So there are long posts flying around tumblr compiling questions about plot holes in TFP. Lots of them circle around Eurus: how did she control all the video clips, set up the Garridebs, get across to the mainland and put John in a well, escape her cell and then come back…? On and on.
You can answer these questions if you accept the character as described: She can control anyone by talking to them, so she had tons of people at her bidding, lots of little Eurus minions scuttling around like Oompa-Loompas setting up special tricks and games on her behalf. All plot hole / continuity questions that begin “How did Eurus…” can be answered by saying “She controlled lots of of people, because she can.”
The bigger question, though, is: Why did anyone think it was a good idea to write a character like this?
And what did they do to the rules of the Sherlock universe by creating Eurus?
Well said!!! Mark said they weren’t giving us warm paste, but a villain like that really feels like lazy writing.
yes the betrayal of the Sherlock universe is one of the biggest issues with TFP for me– they break the rules of decent writing both with their magical mcguffin of a character but also by introducing as the solution to everything something which no one could possibly have deduced and offering no explication or exposition for any of the things that happen. The fun of Sherlock doing fantastical things is, canonically, the part where he explains them and they are revealed to be simple logic. Showing us bleeding portraits with no explanation, or magical hypnotist super geniuses whose actions are illogical and don’t add up is just boring- because when there are no rules nothing is fantastic or impressive.
Everything here, and also last comment
when there are no rules nothing is fantastic or impressive
which, together with aesthetic objections, is why I don’t watch zany kids’ cartoons anymore.
It all comes to this really: If you fill your story with romantic tropes and plot twists and you fail to deliver closure for both, you’re a bad writer.
This is sort of a follow up to my earlier post about “The Final Problem’s” self-indulgence and the way the writing ultimately betrays the extraordinary work being done by everyone involved in the production–including, I am about to argue, the actors.
One of the first questions that emerged as I pondered my own response to this episode was: why was I so much more affected by the scene in which the prison governor dies than I was by what I am sure was intended to be the emotional climax of the Eurus-experiments sequence, which is the scene in which Eurus demands that Sherlock kill either Mycroft or John?
Below the cut tag I’m going to talk about why. The short story is that the second scene is the moment where the whole production has to pay the piper for the cumulative effects of Moffat and Gatiss’s bad writing decisions.
So there was a CLOWN and mycroft was going to duel him with his umbrella because it was actually a sword that was actually a GUN but actually it was sherlock’s plan and he was like HEY BRO! and then john was like oh yeah last ep’s cliffhanger? nah just got shot but it was a tranquilizer anyway let’s go back to baker street OH LOOK A DRONE GRENADE
The
annoying thing about S4 of Sherlock is that the show has been telling
you to THINK and look beyond the surface from the very beginning. But when
you do, there is… NOTHING THERE. Plotholes so big you can drive a
freight train through them. And that’s what just really sucks. You can
literally only enjoy this show if you’re not critical of anything, and
above all, DON’T THINK.
But much more importantly, the narrative arcs really suck. And what is a story with bad narrative arcs? A bad story. Sadly.
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