#Morstan Meta

[mrsmarymorstan]

I am very much enjoying the "Older Cousin Running A Game" vibes that Rose is brining as the Taskmaster here. She's authoritative not mean. She's on the side of the kids at all times, even when she thinks an idea is rubbish she doesn't dwell on it but rather encourages their creativity. She's 5 seconds away from being COMPLETELY out of her depth.

And Mike is the loser substitute teacher everyone bullies. Excellent dynamics.

Oh and I love Persia The Pigeon Girl. I hope she goes far in life.

[mrsmarymorstan]

When I was in the middle of my absolute worst depression, I made myself a sticker chart. It had tasks like, getting out of bed, getting dressed, eating a meal etc. Each time I did one, I got to put a fun sticker on there. And. It. WORKED. The physical reward was enough of a motivation to actually do something! It also made me leave the house so I could go and have fun browsing stickers.

Never underestimate the power of a fun sticker. And never let anyone try to belittle you for having one!

i literally love when people realize positive reinforcement works like yes its so silly isnt it. but it literally works humans love juice reward too

[winterdaphne2]

Gay Easter Eggs in BBC Sherlock

(I trust the above requires no explanation.)

Perhaps someone has done this before, but I wanted to put together a compilation of gay easter eggs in the show that I’ve seen other people point out and/or have thoughts on myself. So here it is!

When I say “easter eggs,” I’m thinking of small clues that the show creators included in the set designs, music choices, and other details of the show to reference that Sherlock and John are in love. I’m thinking of things you could miss at first, especially little clues that often require a bit of extra information or require observations across episodes to understand.

Of course, there’s also lots of subtext woven into the show, moments where interpreting the dialogue or visuals in a certain way tells us something about Sherlock, John, and/or the state of their feelings for one another. I’m not sure if I can clearly define “subtext” versus “easter eggs” and explain what distinguishes them, but at least to me, several of the things I’ve listed here seem a bit different from what people often refer to as subtext. Maybe subtext is about uncovering the layers to a piece of dialogue or an action that takes place in plain sight and seeing how that impacts our interpretation of the story, but easter eggs are about spotting smaller, hidden details. I’m not trained in literary or film studies, though, and I’m not trying to be doctrinaire about this at all! This list is just for fun, anyway. (The above image might not actually count as an easter egg, but I couldn’t resist including it here. Indulge me.)

The more I read about this show and the harder I look, the more I think that hardly anything is there on accident. All these easter eggs must have been included on purpose. The creators knew they were telling a love story all along.

I’ve linked to the posts where I initially saw people point these out or to other good sources, and for some of these I’ve added my own commentary/observations/interpretations. I’m sure there are many other easter eggs that I’ve missed! What have you spotted?

John’s PIN in TBB – When John tries to pay for his groceries at the beginning of the episode, we see that his PIN is 743. In ASIB, Irene’s code to unlock her phone is SHER, which would be 7437 on a phone keypad. So, John’s PIN is a clue that he is or will be in love with Sherlock. Source: @loudest-subtext-in-tv, here.

Shaftesbury Avenue, 20m from Piccadilly Circus in TBB – While investigating in Chinatown, Sherlock and John bump into each other at what used to be a cruising spot for gay men in London. Source: @the-signs-of-two, here.

Archer the American in ASIB – In the scene where the American CIA agents try to get Sherlock to open Irene’s safe, the head CIA agent pressures Sherlock by threatening to have one of his men shoot John. The agent says: “Mr. Archer, on the count of three, shoot Dr. Watson.” Ordering someone named “Archer” to shoot John could be a reference to Arthur Conan Doyle’s poem “The Blind Archer,” which is about Cupid and describes Cupid shooting two men who sound an awful lot like Sherlock and John. Source: couldntpossiblycomment, here.

“¿Dónde Estás, Yolanda?” in TEH – The song that plays during the scene with John and Sherlock’s disastrous reunion at the Landmark restaurant is a cover of the song “¿Dónde Estás, Yolanda?” performed by the band Pink Martini. The Spanish lyrics to this song are about searching for a long-lost lover, which is fitting for the scene where John sees Sherlock again for the first time since his fall. Notably, the creators didn’t use the first of the two versions of this song that Pink Martini has released. The band’s first version appears on their 1997 studio album Sympathique and features a man singing about a woman. Instead of using that version, the creators used the version from Pink Martini’s 2011 compilation album A Retrospective, in which China Forbes performs most of the vocals. So, the creators deliberately chose a remade version of the song in which a woman sings about a woman. They chose a gay song about searching for a long-lost lover for Sherlock and John’s reunion. abrae (@tea-and-liminality on tumblr) has a meta with more to say about the use of this song here.

John’s “oscillation on the pavement” in TEH – In TSOT, John observes a potential client standing outside 221B and trying to make up her mind as to whether to come in. Sherlock tells John “I’ve seen those symptoms before. Oscillation on the pavement always means there’s a love affair.” In the previous episode, John came to visit Sherlock at 221B but hesitated on the pavement outside, staring at the door and trying to decide whether to go in. Sherlock’s comment, “I’ve seen those symptoms before,” is a hint that we, the audience, have also seen those symptoms before—with John in the previous episode. Source: @bidoctor, here. (I saw someone else point out that last part about Sherlock’s hint to the audience, but I can’t find that post, sorry!)

Lilac dresses in TSOT – While planning John and Mary’s wedding, Sherlock chooses lilac-colored dresses for the bridesmaids. When John tells Sherlock that he likes the bridesmaids in purple, Sherlock pointedly corrects him by stating that the dresses are lilac. Apparently, “In Victorian times, giving a lilac meant that the giver is trying to remind the receiver of a first love.” So by dressing the bridesmaids in lilac, Sherlock is trying to remind John of his first love: himself, Sherlock. My heart breaks. Source: @asherlockstudy, here.

Putting the horns on Mary and Janine in TSOT and HLV – In TSOT, there’s a shot where Mary gives Sherlock and John a thumbs up before they head out on a case. The way Mary is standing, the horns on Sherlock’s cow skull thing on the wall behind her are placed right over her head. (I always thought this shot looked pretty weird, but now I see that it must have been intentional!) In the HLV scene with Janine at 221B, there’s a moment when Janine steps in front of John in the frame to kiss Sherlock, and her movement positions the horns right over her head. “Putting the horns” on someone means cheating on them. So in both cases, placing the horns right above Mary’s and Janine’s heads indicates to the audience that Sherlock and John are the real relationship in this show. Source: this post from multiple users on the @sherlockmeta blog.

The architecture of Sherlock’s mind palace in HLV – In the mind palace scene after Mary shoots Sherlock, the architecture of Sherlock’s mind palace is based on locations from ASIP. Sherlock literally built his mind palace out of places from his first case with John, illustrating that his relationship with John is what grounds him and that it means everything to him. abrae has some very helpful screencaps of this here (and I would recommend that whole meta, btw!)

The glasshouse scene in TAB – In TAB, the Victorian John tries to ask Sherlock about his sexuality and sexual history while they’re sitting in a glasshouse. In Victorian Britain, “glasshouse” was another term for a military prison. So John, a military veteran, asks Sherlock about his sexuality in a setting that represents where he would have been sent if he had acted upon his homosexual desires at a time when homosexuality was criminalized. Source: @haffieliesel, here.

What do we say about coincidences? The universe is rarely so lazy.

[lichanicksstuff]

What I love about Sherlock & Co. is that they aren't afraid to write close, healthy friendships. Many shows/books/etc. focus on the romantic aspect of every relationship, make characters pining for each other just to get people excited and thus - make a show more popular. I hate this. I hate that society puts romantic relationships on a pedestal and views them as something better than a deep platonic bond between friends. That's why I'm so grateful that the people working on Sherlock & Co. aren't afraid to do that, to play with character dynamics, and also to say a subtle "fuck you" to toxic masculinity.

[buckingham-ashtray]

“Because… you chose her.”

“Liar.”

—— The Empty Hearse

Remember when Sherlock saw but ignored the ‘Liar’ as he deduced Mary? The reason why he didn't have the heart to tell John was not just because he didn't wish for John to think that he was trying to “meddle” with his life, but more importantly, it was because Sherlock felt like he was in no position to hold Mary hostage for being a liar.

Sherlock knew well enough that being the liar he was, as he had lied to save John he had also almost killed him. He knew well enough that Mary‘s lies were what had pulled John back from the brink once more, so how was he in any position to condemn Mary for committing the same crime as he has only with the result of saving John.

And by urging John to forgive Mary‘s lies, how was Sherlock not wishing, wishing, wishing for John to forgive him as well.

I lied to save you, John. I don't give a damn if she lied for her own sake but she ended up saving you nonetheless.

I don't want to die but I killed myself to save you, John. I would die over and over again to save you, I would step off of a building I would let serial killers suffocate me I would shoot a man point-blank for your wife and embrace the consequence of going on a suicide mission with no return. I would, and I have.

I'm sorry that my lies have hurt you, John. But I am never sorry that those lies have saved you.

I lied to save your life, John.

“Because… you chose her.”

—— SHERLOCK, The Empty Hearse

As for the “you chose her”?

It was not the accusation of Sherlock‘s toward John for choosing Mary‘s lies over his. Because how could John not.

Her lies were pretty dresses decorated with promising smiles and overt affection. Her lies were far less harmful than my vacant pulse under your fingertips or my brains splattered on the pavement in front of your eyes.

You chose her. It is what it is.

[mrsmarymorstan]

My friend was in Japan during the Exhibit and went out of his way to pick me up goodies even though all he knows of the series is that I like it and I'm obsessed with the OT3. (He does now want to read it/watch it after seeing the art but still!!!) He is the literal best human on earth.

[tjlc-hellven]

Johnny! There is no baby!

[221b-alovestory]

Random thoughts-

Is it just me or Mary Morstan had potential to be such a good villain ,as both John and Sherlock loved her in their own way and fighting against that kinda person would have been their toughest battle ever,another Moriarty level enemy.

Mary WANTED to kill Sherlock, out of jealousy or to protect her secret( I guess it was both). God knows why writers took a sudden U turn there. She threatened him again,boasted about her shooting skills to Sherlock. Ofcourse she would have shot him again if John wasn't present there. Episode was going so well and then BAM the white washing began and it made no sense whatsoever.

"she saved me John" "because you chose her" "she called the ambulance". No Sherlock ,she didn't want to save you. You said so yourself in your mind palace(Molly - "you are going to die"), your heart stopped fgs. She was a danger to John according to you. Actually only JW s reaction looked reasonable(atleast initially). What happened that makers suddenly turned our detective into a marriage councellor post that incident ?? The story no longer was about two friends fighting crime together, it was all about Mary and how great she was. That conversation with John at Christmas was when I hated her the most- "ohh now you want to talk ,after months of silence" ( sherlock is inviting her for Christmas now,at his house with Mycroft right there completely oblivious, yeah right). Now I would have been so excited about this of this was villain Mary talking.

It all seemed like makers started her off as another love interest, turned her into a villain and got confused towards the end. Her death sequence was one of the most poorly shot scenes of the series according to me. CAM, Culverton and Eurus didn't do anything for me tbh, their was no build up there and it was pretty boring. But Mary s graph would have been so cool as a villain, a wasted opportunity really. Also I wanted to see more of Irene Adler and Janine (loved her character btw).

My point is this series was riding high initially only and only because of its leads. Benedict and Martin, their extraordinary acting ability. Their chemistry took the show to another level.

Two of them against the rest of the world became two against each other. Chemistry went downhill and so did the show. Makers really f*cked up big time just to whitewash one character. You had a whole literature ready for you by ACD and you managed this!!!

[mrsmarymorstan]

So, my take as a Queer Disabled Person? Slurs like "Faggot" and "Homo" and "Dyke" can all be reclaimed. I see it every day! You take the words they call you and reclaim them into something BEAUTIFUL and POWERFUL! But they have to be reclaimed BY THE PEOPLE WHO THEY'RE THROWN AGAINST!!!

R*tard and Sp*stic cannot be Reclaimed by Able-bodied People. They cannot be reclaimed by people who do not have those specific disabilities to begin with. They're used to hurt and to harm. And they're always used to show that something is NEGATIVE. That you're LESSER for being these things.

There is power in being a Dyke. There is not power in the words I cannot say. The words I've never used about myself in celebration, only in my darkest most self loathing moments.

IF a time comes -- and god I hope it does -- that these ableist slurs CAN be reclaimed then that will be AMAZING! But that time is not now.

Now, Disabled People need our Queer siblings to stand with us! More so than ever! Not start a debate about which words they can use to insult me.

Are you an advocate for censorship?

is this because i said not to use the r slur

[7552locked]

We have our options!

[starlostlix]

Some of my favourite moments of MTP Volume 11 (since I just read it for the first time yesterday)

[I don't have any meta theory content right now tbh I'm too preoccupied with exams, I had started a whole thing about depictions of brotherhood in the series that's kind of interesting but idk if i'll finish it. Also I took pictures of the physical volume so sorry for my camerawork)

1) Jealous Sherlock Holmes and Miss Hudson calling him out. She's iconic and him being in denial about being jealous is funny as hell.

2) Whatever this is (Sherlock buddy I know what you are because why is William living rent free in your head bro)

3) More jealous Sherlock Holmes, he's literally third wheeling in the first picture and he's so pissed about it.

4) TOBYYYYY

5) William showing up in this double page spread between chapters despite having no plot relevance in this volume

6) This panel is fun idk

7) I don't have any pictures for this but Mary Morstan being the one to figure out that there's 2 intruders go queen. Also the whole Sherlock vs Mary 'mind games' type stuff is so much better in the manga than the anime they watered her down so bad.

That's all for now but I could probably write a lot about Mary's character and Sherlock's responses to her and his tests to try and find out her real goals because in the manga she's so much more interesting. I should be reading volume 12 soon which means I could potentially have a ton to talk about but also alevel exams are taking up a lot of brainpower right now so idk when that will be lmao.

[mrsmarymorstan]

I've started to get five or six anon asks that are clearly fake Gaza Aid Go-Fund-Mes. It's honestly too much to handle, especially since it's so obviously vicious to take advantage of a situation like this.

As such, for the first time in 12 years, I'm gonna be turning off Anonymous Asks.

I'll do this at close of day today. So this is your chance to send me any weird anon messages you want me to see. I shall be replying to them all publicly. Within reason.

If you're going to send hate then at least be funny.

[mrsmarymorstan]

Also towards people who are ALLERGIC to dogs! I get so much "Oh but he's FRIENDLY!" when they start jumping around on me because they're off the leash despite all the signs up in the park.

I don't care that they're friendly and "mean no harm", I am still allergic to them and they WILL cause me harm! I deserve to be able to use the public walking path as much as you do! JUST PUT THEM ON A LEASH!!!

And yeah, that's the REASON they have "No Dogs Allowed" signs. Because your darling little puppy hasn't had the intense "No Interaction With Strangers" training a Guide Dog has had and WILL get too close to me and I WILL have an allergic reaction!

And yeah, for me it's just watery eyes and a cough and sneezing. But there are people out there who could literally die.

Just obey the rules, they're there for a Reason.

reading r/amitheasshole and being struck once again by how shitty some ppl are about fear of dogs??

seems like some people can't seem to even get their heads around the concept of being scared of dogs? 'what does she do in public get triggered every time there's a large dog' i. yes?? presumably yes if someone is triggered by dogs then they get triggered every time there is a dog

[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.

[silentauroriamthereal]

Your blog is a literal goldmine to me lol. I love going through your Mary Morstan tag.

Ahhh I love that!! I’ve always said that I write my metas directly into fics, but the occasional post (read: rant) is always fun, right? 😛

[transholmes]

The Russian Flu pandemic, one of the deadliest pandemics in recorded human history, raged between 1889 and 1895. London, with its huge population and quite frankly piss poor sanitation and hygiene standards, were particularly hard hit.

Knowing this, it lends another light than usual to why Watson was involved in so few of Holmes's cases between the autumn of '89 and Holmes's "death" in April '94. It wasn't that he didn't care about his friend or didn't want to get involved, but as a practicing doctor in a pandemic riddled metropolis he would have been overworked for a large part of the year while the virus resurged.

Also Holmes would have been hesitant about involving him against Moriarty, not just out of concern for his safety but because he knew his friend was already overworked.

It also offers another facet to why Watson was willing to sell his practice almost immediately upon Holmes's return and why Holmes asked him to.

Watson didn't have the best health to begin with, he did after all never fully recover from his case of typhoid fever. When Holmes returns in April '94 that winter's resurgence had only just begun to abate and this was just the latest one of a yearly recurring resurgence, resurgences that often took over half a year. This as well as Watson's twin bereavements (Holmes and Mary) could easily at this point have meant he had reached the end of his ability and capacity. Holmes might indeed be legitimately worried that Watson might work himself into an early grave if he doesn't take a prolonged break. A ironic role reversal that I don't think was entirely lost on Holmes.

So Holmes might have asked his cousin and fronted the money just to be sure that Watson did sell and quickly enough that he didn't get second thoughts.

All of this is brought to you by the theory @jeremys-come-to-bed-eyes showed me, that it was the Russian Flu that was the cause of Mary Watson's untimely death. Something that would lend an even more tragic twist to the whole thing.