holmes’ homosexual secrets? This is why Magnussen, when threatened at gunpoint, told Mary “but what about your husband?” and the fact that her husband (John) is so English and honest. Magnussen, the blackmailer, knows a secret that will topple Mary’s life and make John leave. What this really is is the media getting ahold of the true homosexual love story, outing John, and knowing “it would break him”. John, who can’t handle others suspecting what he is to Sherlock. That flashdrive is everything she’s ever done – Magnussen getting ahold of that file is like the media seeing all the homosexual proof of the last 120 years.
Magnussen asks John if he’s read the flashdrive. John refused to look at all the proof of Sherlock’s gay love. Magnussen thinks that’s a pity – he thinks John could get off on that kind of stuff. You know, the wild assassin (gay) life he’s always been attracted to but told himself to stay away from.
I like that when they rebuild their life together at the end, it’s theirs. It’s not John moving in to Sherlock’s apartment, it’s them (re)constructing it together – keeping what works, what they like, and presumably letting what doesn’t work go. I loved this little moment.
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