Sorry if this is a bit thick - but why did Mycroft turn up with an armed unit - I can't quite work that one out?

Accept that the first series wasn't quite like that was it. The first series also had convoluted plots and character development (it had to introduce the main characters and build their relationship for a start).

As Moffat says, it a series about a detective, not a detective series. If you want to watch that kind of thing there's plenty of it about. There's nothing else like Sherlock.

well he woke up and found everybody had been drugged and his laptop which has government secrets in it has been stolen and sherlock and john are gone .

Well when you put it like that .....
I did say sorry if it was a stupid question - what I was meaning though is that even if Mycroft didn't know what Sherlock was about to do ( and I'm of the inclination that he did know), he's smart enough to have figured it out when he woke up; I was slightly puzzled as to why such a large operation to get it back, when CAM was basically thought to be physically harmless - no big deal though; it made for a dramatic scene, and I guess that was the idea!

Thanks, nethwen - now it makes sense.

But I still find it annoying that I have to find out by other means than straightforward explanation on screen. How hard would it be to insert a line of exposition?

And, no, I don't need to be "spoon-fed" every detail - I just like clarity.

the odd thing is - CAM knew that armed services would be arriving shortly , how did he know this ?


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He did mention the GPS in the laptop - maybe he'd worked out it wouldn't take long for them to come and collect it - he thought that was Sherlock's plan; that once Mary's file was handed over, security forces would arrive to get the laptop back?

I'm certainly not trying to claim that it makes sense in any sort of real world, but in terms of the storyline, I think there can be some sort of logic.

As I see it:

CAM is totally confident he has control over pretty much everyone.

Searching Holmes and Watson when he came to Baker St is part of putting his mark on them, making it clear that he is the alpha male. I can't remember his exact words, but it was something to the effect that it was now his office. (Edit. I remember, Sherlock said something like "I thought we were meeting in your office", and he replied that it is his office).

He has relied on everyone being afraid of him. People dare not kill him for fear that what he has on them in his vaults (and possibly elsewhere) will still come out.

When Mary broke into his office, it was not to kill him, it was to get hold of the information he had on her.

On that basis, he has no fear for his life. The henchmen with him at Baker Street were more for show, to make him look powerful.

Sherlock can judge people on first meeting based on small pieces of information. CAM does the same, but uses it as a basis for getting information to hold against them and to blackmail them. I don't see why Sherlock would not realise that, as he could do the same if he was so inclined. As a result, I think Sherlock fully understood CAM's methods. On that basis, the neeting in the cafe takes on a different meaning. Sherlock pretends to think that the glasses are important in order that CAM becomes more and more overconfident. An apparently awestruck Sherlock then basically begs to be allowed to visit Appledore, and is prepared to offer CAM a prize that he cannot ignore (ie Mycroft).

All this apparent sycophancy from Sherlock just strokes CAM's ego and he becomes overconfident. When Sherlock arrives at Appledore, CAM's still confident as he now has even more hold over Sherlock - he's not bothered about the GPS in the laptop, it means he has Sherlock.

He becomes so overconfident that he cannot wait to show Sherlock that the "vaults" are all in his mind. A stupid thing to do, as it now makes him a target. Now it's not only that he can be killed, as the secrets are nowhere else, but he must be killed to that the secrets can never come out.

I know its a bit far fetched, but that's the only way I see that he would open himself up to the risk, ie that his overconfidence and feeling of superiority blind him to the risks and he cannot resist showing off how much in control he is. But at the end of the day it is no more far fetched than the basic idea of being able to learn so much about people just be looking at them.

Maybe Moriarty never left the building, he could be still there.

And Mycroft would have a cast iron reason to search Appledore and take all of the 'information' in the 'vaults'.

CAM says something like 'he's been waiting for the opportunity' and that Mycroft would be pleased with Sherlock.

Eastersundae Good post.

It's my take on it too. And the actor plays Magnusson's gleeful, overconfident, hubris ridden powermad powertrip really well.

Enough for me.

I would like to know how Mary got in the building and got to Magnusson.

but that's the bit that doesn't work - having his men search them only draws atention to it's omission later on . plus its unnecessary , he already shows his superiority over them by arriving unannounced and pissing in the fire , and generally treating them as low-lifes .

I suppose it must have been Janine. She was a crap PA wasnt she?

There's been talk about what kind of team it will be next season: Sherlock/Watson, Sherlock/Watson/Mary, Sherlock/Molly, etc, ?
I talked about Billy before, saying he was not a new made up character, he appeared in 'the valley of fear' and 'the Mazarin stone'. Only two stories but here's how Watson interacted with him in Mazarin and shows Watson lived a life outside 221b:
It was pleasant for Dr. Watson to find himself once more in the untidy room of the first floor in Baker Street which had been the starting-point of so many remarkable adventures. He looked round him at the scientific charts upon the wall, the acid-charred bench of chemicals, the violin-case leaning in the corner, the coal-scuttle, which contained of old the pipes and tobacco. Finally, his eyes came round to the fresh and smiling face of Billy, the young but very wise and tactful page, who had helped a little to fill up the gap of loneliness and isolation which surrounded the saturnine figure of the great detective.

"It all seems very unchanged, Billy. You don't change, either. I hope the same can be said of him?"

Billy glanced with some solicitude at the closed door of the bedroom.

"I think he's in bed and asleep," he said.

It was seven in the evening of a lovely summer's day, but Dr. Watson was sufficiently familiar with the irregularity of his old friend's hours to feel no surprise at the idea.

"That means a case, I suppose?"

"Yes, sir, he is very hard at it just now. I'm frightened for his health. He gets paler and thinner, and he eats nothing. 'When will you be pleased to dine, Mr. Holmes?' Mrs. Hudson asked. 'Seven-thirty, the day after to-morrow,' said he. You know his way when he is keen on a case."

"Yes, Billy, I know."

So it seems that Billy lived quit a few adventures with Sherlock.
I learned in the Timeshift special from the other night that someone made a play based on Sherlock Holmes in 1900. And the actor playing Billy was Charlie Chaplin!
Besides that fact, i think we'll see Billy next season; that's why i include him in the team.


There's been talk about Janine being or not an ally of Sherlock.
I think she is and it's really just the fact Sherlock lied to her that pisses her off at the moment. People have pardonned much worst things from a lover.
I quickly made that after the last episode,
http://imgur.com/KcJ8xVE
Do you think she should be part of the team?

I don't see the problem. Searching Holmes and Watson was never to check whether they were armed. It was simply to say "I can come into your home and do as I please". As it was never about weapons, he wasn't actually searching them in the first place, so to not do it the second time was not an omission.

Searching them on the first meeting was purely to show who was boss. By the time they visited Appledore, he was (in his own mind) already the boss and everybody knew that, so he had no need to prove anything and no need for any show of strength.

If the storyline is based on his overcofidence causing him to let his guard down, then I
think the lack of a search fits in OK.

Edit. I didn't see the searching as being separate from peeing in the fire, it was all part of the same action - coming in uninvited and taking over.

Luke Skywalker: Your overconfidence is your weakness

Evil Emperor: Your faith in your friends is yours

Emperor then gets killed by someone he thought he owns...


Old fashioned tropes in new clothing is all...

And in relation to the Character of Mary...

If Moff/Gatt were happy enough to raid the Dark Knight for a Jokeresque Moriarty (including being captured being all part of the plan) and to use the same allusion for the clown mask wearing bank robbers in ep one this time round, is it too much of a stretch to suggest a baddie seeking a clean slate/a way out of the life she was trapped in is as much a 'theme/character inspired by' piece of the puzzle.

Mary is Catwoman, basically. What she does in 'Rises' needs a lot of forgiveness but she receives it, due to the threat to her being behind her actions. Same with Mary. Unless or until future stories revise that.

well they did search them and they did find weapons , and later on he'd have even more reason to search them because he'd antagonised them and threatened them etc.

Moffat said it was overconfidence and 'it doesn’t occur to him that Sherlock Holmes might just shoot him. He hasn’t factored that in. He doesn’t think people can do that.'
Which is strange since he had an attempt on his life or at least a violent response to his actions.

But i can accept that if i streach a little bit. And if Magnussen was just a blackmailer.
Let's say he was not a blackmailer and just a media baron of international notice. He is that too. I find it weird that such a person doesn't have a metal detector build into his house. And he's a blackmailer too! Why would he say to his bodyguards 'please disconnect the metal detector for Sherlock'.
To me, it is a plot hole but one i can live with.
Still, that's no reason to stop analysing

Sounds like he was planning his own death, creating the exact circumstances in which it would be the inevitable outcome (a man with dangerous knowledge in his head but not stored anywhere else can only hurt Sherlock and those he cares for if he lives to threaten to spill the beans and he had just very specifically made a point of saying one phone call to the right people from him and Mary is a dead woman, which stands even if he is captured).

The game is still afoot, with Moriarty (alive or dead(with his plans creating ripples beyond the grave)) having the Goods on CAM and provoking the same end: die or be made to suffer, and die where your death can be seen.

Or whatever, basically he knew all he had to know, except that someone would be willing to kill him to stop him. Powerful people tend to think they are untouchable. If someone isn't afraid of the consequences of crossing such a person and willing to accept those consequences, powerful people fall.

This is available as a mp3 Empire interview

Thank you for that link, some great pictures there as well.
There I was, fretting for days what Redbeard could possibly mean, and then the explanation turns out to be quite simple and to the point...that'll teach me to go hunting for clues - I will never look at any Gattis tweets again, ever

Bit disappointed though when they say "No-one figured out about Mary" erm, yes actually, loads of us did right from the start!

On a sidenote, I guess one of the problems with Sherlock is that most of us know Moffat mainly as a DW writer, so we go off in all kinds of wild directions looking for extraordinary explanations. (Which is, of course, part of the fun.)

I think I'm going to be watching the repeat on BBC3 tonight - there's been so much discussion over the last 5 days about what some of you have noticed, and I seem to have missed loads. It will be interesting to go back and see what everyone else has spotted!

As a matter of interest, Amanda Abbington was on This Morning today, and mentioned that Mark Gatiss/Steven Moffatt are writing new stuff at the moment. They're hoping to get everyone together this year.

But he wasn't afraid of weapons so it didn't matter whether they found any or not. The point was that he did not fear them because as far as he was concerned they would not dare to kill him, as he had too much power over them. if they had wanted to kill him, they could have hit him over the head with the laptop.

he just didn't fear them, so weapons were not a concern.

he looked pretty afraid when Mary was pointing one at him . He's still human , he can be shot dead .

there's really no need for the first search , imagine if it was left out , would it hurt the story ? the important bit in that scene is his attitude and the pissing in the fire .

but I think we're just going back and forth now , guess we'll just have to disagree on this one
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