#or just watson being the unreliable narrator he is

[moonlightandpalmtrees]

I’m always so fascinated by how Watson accidentally became an interesting character. He was supposed to be a blank slate! Narratively he’s just there to follow Holmes around and ask questions

and then stuff just. Kept being added and we slowly start getting the outlines of an interesting character seemingly by accident. His army time ptsd, his war wound, his relationship with his brother, his want to follow Holmes around and solve crimes with him + his insistence that he’s not that interesting and he’s sooo normal, him canonically telling us he’s an unreliable narrator in the sense of changing names and then all of ACD’s story inconsistencies accidentally creating ‘the game’, “three continents Watson” + how the hell many times has this been man been married, him canonically being a hunk, his gambling problem, the fact that the fanon of his middle name being ‘Hamish’ is so well accepted because ACD forgot his first name, the list goes on

[ogsherlockholmes]

I've been thinking about trying to form my own sort of order of the Holmes canon (yes, I've been very inspired by other current Holmesian content) since I'm trying to get back into the annotations that I used to do and I'm at a loose end as to what to do with my life at the moment, but I really find it difficult to read the stories as examples of chronology, if that makes sense.

I've obviously been proven wrong time and time again as many people have wrote their theoretical canon chronologies, but part of me seriously feels that that's impossible. If they were supposed to have an order, ACD/Watson would have wrote it that way (again, my own personal opinion, I'm not trying to impose rules in the fandom because that would make all this boring). But, since he's our favourite unreliable narrator, he mixes up dates, changes them- sometimes he tells us, sometimes he let's us figure it out for ourselves.

There's the whole idea of the game, the 'true' meaning of the Holmes books and what ACD was trying to tell us. I, of course, am inclined to think that the mysteries aren't the main story, it's Holmes and Watson's relationships that are supposed to be focused on, so dates just aren't important to me. I don't believe Watson when he feels the need to include exactly when something happened, because it looks like he's establishing an alibi. Diverting attention from something.

And, I don't know, maybe I am taking it too seriously, but half the time I read the 'cases' and I doubt they even happened (as in, within Holmes' London)- a good example is obviously The Blanched Soldier wherein two men are kept apart from each so they don't endanger their reputation... a very diluted version of events, I know, but a brief example of my feelings on this. The cases are metaphorical, symbolic- cover ups.

I'm being extremely cryptid because I'm reevaluating my reading of the canon, and finding it surprisingly easy to ignore virtually everything Watson tells us to find a deeper story running through it all (not that there's anything wrong with serial crime stories- that's why I started reading in the first place).

I plan on actually forming a little bit of work on this- I doubt it'll go any further than this blog, but it'll be entertaining nonetheless, and I hope that at least a few people will understand where I'm coming from.

[contact-guy]

Really want a Holmes adaptation where, like in the text, Moriarty is referenced but never definitely appears, and it’s an open question whether he is real or a self destructive invention of Holmes……I think there’s a case to be made that Holmes wanted to disappear (because Watson got married??? Just a theory) and made up the whole thing, which is very in keeping with his tendency to pretend to be sick and injured and generally to have elaborate schemes he doesn’t let anyone in on. (And Holmes only comes back once Watson’s wife has died or dumped him which LENDS WEIGHT TO MY PREVIOUSLY STATED THEORY THANK U VERY MUCH)

IN GENERAL I really want an adaptation that engages with the unreliability of Watson as a narrator and Holmes’s tendency to hide the truth! When the narrative is being written by one of the main characters - AND when every single story is about uncovering hidden truths - that’s an open invitation to the reader to question its veracity!!!

[gregorovitch-adler]

My thoughts about The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes:

Let's start by summarising the movie -

No crime-solving happens in the first 34 minutes. The first act is all about Holmes and Watson's dynamic, exploration of the nature of their relationship with each other, etc. If you're the type of person who only watches/reads Sherlock Holmes for the cases, you'd believe this portion is skippable. Only the blink-and-miss detail about the "Midgets' case" is important as far as Holmes' detective work is concerned.

However, if you think exploring Holmes and Watson's interpersonal relationship and their casework are both equally important, like I do, the first act is GOLD. Most of the Tumblr gifs about this movie are from the first 30-35 mins lol.

1.) Holmes enters and they bicker like an old, married couple.

H: Oh, come now, Watson, you must admit that you have a tendency to overromanticize. You have taken my simple exercises in logic and embellished them, embroidered them, exaggerated them ---

W: I deny the accusation.

H: You have described me as six-footfour, whereas I am barely six-footone.

W: A bit of poetic license.

Not only is this whole scene just delightful in general but the theory about Watson being an unreliable narrator in ACD canon is actually being supported throughout the movie, starting right here.

--

W:It's those little touches that make you colorful...

H: Lurid is more like it. You have painted me as a hopeless dope addict - just because I occasionally take a five per cent solution of cocaine.

W: A seven per cent solution.

H: Five per cent. Don't you think I'm aware you've been diluting it behind my back?

This exchange was lovely. Way to slip in their closeness through a few words.

2.) Watson doesn't think it's odd to barge right in when Holmes is completely naked and taking a bath?

Also, why the hell does Holmes bathe with his bedroom door wide open?

And what's that thing he's taking a bath in called? Does anyone know about this stuff? Was this thing common in that timeline? It doesn't seem to fit a grown man like Holmes.

I have so many questions and I'm speechless at the same time. I'll just drop this here:

3.) Then Watson persuades Holmes to go to The Swan Lake ballet.

Watson enjoys that ballet, a little too much at that, mostly because he's staring at all the women on stage. (We'll get back to this later.)

Holmes on the other hand has dozed off. All he can admire about the most beautiful dancer, Petrova, is her strong arches. Which is... 🏳‍🌈

Then that whole scene about Nicholai and Petrova and Holmes in the dressing room. XD

Petrova offers a Stradivarius violin to Holmes in exchange for sleeping with her for a week, so that her child would be beautiful like her and brilliant like Holmes.

Holmes gets out of the situation by lying to both of them; saying he's in a relationship with Watson.

Honestly, that whole bit. Just look at the lines:

N: She has been dancing since she was three years old, and after all, she is now thirty-eight.

H: (gallantly) I must say she doesn't look thirty-eight.

N: That is because she is forty-six.

And:

Nicholai: (about Tolstoy) Too old --- Then we considered the philosopher, Nietzsche --

H: Absolutely first-rate mind ---

N: Too German --

Etc. They're all so funny. This whole scene is something else.

In fairness to Holmes, he did try to get himself out of the situation by lying about having hemophilia in his family, or saying that he's unromantic because he's English, etc but Petrova was having none of it.

Watson coming into the room all of a sudden gives so much clarity and calmness to Holmes. He just knows what to say to help himself because of Watson.

This unforgettable exchange:

N: You mean, you and Dr. Watson - He is your glass of tea?

H: If you want to be picturesque about it.

On a side note, I absolutely loved Nicholai's face journey throughout both scenes - in the dressing room, stuck in the middle of Holmes and Petrova's awkwardness, and later on when he asks about the alleged Holmes-Watson romance to Watson after having spread the rumour in the whole room.

I just loved his reactions a lot.

According to this movie-

Caprice of Mother Nature = Gay.

Half-and-half = Bisexual.

Watson comes to know about the rumour, after having had the time of his life with both men and women in the ballroom. Watson is pissed off, he goes home and confronts about the whole thing to Holmes.

They have a row at Baker Street, in which Watson is being extremely heteronormative again. Thinking too much about his reputation without stopping to question his own feelings and his weird fixation on Holmes' love life.

There's that famous line again:

W: Holmes, let me ask you a question. I hope I'm not being presumptuous -but there have been women in your life?

H: The answer is yes -- you're being presumptuous. Good night.

Awesome.

This marks the end of Act I.

The existence of these 33 minutes of the movie is proof that the writing team in this adaptation knows that exploring Holmes and Watson's characters and what they mean to each other is as important as Holmes' casework. Billy Wilder takes this seriously, even though there are some jokes here and there about it.

The whole of Act I is filled with raising questions about Holmes and Watson's preferences, etc. Does Holmes feel love or is he just a machine? Does Holmes feel love for Watson? Does Watson know about Holmes' feelings for him? Does Watson feel the same way about Holmes?

In my opinion, all the answers to the personal questions about Holmes are as clear as a day. What's really questionable is whether Watson knows and/or feels the same way about Holmes or not. Different viewers might draw different conclusions/inferences after watching this movie.

After this, the movie takes a turn because "Gabrielle" enters the picture, and the actual crime-solving begins from here. The tone becomes a bit more serious in this act.

A young woman, completely wet and in shock enters 221 B. Watson has to pay for her fare to the cabbie before he and Holmes take her upstairs to take care of her.

She can't remember anything at first, then from her wedding ring, Holmes gets to know her name: Gabrielle Valladon. Her husband's name is Emile Valladon.

She appears to have temporary amnesia because of getting hit on the forehead and almost drowning in the Thames.

She reveals info about herself that she's from Belgium, her husband was here in London for a job, they used to write to each other, and after some time, the letters from her husband stopped coming. She'd gone to the London police first after coming to this city. She says the police had advised her to consult Sherlock Holmes.

Now, this should make the viewer skeptical of her. Scotland Yard does consult Sherlock Holmes when they need him, but they aren't going to let him have the whole case if there's a situation like this.

Besides, that woman ending up at Baker Street specifically seems to be planned, anyway. Also, there's always this man who keeps waiting for her or someone else's signals on the outside.

I know what we see on screen comes from Watson's drafts on loose pages, but this movie's narration seems to be Third Person Omniscient POV to me. Where the viewer is privy to more information as compared to the characters.

The three of them keep looking for her husband's whereabouts, and she pretends to be helpless, needy, and fragile (to stroke the ego of the men around her, I believe. I mean that could be one of the reasons...) with temporary amnesia throughout most of the movie. Holmes and Watson don't suspect a thing about her as they keep working for her and she keeps sending cryptic messages to the "Trappists" (German government) with her parasol.

The thing I love about this act:

Ilse von Hofmannsthal aka Gabrielle Valladon is actually a competent character who happens to be a woman. We can see something shady is going on with her even though we don't know her real name, but one of the most brilliant people on the planet doesn't suspect anything. He thinks she's just a woman looking for her husband's whereabouts. He thinks her back story is real.

He keeps on thinking that until Mycroft basically tells him in the third act which is why we're able to see for ourselves that Ilse was genuinely able to outsmart Holmes. We don't have to be told by the narrative voice about Ilse's strengths (*cough* unlike BBC Sherlock and a lot of female characters written by Steven Moffat *cough*).

I, for one, felt respectful of Ilse or "Gabrielle" for real. It was quite refreshing to me after having watched some modern Holmes adaptations.

Holmes, Watson, and "Gabrielle" go looking for the cause of Emile Valladon's death after they've found his coffin in the graveyard, in the guise of having a picnic. Holmes and "Gabrielle" pretend to be a married couple - Mrs and Mr Ashdown, and Watson is their valet. The scenes after this point are delightful mainly because of Watson's reactions (which could be read as his jealousy over Holmes, too).

Also, me when Holmes calls Watson 'John' in an archaic Holmes adaptation:

Because of his sort of stupidity, Holmes takes Ilse, a German spy, right in front of the submersible (which he thinks is a mechanical 'monster' that lives underwater) in a boat, along with Watson.

Ilse was trying to grab as much information as she could about that secret project because she was working for her country. Who knew someone would show her the live version of that model so readily (albeit unknowingly)? :P

The three of them are obviously unable to find anything about Emile Valladon, so they go back to the inn room they're staying in.

That's when one of Mycroft's men comes to pick Holmes up and take him to his elder brother. Here's when the third act begins, I think.

Mycroft had warned Sherlock not to pursue "Gabrielle's" case any further during the second act. But Sherlock didn't listen, because a.) he's an empathetic man, and b.) Mycroft can't just order him to do or drop something just because. Sherlock is not a child anymore.

I know Mycroft was only trying to protect Sherlock, and that he couldn't have told him the real reason to stop him at that time, but still.

Either way, months of planning and testing the submersible have gone to waste because Holmes did not suspect at any point that his client, "Gabrielle Valladon" might have just been lying to him since the start. Can't blame Holmes for that. Ilse was meticulous.

Mycroft shows the model to the queen and she strongly disapproves of the model and curses it a lot. Personally, this seemed to be a shitty decision on her part, and I felt so frustrated and annoyed at her in that scene. She didn't even care to hear about its features. She just rejected it on the spot! :(

Mycroft decides to 'give the submarine' to the German government. It's implied that the Trappists were drowned along with the submarine itself in the deep waters. (That's what I gathered from that scene - correct me if my interpretation was wrong).

In conclusion, while Ilse is genuinely able to outsmart Holmes (unlike some writers forcing us to believe it in their adaptation because they told us so), the German government isn't able to go anywhere with the info they've gathered through Ilse because of Mycroft's last move. Moreover, the English government would have sent her to jail, if Sherlock hadn't suggested Mycroft send her back to her own country.

So, in the end, it's a lose-lose situation for all of them.

1.) Sherlock Holmes didn't know that Ilse was faking her name and her whole identity for a long time, so he unknowingly helped a German spy, thinking he was just helping an ordinary client. Ilse almost had him and the viewers could see for themselves that she'd outsmarted him.

2.) Even after Ilse von Hofmannsthal has got what she wanted for her government, as a spy, they aren't able to make use of that info because of Mycroft. And she has to get out of England anyway.

3.) Mycroft Holmes also fails, to some extent, because ages of effort to plan the submersible, hide the plans, and test the model in secret - all of it has gone to waste. The queen doesn't even want to hear him out in the end.

But even if it was a lose-lose situation, the battle was damn intriguing because of the high intellect on both sides - Holmes brothers and Ilse.

Months later, Holmes receives a letter from Mycroft about Ilse's arrest and execution by the Japanese government. Reading that, he's so moved that he can't even finish his breakfast. He gets up and asks Watson for his cocaine supply. Watson tells him, and then Holmes grabs the bag and goes to his room. Holmes shuts himself in, Watson gets up from the breakfast table too, sits beside the fireplace, and begins to write something on a piece of paper. Probably about the case, but for nobody to see.

End of Act III and the movie.

--

I loved the background score of this movie. It's quite touching and refreshing to listen to.

A lot of dialogue exchanges in the movie are so deep if you stop to think about them. It's unbelievable how much writers can convey through a few words. Some of them are quite funny too - particularly from Act I. There's a thin line between being funny and mocking, and TPLOSH didn't cross that. It was nice.

I love this portrayal of Sherlock Holmes. It's clear how deeply they've understood him from the original canon. Pretends to be dismissive and closed off but actually cares about everyone way too much.

I also liked Mycroft in this movie, even if he didn't have much screen time.

About Ilse von Hofmannsthal - I loved her. Seriously, this is how you write female characters, modern writers! People say ASIB is a direct adaptation of TPLOSH, which is true, but I'd prefer TPLOSH over that episode any day, and one of the reasons is the way the female lead has been written in the former. Not exactly a fan of how Moffat wrote her in his adaptation. He did her dirty, I'd say.

Characters like Ilse make me think that the writing team of this movie knew what feminism is. I can't say the same for the modern Holmes adaptation that has been heavily inspired by TPLOSH.

I loved the plot of this movie too. The case in itself was also pretty interesting and kept me hooked throughout. Even if it wasn't exactly resolved finally, and the ending was melancholic.

I wasn't expecting the movie to be this good. Which is why it took me so long to sit down and watch it.

I only have one complaint about this movie - Watson's characterisation.

I mean, Watson wasn't half as bad as I'd expected (I thought he was going to be horrible, based on the snippets of the movie I'd seen before), but still. I like how he doesn't fall into the bumbling idiot stereotype. As far as the casework is concerned, Watson is also quite competent and observant in his own right. He can handle the medical work too.

I've got problems with his heteronormativity, and the fact that when it comes to deducing what lies in Holmes' heart, he's dumb as bricks. It's annoying. Like, it's one thing if he doesn't feel the same way about Holmes, but he doesn't have to be so weird and homophobic about it. Also, I think Holmes should've told him about the truth related to Ilse and the 'mechanical monster'. I've had enough of 'keeping Watson in the dark for his own good', damn it! He should be more in the knowledge.

Watson's character was the only element in the movie that didn't receive justice from the writer. As a Watson-centric fan, I need this to stop happening in future Holmes adaptations. People should see more from his POV too, and stop to actually see where he's coming from, and properly understand his character in the next show/movie/whatever they make.

What I gathered from the movie about the characters and their interpersonal relationships-

Holmes is in love with Watson but doesn't admit it... for valid reasons this time. (side eyes at Watson's homophobia).

Watson is deeply attached to Holmes but sees him as a close friend. I wish he felt the same way about Holmes in this movie, but alas! Though if he doesn't feel that way about Holmes, why the hell does he seem so jealous of Ilse in Acts II and III? This is beyond me.

I think what they've tried to show is that Watson is too close-minded to confront his possibly repressed feelings for Holmes, deep within his heart? Maybe. It could very well be my wishful thinking lol.

But as far as Holmes' feelings for Watson are concerned, it's not even wishful thinking. It's just... right there. I wish the subtext about Holmes' pining were spelled out. I know why it couldn't (the Doyle estate was being a pain in the ass at that time), but still. It's quite clear what they wanted to write as far as Holmes' emotional side was concerned, but they dropped it from the scripts after Act I and decided to focus on the case instead.

Holmes is dismissive of 'Gabrielle' at first, but he becomes sympathetic for her after some time. He reaches out to help her with her situation, and as the plot moves forward, he grows affectionate for Gabrielle/Ilse, which is why he doesn't hold a grudge against her when he realises he's been outsmarted by this woman (even though his ego was mildly hurt for a while).

The way they maintained a balance between the plot and the characters is commendable. I love seeing well-written women in fiction and this movie showed me that.

I was surprised to see how good this movie turned out to be, as compared to my preconceived opinions. The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes has officially become my comfort movie now. Miles ahead of BBC Sherlock, in my opinion.

Thanks to my discussions with @jamielovesjam in a previous post about this movie lol. I wouldn't have wanted to watch the movie if not for the long talk I had with them. Also tagging @gaypiningshit and @helloliriels for further discussion.

End of my unnecessarily long rambling.

[victimsofyaoipoll]

Round 4

Joan Watson

How were BBC Sherlock shippers so rancid about a WOMAN who wasnt even in the SAME SHOW?????

Martin Freeman of BBC Sherlock insulted Elementary and specifically Lucy Liu in the press. He straight up called Lucy Liu a "dog" in an interview APPARENTLY as a joke, because calling female actors ugly is hilarious. Benedict Cumberbatch was more measured about it, but he still said he was cynical about Elementary because it would lose the "male friendship" dynamic, which of course Johnlock shippers used against Joan Watson fans. Even the lead BBC Sherlock actors got in on the yaoi victimization of Joan Watson... 😔

she wasn't even in the same SHOW as the yaoi I've been convinced she deserves to win the entire poll. I was a Johnlocker but I did watch the first season of Elementary and it was fine????? It was totally okay????? Especially in hindsight given how hard Sherlock season four flopped. Also Lucy Liu is a queen and deserved zero vitriol for *checks notes* playing a character???? A fucking fictional character???????? Oh my god we were all SO mean to this show and we (or at least I) thought it was like The Good Fight™️, like we were defending BBC Sherlock against copyright infringement and straightwashing and Jonny Lee Miller's bizarre scarf, (it wasn't a good scarf I do stand by that) but then Elementary didn't make Holmes and Watson a couple either???? And also it didn't insult its audience constantly etc etc we've all seen the Hbomberguy Sherlock is Garbage video. This is really long sorry hashtag justice for Joan Watson.

Misa Amane

she gets treated in-canon the way fandoms treat female characters that Threaten an m/m ship. it's like, "oh why don't you go sit in the corner and be pretty, misa, while the Men have intelligent conversation and pretend they aren't ten seconds from fucking each other, doesn't that sound nice?" it's infuriating. and MAYBE it's better now but i remember her getting treated the same way in fanfiction too, like we all need to do just as badly by our female secondary characters as fucking tsugumi ohba, but with the added insult of making her be alternately oblivious of the relationship between light and L or actively trying to sabotage it—incompetently, of course, because god forbid misa be allowed dignity or moments of cleverness.

she's one of the first characters I think of when I consider old school fandom misogyny. The annoying bitch and clingy crazy gf allegations were AFTER HER ASS. She's also a lot more intelligent than people gave her credit for, but most seem inclined to take the Very Biased word of our unreliable, narcissistic narrator and his homoerotic arch nemesis and claim that just because she's bubbly and into romance that she's also a complete moron. Which is blatantly untrue. Everyone was afraid of Misa girlbossing too hard. Killing people and devoting yourself to the deranged twink of your dreams even though you know he'll never love you back??? Having a hardcore goth aesthetic and being so Hot even literal Death Gods are into you?? God forbid women do ANYTHING!

Not only is she the victim of yaoi culture, she is the victim of early 2000s misogyny by an author that wanted to introduce a girl character because he knew his male rivals were getting too homoerotic. She is a goth bimbo icon who portrays what I think is one of the few callouts for stan culture and what parasocial relationships can do to both the stan and the idol. The fact that she is a toxic fan of Kira and also hot, funny, sociable is tragic in its own way, which I think the author did try to touch on but was too misogynistic too really get through. Of course, she was reduced to villain status by the fandom and anime alike because she got in the way of the supposed romance in their psychological horror anime.

[anneangel]

Timeline of the relationship between Sherlock Holmes and John H. Watson!

*I had already posted this, but I deleted. I found new information as flipped through my books. So, sorry who had rebloged the previous post that I deleted, but I prefer to delete and rewrite CORRECTLY, ok?

1881 - Sherlock and Watson meet each other, through for Stamford. As per A Study in Scarlet.

1881 to 1886 - Both continue to live together in Baker Street.

1887- Watson tells us that will marry a woman, whose name he never tells us. As per, The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor

1887- Watson is married to a, no name, woman. Although his friendship with Sherlock remains and Watson even stays at Baker's when his wife is out of town. As per The Five Orange Pips.

March, 1888 - Watson remains married to an unnamed wife, according to A Scandal in Bohemia.

September, 1888 - Watson meets Mary Morstan, falls in love with and becomes engaged to her, as read in The Sign of the Four. There is no mention of what happened to the previous wife, apparently he didn't have any children either with her (I think it unlikely that she died, after all Watson never mourns her, and is soon engaged again without bereavement). It's almost as if this previous girl did NEVER exist.

1888 or 1889 or 1890??? - Watson married Mary, as read in The Adventure of the Stockbroker's Clerk. Watson says his marriage took him away from Holmes. But curiously there are some cases after his marriage where Watson is with Holmes and makes no mention of his wife (strange, isn't it?)

*that's confused me in the post I deleted, regarding the date of Watson's marriage to Mary.

Watson mentions one of his weddings being in the summer/spring and another in the fall/winter. But he does not deign to say in which he married Mary. Having met Mary in September, if he married her in the same year then it was autumn, but if he married her in summer then it is 1889.

Still, Watson says that his marriage and return to the medical profession took him away from the Holmes cases, however there are some cases where he seems to live on Baker Street in 1888 and 1889!! And this confused me earlier, whereupon I said that perhaps he was married in 1890, for how can he be married in 1888 or 1889 and also live with Holmes? Lmao.

Yes! It could just be Watson/Doyle being an unreliable narrator. But do you agree that it leaves room for doubts and assumptions/subtext?? correct?

1890 to 1891- The point is that Watson married Mary, because in The Red-Headed League, which takes place in 1890, he is married! Well, as he mentions his marriage in The Final Problem, allegedly stating that his marriage alienated him from Holmes, a case that takes place in 1891, where Holmes supposedly dies.

1894- Holmes resurfaces, and we are briefly informed that Watson's wife has died, apparently he had no children with Mary. So he returns to live with Holmes in Baker Street. As per The Adventure of the Empty House.

1895 - They aren't on Baker Street, aren' t in London, Watson refuses to say why. They weren't out on a case! (Coincidence or not, this was the year of Oscar Wilde's trial who, although married and with children, was condemned for his relationship with men). They are back in end of April and July in the The Adventure of the Solitary Cyclist case and The Adventure of Black Peter case. But travel to norway after that. Return to Baker in September, as seen in the case of the Bruce-Padington plans case.

1894 to 1901 - Time they lived together in Baker Street again. In that time, Watson stops practicing his profession and sells his medical clinic (at Holmes' request), Watson does nothing more than follow Holmes on cases and write them down, curiously Holmes keeps Watson's checkbooks with him (not there is no explanation why, although assumptions are made that Watson had problems with overspending or bet) and Watson helps Holmes get off drugs too! As per The Return of Sherlock Holmes book.

*p.s: in the year 1896 there are cases where Watson says he does not live in Baker Street, as for example in The Adventure of the Veiled Lodger. However, these cases ALWAYS have narrative inconsistencies. And to other cases in 1897 where he LIVES with Holmes, as per The Adventure of the Abbey Grange.

Yes, Watson/Doyle is a miserable and unreliable narrator because many cases have DATES or DATA and inconsistent FACTS that don't fit, so that it's impossible to organize the 60 cases in chronological order, there comes a point where we get out of accuracy and we have to start to ASSUME/suppose/imagine where some several cases take place. As someone who has tried to organize, believe me, it's a never-ending headache, which is why there are different lists of Timelines. So I'm ignoring Watson's inconsistencies as a narrator in order to claim that he lived with Holmes from 1894 to 1901, okay? I'm just putting here the dates given by Watson that don't have apparent contradictions.

1902 - Watson left Baker Street, for reasons he does not tell us. Claims to live on Queen Anne Street. Although he still takes part in Cases and Turkish Baths with Holmes, as per The Adventure of the Illustrious Client.

1903 - Last cases. Sherlock regrets that Watson has left him to marry a woman (another nameless wife of Watson), so the detective is left alone to investigate the cases. As per The Adventure of the Blanched Soldier. And Watson returns to practicing medicine with a good clientele as per The Adventure of the Creeping Man.

1907 - Holmes is retired. He lives with his bees and a housekeeper he doesn't talk to much. He gets along well with the director and teachers of a school close to his house, to the point of visits, walks and swimming on the beach. Sherlock says he sees Watson on weekends. As per The Adventure of the Lion's Mane.

1908 to 1913 - Watson claims he rarely sees Sherlock, because Holmes prefers to send short telegrams rather than letters. Watson continues to write old Holmes cases whenever Holmes lets him. As per The Adventure of the Devil's Foot (which takes place in 1897, but Watson does just tell us until after Holmes is retired).

1914 -The last appearance of both at Canon. Date of the First World War. Watson had not seen Holmes for about 2 or 3 years, he thought that Holmes had become a hermit with his bees. But Holmes was actually undercover as a spy for 2 years on matters involving the war. As per His Last Bow case.

P.s: In the post I deleted mentioned that Watson got married 3 times and claims to have experience with women on 3 different continents. While Sherlock says he has never loved, has no interest in women and has his body as an appendage and is against emotions that undermine his reason. What they both think in terms of homoaffective relationships cannot be exposed since it was a crime at the time. Watson explicitly exposes to the public a fact that he is Heterosexual while Holmes seems to fit in Asexuality. However, narrative inconsistencies, narrative omissions and errors leave gaps for subtexts. Watson also admits to omitting data and facts that could expose clients or Sherlock and himself. So this also adds assumptions for subtexts.

[surfpent]

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Archive Warning: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Category: Gen

Fandom: Dream SMP

Relationship: Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit

Characters: TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF) Wilbur Soot

Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Historical Horror Immortality Scientist Phil Watson | Philza Inspired by The Magnus Archives (Podcast) Implied/Referenced Suicide Blood and Gore Psychological Horror Post-World War II 70s Amsterdam along with various other locations and decades Wilbur Soot and TommyInnit are Siblings Period Typical Attitudes Ambiguous/Open Ending Wilbur Soot is Not Okay Unreliable Narrator Specific TWs in Chapter Notes Supernatural Elements activates jonathan sims voice statement of thomas innes regarding his brother mcythalloween2024

Summary:

All he knows is that neither Wilbur nor he have aged since Autumn of 1943.

Or, well— it’s possible they are aging, just not on the surface. This is a hypothesis of Wilbur’s, also regarded whilst heavily intoxicated, which deters Tommy from giving it too much thought. His brother’s demeanor often contradicts said hypothesis anyway; he acts less like a man approaching his thirties and more so the role of the eighteen year old he’s supposedly trapped in.

“No point in being immortal if you can’t bend a few rules, eh?”

“I’m quite certain second degree murder is considered more than bending a few rules, Tommy.”

“In the eyes of the law, maybe.”

Wilbur coughs. “You see my point.”

“But what about God, Wilbur? What about His eyes? They’re all seeing ‘n shit.”

“I don’t think Big Man in the sky approves of it either.”

Tommy faces him with a blank stare. “Does that mean I’m going to Hell?”

@mcyt-halloween @swedisheek

[alltingfinns]

TEH, part 3

I wasn’t sure how much there was left after the bonfire scene but apparently there’s about a half hour left, meaning these parts are in neat thirds.

I write as if anyone else knows what I’m talking about when these drop randomly once a year or so.

Sherlock remained more in focus from John’s perspective.

Still so cute how Sherlock immediately must hustle his parents out when his crush heterosexual former roommate shows up.

Mum putting her foot in the doorway in case there was any doubt who’s the “sherlock” of these two.

“Your parents? Your parents? Those were your parents?”

John who desperately wants to understand Sherlock. How much he would have wanted to interrogate them, I’m sure. But then he has to giggle at the absurdity of the Holmes brothers having such (seemingly) ordinary parents.

And then the hurt. “Did they know too?”

“So that’s why they weren’t at the funeral!” Because if they had been, John would have recognized them now of course. But also he probably thought they had died or something, making their existence as ordinary people even more shocking.

“Wasn’t working for me.” If Molly and John not mirrors then why this exact line. Why not “Well, everybody hated it” or “Didn’t fit me” or “Kept tickling my lips”.

Just saying. Plenty of options.

“Last night” “Too nebulous” goes on with the case.

There’s all the likelihood that, like with Sherlock’s survival, the writers just didn’t care who put John in the bonfire. They just wanted John in the bonfire. So that Sherlock could heroically rescue him.

And yes I was thinking about how this episode takes place “today” as in 5th November as in Guy Fawke’s Day. (Though the cool kids call it John Johnson’s day.)

Am I just that Johnlocked that I find it adorable that Sherlock angled the laptop so that John would see more/be more included?

Sumatra road is 28 minutes by car from Westminister. Definitely not below it. Gotta take some creative liberties for those sweet canon references.

Why hasn’t Moran just left town entirely? Oh well.

A bit of illegal breaking and entering as people walk by without giving them a second glance. That’s big cities for you.

I forgot how far they have to go through this.

Love that John got to comment on the demolition charges.

Ah, I get it! Moran still has to be in like radio range or something.

“Why do you think I know what to do?” Really, Sherlock? Really?

“And a soldier, as you keep reminding us all!” Sherlock why are you being so petty, you love him being a former soldier.

051113 is the bomb code.

I just love the line “Use your mind palace” because it makes me think of how intelligence is weirdly used as a superpower in media.

Also that you can vaguely hear Sherlock saying “off” as he’s panicking with his hands around the bomb.

John is so fucking smart but also maybe he also just has faith in Sherlock being clever enough. But anyway just cutting through the bullshit, this is a trick.

Maybe Sherlock is underhanded here. But John finds this sort of stuff difficult.

So here we get John Watson’s version of Dean Winchester’s purgatory prayer. “Of course I forgive you”

This explanation is definitely unreliable narrator. Sherlock wasn’t quite as in control as he likes to portray himself so of course he makes it out otherwise. But he’s convinced that Moriarty died but again: A. Singular. Body.

This explanation means that it was John that most importantly had to buy it. Possibly because close friend, with medical certification who Sherlock nonetheless felt he couldn’t trust the acting skills of.

I think this scene happened (more or less) and sometime after the proper end to the episode. But like even Anderson(Philip) noticed that the explanation is lacking.

Sherlock laughing like the utter little shit he is.

“There’s always an off switch.” Say that to the undefusable bomb. Although technically it did have an off switch, it was just too complicated to be tried without knowing the proper sequence.

Getting John to laugh even when he’s angry with him.

They really are the right kind of wrong for each other.

Mycroft being les miserable. XD

“Weddings. Not really my thing.”

You’re going to be planning and arranging the whole thing you miserable bastard!

A difference between Molly and John. She went for the suspiciously similar substitute, he went for (what he believed to be) the exact antithesis.

Oh my little lestrolly heart at Lestrade asking if Molly and Tom are serious. Although he is likely doing it because he is the one who would comment on the elephant.

“Real life is rarely so neat.” The goddamn bonfire.

They’re literally saying that the one true explanation for Sherlock surviving is that John asked him to.

“Time to be Sherlock Holmes.” *wears the damn hat*

Sherlock’s mind palace is certainly nicer than Magnussen’s.

[user-needs-new-hyperfixation]

Hello, can I ask what do you mean "in canon it's impossible for Sherlock to settle down with a woman"? Like, as a fan of Holmes and always read the books since middle school, I'm kinda confuse here, I don't mean anything negative. Sorry, do you think Poirot (from Agatha Christie) is also queer?

Maybe because I grew up with very religious mother and lived in anti-LGBTQ country, I'm kinda slow in picking up subtext. Like until now I'm still kinda confuse with my friend who have ships from any fandoms (but I still love to hear and read her headcanons or fics about those characters)....

I really agree with you, I've seen many Holmes' adaptations (cartoon, tv series, manga) but Yuumori is clearly the closest to Doyle's works. Do you think the mangaka also love to read Holmes' books?

Story time! (Welcome to "Hyper answers asks like an old lady going on an hour long barely-on-topic tangent at the slightest prompting.)

I totally get where you're coming from, I was raised in like...knockoff Southern Baptist churches. Growing up, homosexuality was presented to me as a sexual perversion incapable of involving real love. It's kind of silly, but it's true: a ship was a big part of changing that for me. I read Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle as a teenager, and Kurogane and Fai had something that was inescapably romantic and beautiful but never strictly sexual (tho the potential is certainly there). Between that and an online community of LGBTQ+ adults who were incredibly patient and kind towards me even when I was suuuuper ignorant, I started to open up towards queer relationships as...well, just relationships. Relationships that can encompass sex and also encompass love and friendship and communication and partnership and all those other things I'd been taught were exclusive to monogamous straight people. And then, even as terrified as I was, I was eventually able to face the fact that I'd always had crushes on girls just as often as crushes on guys. So yeah, there's a reason Kurofai is my ship of all ships, the actual One True Pairing for me. Because it cracked open a door just enough that I could slowly lever it open the rest of the way. There seem to be quite a lot of anecdotes like this: women enjoying BL/mlm ships is often seen as fetishy (which can certainly be part of it) but for some reason I can't fully articulate it also seems to sometimes be a means for girls and women to explore their own not-straightness.

ANYWAY. SHERLOCK HOLMES. Tbh I'm not gonna go too in-depth because I would bet good money that there are a bunch of scholarly articles on Holmes' queerness. People have probably done their doctorate theses on this! Much smarter and more well-read folks than I have already covered the topic. For me, it really boils down to: he never outright expresses sexual or romantic interest in anyone (we must resist the urge to assume his respect for Irene Adler is romantic just because he is a man and she is a woman). He's almost certainly on the asexual spectrum. But when he does exhibit symptoms one might associate with romantic and/or sexual interest (particularly romantic, imo), it's always towards men (usually Watson, of course). For example, notable flirt John Watson saying that Holmes blushes at his compliments the way a girl does is...suggestive.

The whole thing is complicated by Watson being (in my opinion at least) an unreliable and sometimes downright petty narrator. He keeps going on spiels about Holmes being cold and heartless, only to turn around and describe him greeting his friends warmly and being emotionally moved by music and baby-talking puppies and charming old ladies. It makes Watson sometimes come across as one of those allo people who are so unable to conceive of a life without romantic and/or sexual desire that they start dehumanizing those who don't experience it. Alternatively and maybe more charitably, he just has a big ol' crush on Holmes, is understandably alarmed by it given the time period, and gets bitchy and defensive when he feels it might not be reciprocated.

But ultimately...do I think Arthur Conan Doyle sat down at a desk in the late 19th century/early 20th century and was like "I am going to write some ace queer representation for the tumblr girlies (gn)"? Obviously not. 😅 I do think he might have set out to create a character who very deliberately did not need to have the otherwise almost obligatory straight romantic side-plot. Holmes is never in any way set up as having a life headed towards marriage and children, in spite of how typical that was for the time. The companionship he does express a need and desire for comes in the form of another man. He's "lost without [his] Boswell." He sneakily buys Watson's practice out from under him so he'll be free to move back in and go on more adventures with him. He threatens violence when Watson is hurt. Etc etc. I think it's very fair to interpret it all through a queer lens, the quibble would be more in whether that queerness ever manifests sexually.

I definitely think the Yuumori creators have not only read ACD but also other fiction based on the stories, possibly even including some very old pastiches like this one. I love how seemingly nerdy they are about it haha! The series is full of easter eggs and callouts to other Holmesian works.

As for Poirot, I know very little about the character beyond a few episodes of the show I watched as a young'un, but that is not the mustache of a straight man (I'm joking I'm joking I have absolutely no opinion on that one! 🤣)

Thanks for the ask, and for actually reading this ramble if you got this far! 😅

[nemo-me-impune]

A Sherlock Holmes RPG could be pretty fun.

Different skill trees based on deductive ability, acting ability, fighting ability and criminal ability

Choices for love interests including Watson, Adler, Mary Morstan and Lestrade or no-one depending on your decisions, with the option to also hook Watson and Mary up if you want

Different endings depending on how Holmes' choices leading to Reichenbach and whether he actually dies there or not depending on your success in the rest of the game

Different notoriety and public opinion, whether people think he's an odd eccentric or a respectable man or barely above a criminal himself

Have the classic puzzles and stuff but also a bit of combat

Have power bars for eating and sleeping that Watson nags you about that can be buffered with drugs lol

Play through the different cases like missions with the Moriarty stuff as a main questline

Do the unreliable narrator thing like in DA2 where there's always the possibility Watson is just telling the police what they want to hear about the events of the game rather than being 100% truthful and how you treat Watson colours that as well and how your Holmes acts - more empathetic and manic or cold and clinical.

[quill-of-thoth]

Letters from Watson: The Cardboard Box

Crimes in Context:

Trigger warning for the whole story, since it's pretty much just spousal abuse, and we're going to cover that (briefly) here.

We have previously covered the inability to divorce in Victorian England, where you could practically separate, and be legally divorced under very specific circumstances, but it took an act of parliament to be allowed to remarry, and it was therefore de-facto impossible for many women to leave abusive husbands or to support themselves at the same level after leaving one. Reasons for a divorce to be granted included adultery and extreme cruelty. Yes, extreme cruelty. The bar for proving that to ecclesiastical court and being alive at the same time would be a high and thin one. (Historically: not being able to leave abusive husbands is a factor in MANY historical poisonings. This is not confined to the 1800's or 1900's either - Giulia Tofana, whose wikipedia entry is weirdly short, was famous, posthumously, for providing poisons to women seeking to end their marriages.) Reading between the lines of Jim Benson's tale, we have a more unreliable than usual narrator. Everything he says is through the lens of "she made me do it" which is both a very common pattern of abusers telling their story and prevents his final letter from being the good-faith explanation of events that we often see in other dead, dying, or condemned criminals in this series. The events are also not reconstruct-able by anyone else besides Sarah, and we have no knowledge of whether or not she ever recovers. He never has proof of anything he says regarding Sarah's feelings or what she may have said to Mary, and the only proof he has of Alec and Mary's affair is the custom that a married woman would likely NOT be going on a day trip to New Brighton alone with a male platonic friend.

(Its possible that Mary was not having an affair with Alec or even considering it, but Mary would have been well aware that absolutely nobody would have taken her word that nothing was going on - so I tend to think that either she was having an affair with Alec or she was engineering a plausible reason, i.e. her adultery, to leave her husband. She had two elder sisters with the means to live independently, if she tired of Jim's drinking and jealousy, she had some options.) We especially don't have evidence that Sarah loved Jim - at best, we have an awkward exchange where Jim interpreted a lessening of formality as love (or lust) and Sarah awkwardly backing out of the situation. It's equally ambiguous whether Sarah was attempting to put more distance between the two of them or if she genuinely felt vindictive about unreciprocated feelings. Whether Mary's suspicion had more do do with Jim's violent words and history of drinking than anything Sarah said, or if Sarah took it upon herself to, belatedly, vet her baby sister's husband's character. Hell, she could have been nitpicking their financial arrangements and Jim's career progression. In effect, we don't know anything about this case, and that, more than the gruesome clues and the murder, may have been why it was left out of the story collections for so long.

Why else wasn't it included in collections?

It's not the only story that contains abuse, spousal and otherwise, and it's not the goriest one. When it comes to abuse and very probable murder of a wife, not to mention abuse of his stepdaughters, we have Dr Roylott of the Speckled Band. When it comes to gore, we've had Rucastle getting his throat torn mostly out by a dog in The Copper Beeches, and we're about to have The Engineer's Thumb, which starts with Hatherley missing a thumb. We've also had the prolonged torture via starvation of Kratides in The Greek Interpreter. It is, however, probably the most hopeless story in the entire canon that deals with abuse. Absolutely nobody is saved, and absolutely nobody is given any closure - in fact, Susan Cushing is probably having a much worse time overall now that Holmes has solved the case. Yes, she would eventually know that her baby sister has been murdered by her own husband and it's absolutely broken her middle sister, who she clearly cares about even if she wants to never live with her, ever. But I posit that it's measurably worse if she has any access to Jim Benson's account - because at one point she approved of him as a match for Mary, and his account will make it very clear how wrong she was, and how Sarah, whose concerns or pessimism have probably been dismissed more than once among the sisters, was Mary's only resource.

[lucere-aeresta]

The other day I was talking with @hey-sherry about Poirot and Holmes' relationships and how Holmes and Watson got separated at the end in canon but the bad ending is easier mitigated; yet in Poirot it's totally another beast. (there's some spoilers involved in not only Poirot but all kinds of things but I guess...since nothing is new so I'm safe to proceed?)

All Poirot's problems lie in the final book, Curtain. It's arguably the best Hercule Poirot book and it requires intensive reading on the previous books to appreciate how that ending is the absolute climax of Poirot's career as well as his character. It deepens the character in a way that all previous books lead to this moment of fulfilment and tragedy, the absolute value and paradox of justice, the torment and sin, yet the self-realization and glory of Poirot. Poirot's ending is irreplaceable and there is no better way to conclude his life in such a highlighted moment.

ACD has little luck with his lazy plots of Moriarty in the same attempts to finish Holmes off. After a long batter between ACD and SH fans and capitalism, the story carried on, and the true ending of Holmes turned out, yet again, somewhat an anticlimax, even bizarrely so in a way that it becomes nonsensical. Poor Watson has long been under scrutiny for being an unreliable narrator (like, somehow his devoted wife got his first name wrong. Curious indeed), and Holmes' account is not doing any better. Even if we leave all that literature analysis alone, just from a fanfiction point of view, it's not hard to remove all the narratives about how they end up not seeing each other often but still leave the core stories intact. The ending of their tragic relationship is forced upon them by a few additional paragraphs which granted no importance to the character development or mystery or plots whatsoever.

But back to Poirot, Curtain relies on such a premise that nobody truly knows Poirot's current state. Not Vera, not Miss Lemon or his loyal valet George, not even Hastings, the man to whom his trust extends to the time beyond his death. Poirot is utterly alone, and the aloneness is the key to the final mystery. At the end, his is all alone to face the ultimate choice and he braves it with the stake of his own life. Hastings only learns about the truth when it's all over. The last case of Poirot is solve by him all alone.

As great as Curtain is, it leaves no room for further interpretation or bending around or...any sort of fanfiction maneuver. The only thing to do is to either accept the eventual aloneness of Poirot, or to ignore/alternate Curtain all together, thus diminish the depth of Poirot's character. This assertion applies to any shipping, including the canon Poirot/Rossakoff. At the end of The Labours of Hercules, it hints that Poirot could have a chance with Vera Rossakoff, but in Curtain the only sensible conclusion is that their relationship did not work out. In Poirot TV show series, their relationship is portrayed as a heart-breaking tragedy, and I think it matches the ending of Poirot perfectly.

I always say that Poirot is such a loving, tender soul yet his love life is always turbulent and tragic. All the people he is interested in turn out either criminals or leaving him--and, well, almost criminal, but on which account Poirot himself is no better either.

Sherlock Holmes, on the other hand, is a lucky bastard who just gets the true love with no string attached. Of course he is no robot or heartless, but his social skill is questionable and he is, canon-wise, asexual and aromantic, somewhat aversive to all social connections. Yet he has Watson. the unconditional love/friendship, the ultimate bond that nothing can undermine. Even with ACD being so painstakingly to separate them, the room for alternative narration is so abundant that the creator's hinderance becomes some kind of delightful challenge for future writers rather than problems. I mean, we can all agree that ACD is a master of breaking his own world-building even though he took the effort to make it realistic; after all, ACD himself relinquished the seriousness of lore-keeping in Empty House. If he is allowed to break his lore, surely anyone else could. And ACD recognized this freedom too--"You may marry him, murder him, or do anything you like to him”. Bless this noble soul; we have his permission for eternity.

As a habitual fanfiction writer, it naturally comes to a (personally) inherent paradox of fanfork: it thrives on the imperfection of the original work.

By "imperfection", I don't mean artistic flaws of the works (though it could be); I mean the aspects that are ignored or otherwise not under the spotlight of the original work. In the context of fanfictions, mostly relationships.

Again, I must stress that it's pure personal. I know a lot of romance/relationship focus works have a huge fanbase devoted into it's already well developed romance perspective. But I almost never got attracted into those fandoms. I find it limiting, not enough room for me to explore and insert my own ideas and creativities. I believe, however, that I am not alone feeling this way. A lot of others may have similar experience that they somehow inserted part of themselves or their own feelings and understandings into a fandom/ship/character/etc. that part of their identity belongs to, or extends from it.

(We all agree this discourse has nothing to do with copyright and profit and the like, I assume, but just to make it clear here. )

In fandom and fanworks, there is a sense of belonging, and more importantly, ownership. The aspects that the original work creator discarded are treasured by fans; the nook and crannies not explored in the canon is the kingdom of fan-creators. There is a space of creativity, of personal expression, of standing on the shoulder of giant (or just normal persons, but a higher ground nevertheless) and overlook for the horizon. In a fictional work one may find a language of self-expression they have a hard time to find on their own, and they can start from there. It's the beauty of fandoms.

The original creators assert the first and foremost ownership. They decide the trend, the structure, the mood, the back and forth. And it comes the fanworks. But there is always space of negotiation, some small and some large. This kind of flexibility creates a harmony as well as a tension, thus the love and conflict between the fans and the creators.

The conflicts stem from many things, one of which is when the creators claim an aspect (again, mostly, relationship, especially romantic ones) of the original work.

That's why I realize why I am more into the non-romantic works more than romantic ones. And that's how a work can be homophobically gay, even worse, intentionally so.

When the creators acknowledge an pervious ignored aspect of their work, they claim it and define it. They take the ownership rather than leave the gray area to the fans. It is nice to be comprehensive, yet it could be dangerous especially if they did not have the best intention/interest of others in their mind (or really it doesn't matter what their intention is at this point).

Without specify the name (but y'all know what I'm talking about) of the work, there is the worst offender that I have off the top of my head: after over a decade they have the characters confess their love right the minute before the ultimate death.

It's the worst kind of acknowledgement of a relationship. It attempts (inadvertently or not or something in between) to take away the ownership of the fanworks and the fan community on these characters and claim that "I hereby assert my ownership of their relationship and deny anything you have bestowed". It is not like a legal statement to enforce with the backup of real power or anything, but at this point the original creator announced their point clear and loud. It's a way to cancel out anything that previously attached to the work from their point of view yet still present as "supportive" to a said relationship. It's utterly destructive in both artistic expression of such character relationship and a social equality point of view. It's, in a way, as bad as, if not worse than, "gay characters must die" in old-school homophobic works.

(Of course the fans can still stand against such attempts and create their own fanworks based on them. I mean, nothing stops individuals from expressing themselves from certain medium anyways.)

In a work that designed to acknowledge and/or focus on the relationship of characters, it circles back to the issue of how the story is structured and how well it is written. I personally find a perfect written story leaves no space for my personal interpretation and expression, so I appreciate it and move on. It's always some ambiguity gives inspiration and life to my personal creation based on someone else's work.

Thus, once a creator shifts their focus on their work, there bound to be a conflict. An example is Good Omens 2. Personally it is a weird case that the creator themselves attempts to make a fanwork on their own work that originally focused on something else totally different. I know it sounds crazy but that's exactly where the controversial comes from--if a fanfiction writer writes something impressive you either hate it to the gut or love it to to bones, or are forced to ignore it, one way or another. When the creator themselves claim an aspect of an artistic work, the conflict with the audience is inevitable. In the example of GO2, the ending suddenly limits all the possibilities of the relationship of the characters into that single moment, the climax at the end of the show. It's almost like forming a black hole that all timelines collapse into one singularity. For the people who love this moment it is the best thing they can expect for this show, but for the ones who'd already claimed an ownership and/or an identification in alternative expression of this show, it's the ultimate disaster.

(Needless to say [but somehow still necessary], I am talking from a standpoint of artistic appreciation and personal tastes. Anyone who disapproves the ending of GO S2 because of homophobia, they can go fuck themselves with a cactus for all I care.)

As for the works that are designed for characters relationships from the very beginning, it's much simpler and solely relies on how the relationship is portraited. Again the more marvelous and airtight the structure is, the less room it leaves to the fanworks. In this way I think OFMD kind of maintains such a balance. It's not within my personal taste because how the confession comes kind of lack of tension, but exactly because the relationship development can be altered, and the climax not limited to the moment of confession, there followes much more room to be explored by other fan-creators. I personally found it not intense enough, but as I said earlier, the imperfection is the source of fanworks inspiration, a motivation to make it perfect.

But on another note, for me and a lot of fan creators like me, a more emotional intense expression is more likely to inspire, albeit limiting. To be honest, there is no universal law but just how a person perceives certain work and how much room the said person finds in it.

[queerholmcs]

6, 12, 15!

6. Favourite Holmes portrayal?

oooh i do have to go really basic here and say jeremy brett. i think he was the first Sherlock Holmes i ever saw and... let's be real here, he truly did absolutely nail the character.

12. Headcanon about Watson? (And do you have any favourites?)

besides being THE unreliable lying deceptive narrator of all time....... i'm not sure how much this counts as hc but i like thinking about him discussing his stories for the strand with holmes prior to publication. doing dramatic readings and having bantering arguments over details to include or not to include, or him writing them knowing full well that holmes is going to read them later and roll his eyes with affection at how he's dramatised the story, at the artistic licenses he's taken, at the things he thinks he can get away with just saying so blatantly... 🥰

15. Do you draw Sherlock Holmes fanart?

i wish! but my art is one of words 🖋️

sherlock holmes ask game

[officialbruciewayne]

ooc. Yess- adding with some thoughts, and hopefully not derailing OP's wonderful post!

It is impossible to claim that Bruce Wayne's philanthropy and pacifism (not even kidding, Batman isn't tho) is not an intrinsic aspect of his character. The establishing of various charities, individual donation, social change and a commitment to disentangling his company from weapons manufacturing have been consistent in portrayals of Bruce for decades now.

I do think it would be fair to say that Brucie Wayne is less authentic facet of Bruce. Public persona, especially heavily scrutinized ones, can often be very deliberately crafted. That said, there's elements of playfulness, recklessness and straight up manipulation in the Brucie Wayne persona that are very true to B.

When I'm writing B I tend to see it as he thinks Batman is the more genuine self. At least when initially starting out on his mission.

Early Batman and Pre-Batman years speak to a lot of discarding of personal autonomy and self dehumanization (e.g: not pursuing his medical qualifications, ending multiple relationships for 'safety', honing his body into a 'tool' or even weapon).

His willingness to sacrifice his interests, personal life, health and life tells us how he prioritizes Batman over Bruce Wayne, and this suggests that Bruce Wayne is possibly less "real" to him. He's certainly not treating Bruce Wayne like a person.

This is further supported by instances where he states that 'Bruce Wayne' died with his parents, even with visuals of burying his childself. Holy Dissociation Batman!

I suspect that between Brucie Wayne being much more curated and B's own self-perception is where the misconception of Bruce Wayne as a mask arises.

However, I did say early Batman, because there did come a point where Bruce began to prioritize an aspect of self that cannot be fully disentangled from Bruce Wayne or Batman, and is an area where he even prioritizes Bruce Wayne over Batman in many ways.

Namely, the man started a family.

Even in the pre-Hays Code version, where the dynamic duo are much more Boston Marriage Holmes-Watson energy, there's still a definite air of kinship between Bruce and Dick, just as much as Batman and Robin. Post-Hays Code revisions that emphasized the much more parental dynamics, especially with Jason, there is explicit text that Bruce has become a father.

Not Batman. Not a sidekick. Bruce "Batman" Wayne. B.

This tends to coincide with the development of actual friendships where his multiple personae are explicitly known. Not to mention the Super Friends (read: Justice League)!

So I do think early B may view Bruce Wayne as at minimum less important than Batman, and at most unreliable narrator, as less real than Batman. He's wrong though, but jury's out on if he's willing to admit to it in under a decade.

Bruce Wayne and Batman are both the true him it’s just that he often prioritizes Batman and considers Batman to also be a valid an fully formed identity that he calls himself. He can say his name is Batman while under the influence of the lasso of truth or a truth spell because it is true. They are both facets of a fully formed multi faceted person. Batman is his real name. Bruce Wayne is also his real name. You cannot tell me that Bruce’s philanthropy and charity is not just as authentic to his person as Batman’s crime fighting and detective work are just because he plays up certain things while dealing in his public persona, that is something that most public facing people do to some degree.

Bruce Wayne is not the mask and neither is Batman. They are two sides of the same coin.

[gregorovitch-adler]

Hi there! I was wondering what your thoughts are on ACD Watson's wives. First of all, I know nothing about the marriage traditions or laws in Victorian England but it seems weird to me that he kept remarrying because I guess his wives kept passing away? I mean he didn't/couldn't divorce them back them, right?

He didn't do very well with his private practice from what I've gathered. How come he could afford remarrying all the time. Also in my culture (East Asian), if a person's spouses kept dying, the matchmaker would refuse service because that person would be considered a curse.

Thank you and have a great day!

Hi!

Your questions are pretty interesting. As a South-East Asian, I can understand how people would frown at the person whose spouses kept passing away. There must be quite a few similarities in our cultures, even if we're not from the same country/region.

1.) A simple, detached answer would be that Arthur Conan Doyle was not the best person when it came to keeping his stories consistent, especially on the character-related details.

He might've wanted to tell us that Watson got married, but probably he didn't want Watson's marriage to keep him from assisting Holmes with his cases, and that's why everything about Watson's married life and wives is so skewed.

He wasn't even consistent about the location of Watson's gunshot wound in A Study in Scarlet. Initially, Watson was shot in the subclavian artery of the left side. But on the next page, the wound location has been shifted to his leg? This is just one of the many examples of Doyle's inconsistencies in his stories.

Maybe he didn't check that Mary Morstan had died sometime during one of his stories. Anything is possible.

2.) Another version of the answer (which is heavily filled with Holmes/Watson shipping): Watson was an unreliable narrator and didn't want any unwanted attention of the general public drawn towards the nature of the relationship he had with Sherlock Holmes. That's why Watson was so inconsistent in the stories that he published in The Strand magazine. I believe there's a reason Watson describes Holmes as cold and calculating at some points, but goes on to describe the incidents where Holmes was undoubtedly kind to someone at other points of the stories. I even wrote a meta about it here .

The fanon version is that Watson wanted to avoid the risk of being arrested on the grounds of gross indecency, and so he made up a wife - or even several wives - to cover it up.

I mostly agree with this theory, because otherwise, Watson (who's married by the timeline of The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes) going away with Holmes to Switzerland, and even sharing a room with him would be pretty weird and not exactly plausible, I don't think his first wife, Mary Morstan, is an imaginary character. But it's very much possible that her marriage to Watson was just a ruse to hide from the prying eyes of the public.

If we strictly talk about canon, then Watson marries Mary Morstan in The Sign of the Four, then she probably passes away by the time of The Return of Sherlock Holmes short-story collection (the jury is still out on that one - again, because of Doyle's inconsistencies), then Watson starts living with Holmes again as a bachelor for a long time. Then by the time of Casebook of Sherlock Holmes, his wife is brought up again.

Either it was another case of Doyle's inconsistencies, or Watson remarried sometime off-stage. (Though I think Doyle would've at least made a passing reference to Watson's remarriage, him being the POV character in most of the stories and all... idk.)

From what I've gathered after reading all the stories, Watson seemed to have only two wives at different points of time. Mary Morstan and another unnamed one in Casebook.

From the first-hand experience of reading those stories, I don't think Watson having multiple wives is a canonical thing. That's also a part of fan-interpretation. It's because the physical description of Watson's wife/ wives kept changing every time she was mentioned in any stories because of the lack of consistency in the whole narration. That's how it seemed to me when I read the stories. Though I've gone through them all only once, which means I could be wrong about this bit of detail in particular.

Still, Watson didn't seem to have numerous wives in canon to me. Just two.

And yes, you're right. Watson wasn't well-off even with his private practice. The fact that he was able to afford to remarry so many times (if he ever did) is quite odd.

Then there comes the social stigma behind divorce/remarriage. I'm not that familiar with the marriage traditions in Victorian England either, but I don't think people worldwide were so free and open-minded about the topic of divorce in general. Things have advanced in Western countries nowadays, but the social aspect of all this must have been quite different in the Victorian era. So, you're right about that thing too.

Tl;dr: There is no specific answer to your question, because the author of the original stories didn't bother to keep his details intact. They kept changing in canon, so you're free to believe whatever you want to. Because, as you said, the fact that Watson keeps remarrying all the time doesn't add up with his financial condition along with the societal conditions in that era.

So, everything is just open for interpretation here.

I personally believe that Watson only had one wife - Mary Morstan - whom he had a lavender marriage with (a fake marriage for the sake of society). I know this isn't canonical either, but what actually is canonical - well, nobody has a definite answer to that question.

I hope you find my answer satisfactory, because your ask was rather interesting.

Thanks.

[tracinginwardinvestigation]

Note #44: Walter S. Masterman’s The Wrong Letter: The blind spot

(This post contains full spoilers of the novel)

The detective figure and the assistant dynamic have always been an integral part of the classical formula. It was there since Poe’s The Murders in the Rue Morgue, and Arthur Conan Doyle only further popularized the dynamic with Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson. At some point, the dynamic has been so widespread among classical detective stories that not having them is like a romance novel not featuring romance. In their most basic roles, the duo often act as the reader’s gateway into the fictional world: they are the ones that gather the clues for the readers to theorize, and who also provide additional hints about the solution should the reader need guidance. With such important recurring roles, they tend to be the safe bets for being innocent when the reader tries to narrow down the identity of the culprit. Yet, such an assumption makes the duo a perfect blind spot in readers’ eyes, which some writers have used to full extent for a twist such as in Walter S. Masterman’s The Wrong Letter novel.

Like many works that were published around the peak of the Golden Age of Detective Fiction, The Wrong Letter also begins with an introduction of the detective and his assistant, along with a typical whodunit mystery: Superintendent Sinclair is sitting in his office when he receives a strange call from an unknown person who claims that the Home Secretary is going to get killed. Just as Sinclair is pondering over the news, arriving in his room is Collins, a sleuth who has been working with Sincliar from time to time. The two soon depart to the Home Secretary’s house to discover the truth. The first chapter pretty much sets up the typical dynamic of the detective duo: Collins the eccentric detective and Sinclair the layman.

In keeping up with tradition, the primary point of view of the novel is through Collins’ point of view as he investigates the crime: He is the first person that investigates the crime scene, and he is also the one that conducts most of the questioning with the person of interest. Along the investigation, Collins also trades theories with his partner Sinclair. Like a good assistant who is supposed to be an audience surrogate, the nervous superintendent often acts clueless and questions the detective’s bizarre theories. In treating these two as close to their classic archetype, the novel attempts to render them as an innocuous factor: they are entertaining, but not the point of focus of the novel—the main draw here is the mystery behind Home Secretary’s mysterious death in the locked room space instead.

But that’s all a facade Masterman puts on for the reader. Chesterton was right when he wrote in the Preface that he “will confine [him]self strictly to saying what [the author] does not do”, because the real trick of the novel lies precisely in a disruption of the trope: the assistant is actually the detective, and the detective is actually the culprit.

Masterman achieves this trick through the use of an unreliable narrator and reader’s familiarity with the formula. From the beginning, Sinclair is often portrayed as a clumsy assistant who is dependent on the detective. Sinclair’s negative traits are put on upfront such as when he helps himself to the victim's whisky in chapter I: "It was a little weakness he had". Likewise, for most of the novels, he serves as audience surrogate by listening attentively to Collins’ theory or by lacking a capacity to interpret clues by himself. Everything seems to point as him being just a layman who is competent for his job, but not on par with the mar. In a way, the novel encourages the reader to not expect much from Sinclair, so when it is revealed that Sinclair is actually a careful detective who tries to avoid too many hints to his suspect, Collins, it recontextualizes his whole caution and shyness as not being clueless, but as an attempt to draw clues from Collins. In particular, the scene in Chapter XX where Sinclair ponders over Watson’s letter takes on a special meaning under this contextualization. Instead of being just a scene where the assistant cluelessly withholds a vital clue from the detective for a later dramatic effect where a strange clue finally fits into the whole puzzle, the truth is that Sinclair is perfectly capable of interpret that clue by himself, and that letter is what transforms him into a full-fleshed detective that the audience doesn’t get pried into.

 “I would like to see inside your head, and find out what there is there,” said Sinclair. “You’ve something concealed.” — Chapter XIV

The novel also attempts to hide Collins’ true identity in a similar manner, but in an opposite direction. Whereas Sinclair’s characterization is hidden underneath all the outward depictions of uncertainty and incompetency as per assistant tradition, Collins’ is revered in absolute authority. Throughout the novel, Collins often makes absolute statements about the case that do not seem suspicious at first glance precisely because they are in line with the norm of the genre. An example of this is in chapter IX, where he calls out the idea of John Jackson, a lunatic, being the culprit as “absolute rubbish”. To a familiar audience, the line seems innocuous—being the detective figure, Collins is probably right that we might get the wrong person—but the double meaning lies in his hidden motive: Collins wants to hinder the investigation’s process as much as possible so that he could find his target, Sir Ronald Watson, under the pretense of needing him for the investigation. This trick repeats multiple times throughout the novel: every time Collins acts like his supposed trope, the detective, it is because he wants to avoid drawing suspicion to himself as he advances his own personal plan. Even his thought process, which the reader does get pried into, is often vague enough to hide his real motivation of trying to find the victim’s estranged son. By hiding in plain sight, Collins’ true identity as culprit manages to stay in the reader’s blindspot.

Collins laughed. “That’s just what I was thinking. What are you after? Well, we will each keep his own counsel.” — Chapter XIV

This archetype subversion twist calls into question the audience's overreliance on familiar tropes. By making Collins the culprit and Sinclair the detective, the novel calls into question the kind of bias the reader may have about their unquestioned trust in the archetypes, especially when it comes to lead characters. For a genre that thrills on using rationality to discover the truth, such bias is dangerous, and the novel demonstrates such impact by making the culprit the one person that the audience thought they could trust unquestionably. In that sense too, the trick serves as a reminder that the reader should think for themselves, instead of relying on a character’s point of view as their objective view.

While the ending does feel like it ends too abruptly with Collins getting his just dessert off-screen, The Wrong Letter was a pleasant read overall. The trick of subverting detective and assistant’s dynamic is not exactly that rare nowadays, but it is always fun to encounter and get fooled by it. It would be fun to write a long essay on this subject eventually.