BBC's Sherlock Thread

[Seika]

There was some actual good television in this one.

[Skull]

Hmm, well that was a thing.

[Huitante]

Intense, still I couldn't help but pause on a certain cringy part towards the end. The ending itself was rather touching.

[RoydGolden]

Just finished watching the last episode tonight with my dad.

Poor Eurus. She just wanted to be noticed by her onee-san, but he was too busy playing with another boy to trigger flags for the little sister route.

Seriously though, a great finale with lots of crazy twists and turns throughout. Just about everything was wrapped up satisfactorily (it better be, since there almost assuredly won't be an S5). Poor Molly is left hanging as ever but since a big part of Sherlock's appeal is his inherent ambiguity in regards of romance, collapsing that and just having him be outright in love with her (or anyone, really) would leave a sour taste as well. He clearly felt something for her though, so I could easily see that forced "confession" becoming the stepping-stone to a genuine relationship. Insofar as somebody like Sherlock is even capable of romantic love anyways. Once again, that's the delightful ambiguity of his character!

...What am I kidding, we all know perfectly well his bromance with John is the undisputed OTP of this show. The yaoi shippers cannot be denied!

If I had one critique, it's that the scope of Eurus' persuasive abilities kind of strained credibility IMO. Sherlock's deductive prowess may be outlandish at times but, as dramatized as it is, the show is still careful to make it clear it's actual reasoning at work and not some kind of magic power. Even the mind palace (which probably strikes most viewers as a fantastical invention) is a real-life mnemonic device that humans have used, particularly in ancient times when individual memory was more invaluable.

Eurus' "break them by talking" shtick on the other hand, came across more as a straight-up superpower. Especially since (unlike Sherlock's deductions) the show never bothered to showcase how she manipulated people, it felt less like watching a genius with incredible mastery of human psychology and its weak-points then somebody who just happened to have a magically compelling voice that can be resisted by a certain rank in the INT stat. I find it seriously hard to believe that anything less then an eldritch abomination or hyper-intelligent AI could convince some random person to kill their family just by chatting them up. That's not intelligence or persuasion, but outright mind-control.

I get that they wanted to hype up how dangerous the new and final villain was, but it still seemed like a bit of a stretch by this show's normally (relatively) grounded standards.

[You]

meh

- - - Updated - - -

Hmm, well that was a thing.

actually more this

[RoydGolden]

Intense, still I couldn't help but pause on a certain cringy part towards the end.

What moment was this? Just out of curiosity...

[Huitante]

What moment was this? Just out of curiosity...

The coffin task. Besides of how cringeworthy Sherlock "handled" it, this was way too cruel.

[RoydGolden]

The coffin task. Besides of how cringeworthy Sherlock "handled" it, this was way too cruel.

Well yeah, I did point out how Molly got left "hanging" (literally, on the phone). If it helps though, you can also imagine they actually hooked up sometime after the fact.

[Kratosirving]

s4.e3 contents/slight rant on s4 as a whole

I think the main theme of Season 4 sums it up perfectly, considering how often they kept hammering it home.

"It is what it is"

That being said I didn't particularly enjoy this season, which is a shame considering this is likely the last we'll get of Sherlock. There may be another one-off episode like The Abominable Bride, but I think we're done with the three 90-minute episode seasons now. As for what I didn't particularly like? It's kind of hard to express. It's like, it felt that this season delved off of what made Sherlock good. A lot of the setup was done well, but the follow-through wasn't and therefore the payoffs fell flat.

The Lying Detective was unique in its application and probably my favorite episode of the season when compared to The Six Thatchers and The Final Problem. Six Thatchers started stong with AGRA but than fell off... landing terribly with Mary moving at super-sonic speed to intercept the bullet. I can understand her dying at that point, but have her moving before the gun fires at least, lol. The Final Problem had a beautiful setup with Eurus having just been revealed, tying in the 'east wind' to everything. Sherlock's initial setup to scare the shit out of Mycroft was great and was something along the lines of what I hoped Eurus would do but ultimately did not. The 'reprogramming' talent of hers is never properly explained; how exactly does it work? I can understand suggestion, but it felt more like a brainwashing superpower in the way it was executed here and really took away from her menace. Also, wouldn't she have been able to just 'reprogram' Watson in their therapy sessions in The Lying Detective? Why wasn't that utilized to some extent here? Also, the end result is that she's basically a split personality with the cold, calculating villain that subtly tortured them throughout this episode... and the crying child who just wanted to be loved by her brother, and that is ultimately the one that won out and ended the story so disappointingly? Jesus, my only guess is that Moffat and Gatiss ran out of ideas on how to do Sherlock at this point because the end to Eurus' involvement was a huge letdown for me.

The 'epilogue' part if you will of Mary's monologue and the subsequent shots of Sherlock and Watson rebuilding their Baker St. flat and resuming the business was probably the best part of the episode considering it brought back the nostalgic feel of the earlier seasons and other stories from Conan Doyle. Again, this is most assuredly the end of 'Sherlock' and it was a fun ride while it lasted. I just wish this season had been better executed.

[Huitante]

Well yeah, I did point out how Molly got left "hanging" (literally, on the phone). If it helps though, you can also imagine they actually hooked up sometime after the fact.

I wasn't sure whether she got disconnected before she could hear the following dialogue. I mean, that could have amplified the damage

[Dullahan]

I didn't think it was possible to construct an episode out of pure cringe, but the finale proved me wrong.

[Bird of Hermes]

My ratings of the series so far would be
2>1>4>>>>>>3

A bit annoyed that the series has lost touch with it's grounded roots (but I have elementary for that) but given the series initially small steps becoming more Bond/Bourne at the end of S2 like to outright embracing it here, it was basically the best end the series was gonna get.