Elementary 4.14
Feb. 26th, 2016 09:59 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenakIn which we finally get some backstory intel on the late Mrs. Holmes, while the case of the week contains a riff on a ACD trope.
The whole "master of disguise" thing, of course, which Original Holmes does all the time in the Doyle stories. Having Sherlock explain why that wouldn't work for him anymore these days is a bit meta, but was still a nice moment, especially the backstory about him having acted at school. Which was when he was writing fan letters to Alistair, so clearly Alistair was his inspiration. (I now want that AU where he actually tried being an actor.)
Otherwise the case of the week used the Triads as background but made sure to let the actual villain be a white man who wasn't a professional gangster and instead preyed on the weak and elderly in a home for same. Though the most interesting guest star of the episode in that plot to me was the 70 something female crime lady.
Meanwhile, in the ongoing Holmes family melodrama tale: the teaser made me wonder whether Sherlock and Joan drove all the way by car but then I remembered the distances and decided they must have taken a plane to Montreal and then the car. Though if I was living alone in Canada and elsewhere, I certainly would not let a strange woman in to make a phone call, I'd make the call for her. Anyway, Sherlock later referring to Sabine's daughter as a step relation and showing some jealousy/resentment about Morland's concern for her makes me think we'll see her again, and also it was a believable emotional touch. By far the most interesting bit in this subplot, though, was that we finally got some information about the late Mrs. Holmes, starting with her first name, which is May.
May did not die tragically when Sherlock was still a toddler, as I'd assumed because that's the standard dead mother/estranged father media combination. Instead, what Sherlock until now thought that happened was that Morland divorced her when Sherlock was 8, got custody of his sons (btw, thanks, episode, for name checking Mycroft again when appropriate), didn't give her much money due to prenup and thus ensured she died in a ghastly neighborhood; what Morland now says actually happened was that May was an addict, had a relapse, and he divorced her, got custody etc. in anger over that. I'm a bit torn; otoh, I'm against anything that makes addiction look like something you can inherit biologically (and since Sherlock had no idea, it's not like he picked up by example, which of course is far more likely in terms of what having an addict parent can mean), otoh, the episode doesn't imply that, and certainly it continues the trend from the last episode with Morland in it to make the Sherlock and Morland dynamic more specific to them and less standard daddy issues. Especially since Morland admits he didn't due the cutting May off as a kind of tough love in the hope this would shock her into getting on the wagon again but because he because he was so angry at her, as retaliation. And certainly "I look at you and I see your mother" makes sense of his avoidance of Sherlock, of hiring Joan by distance and not meeting her until this season etc., in a way that "busy businessman" does not. (It also gives Sherlock more to resent Morland for than "had never time for me".)
(I do wonder, given Mycroft was older, whether he knew re: their mother? It's the kind of retcon that would work with the relationship if he did but didn't tell Sherlock.)
Of course, the fact that Sherlock references Moriarty in his last conversation with his father makes me wonder whether either Sabine or May will turn out to have faked their deaths, since we seem to be doing parent-child parallels this season.
Trivia: is that an Arab newspaper Morland was reading?
ETA:felis told me it was an Indian newspaper.
The whole "master of disguise" thing, of course, which Original Holmes does all the time in the Doyle stories. Having Sherlock explain why that wouldn't work for him anymore these days is a bit meta, but was still a nice moment, especially the backstory about him having acted at school. Which was when he was writing fan letters to Alistair, so clearly Alistair was his inspiration. (I now want that AU where he actually tried being an actor.)
Otherwise the case of the week used the Triads as background but made sure to let the actual villain be a white man who wasn't a professional gangster and instead preyed on the weak and elderly in a home for same. Though the most interesting guest star of the episode in that plot to me was the 70 something female crime lady.
Meanwhile, in the ongoing Holmes family melodrama tale: the teaser made me wonder whether Sherlock and Joan drove all the way by car but then I remembered the distances and decided they must have taken a plane to Montreal and then the car. Though if I was living alone in Canada and elsewhere, I certainly would not let a strange woman in to make a phone call, I'd make the call for her. Anyway, Sherlock later referring to Sabine's daughter as a step relation and showing some jealousy/resentment about Morland's concern for her makes me think we'll see her again, and also it was a believable emotional touch. By far the most interesting bit in this subplot, though, was that we finally got some information about the late Mrs. Holmes, starting with her first name, which is May.
May did not die tragically when Sherlock was still a toddler, as I'd assumed because that's the standard dead mother/estranged father media combination. Instead, what Sherlock until now thought that happened was that Morland divorced her when Sherlock was 8, got custody of his sons (btw, thanks, episode, for name checking Mycroft again when appropriate), didn't give her much money due to prenup and thus ensured she died in a ghastly neighborhood; what Morland now says actually happened was that May was an addict, had a relapse, and he divorced her, got custody etc. in anger over that. I'm a bit torn; otoh, I'm against anything that makes addiction look like something you can inherit biologically (and since Sherlock had no idea, it's not like he picked up by example, which of course is far more likely in terms of what having an addict parent can mean), otoh, the episode doesn't imply that, and certainly it continues the trend from the last episode with Morland in it to make the Sherlock and Morland dynamic more specific to them and less standard daddy issues. Especially since Morland admits he didn't due the cutting May off as a kind of tough love in the hope this would shock her into getting on the wagon again but because he because he was so angry at her, as retaliation. And certainly "I look at you and I see your mother" makes sense of his avoidance of Sherlock, of hiring Joan by distance and not meeting her until this season etc., in a way that "busy businessman" does not. (It also gives Sherlock more to resent Morland for than "had never time for me".)
(I do wonder, given Mycroft was older, whether he knew re: their mother? It's the kind of retcon that would work with the relationship if he did but didn't tell Sherlock.)
Of course, the fact that Sherlock references Moriarty in his last conversation with his father makes me wonder whether either Sabine or May will turn out to have faked their deaths, since we seem to be doing parent-child parallels this season.
Trivia: is that an Arab newspaper Morland was reading?
ETA:
felis told me it was an Indian newspaper.
no subject
Date: 2016-02-26 05:27 pm (UTC)Having Sherlock explain why that wouldn't work for him anymore these days is a bit meta, but was still a nice moment
I agree, I enjoyed that, especially after Joan's disguise at the beginning was simply a different name, ha. The teaser was well done I thought. Although it would still be fun to see Sherlock play a different role for investigative purposes. It's a bit tricky in an american version of course, he'd most likely have to get rid of his English accent.
Trivia: is that an Arab newspaper Morland was reading?
I think it looked like an Indian newspaper, the script maybe devanagari?
no subject
Date: 2016-02-26 05:33 pm (UTC)Well, I think it's obvious that Sherlock isn't an unbiased source re: what he may have inherited from whom. :)
Between Joan calling herself Nicolette when going undercover and Kim on Better Call Saul improvising the nome de plume "Giselle St. Clair", I'm starting to suspect US tv heroines all have secret fantasy alter egos who are French...
Indian newspaper it is, then, will edit that information in.
no subject
Date: 2016-02-26 10:12 pm (UTC)That said, it wasn't entirely clear to me when May died (if she did - was there a body after the fire? but I digress): were those "last few months" immediately after the divorce, when Sherlock was still 8 yrs old, or was it some unspecified time later. did he visit her at her flat? did he know about the fire right away? or did he learn all that at a later point, when researching what happened to her (as an angry young man, I imagine).
As for what Mycroft knew, in 2x24 we learned that he was busted for having a bag of pot when he was in college in 1986. while that's not exactly the same as being a heroin addict, it does wave vaguely in the direction of familial patterns of drug use. I wondered if it was Mycroft's example that got Sherlock started experimenting with drugs (which I imagine started in his early teens. or maybe earlier; he would have been about 10 when Mycroft was arrested).
no subject
Date: 2016-02-27 05:30 am (UTC)Re: Mycroft, I had forgotten about his teenage pot use, but you're right. How much older than Sherlock is he supposed to be in this incarnation anyway? My guess is, based on looks of actors, not more than five years or so. And a child of ten, twelve or thirteen years, even when just at home for the school holidays, is almost bound to notice.
no subject
Date: 2016-02-27 12:40 pm (UTC)