No they didn't. The train geek said there weren't any sidings etc presumably according to the maps he'd been looking at, but then he remembered the story about an abandoned line and station.

Have you never corrected yourself by remembering something you'd forgotten?

At least one such station exists, although it's nowhere near Westminster. Bull & Bush is in Hampstead (actually not far from the real-life street Sumatra Road) - it had platforms and staircases built but no ground-level station. Gatiss has confirmed in interviews that B&B (and his general love of the Underground) was the inspiration for his fictitious Sumatra Road.

There's a book by Barbara Vine (Ruth Rendell) called King Solomon's Carpet, that has lots of information about the unused tracks and stations, and the story involves a plot to bomb the underground network via these passages.

One place that features in the story is the facade of two houses in Leinster Gardens in Bayswater, which is a trompe l'oeuil thingy built to hide a ventilation shaft. Unless you know it's there it's easy to walk past it without realising it's just a false wall.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leinster_Gardens



http://underground-history.co.uk/images/leinst01.jpg

Agree it was perfectly logical to me, far more so than say a bomber who goes to the trouble of booby trapping a bomb but colour codes the wires. That has always really peed me off.

I haven't checked, but I don't remember him saying anything about an abandoned line, just an unfinished station. Not many stations are on cul-de-sacs.

Yes, I guess we needed to join the dots there, unless you want the script to spell every single thing out for you.

Neither did he say it was built to be on a cul-de-sac. It could just as well been on an intended link between two different lines, which was then scrapped before being completed.

I don't see why it is necessary for the writers to fill in all the details to explain every line of dialogue. If they did, the action would grind to a halt.

And I don't see why it is necessary for viewers to have to invent explanations to solve plot holes.

The switch is more logical than the countdown timer - nobody ever criticises that...

Welcome to the world of 'Doctor Who'!

It isn't necessary and they don't have to. But there's nothing to stop them if they want to.

Neither is it necessary for writers to have to explain every little detail to the hard of understanding when it's glaringly obvious what we are meant to assume.

You obviously want the story to work and are happy to add your own details to it. I on the other hand prefer for there not to be plot holes that quite easily sink the main story line without viewer imagination.

This second episode hopefully will be more to DS FM's taste. I enjoyed the Empty Hearse but I have found the comments fascinating and concurring with Mark Lawson's review.

Illustrating a saying I've seen,

The map is not the territory.

Or on a more historical note surgeons new for centuries that the anatomical diagrams created by Galen were flat out wrong.

One place the existence of unused sections of tracks would show up might be on the kinds of map used by surveyors for mortgage companies. Unlike the unofficial coal mines that riddled parts of Glasgow and eventually resulted in vast quantities of concrete being pumped in to prevent subsidence the kind of tunnel we're talking about in this episode would have left fingerprints in it's planning stages and on official records of that kind. The problem is that they were looking in the wrong place. Which might tie in to how Sherlock managed to fake his death as in misdirection. That's assuming he had managed to fake it and wasn't simply prepared to die to save others.

Interesting that you assume you are smarter than me, whereas I assume you accept lower standards in writing. Jumping to insults rather than having a debate is not a sign of intelligence.

Hold on, lets consider the actual "plot hole" we are talking about here.

We are talking about railway geek guy not telling Sherlock that the neglected underground station under the palace of westminster is joined by a track to the circle line.
Well goodness me! If you find it astonishing that two underground stations (even disused ones) are connected by a track and that you are not told this in the dialogue... well I don't know what to say really.

That isn't a plot hole, it is just assuming people know that stations are connected by tracks.

Moreover I take issue with your point in general. Yes certain things are suggested or left to the reader/viewer to interpret in the majority of creative works.
If you find this too challenging then perhaps it'd be better to give Sherlock a miss until you've completed the John and Jane series.

Seriously Welsh-Lad, you need to think about the position here.
The Sumatra station was disclosed as being built ON the line that the tube train with the missing passenger and missing car was using. There is no mention of additional lines, no mention of additional tunnels, no mention that there is a mystical extra link to a station that was never finished, just that the Sumatra station was built on the main line and never completed.
Your immediate jump to there being extra anything is something you have assumed and are happy to live with in the confines of enjoying the story. I am really happy for you that this is the case. I however who have moved way past the "John and Jane" books (as you so dismissively & rudely put it) expect both literature and video entertainment to provide enough DETAIL in a story that allows the viewer/reader to accept that the story has been coherently thought through.

One additional line of speech in the whole episode taking up a mere 5 seconds stating "The Sumatra station was built as a link station between X line & Y line" would have created an entirely believable option and reason for there to be an additional tunnel for a train car to be sat in without anyone noticing.

So you deliberately look for plot holes? Why do even bother watching TV then?

No wonder Moffat/Gatiss include intense nerdy-geeky fan stuff in their storylines.... there's a wealth of material to work from!

No, not at all. Many people have pointed out plot holes in things that I have never noticed. One such example is the big one in Gremlins, when exactly is it NOT after Midnight. How do you knoww when it's safe to feed them. This was only pointed out to me a year or two ago, but as the story is so very very far removed from reality (unlike Sherlock, which is an exaggeration of a familiar reality) it's far easier accepted.

Do you actually think constructing a station around an existing stretch of rail track is safe? Do you not see that it'd be safer to build a parallel piece of track either intended to replace the existing segment once construction is complete or as a diversion during the construction. Are you completely unaware of diversions on roads whilst repairs and renovations take place. Hell there's an M road near me that parallels part of the A road it replaced. Even then what you're quibling about is the word line rather than track.

Spending 2 years wondering how & starting fan groups to discuss how he survived is nerdy-geeky stuff.
Asking where a magical unmentioned tunnel & section of track comes from, not so much.

Sherlock had specifically said they were looking for an additional line, ie he knew that the car could not be on the main line. So clearly when they found the additional station and realised it was what they wanted, it clearly must have been on another line. So there was no need to say anything else - not that there was any need to say anything in the first place, for that matter, but as it happens they did.

Don't think it was described as a new station, they just said it never opened and therefore never made it on to the maps. The platforms and staircase were completed only.
Also the financial implications of building a new tunnel, rather than just closing the line/track (I've never quibbled over these terms) while the station was built would be astronomical.

BTW, I enjoyed the episode and the humour it had along the way.