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arabellaflynn · 4 years

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Fandom frightens me sometimes. Often, if we're honest.

I've been digging around for the Sherlock Holmes project I mentioned before, and one of the things I ran into is The Johnlock Conspiracy. For those who don't know, this was a movement among fans of the BBC's 2010 series Sherlock who contended that the series was building up to a Big Damn Gay Kiss between the leads at the end, which was theoretically the conclusion of series 4. Lots of people contributed, but this particular lady seems to have been the biggest and most thorough, having contributed a 40-some-odd episode analysis of the show, via YouTube.

Shit like this terrifies me.

There's nothing wrong with her character analysis. Her take on the significance and motivation behind what the characters say and do on screen is completely valid. I think she's 100% right in some areas, particularly Moriarty. Jim Moriarty's obsession with Sherlock is both disturbingly sexual in tone, and disturbingly indicative of someone who sees sex not as a social interaction, but as the apotheosis of control over another human being.

There's also nothing wrong with hoping the series is building to a gay romance. "Queering the canon" of Holmes stories has been a thing for a long, long time. It tends to happen in any work where two same-sex leads have a deep and devoted relationship, and because homosexual leanings were so hidden and coded for such a long time, there's much more history of having to "read into" things than with heterosexual pairings. If that had indeed been where the writing in Sherlock went, I would have considered the relationship more than adequately set up in the earlier series. AFAIK the leads wouldn't particularly have balked; I don't know all that much about Freeman's career but as a human he seems pretty no-nonsense, and Cumberbatch has a history of doing very well as queer and neuroatypical characters, under the general philosophy of 'I'm an actor, I act like other people, these other people are interesting'. With respect to the creators, Gatiss himself is gay and Moffatt has written at least one pair of lesbian Holmes/Watson analogues, Madame Vastra and Jenny, into Doctor Who.

What bothers me is the rampant apophenia among the Johnlock Conspiracy fans, typified in this lady's analysis. I'm not saying that the Sherlock crew wasn't admirably detail-oriented. They were making a show about a character whose entire schtick was noticing tiny things in his surroundings, and the main viewing audience had been fans of these tales literally their entire literate lives. Continuity had to be on the ball at all times or else. There were, in fact, plenty of passing references, allusions, background gags, and Easter eggs that were just there to say, "We read all the stories! You will find this amusing if you did, too." There's plenty of material available if you want to compare and contrast to the original canon, and discuss how the implications of various things would have changed from Victorian times to the modern-day setting of Sherlock.

When you get to the point where you are interpreting literally every detail of every line of every story as support for your one pet theory, you have a problem. No piece of writing is that focused. Her TJLC videos spiral into such a terrible black hole that every side character, every suspect, is interpreted as a "mirror" of one of the main characters, and moreover their actions are used in support of the One True Theory. Random set and costume details are interpreted as "communication" from the production crew that the theory is right. And, the very hallmark of a tinfoil-hat conspiracy, denials from both the characters on screen and the creators off are interpreted as yet more evidence in favor of the theory, because everyone knows that lying liars who lie are just trying to throw you off the scent.

And the sheer entitlement. Dear God. When no Big Damn Gay Kiss happened at the end of series four, the wave of anger from TJLC people was unbelievable. The writers were doing it wrong. The fans deserved to have their theory validated. How dare they write the thing they said they were writing the whole time.

The accusations of queerbaiting, I feel, are unsupported. The people slinging them have a very narrow view of what constitutes a queer relationship. It is true that Sherlock and John did not end series 4 in a homosexual romantic relationship acknowledged both in and out of universe. On the other hand, Sherlock's "married to the job" speech in the first fucking episode pretty solidly establishes that he identifies as aroace, even if he doesn't have the vocabulary to say it in exactly that way. I don't know when "I'm not interested in anyone like that" started to translate to "you can ignore everything I say about myself", but it's just as rude and invalidating to do it to representational characters as it is to real humans, so. Sherlock followed all that up by repeatedly, vehemently -- and given everyone else's reaction, uncharacteristically -- inviting John into his work, which he characterizes as his greatest if not only passion in life, so he's clearly starting something he sees as significant.

The amount of emotional and domestic entanglement that Sherlock wants out of John is huge and would seem to qualify for what the tumblkids call "queerplatonic". This relationship does progress over the course of the series, is explicitly acknowledged and discussed in-universe, is consistently reciprocated by John Watson, and IMNSHO, more than qualifies as what the creators have said since day one is going to be a "love story". There are more things in heaven and Earth, Horatio, etc etc etc. Not everything has to end with people tumbling into bed.

I would frankly consider it a more narratively interesting option than a romance, as it is far less common. Sherlock's central conflict is the same either way ("Oh god feelings WHAT DO"), but it changes John's somewhat. Rather than a relatively straightforward story about a man coming to terms with his sexuality, John instead has to wrestle with the idea that he might have found a life partner in this sort of relationship, rather than the traditional marriage-and-children context he was clearly anticipating. If concluding that yes, that is what he wants (and even marrying a woman who accepts the relationship, quite likes her husband's Most Significant Friend, and pushes both John and Sherlock to keep the connection alive) doesn't count as a happy ending, I have no idea what does.

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titan-wolfdog · 4 years

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spoilers and opinion about tlou 2 under cut

it’s amazing to see how many people fall for the stupid ‘‘token lgbt+ symbol’’ with that goddamned torn trans flag in the game as if they didnt put the main female character, a lesbian, get abandoned and fucked over by her ‘‘girlfriend’’ when she leaves her like she’s nothing

and they fucked up her story, like, as a whole

the entire story and writing sucks, which makes it so painful because holy fuck everything else looks good, but it fails where it’s most important and WOW that queerbaiting sure is something, huh

the fact some celebrate the game being ‘‘boring’’ as if that isn’t the exact opposite of the objective of any piece of entertainment

im not even gonna talk about Joel’s death as if that wasn’t the most distasteful scene I’ve ever watched since Ben’s entire death sequence in Dec 2019

or the unnecessary sex scene in the game which, BLEGH, so disgusting

no one i know has liked the game, not even ONE, and there’s SO MUCH to talk about it, but in general it’s a ‘‘teaches nothing, learns nothing, no new takes on the tropes it uses, spits on the audience and still expects you to like it’’ sack of bullshit

i’ve known all this shit since the leaks and thank fuck i didnt buy the game like i had planned, but i’d be lying if i didnt say i was disappointed at least, and downright furious at most

#personal #tlou 2 spoilers #spoilers

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eisforeidolon · 5 years

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I knew minions were gutter trash already, but one of them got so mad at being "queerbaited" about the 12th episode that they printed out a picture of Jensen from that CW promo video and literally set it on fire and posted pictures of it. They are all fucking disturbed, delusional, entitled and frankly Jensen deserves so much better in a fanbase than those nutjobs. One day they'll go after their actual queerbaiter Misha and then hell will freeze over. Scum.

Just ... WHAT.

They can squawk all they want about just not wanting to be “queerbaited”, but it’s obvious they’re perfectly fine with being strung along and baited. What they actually can’t stand is being given a straight answer if that answer is no. Which is exactly why this shit never significantly bounces back on the hellers & minions that write the absurd meta or lol!journalism pieces about how it’s gonna be canon any minute now or Misha “King Troll” Collins as it rightfully should.

The guy who gave them exactly the clarity they claim to want, bluntly telling them “Destiel doesn’t exist”? Who doesn’t change his answer depending on who is in the room at the moment or have a history of lying and twisting the truth? Who not only has regular conversations, but input with the writers about the trajectory of the show’s storylines? That’s the guy they ignore, deride, and slander - then turn on again and again with cries of “queerbaiting” when the lies & delusions they choose to believe from other sources instead are exactly that. And now apparently burn pictures of in effigy because some of them really are that completely psychotic. (No matter how many times I read that over, it does not get less bugfuck insane.)

It’s not about being little brats with some serious entitlement issues, it’s totally about “queerbaiting”! The part where the anger almost never goes towards the people actually leading them on, well, uh ... I’m sure there’s some logical reason for that! Oh, right, it’s that they’re full of shit.

#destihellers #anti misha's minions #askboxery #vaguely #anti misha #transparent as fuck #shipping goggles of WTF is WRONG with you?!?#Anonymous

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justanearth-boundmisfit · 5 years

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I checked some metas infamous for their superior attitude and what do I find, serious doubts about endgame desti*l. Same reasons why bitter cas stans do not believe in the ship since YEARS!! How could we know already years ago, without our PHDs and certificates in literature!? But they believed in the writers! Do they know the writers are not freelancers but EMPLOYEES, and that Saint Bobo cares about putting food on the table, not abt going to war for lgbt rights on spn of all the places

Lmao anon! And also they are playing the “Pedowizt it’s at fault” card, that I’ve seen coming from months ago. “The writers, showrunners and directors are not at fault here for the queerbaiting, they are just poor souls that got roped into the pure evil that is network television!” Give me a fucking break! Like I said in one of my previous posts they are out of excuses, the reach towards looking for someone who is at fault for destiel not going canon is amazing. Anything that is not accepting they were wrong, or that the writers are full of shit, goes.

NOW they are saying that the CW is not as lgbt+ friendly as everyone thinks, NOW? Why they didn’t bring that discourse out front when they were trying to convince everyone how ENDGAME destiel was? Because I’m not going to give names here, but I remember THAT meta going around being happy as fuck because Castiel died and that meant that destiel was going to go full canon. I remember very well… But suuuuuuuuure we are the ones acting like bronlies, and being bitter and obtuse, while they keep lying and going around like chickens without heads, because their excuses have found an expiration date.

I have talked about the CW being a shit network with my friends for years now, and some of them tried to convince me that I maybe was wrong. But I still maintain that is a network that is full of queerbaiting and the writers, producers and showrunners know VERY WELL the way the network is. They are not innocent in this ffs. Trying to put the writers especially, out of the blame for how they played with destiel and the fans, is just the way metas are excusing themselves and how full of shit their idols are, because they are tptb stans, and it shows. They never were shippers or loved the characters as we do.

They are just SO laughable at this point, I mean if I REALLY was like that account on twitter that likes to screencap everyone, and is calling out Cas’ fans lately because not everyone is buying their lies, I could get TONS of metas contradicting themselves in the last three years or so… Like literally hundreds of posts with them lying and then making excuses. But I’m not that person, and I really don’t want to read years of their bs, so I’m not going to do it. If anyone it’s interested it’s all out there… in their blogs, by their hands.

And sure, bobo is an lgbt+ warrior, that surreptitiously wrote destiel, against the network wishes, because he fights for the ship above anything else. Metas like to quote bobo? I like to quote bobo too, let’s see what he has to say about the network:

Now they are going to say that the tweet is taken out of context (is not, someone asked him why he writes Cas with two s) or that he was joking… so their screncaps from bobo are ok and have to be taken like the holy word, but when he says things like this he was just kidding for funsies! He has proved time and time again how attached to the machinations of tptb he is. He even put people inside fandom to test the waters for Wayward, he is not here to be an lgbt+ warrior, he is here to make money like you said, how hard is to see that? Apparently is too much for meta brains, weird because they are SO smart and above everyone else!

The other new bs they are spewing is how we have to take things as they are given to us and be grateful for them…. is this a church? A cult? Why I have to be grateful for the queerbaiting and how they destroyed my favourite character, especially in Dabb’s era, over and over again? Are they fucking crazy? Istg that I’ve never seen people so far into their own asses in any fandom. They want us to be these idiots, that really don’t think, and bow to every piece of crumb and bs that tptb have for us… That’s why they get so mad when some of us say: mmm nop, not going to happen, because I can think, I can feel, I can form my own opinions and I’m not going to buy into your trash show full of misogyny, queerbaiting, homophobia and racism… You want to buy that? Fine by me! I’m not saying don’t eat the crumbs, but don’t go policing me and everyone who is not going to bow their heads and say: yes, please more…

I get the feeling that we are going to see so much bs from them from here until spn ends….but I have to be grateful to bobo you know? After all he gave us an episode where his bs is REALLY showing and some in fandom are finally waking up. I hope it’s not too late.

Take care anon!

#Anonymous #rant #vent #istg these people XD #I have to go and read their latest bs too #and generally I get mad #but this?#I just have to laugh XD #thank you for turning into the laughing stock of the fandom #we really need the laughs #anti metas bullshit #anti spn #opinions #don't like don't read #dirt for ts #long post for ts #replies #ranty replies

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theaxisofidiocy · 7 years

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Yo this is not an informational post. This is an emotional rant based on things Ive heard and not confirmed. Just a psa

So I love stranger things two and the more I think about it the more I love Billy Hargrove and want to see his character broken down and put through some interesting development in future. Trouble is, this simple desire is apparently highly controversial on the tungl dot come because of the demand for ideological purity and teenagers with no dissociation between fiction and reality being given an anonymous internet megaphone to broadcast their frustration with the world. I’m no stranger to such anti fandom discourse, I tend to like dark characters and ship dark ships (where dark = problematic) so Im used to the whole “ew gross these people are horrible bigoted nazi pedo[hile abusive dog shit lumps because arbitrary fiction opinion” thing though I’d be lying if I said it didn’t bother me at all. I’m a pretty sensitive person so yea sometimes it hurts but whatever that’s my problem rationally I know that none of this matters. love isn’t real. death is certain. embrace the void.

So anyway Billy. Oh Billy. My dear sweet sweet self destructive asshole trainwreck of a baby boy. Important to note is that I did not love him immediately. At first I hated him. He seemed really obnoxious and pointless. Then the last episode happened. We’ll talk more about that later.

I started to get into the Billy and harringrove fandom subset a bit and let myself hope for character development. Then I heard that apparently the creators of the show have confirmed that they’re not going anywhere with Billy’s character because he’s just the new villain. um....ok....what

(i haven’t actually been able to find the source for this but hey im a pessimist so lets just assume it’s true while staying open to it being false. wow what a concept. mental flexibility.)

And I know there are a lot of fans who would like this as well, for Billy to just be the one dimensional villain and hopefully be brutally killed off as soon as possible.

And I gotta tell you guys...that is just terrible writing.

Like I said I hated him at first. He was mean and obnoxious and had a stupid mullet and did nothing of value and why was he even here? Apart from obviously being meant to contrast with Steve to prove how much better he is now which...cmon...did we really need that? Do we not have eyeballs? It felt stupid and condescending and I was truly annoyed everytime he came on screen. Gradually I became intrigued by just how fixated on Steve billy seemed to be. That was weird. Didn’t know what to make of it. Then episode 9 happened.

so hey any writers out there, if you want me to all out hate and not care about a character who you only meant to be a one dimensional villain, here’s what you dont do; you dont contextualize his behavior in a relatable and sympathetic way. Revealing his father’s abuse made soooo many things about Billy suddenly make sense. It even painted some in a new light as I looked back and realized just how self destructive most of his actions are. A lot of people also began reading him as gay, which Im not so sure of since tv loooves to queerbait, but I do agree it’s a perfectly logical interpretation of what we’ve seen. The whole scene was a giant “ooooooohhhhh” moment. With that little piece of context as to Billy’s perspective on his family (that he fears his father, that he is responsible for Max under threat of violence and thus resents her, etc) his character suddenly became...an actual character. An interesting character, that I want to see more of.

I cant for the life of me think why they decided to add this scene if they intended Billy to be a flat villain that we’re not supposed to care about. It utterly baffles me. Why? Why would you do that? This show is full of amazing, complex characters whose entire appeal is that they feel real and have flaws. So why would you add another one, but tell us that he’s not supposed to be complex or real and we’re just supposed to hate him and accept him as the dull bully villain?

I hope to god that these things Ive heard aren’t true because if they are I have a sinking feeling that the writing in this show is about to take a nosedive.

#stranger things 2 #billy hargrove #all my faves are problematic #discooooourse #harringrove mention #hit me up harringrove peeps #i am one of u #frustration #tv #i have been let down so many times before.#please stranger things #dont be next on my terrible tv experiences list #do better #wow lookit all thos words #so smartness #i even went back and capitalized stuff #for maximum smart

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tuckerfuckingdidit · 7 years

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googled a sherlock acronym i’d never seen before, and omg

Jo///hn//lo//ck is endgame. The writers have always intended John and Sherlock to end up in a romantic relationship. They are planting subtextual clues for viewers to find and piece together the puzzle of the century while systematically lying when asked about it. They are not, in fact, queerbaiting their audience.

i’m nor sure if it is a goal or a nightmare to ever have this much faith

EDIT 17-01-2017: Well. That happened. I am hugely disappointed in series 4, and not only because T//J//L//C turned out to be wrong and we were actually queerbaited,

but i know it’s gotta hurt

edit: in the wake of shit like what went down on hannibal, i can see how people’s hopes might have been up, but just. omg.

#no rebagels #ignore me i am having spn fandom flashbacks #spn digs #as soon as that shit went sideways i was like WELP i've got places to be and people who are NOT gonna hurt me #so.#it's been 84 years #i refuse to have a sherlock tag

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paperlacejane · 7 years

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In the light of Season 4 of BBC Sherlock,

I’m going to post my archived reaction to S3 and the Victorian Christmas Special, and some thoughts about the state of things. Completely unwanted and unrequested, but I want to share.

I also feel I should say that there is some positivity amongst the torrent of negativity.

I initially wrote the reaction to The Abominable Bride for my own personal catharsis. I considered posting it, tailored it as a review of the episode, even, but ultimately decided that I didn’t want to spread the negativity. If people were still enjoying it, then I didn't want to spoil it (I'm a sensitive type, and seeing negativity can easily harsh my buzz, so I didn't want to do that with anyone.)

I also still didn't want to believe where the show was heading. But now, given S4, I feel it's inescapable. Right now, I feel like I'm jumping out of the wood-work now to say: "SORRY GUYS, I KNEW THIS WAS GOING TO END BADLY." But I also really do want to make a point about the direction that the series took with S3 and the hideous Christmas special. [There were some considerable insulting blips along the way before that, but S3 (my main problem is His Last Vow) and TAB were so concentrated in their shitness, that I feel I need to single them out.]

I just want to point out that this wasn't a sudden thing. I feel like I need to say this, because a lot of people I'm seeing have been saying: "how did it go so wrong, you fucked up, this season was horrible" as if there weren't signs before this. People much more eloquent (and concise/pithy) than me have highlighted some of the questionable shit that has cropped up in Sherlock. I'm not going to write out all those points here. What I focus on are the glaring bits that offended me the most, that jarred the hardest, that really hurt -- and which appear to have been dialed up to 11 for this last series/season. I haven't read any (?? I think?) critiques of The Abominable Bride, so I can't say whether people have commented similar. I hope they have. (I had read over a couple of positive ones before writing this, on the IMDB page for that episode. This 'review' was what I was going to submit as a review on that page, because I was frustrated with the positivity, but I decided it was too-ranty and too downer-like for there.)

Very very few people are going to see this, let alone read this. But I just want to let out something that I’ve felt for a long time. That the signs of the fall were there, and that the writers, the actors, they've been screwing with us for ages, and that they've been wronging us in more ways than the no-johnlock queerbaiting-turned-queerbashing thing (which is a huge WRONG.)

So, this is my cathartic rant from however many years ago. I titled it, because Evernote wanted me to title it, "Notes on The Abominable Bride and the Questionable Direction of BBC's Sherlock" (the original title, I recall was: "what the actual fuck," or similar.)

In two words? Truly repugnant.

There is an aggressive amount of sarcasm at several points in the following paragraphs. Just, be warned. It should be obvious, and I've switched some of it out for easier reading with fewer double-negatives, but.

Given the era that Conan Doyle's stories were written, sexism is evident. Even within the character of Sherlock Holmes. He is quite gynophobic in the original stories, I have no illusions there. And yet he still respects women. He respects them when they're intelligent, when they're clever -- and those are not 'masculine' traits. He defends women, and threatens righteous violence against people who prey on them - one of my favourite moments is when he literally goes to get his riding crop to whip a man who has been manipulating and catfishing his own daughter. But still, there is sexism in Sherlock Holmes.

But I have never felt so attacked and demeaned as a woman by a Sherlock Holmes story as I have while watching this episode of BBC Sherlock. Whose idea was it to dress feminists in purple KKK hoods? To have them adopt KKK methods? To have pretty much all the women of the series thrown into a cultish vendetta club who specialised in systematic terror and serial murder? Oh, bravo. I don't care if it was all in Sherlock's head, or supposed to be justified within the narrative, or if it's supposed to be 'real'. Why would they put that on screen? Why would they make those links, create those parallels? And who thought having Steven Moffat tackle the topic of women and sexism was a good idea?

The only truly respectable life-like woman I have seen in this series is Sarah - a simple doctor, everyday but exceptional, who was clever and held her own. And yet she was disappeared. To be replaced by vindictive hags, insipid would-be love-interests, charicature land-ladies, and a woman who shot and technically killed the most-loved literary character of all time - who we're supposed to have forgiven because she "didn't mean to kill him," because her killshot was supposedly "surgery." The writers of this series would do well to remember that this isn't Doctor Who. It's not a science-magical world where the audience is obliged to grudgingly swallow down all the unlikely and downright absurd rationalisations that are thrown at us. If you use that sort of bullshit logic for a story which is supposed to be more-or-less realistic, it just looks exceedingly lazy -- even lazier than it does in Doctor Who. Not only that, It's fantastically cheap, and, at least personally, your audience ends up feeling cheated.

It also looks immoral in the extreme. How is it that all the characters -- John and Mycroft particularly (a pragmatic but emotional man who is supposedly devoted to Sherlock, as well as Sherlock's own brother who tenderly takes care of him every time he ODs) -- how are they supposed to have forgiven Mary too? I could, maybe, believe that Sherlock's self-esteem is so low that he might try to rationalise Mary's actions away in order to not rock the boat and not lose the people that he thinks of as his friends. But why in fuck's name are John and Mycroft believing that crock of shit? Even if it were "surgery," you're telling me that they can both just let the bare fact that she shot Sherlock slide? No visceral rejection of a person who could do that to someone you care about? No wish to see them pay, or be brought to justice? They're not repulsed by her actions in any way? They still trust her, when that's what she's capable of? When "I'll shoot Sherlock in the chest and maybe/probably he'll die," is a perfectly acceptable risk for her to take? (I say 'probably' because he flat-lined. And if it weren't a TV show, everyone has a good chance of dying if shot near point-blank in the fucking chest.)

Sherlock may be portrayed unsympathetically in this series, particularly in this latest episode, but he's no Magnussen. I wasn't torn up when Sherlock shot him in the face -- there was common decency on Sherlock's side, which goes a surprisingly long way. Magnussen was a blackmailing creep who had a penchant for sexual intimidation and degradation after all. But Mary shot Sherlock. Sherlock still equals 'good guy.' Let me break that down for you: A deceiving unrepentant liar and serial killer shoots good guy in chest for no good reason except so that she can go on lying. But not only are Mycroft and John letting that slide with little to absolutely no fuss, they're then letting Mary make smarmy little snide comments about Sherlock and joking about the lacking security of MI5 (and yeah, of course Mary can hack Mi5 instantaneously on an iPhone. Why not! Who cares about believability when you have the opportunity for 'witty' banter?) Mary is all-round a despicable character who somehow gets away with being a piece of shit because... She's sassy? The result is that she is a bad guy who gets no repercussions for her actions, and appears as shallow as a shower to boot. (I'm reminded forcibly of River Song.) The whole thing makes all of the main characters appear void of all human feeling, all basic human reasoning. They have no principles. Given that the show's main characters are meant to be crime-solvers, justice-dealers, law-and-order types, and "the British Government," you'd think there'd at least be some sense of moral rectitude abounding. And yet, no. There's a difference between "just enough of an arsehole to be worth liking," and just plain old arsehole. There's also a difference between morally grey and morally bankrupt. I feel increasingly under the impression that the writers don't know the difference.

On a related note: the true Sherlock Holmes was never, ever a sociopath (the term "sociopath" hasn't been used by any respected psychiatric authority since the 1960s - Sherlock would know that, even if the writers don't.) He has been sexist, but he has never been devoid of moral feeling. He has occassionally been devoid of tact, and often focused on fact over feelings, which are clearly very very different things. It's often remarked that as a character Sherlock Holmes is admirable, but that it's hard to like him. That's never stopped me before. That is, it's never stopped me with the original stories. Even within other adaptations, I have a great deal of affection for him and the stories he inhabits. With this series, they've done a good job of twisting that affection into disdain and disappointment.

Oh! And whose idea was it to harass a historically asexual/non-sexual character on his orientation? That was an added touch of pure ignorance - and that amidst the existing pool of unreason, it must have been the audience's birthday! Then, of course, they couldn't possibly forget to lean on the fact that Sherlock kept Irene Adler's photo in the stories! I mean, it's a given that he should be harassed for being non-sexual and non-romantic, but of ~course, if he were actually interested in sex and romance, he's obviously secretly definitely, ~definitely straight. Never mind that he also kept a bust and picture of Goethe. Nevermind that he has a picture of Poe in his bedroom. Nevermind that Irene was (in the original stories) a woman who just barely outwitted him, who ~just got away. Forget that it's perfectly conceivable that he might admire her resourcefulness and cunning -- they're just the things that as a character he always admires -- no, he obviously kept her picture because he wants to fuck her. Of course! God forbid a man admire and wish to remember a woman and not want to fuck her. Never mind all other evidence that he's content being a non-sexual non-romantic creature. Never mind respecting his orientation as valid. Never mind that Watson explicitly states that Holmes wasn't interested in Irene romantically/sexually, nevermind that he was willing witness at her wedding-- Oh, but they've found a solution for that as well! Watson was lying! Of course he was! How convenient for them!

I cannot adequately express just how disgusting it is that they are trying to suggest, in this same scene, that this particular interpretation/incarnation of the character of Sherlock Holmes is somehow the secretly ultra-accurate portrait of the 'real' Sherlock Holmes. They literally state that the original stories are glossed-over for the good of Dr Watson's reading public of the time. How narcissistic and power-hungry (and delusional) do you have to be to say that your adaptation is somehow a more 'real' or 'accurate' portrayal? "Oh, he's arguably one of the best-loved characters of all time? Well ours is more accurate and better and we have mobile phones!" The original Holmes is an icon, a simple character who is at the same time exceedingly complex, he's paradoxical and he's wonderful. He stands the test of time. And there was once a time when I would have defended this BBC portrayal of Sherlock as the most accurate adaptation I've seen - a rougher, younger Sherlock, but tactfully brought into the real and present day. Not anymore. They've ended up exaggerating Sherlock's flaws so that they consume his entire character - the drug-use/-addiction, the tactlessness. Then they have all the other characters hate on him, slap him, mock him because of the exaggerated character traits that once accented Sherlock Holmes, and that the audience once loved so much. I just feel like the entire series is being geared towards people hating Sherlock Holmes, hating this series. I don't understand what the intent is for making these narrative choices.

You cannot put your characters into situations, have them graphically violated and manipulated and slander them in-text, and then give a small throw-away line as if to forgive all trespasses. Audience engagement doesn't work like that. You're working towards your audience feeling violated. Offended. And we're given no justice, no closure. And rest assured: we remember everything. Why are there no repercussions? Why is there so much that doesn't add up, why is so much skated over, if this is meant to be the accurate depiction of the 'real' Sherlock Holmes and his world?

I don't trust the writers of this series. I don't trust them to give me closure, to take me on a journey or tell me a story that doesn't rankle in the wrong way - that doesn't violate reasonable sensibilities and then shrug off the trespass in the following moment. I feel like I should be slapping the creators with a glove and screaming "I demand satisfaction!" Because this latest instalment (the latest two instalments) have done little more than alienate and aggravate me. Even to the point that I'm ashamed of having once been a fan of this series. Even saying that I ask myself: am I over-reacting here? But I reason with myself, and I still feel it's true. It's become a series that I truly don't even recognise anymore. It feels warped. And I don't know how they can turn it back into a story about Sherlock making the transition from great man to good one. I'm not convinced that they have an idea of what a good man is, given what they're letting their characters get away with.

Moral relativity is a thing, but surely it's not just me that thinks the BBC Sherlock bar for "good" or "acceptable" is severely and unrepentantly low. Like I said: there's a difference between morally grey and morally bankrupt. There's not even any in-depth critique about actions, no reasonable discussion - everything's allowed, everything's thrown under the rug of "I'm a sociopath! He's a sociopath! She's a sociopath! Everyone's a sociopath!" Not only is that boring in the extreme to watch, it's so unsubtle that it's infuriating. There's no examination of what someone's shitty remark or action means. There's no weight to any interaction. It's pointless banter. It's flimsy. And when anything goes, then by what basis can they be solving crimes and catching 'bad guys'?

The vision for the series feels shot to shit. It feels like the series' universe has become an absolute fiction, devoid of any consequences, lacking in insight, depth, and subtlety, and populated almost exclusively by characters who drive me to be empty of any sympathetic feeling. I know that it's perfectly possible to write hateful characters who are never-the-less engaging, who inspire sympathy and empathy. But this series does neither. Look at the characters on paper and they become nothing. They're empty. I struggle to find instances of cogent speech that reflect some semblance of a fleshed out character beneath the flaking veneer. It's like they're just spouting words, but the words themselves have lost all meaning. And even when I find a moment that seems like it rings true and clear to the character that's speaking (Mycroft asking Sherlock if he'd made a list of narcotics used was the first that came to mind), that poignant moment is directly contradicted by their actions in a multitude of ways (your brother's killer is sitting right next to you, and you don't mind). That's a man who loves his baby brother (emotional reasoning) who is fine with his brother's flippant murderer a) still breathing, b) un-punished, c) being all sassy and nonchalant about Sherlock's drug abuse, and d) hacking into government restricted records in front of 'The British Government'. THAT SHOULD TRIGGER A FUCKING EMOTIONAL REACTION. It results in the portrayal of an inconceivable level of self-deception and compartmentalisation that reasonable men with moral feeling wouldn't stand. The characters don't feel solid. There's no integrity to them. You examine their reasoning, their internal logic, their actions, and they crumble to pieces. That, or they're so two-dimensional that they don't stand up to scrutiny anyway. It's all contradictions -- but they don't make a beautiful paradox, they make a jumble of nonsense tropes.

Beyond my perverse observation of how... wrong they seem, how much they betray how they're straying from the vision of the first and even the second series, these last episodes have simply served to make me disinterested in practically every single character. This is a truly impressive feat when they were once among my most-loved. I feel so fucking jaded. But all of the crap is just piling up to the point where I'm literally just stepping away from this series. I'm figuratively and literally throwing my hands up and saying: you know what? Fuck off. I have a feeling it may be like a car-crash for me for the next few episodes -- "don't wanna look but you can't turn away" -- but I don't see how they could bring the series back from this. I can't be the only person that's feeling seriously, seriously wronged by this episode. I can't be. Burn me once, shame on you. Burn me twice, shame on me. Burn me thrice? Fuck. Off. I'm off to watch something that doesn't make me want to throw up and claw my own face off .

So yeah.

After quietly “breaking up” with the show -- think in the style of Jon Snow bitterly saying: “My Watch is Ended“ -- I semi-waited for S4. I say semi-waited because I wasn’t going to watch it. But I was still hopeful, at least a little bit, on the behalf of the people that I followed on here, that I met in real life, that still had hope for the series. I thought to myself: “maybe. maybe it won’t be shit. maybe they’ll explain what the fuck why the fuck how the fuck.“

As we've found, and as I've mentioned, from what I have seen from my tumblr feed tonight, it went about as well as I expected.

I still haven't seen S4. The last episode I watched was TAB. But from what I've seen on here, it's been a clusterfuck of queer-coded villains, and copious dashings of even bigger plotholes than before, logical blackholes, more morally reprehensible crap -- and so many inconsistencies, it'll make your head spin worse than the hammed-up cinematography.

So, I'm so sorry for the people that had such high hopes, and who were deceived and let down in a big way. I -- and all of us, I think -- know that in the greater scheme of things, one TV show that went to shit, as TV shows are prone to do, isn’t so horrible a thing. But this show meant a huge amount to me. It meant an enormous amount to many, many others. I think of the creative fan-community, so many hours making gorgeously complex filthy brilliant heartwarming heartbreaking fic (so so much better than what we received)... to have what spawned that creative storm of brilliance and engaging life-affirming work -- life-consuming and life-ruining (in the good way) in equal measure -- to have what brought these works about go so bad, it actually hurts. It hurts less for me now, because I'm much further away from it than I was a couple of years ago. But it still stinks. And if it hurts me, I can't imagine how much that'd suck to have the show you spent so long making intensive work around go down the gurgler. The fandom and the general community that surrounded this show, for the most part, were way beyond what it ended up deserving.

In further efforts to legitimise my (our) frustration and disappointment, I'll reiterate that engagement in fiction is a huge part of our modern lives. We care about what happens to these characters and these stories. It matters, for one thing, because representation matters (be that queer, female, moral). Media fucking matters. It mirrors and exaggerates reality, and they ended up giving us a steaming pile of bullshit. (In a positive metaphor, this bullshit may still be used as effective manure from which better works can spring. Just be careful handling it.)

But, I have to say, given the backlash, I am also giddy. Because people aren't standing for it.

People are still making up theories to excuse where the show has gone, and what they've done, but at this point it really is super-keen denial, which some have realised even as they speak it. But the denial, the desperate “surely this is a trick” reaction, while sweet in its idealism, is also really sad. Because I don't think 'The Show' is gonna come back from this. I don't think they can get away with what they have been putting on the screens anymore. How can they? I can't forgive them. And after S4? I'm getting the impression that most of the world who gave the slightest of shits about BBC Sherlock can't forgive them either.

But lastly, I just want to say: okay, it hurts now. It really hurts. I remember that I was going through some horrible shit when they first started fucking up this show. Really shit timing, Show. I don't remember much from that time, just snippets, because that's how the brain copes. But I remember saying to my sister in a fit of desperate honesty: "all the therapy things I read, they say you're meant to hold onto the little things that makes life worth living, that you live for, that you want to see and experience more of... But BBC Sherlock was that for me, and it can't be that for me anymore?" I remember so clearly it being a question because I was fucking lost and BBC Sherlock was my refuge, anchor, thing that I could cling to as a source of enjoyment and escape and engagement. And it disappeared, nonsensically. There was no beauty to the unravelling, it just turned to crap on me. So if I sound like I'm being overly dramatic, trust that it’s coming from a real place, of just... complete disillusionment and disappointment. And to be not only without that refuge, but to have it turn into something grotesque that appalled me on a number of levels... that was just insult to injury.

“Breaking up with the show“ actually felt like a real-life relationship breakdown. Recently, I remember reblogging that post by alecslightvood:

one of the saddest things is when a show you invested so much of your time into and became emotionally attached to seriously fucks up and you are no longer captivated by it whether it’s because of illogical plots with zero substance, ooc characters, sexist writing or because the show kills off and treats minorities horrendously, and all you have left is this bitterness at how things turned out because something that once made you happy now leaves you emotionally and mentally drained.

and I remember tagging it: "it feels like being betrayed, the mixture of heartbreak frustration and disbelief, 'why are you doing this?', 'you're not who I fell in love with', 'you're not who I thought you were', 'you're not who I'd hoped you'd be', BBC Sherlock, I'm looking at you." Because my god, that descriptor fits Sherlock to a tee. I don't know what show they were talking about (the original post is gone,) but god that fits Sherlock so well.

I’m glad I jumped ship when I did (I actually mistyped “shit” there, guys, Freudian slip,) because honestly, I’m so so sorry for you guys that stuck it out. I had some closet hope for your wishes and genius plots (the ones you wove, not theirs) to come together in a beautiful climax that would justify everything. That would have been glorious.

But as it is. You are allowed to dump this show. You are certainly not alone. And I highly recommend it. The reason I’m pleased with this shows catastrophic fall (hah,) amidst the outrage and frustration, is because to be rid of it is freeing. To be rid of the quietly-but-growing-louder queer-baiting queer-bashing woman-hating show that does everything it can to insult the majority of those minorities who watch it, that insults the intelligence of its viewers with stupidity while screaming that it's the best... That's a good thing.

#please don't hate on me #if you don't agree with me this post wasn't meant for you #I'm not looking for an argument or a debate #I'm just trying to support in a realistic and disillusioned fashion

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