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OMG, I forgot how intense it feels to get New Sherlock after a hiatus. It's hard to even sort out what my reaction to the content of the show is because the whole time I'm watching it there's a part of my brain excitedly repeating "IT'S BACK! NEW EPISODE! IT'S BACK! NEW EPISODE!", which gets distracting. Here are my thoughts as best I can get them down, in no particular order:
-When Dr. Hooper came onscreen, I squeed out loud at such a volume and high pitch that it scared the cat. Molly in drag!!! She's running the morgue, being addressed as doctor, and bossing around Anderson! I am so glad I wasn't spoiled about how Molly figured in to the Victorian setting. That was a moment of joy (and sexy) I was not expecting. I'm not entirely sure I buy Holmes never picking up that Dr. Hooper is a woman in disguise. I wonder if he noticed it upon first meeting her, decided that she was very competent in her job and thus there was no reason to expose her or let their professional relationship get weird, and so he just deleted the information.
-Mary was such an excellent BAMF in this episode! It's like they wrote most of her scenes JUST FOR ME. Victorian!Mary worked as a secret agent for Mycroft on behalf on England. Mycroft calls her Watson, because Holmes brothers work best with a Watson around. Modern!Mary snarking about MI-5's lack of security was marvelous. I loved how obvious it was that Sherlock really likes Mary. He recognized her under the mourning disguise before John did, and when he and Watson showed up as her backup in tracking down the cult he said something like "For you, Mary? Any time." I don't remember the exact line, just the degree of happiness it caused in me. And if the Victorian setting is a mind palace exercise/drug-induced dream of modern!Sherlock, then we can surmise that he sees her as working unequivocally on behalf of good, albeit in a secretive way. Take that, anti-Mary folks who have doubted whether Sherlock's willingness to forgive Mary in HLV was genuine. Also, how cute is it that Holmes refers to her impish sense of humor? Very cute.
-Mrs. Hudson's literary criticism by pointed silence was delightful meta. Mrs. Hudson in general was excellent. Also, her conversation with Mary gave this ep a Bechdel test pass. (The secret society scene had a ton of women, but I think they mostly just talked to Holmes and Watson.)
-I lied about there being no particular order to my thoughts. I am talking about the female characters first, because they are clearly my priorities.
-Speaking of ladies, I was less fond of the resolution of the case (in one level of the Inception-esque trip that was the latter part of this episode) with the secret society of women. It felt like Moffat way too pointedly trying to address the criticism of his writing of women but being super obnoxious about it. All these women may be on the right side of history, but they're also a murderous, melodramatic cult of Furies that takes some of its trappings from the KKK. Geez, Moff, tell us how you really feel. *eyeroll* As I said in my earlier bullet points, the treatment of the individual recurring female characters was great, but the conspiracy of women was not my favorite.
-Perhaps my least favorite thing was the fat-phobia in how the show treated Victorian!Mycroft. I get that Mycroft is fat in ACD's stories. They could have stayed close to canon by simply putting Gatiss in a fat suit without making such a big deal about him being gross and close to death and constantly eating. Or they could have had the slender Mycroft we're used to but throw in some line about how Mycroft insisted that John disguise his appearance in the write-ups of the cases so nobody would give him the obnoxious attention they gave Sherlock. The way they chose was just obnoxious.
-I had been hoping for a frame story in the present to give meaning to the sudden shift to Victorian times. Apparently I should be careful what I wish for. I will have to watch the episode again before I fully make up my mind about it, but my initial reaction is that it was too much drug-addled dream-within-a-dream stuff. I am okay with ambiguity about whether the Victorian or 21st century Holmes is the "real" one, but I ended the episode confused about what happened in both time frames, especially the present. Did Sherlock end up deciding that Moriarty was definitely dead or is there still ambiguity? Are we supposed to accept the secret society of avenging women as the real explanation for the historical case Sherlock was pondering, or is that just a product of his penchant for meladrama?
-And where did Sherlock get drugs to take before the plane to exile anyway? I thought he'd been in prison since shooting Magnussen. I did enjoy the Holmes brother feels about Mycroft taking care of junkie Sherlock.
-I did like all the meta commentary and focus on Watson as storyteller. Also, apparently when Sherlock is upset on the plane he read John's blog about them meeting. Right in the feels!
-Andrew Scott is soooo fantastically creepy as Moriarty. On the one hand I shudder every time he appears on screen, but on the other hand I really enjoyed seeing the Victorian versions of him and Sherlock having their confrontations.
-I really loved the scene where Victorian!Holmes was manipulating the floating newspapers articles as a mind palace exercise. It was visually beautiful and a nice analogue to the more computer-esque mind palace visuals in Hound.
-That conversation where Watson talked to Holmes about how he ought to marry was so sad. Watson, you fool, he doesn't want to marry a woman, or even The Woman. He wants to marry you and Mary. Failing that just you, or just his work.
Overall I will have to watch again to reach a final verdict on whether the plot towards the end was merely unecessarily hard to follow (but pretty good if you get it) or a Total Mess That Thinks It's Clever But Isn't. Other than that, however, I enjoyed this episode a great deal.
-Mary was such an excellent BAMF in this episode! It's like they wrote most of her scenes JUST FOR ME. Victorian!Mary worked as a secret agent for Mycroft on behalf on England. Mycroft calls her Watson, because Holmes brothers work best with a Watson around. Modern!Mary snarking about MI-5's lack of security was marvelous. I loved how obvious it was that Sherlock really likes Mary. He recognized her under the mourning disguise before John did, and when he and Watson showed up as her backup in tracking down the cult he said something like "For you, Mary? Any time." I don't remember the exact line, just the degree of happiness it caused in me. And if the Victorian setting is a mind palace exercise/drug-induced dream of modern!Sherlock, then we can surmise that he sees her as working unequivocally on behalf of good, albeit in a secretive way. Take that, anti-Mary folks who have doubted whether Sherlock's willingness to forgive Mary in HLV was genuine. Also, how cute is it that Holmes refers to her impish sense of humor? Very cute.
-Mrs. Hudson's literary criticism by pointed silence was delightful meta. Mrs. Hudson in general was excellent. Also, her conversation with Mary gave this ep a Bechdel test pass. (The secret society scene had a ton of women, but I think they mostly just talked to Holmes and Watson.)
-I lied about there being no particular order to my thoughts. I am talking about the female characters first, because they are clearly my priorities.
-Speaking of ladies, I was less fond of the resolution of the case (in one level of the Inception-esque trip that was the latter part of this episode) with the secret society of women. It felt like Moffat way too pointedly trying to address the criticism of his writing of women but being super obnoxious about it. All these women may be on the right side of history, but they're also a murderous, melodramatic cult of Furies that takes some of its trappings from the KKK. Geez, Moff, tell us how you really feel. *eyeroll* As I said in my earlier bullet points, the treatment of the individual recurring female characters was great, but the conspiracy of women was not my favorite.
-Perhaps my least favorite thing was the fat-phobia in how the show treated Victorian!Mycroft. I get that Mycroft is fat in ACD's stories. They could have stayed close to canon by simply putting Gatiss in a fat suit without making such a big deal about him being gross and close to death and constantly eating. Or they could have had the slender Mycroft we're used to but throw in some line about how Mycroft insisted that John disguise his appearance in the write-ups of the cases so nobody would give him the obnoxious attention they gave Sherlock. The way they chose was just obnoxious.
-I had been hoping for a frame story in the present to give meaning to the sudden shift to Victorian times. Apparently I should be careful what I wish for. I will have to watch the episode again before I fully make up my mind about it, but my initial reaction is that it was too much drug-addled dream-within-a-dream stuff. I am okay with ambiguity about whether the Victorian or 21st century Holmes is the "real" one, but I ended the episode confused about what happened in both time frames, especially the present. Did Sherlock end up deciding that Moriarty was definitely dead or is there still ambiguity? Are we supposed to accept the secret society of avenging women as the real explanation for the historical case Sherlock was pondering, or is that just a product of his penchant for meladrama?
-And where did Sherlock get drugs to take before the plane to exile anyway? I thought he'd been in prison since shooting Magnussen. I did enjoy the Holmes brother feels about Mycroft taking care of junkie Sherlock.
-I did like all the meta commentary and focus on Watson as storyteller. Also, apparently when Sherlock is upset on the plane he read John's blog about them meeting. Right in the feels!
-Andrew Scott is soooo fantastically creepy as Moriarty. On the one hand I shudder every time he appears on screen, but on the other hand I really enjoyed seeing the Victorian versions of him and Sherlock having their confrontations.
-I really loved the scene where Victorian!Holmes was manipulating the floating newspapers articles as a mind palace exercise. It was visually beautiful and a nice analogue to the more computer-esque mind palace visuals in Hound.
-That conversation where Watson talked to Holmes about how he ought to marry was so sad. Watson, you fool, he doesn't want to marry a woman, or even The Woman. He wants to marry you and Mary. Failing that just you, or just his work.
Overall I will have to watch again to reach a final verdict on whether the plot towards the end was merely unecessarily hard to follow (but pretty good if you get it) or a Total Mess That Thinks It's Clever But Isn't. Other than that, however, I enjoyed this episode a great deal.
