#sherlock holmes and the internet of things

[gingerswagfreckles]

Living is New York City is annoying because someone will ask you where you live and you say oh I'm from New York City and terminally online weirdos will go omgggg here the New Yorkers go again thinking they are soo cool and special. Like ok I think maybe you are just a jerk actually.

[aunhinged]

Sherlock and House crossover AU

Sherlock: I switched John’s phone language to Icelandic. He’s been trying to translate texts with Google for the last two hours.

House: I changed Wilson’s ringtone to the sound of a cardiac monitor flatlining. He nearly had a heart attack.

Sherlock: Efficient and thematic.

House: I aim to please.

John (to Wilson): We could just... ignore them?

Wilson: Ignoring them only makes them try harder.

[renaultphile]

Free on the Internet Archive.

"My Dearest Holmes" by Rohase Pierce (1988)

[hot-on-my-watch]

An "Always the Grown-Up" Rant

I know that a lot of fans are angry at Moffat and Gatiss for a lot of things, and most of all for Season Four.

I personally am mad at them for a few things. Mostly things that I can easily let slide given the immense enjoyment I've had and continue to have from their BBC Sherlock series.

But THIS FUCKING LINE!!!

A woman's wedding ring is dirty even though the rest of her appearance is carefully curated? I'll handwave it and maybe google when we started using soap.

Man wears same large thick coat outdoors in all seasons? Fine. It's England. And I have an old (autistic) friend who actually does this.

John's eyebrow says that he hasn't rung his sister, and Mary's a bread baking disillusioned Guardian reader with a secret tattoo? Hahaha why not?

Sherlock has to use his incredible mind over matter to restart his heart but also "it was surgery"? Bit much, but I'll overlook it. For you.

Evil genius simultaneously hacks every screen in the country? Eh, ok.

Secret island prison? Sure. Let Sherlock live his pirate fantasy. Let John point his gun at someone. Let Moriarty play Queen while dramatically disembarking from a helicopter.

Predicting multiple terror attacks at lightspeed from Twitter? Well, we've come this far.

I do not watch Sherlock for 'slice of life' realism and dear lord I hope no one else does. I do not WANT realism. I want to forget that I am vast majority bedbound and that people are out there having coffee and going for a pint and working at normal jobs with payslips and lanyards and spreadsheets. And generally speaking, BBC Sherlock has helped a lot with that!

But WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK were they THINKING WITH THIS LINE???

SERIOUSLY?!?!?!

Sherlock is barely a fucking grown-up on his own, but I'd allow it. Especially after the "baby" jokes John, Lestrade and he himself have previously made at his expense.

But COMPARED TO MYCROFT?!?!

WHAT. THE. ACTUAL. FUCK. LADS?????

WERE YOU HIGH? WERE YOU OUT OF YOUR GODDAMN MINDS? WHAT THE FUCK???!!!

See, after I first heard this, I quickly recon headcanon-(is this a thing? Is there a name for this soecific thing?) -ed it into Mrs Holmes the mad genius being completely out of touch with the social reality of her children- especially as she's been so harsh to Mycroft in this scene and not massively had to look after adult Sherlock herself. Because, y'know, Mycroft was doing it!

Then I complained about it on Reddit.

To my HORROR, another user told me that Steven Moffat had said in an interview that it was meant to be taken as true. But y'know, we're all just randoms on the internet and people get things wrong.

Then another user told me they theorised that Eurus had reprogrammed her parents to favour Sherlock, which is an interesting theory.

But clearly in the script, everyone... including Sherlock and Mycroft... just quietly agrees.

What....

What is the reasoning for this?

I know some will say "mate, welcome to all of season four" or even "three and four" or all of it.

I know some people consider Mycroft a bully, but I really don't. Certainly not after the scene on the plane and the 'Redbeard' reveal.

I'm open to persuasion though. If anyone has any thoughts on this, feel free to share! I might well not agree, but I won't attack you either.

Or the writers. But again, if I ever end up trapped with them in a lift or some such... I WILL have questions!

/rant.

[feminismisstillahatemovement]

You may have seen photos of him before, such as this one from 1886, when he (on the left) was already 50 years old:

It just struck me today that in his lifetime he has lived through the invention of photography itself, as well as moving pictures, television, VHS tapes, DVDs, BluRays and streaming; the first sound recording, 78rpm shellac records, 8-track tapes, CDs and MP3s; bicycles, cars, motorbikes, zeppelins, airplanes, helicopters, spaceships, satellites, the Moon landing, the Mars rover; the telephone, the internet, the smartphone, lasers, plastics, cellophane, washing machines, vacuum cleaners, refrigerators, electric ovens, microwaves, atomic bombs; the assassinations of Abraham Lincoln and JFK, the American Civil war, the Boer War, WWI and II, Vietnam, 9/11; Vincent Van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, impressionism, surrealism, Salvador Dali, Andy Warhol, Jazz and Blues and Rock & Roll, Disco, Punk, Hip-Hop and Grunge; Charlie Chaplin, Oscar Wilde, Harry Houdini, Sherlock Holmes, Gandhi, Jack The Ripper, Sigmund Freud, Wyatt Earp and Billy the Kid, Communism and the Soviet Union.

None of these things existed before him. Yet he's still alive today, walking around and eating grass.

[charcubed]

wait I'm sorry I just got kicked in the face. There's gonna be more sherlock?

LMFAAAOOO

Okay so. Yes because real ones know that that's always been the case!!

Here's a list of some of the ancient lore quotes from Mofftiss about the 5 season arc:

"instant series commission, a guaranteed 2nd series, a cuddle, a guaranteed 3rd series, and a whispered invitation back to 'my place' (where I'll explain that really I've got a 5-series arc in mind, & a spin-off)" –Moffat, 2009 (one year before Sherlock)

"Having started off with Sherlock and John much younger men than they are usually presented, it would be rather lovely to keep going. I love the idea of them being in their 50's and still doing it." Mark Gatiss, 2013

“…we just got out of the rain and sat at the top of the [Sherlock] production bus… and we just started plotting out what we could do in the future. And we plotted out the whole of series four and five.” –Moffat, 2014

Moffat: "We've had the most sketchy discussions on what we'd do." Mark: "We have an idea for season five on a Post-it note. That's as far as we've got. Unless I'm lying?" –2016

Moffat: "Thank you for showing more patience than any other fandom in history." Mark: "Stay tuned!" 2020, celebrating the 10-year anniversary

Those are just the quotes I have on hand right now, of course, but I do enjoy trotting them out lmao.

And yeah, after s4, basically Moffat or Mark or Sue Vertue all pop up in press every now and then to essentially publicly say "yeah we'd love to make more Sherlock but it's so hard to get ahold of Benedict and Martin :/ someday!" and everyone on the internet goes "OH MY GOD SHERLOCK IS COMING BACK???" and those of us who have been here the entire time are like "yes. it's a matter of when, not if" looollll. (There was an article with quotes by Sue a few days ago so that's why everyone is discussing it again.)

Of course, quotes by the creators (who are also notorious liars) are arguably not what matters most. The biggest evidence that there will be more Sherlock is the fact that the show indicates a 5-season arc and always has. Lowest hanging fruit: "The Five Pips" of The Great Game, for example.

But! Required reading: I humbly direct you to this post by the brilliant @devoursjohnlock. It continues to be my favorite summary about what this show is doing, as a queer story that acts as a queer adaptation/interpretation of Arthur Conan Doyle's work to bring the subtext of the original stories to light as text – amongst other things. And it talks about how/why the story remains unresolved.

Aaaaand I also direct you to this post by @bisexualmindcabin explaining how/why there may be a 10 year gap before s5 – a.k.a. just like Arthur Conan Doyle brought Sherlock Holmes back 10 years after killing him, if Mofftiss wanted to recreate that, they'd possibly aim to bring the show back 10 years after "killing" it.

SO YEAH

TL;DR: THERE'S GONNA BE MORE SHERLOCK

eventually

[tawked]

So, weird funny kinda sexist story about Batwoman --

Kate Kane was introduced to comics while I was still a little Catholic schoolboy in an all-male school. I had this mental image for years of Kate as some kind of hyper-masc, man-hating frigid bitch as a result of being in that bubble.

Almost all of my friends were into comics. We were reading a lot of Batman because my school library had a stack of Batman TPBs, but nothing Batwoman related. We'd learned about Batwoman on the pre-social media forum-based internet, where a lot of the older men we were talking to fucking DESPISED Kate. They'd characterize her as this homophobic stereotype of a massive Hulk Hogan woman with a simply unfortunate face, absolutely flat chest and a werewolf-hairy body who's motivated by her hate for men and straight people.

This concept excited me so much.

I thought she'd be like...

( Hark! A Vagrant, by Kate Beaton )

It wasn't that I wanted to make fun of that kind of character or anything, but like -- how do I put this?

There just weren't women like that in the fiction available to me at all. The literature we read at school was about men exclusively or only placed women in these very uninteresting supporting roles. The most diverse women in this library were in Shakespeare and that shit was inaccessible as fun reading for me as a little baby man. In nerd shit spaces, most of the fiction I was exposed to was again more or less exclusively about men, like most comics, The Lord of the Rings, Lovecraft style pulp lit, and Dungeons & Dragons-style fantasy. Most of the videogames were either about men or hot stereotypical bi women like Bloodrayne who never made anything one could really read as an abrasive feminist statement. This bizarre stereotype that the New Atheist turned Gamergate world had constructed just didn't exist in media and I was so excited by the concept that one did.

I thought that kind of person being written as a superhero would be inherently interesting. How does she navigate fighting with men, in a world where 90% of villains are men? How does she understand and relate to femme fatale villains like Ivy? Is she ever read as a man by other characters and if so, how does she handle it? What was her deal? She was so interesting. I was too young and stupid to imagine myself agreeing with what I imagined her values to be, but what a fascinating, unique angle, right? What a unique way to explore the idea of someone who is sometimes very correct - most dangerous people superheroes encounter are men, after all - but who's absolutism sometimes drives her to make false assumptions. I'm going to be a real homo here and pretend I thought that making a detective woman blinded by hate for men a clever inversion of that one Sherlock Holmes novel but actually that'd be a lie and I was thinking of a movie adaptation I watched 20 minutes of and pretended to have read in order to seem smart in internet conversations.

Anyway, I say this with no sarcasm, that idea of Fiendish Butch Kate captivated me.

So I read it and she's just like this conventionally pretty, broadly inoffensive and unobjectionable superhero. She's kicked out of the army because she's a lesbian and doesn't even get all that political about it, she kinda takes the L as some kind of private affair to resolve with Batwomanning. She scissors with Maggie and Renee but she never, like, attends Pride or punches a dude out for calling her a slur.

Renee responded to some direct homophobia in Gotham Central - she had a lesbian symbol burned onto her actually in a very unsubtle visual metaphor for being branded in her private and professional lives lol - but that kinda thing just didn't come up in the Batwoman run I read.

She wasn't the giant man-devouring woman that the sexist internet losers told me she was.

And the disappointment hit me like a fucking bulldozer lol.

Anyway I love Kate but sometimes I wonder about the version of her my moron sixteen year old self imagined...

[batsarebetterthanpeople]

why do so many people keep calling ed izzy's abuser? I thought it was kind of funny how wrong they were at first because I love being right but at this point I feel like, if you really believe that why do you even like this show? where the main love interest is a violently abusive indigenous man? that sounds boring as shit. what would possess the writers of the show for them to make such an awful decision?

but then I think, if this many people believe it does that mean I'm the one who's wrong? or is it that the creators fumbled that storyline when they should have been clearer about it? or maybe it's just that most people on here have had their reading comprehension scorched away by Sherlock Holmes conspiracy theories and Steven Universe discourse. I can't tell. sometimes I think the internet may have been a mistake.

No they're wrong here's what's going on. People all read this shitty fic called Hell or High Water where Ed was everything the Izzy stans say he was and then instead of realizing that Ed is sad everyone regressed into thinking that the Kraken Era TM was going to be incredibly violent, like serial killing blond men because they look like Stede levels of violence. Even if you didn't read HoHW you saw art or read fic from people who had engaged with this fic and succumbed to it's premise. So there's been this background radiation of misunderstanding what the Kraken is on the fandom for several months. So inevitably when Ed did some mild violence and then attempted suicide by threatening murder until the crew took matters into their own hands, which is not abuse or torture by any stretch, btw, it's a murder-suicide at worst (I say at worst because I consider it fuckery-suicide I don't think Ed was trying to kill people I think he was trying to force them into a situation where they thought it was kill or be killed so that they would choose to kill him, but that is my interpretation and you are free to think it's a botched murder-suicide I have no problem with that), which, murder is something the show has never condemned and if it did it would be horribly inconsistent. So anyway, Ed's whole Kraken Era was categorized in the show by him being sad and doing so many drugs and begging someone please god anyone to kill him and trying to break Ned Low's record out of the evil boredom, but because it had a murder-suicide element to it and Izzy's toes were getting removed and he waved a gun around at everyone once (in a way that felt to me like he was trying and failing to work up the nerve to blow his own brains out but I digress) people who liked HoHW and were mad that people had called it out were like "see hes being violent HoHW author vindicated" as if anything Ed did rose to the level of that fic

And you want to know how I know this read is bullshit? Because when I watch the show with people who don't read fic or interact with the fandom and then I gauge their reactions without showing my hand they all implicitly understand that Ed is reacting to Izzy in a way appropriate to how pirate captains react to threats from subordinates. The spectrum of reactions has been from "hey isn't it weird how Ed was the Kraken because his dad was abusive and now he's the kraken because of Izzy? Maybe there's something there but idk" to "I don't think you can apply the logic of domestic abuse to a pirate captain and first mate but also Izzy had it coming" to "I cannot feel bad for Izzy after last season, I'm sorry." To "lmao Izcel" and I've showed this show to roughly everyone I know. The only thing I can conclude from the fact that people who don't engage with OFMD fic almost unilaterally thinking that Izzy is in the wrong and then coming online to see people thinking the opposite is that Izzy as victim and Ed as abuser is pure fanon, like how Stede is a cinnamon roll who talks like Azeriphael.

But anyway yeah you're completely right about the fact that this would be a bad show if they decided to make Ed into a domestic abuser. I don't want to watch a rom com about a domestic abuser falling in love and I don't want a show that decided to make it's indigenous lead abusive when the stereotype of indigenous men as abusers is still to this day used as an excuse to separate indigenous children from their families and put them with white Christians in order to erase their culture. Good thing OFMD didn't make Ed abusive, so I still like the show.

[preservationofnormalcy]

Ok, so I’m writing a novel involving paranormal investigation (no relation to you, takes place in a fictional town) and I’m on my third draft when the main character shows up behind me, grabs and turns me around to tell me of the “inaccuracies to his case”. Now I wrote them down and how I should change them. And when I looked up from my notepad, he was gone.

I want to continue, and most of these I feel like I can implement within the story, but what exactly happened? And if this becomes a series, will he continue to pop up, or was it one of those “one in a blue moon scenarios”?

And what do I do if it isn’t?

Hey Norm...

Hmm? Didn't you do a PSA about this exact subject in the nineties?

Oh, uh, sure. When I first started. Around '99. It's waaay outdated, now, you know, with the internet and everything, it's better to not even look it up. I don't think it was even digitized, really. I have no idea what happened to it.

Oh, Norm, don't worry! If there's one person who knows your filing system better than you, it's me! Let's see...H for Holmes, S for Sherlock...cross reference to P for Parafictional, 90s...HERE WE GO! "Dear Watson: That's Not Holmes, That's A Lure!"

Oh good, they put it on a disc so that a tech savvy person could find it, uh, twenty five years later. I wouldn't play it, I can't guarantee--

<An old, color degraded video begins playing. It's clearly shot on VHS, with a minimal budget, and had degraded somewhat before being transferred to digital. A man stands in a small, cinderblock room in front of a backdrop depicting a victorian study. He is wearing a tweed jacket with leather patches on the elbows and a pair of smart slacks. A deerstalker hat sits conspicuously on a stack of actual books, Sherlock Holmes novels. The man himself looks sort of like what you'd get if you focus-group-tested the only type of man Don Bluth knew how to draw, and has curtain bangs with frosted tips. The whole ensemble has the energy of a store-brand Milo Thatch. As he speaks, his eyes don't leave a fixed point behind the camera.>

So. You have encountered an entity from a fictional property. You're excited - maybe you wanted to talk to your favorite book character. Or. Maybe you are a writer and you are excited to talk to your protagonist. But...is that entity real?

<There's an extremely awkward camera change, and the man looks to it, his eyes following a point again.>

....or a lure?

<He leans back and there is a too-long pause before he continues.>

When encountering a parafictional manifestation, remember the three S's.

<The visuals change to a grainy blue background, white text appearing as the man's voiceover continues.>

Solidity: are you are this entity is physical and not all in your head?

Subjective: if it's real, are other people seeing the same thing?

Sentience: is this entity sentient, or merely approximating sentience? Is it answering questions like a sentient entity, or like how it would be expected to answer?

<It cuts back to the man, standing behind the chair with his hands on the back. There is a too-long pause again.>

If...uh.

If this entity doesn't pass any of these easy-to-remember checks, that's a red flag. Any number of malicious extranormal entities can exploit the human capacity for creativity in order to feed on our psychic energy, creating a non-sentient construct we call a "Chinese Room" in order to keep YOU from asking questions.

Remember next time you see Darth Vader, Spider-man, or Tarzan - are you so incredibly lucky to experience such a rare phenomena as true parafictional manifestation?

<He awkwardly puts a pipe in his mouth and blows a few bubbles.>

Or are you being lured?

<The video ends.>

....god, my hair.

[the-wine-dark-sea]

This is kind of random, but I love that Edwin reads Charles a comparatively obscure story in the episode 7 flashback.

It would have been so easy to just have him read, for example, a Sherlock Holmes story and be done with it. The epitome of classic detective fiction to this day, which everyone knows about, whether they've ever read any or not. (And it's not like it wouldn't have been fitting for a number of reasons.) But they went with Max Carrados, a character who was popular around the time Edwin died, but who has largely faded into obscurity today. And I think that's such a neat little bit of storytelling, because it shows the difference between Edwin's time and the late 80's or the present day so well. Sure, there are also the usual tells that Edwin lived in the past - he wears old-timey clothes and doesn't understand what the internet is, things that are commonly used for that type of situation. This, however, is a bit more subtle, just a gentle little reminder that Edwin's (pop)cultural influences differ from Charles', or the viewers'. It's only a little detail but I'm very fond of it, and of how it plays with a lesser known classic, with what is popularly remembered and what maybe isn't.

(And Max Carrados is only the tip of the iceberg and better remembered than a lot of other genre/sensational fiction that Edwin might have read when he was alive. It depends on what was deemed worthy to be preserved, and isn't that fitting concerning a boy whose disappearance was shrugged off and who has long been forgotten? But that's probably me thinking too deeply about this lol.)

[finalproblem]

Sherlockian Wednesday Watchalongs: Groundhog Day 3—Year of the Snake 🐍

February is here, and of course we all know what that means! If the snake comes out of its hole and drinks its little dish of milk, we get six more weeks of Lunar New Year.

No, wait… I think I may've gotten a few things mixed up there.

Annnnyway, this month we'll take a journey through four decades of television adaptations of The Adventure of the Speckled Band. Each week, it's another take on the same canon story.

Wednesday, February 5 Your Show Time: The Adventure of the Speckled Band (1949) Alan Napier as Holmes, and Melville Cooper as Watson (One of the earliest known versions of Sherlock on TV!)

Wednesday, February 12 Detective: The Speckled Band (1964) Douglas Wilmer as Holmes, and Nigel Stock as Watson (The pilot episode for what would become the 1965 Sherlock Holmes series.)

Wednesday, February 19 Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson: The Acquaintance (1979) Vasily Livanov as Sherlock Holmes, and Vitaly Solomin as Dr. Watson (This is the series also casually known as Soviet Holmes.)

Wednesday, February 26 Granada Holmes: The Speckled Band (1984) Jeremy Brett as Sherlock Holmes, and David Burke as Watson (Maybe this week we'll finally learn an important life lesson and break out of the time loop?)

Here’s the deal: Like Sherlock Holmes? You’re welcome to join us in The Giant Chat of Sumatra’s #giantchat text channel to watch and discuss with us. Just grab a copy of the episode or movie we’re watching, and come make some goofy internet friends.

Keep an eye on my #the giant chat of sumatra tag and the calendar for updates on future chat events.

[thegildedbee]

:: February 28 :: Selection for Week 9 of 2025 :: 🐝 "the adventure of the six napoleons" (1904) from sherlock holmes: a year of quotes* 🖊️

Lestrade and I sat silent for a moment, and then, with a spontaneous impulse, we both broke out clapping, as at the well-wrought crisis of a play. A flush of colour sprang to Holmes's pale cheeks, and he bowed to us like the master dramatist who receives the homage of his audience. It was at such moments that for an instant he ceased to be a reasoning machine, and betrayed his human love for admiration and applause. The same singularly proud and reserved nature which turned away with disdain from popular notoriety was capable of being moved to its depths by spontaneous wonder and praise from a friend.

Watson's lovely description of how deeply-gratified Holmes feels at his friends' admiration pulls me right in; Doyle somehow contrives to have Watson enclose the reader in the scene as well, as another who shares the sentiment of approval by the two men, and then is allowed to witness Holmes -- literary creation though he be-- being caught off-guard (as he so rarely is) by "us."

"The Adventure of the Six Napoleons" is a story that is suffused with a glow that emanates from amongst the pleasure taken by Lestrade, Watson, and Holmes in each others' investigatory companionship. The very first sentence of the story makes this clear: "It was no very unusual thing for Mr. Lestrade, of Scotland Yard, to look in upon us of an evening," and in the paragraphs that follow, Watson's images and phrasing provide charming glimpses into conversational gambits of cordial regard that set the story in motion.

This is also the story that contains one of the most famous passages in canon, one that underlines this esteem in the penultimate paragraph:

“Well,” said Lestrade, “I’ve seen you handle a good many cases, Mr. Holmes, but I don’t know that I ever knew a more workmanlike one than that. We’re not jealous of you at Scotland Yard. No, sir, we are very proud of you, and if you come down to-morrow there’s not a man, from the oldest inspector to the youngest constable, who wouldn’t be glad to shake you by the hand.”

I've always had a special place in my heart for "The Adventure of the Six Napoleons," for how it features Lestrade, Watson, and Holmes as a trio of overgrown boys at play across the London pitch. If you haven't read it, give it a lookover :-) (I guess I should have said before now, but the Holmes stories can be found in many places on the internet, given that they are in the public domain -- huzzah for the public domain! -- such as here, for T6N.) It's one of the clutch of stories that come hard on after Holmes's resurrection by Doyle in 1903 in "The Adventure of the Empty House," which recounts Holmes's return from the Reichenbach hiatus. Doyle was famously ambivalent about the success of the Holmes stories, because he believed that they overshadowed his high lit ventures, and so, to be rid of him, he became the man who murdered Sherlock Holmes in "The Adventure of the Final Problem" in 1893. And that's one of the reasons that I find T6N so eminently huggable: I picture Lestrade standing in for Doyle himself as we begin again, placing himself front and center as an habitue of 221B, and ready, with a twinkle in his eye, to take on an adventure as a comrade-in-arms with its residents. The appeal that the mind-set and feeling-set that T6N has for me is one of the reasons that I found BBC Sherlock's "The Six Thatchers" so dispiriting. The series belongs, of course, to the writers to do with as they wish, and while, like any (disgruntled) fan, I can list off with asperity things I think went amiss, in the end, it's their vision, and thus and such, and so on, and etc. etc. etc. It's their rulebook, so what they do with canon in creating their canon is cricket.

And yet . . . "The Six Thatchers" has such a poisonous atmosphere in regard to John and Sherlock, and an indifference to Lestrade (unless as aligning more toward John's antipathy), that I really do think there's a case to be made for taking legitimate offense that they enacted grand theft auto on T6N as the canonical vehicle with which to slam on the brakes regarding Holmes and Watson's special bond, and to ignore the Lestradian dynamic Doyle layers into T6N. In my cynical view, I don't even think it's just happenstance that they used T6N in this way, essentially perverting it -- I think it was something of an intentional slap in the face to the Sherlockian fandom (BBC and more generally): it was a way of throwing a bit of a tantrum about to whom they believe the story really belongs, take note, you out there in audienceland, make no mistake. It's a vague feeling that solidified after the last episode of the fourth season, with the throwaway scene of "the three Garridebs" as a visual joke in "The Final Problem." Doyle's original canonical tale, "The Adventure of the Three Garridebs," is noted for another famous passage, this one about the depth of feeling Holmes expresses for Watson when he fears for his life. BBCS' authors, in taking T6N, one of the warmest of Doyle's stories, and appropriating it for an icy plot which ruptures Holmes and Watson, and then devaluing another of the stories, T3G, that demonstrates the special relationship between the two, by treating it as a jape -- well, "not good, no, really not good," in my book.

...................................................... *Levi Stahl and Stacey Shintani, eds., U of Chicago Pr, 2019

& bespoke notifications as requested :-) [thanks for reading!]: @totallysilvergirl and @winterdaphne2 and @keirgreeneyes and @calaisreno

[themuseinthewoods]

Muse's fandom crush list and reasons:

idk, I wanted too. and I want to see if anyone agrees with me.

thank you to my moot @nymphfever just telling me to do it and she just started writing so make sure to check out her blog if you have time, she's doing really well! And I am also tagging @atheopportunist because she inspired me to do this over one of our conversations.

list under the cut, images I got off of pinterest of the internet.

And if you wanna do something, describe my type after reading in the weirdest or funniest way you can think of.

this is going to be embarrassing please don't judge me, I'm just a fangirl

Lord of the rings: Aragorn- Have you seen him?

But also he sings and gives hugs and he's so pretty. I also love that he knows stuff about history, I just want him to tell me stories. I would feel safe with him.

Vikings: Ivar the boneless- do not judge me,

he is the only person I allow myself to be that delulu and think "I could change him" because that is how much delulu I need. Idk, I just want to hold his face in my hands and cover it with kisses. I would not feel safe with him unless his drastically changed.

Star wars: The Mandalorien- do I really have to explain?

do I? LOOK AT HIM. And he has a tiny green child that I can adopt. OF COURSE I WOULD FEEL SAFE WITH HIM

Marvel: Bucky Barnes- I have a thing for moody blue eyed men, okay? Because I want to love them.

Yes, I would absolutely feel safe with Bucky when he isn't winter soldiering. I want to like cook him dinner though...

Troy: Hector- Look. He is so gorgeous already.

And then on the other hand his speeches, his way with words. He's a gentleman. I would feel safe with him, 100%.

Night at the museum: Ahkmenrah- I mean, have you watched the film? He should be the plot

HE HAS A BRITISH ACCENT AND HES ADORABLE. also this movie is so underrated. I would trust him.

Harry Potter: George Weasley- He makes me laugh and I really love when they can do that.

Most of the men on this list do but him especially. I do trust him in the since of like, I know he won't hurt me. I do not trust him to not prank me.

Doctor who: Captain Jack Harkness and the 10th Doctor- IDK I can't pick one!

Look at them! One is a gorgeous blue eyed brown haired man whose so flirty I would swoon and the other is a goofy adorable guy who makes me laugh. 100%, I trust both of them completely

Pirates of the Caribbean: Captain Jack Sparrow- he makes me laugh.

Would I date him? Absolutely not. Do I trust him? Also no. Does Johnny Depp playing him have a lot to do with me liking him? Yes. Absolutely.

Sherlock BBC: Sherlock- *heavy sigh* its those dang eyes

once more, I would never date him but he's another blue eyed dark haired man and as we have established he is my type. Against my best judgment, I would trust him.

The adventures of Robin hood: Robin hood- first of all, this came out in 1938 but this movie really is incredible, like one of the more accurate ones I've found to what we know of the legends!

but he's handsome and I did swoon, okay? Yes, I trust him. Although he does laugh randomly, which is scary.

Robin hood: prince of thieves: Will Scarlet- O k a y,

so he is another traumatized boi with big eyes and I want to cuddle him and have him tell me stories. I totally trust him.

Robin hood: men in tights: okay, I don't know if it's from this movie but this is definitely the actor

and it is a comedy but he has this lovely accent, a beautiful head of hair and that cheeky little smirk. I don't know why I trust him, but I do!

X-men: Wolverine- idk what to say, is it the hair?

the voice? the muscles? the sass? His protectiveness? his handsome facial expressions? I kinda trust him?

Tombstone: Johnny Ringo and Doc holiday- well lookie here...two more blue eyed, brown haired men.

For Doc holiday, it is his accent, his wit and charm. For Johnny, he's just handsome and I feel like he would know how to dance. I trust nobody in this movie lol.

Enola Holmes: Sherlock- IS ANYONE SURPRISED AT THIS POINT????

I mean look at him, his perfect fluffy hair and his stupid perfect eyes and that amazing accent. I sort of trust him? I trust him to keep me safe, just not to rat me out to Mycroft.

Bookdock saints: Murphy Macmanus- look who it is. A brown haired, blue eyed man, with an accent!

But he's also really funny and is a genuinely good guy despite killing so many people. I would trust him with my life. I just want to cuddle him and hold him and listen to him talk.

Top gun: Maverick, Ice man and Rooster- okay, I know its a lot...

Nobody is surprised. They all have attitude, two of them can sing, they all have awesome hair, I would feel safe with all of them.

this actually was really fun, I may add to it cause their are plenty of men and women from fandoms I'm not apart of and I'm just like, yeah, your gorgeous.

Also, some woman I love: Eowyn, Lagertha, Cara Dune, Princess Laia, Luna Lovegood, Mary Watson, Storm, Detective Bloom, and Phoenix.

All gorgeous, I trust them all, they all scare me a little bit...

[victorianpining]

Table of Contents

Want to find something I've made? This post links to my academic and fandom projects from the past few years (and a few from before that point).

Academia:

Presentations

The Inversion of Hope and Sin in A Study in Scarlet (YouTube Recording)

A talk given for Romancing the Gothic offering a queer Watsonian reading of A Study in Scarlet (September 2024)

Publications

Coming Soon (fingers crossed)

Fandom:

Fic & Podfic

The Stories in Our Veins

A love letter to BBC Dracula, expressed through the medium of Holmes and Watson's undying romance. (podfic coming soon)

From a Drop of Water

A re-imagining of Series 4 picking up from the end of The Abominable Bride. (podfic coming soon)

A Pertinacious Idea

Half analysis of "The Blanched Soldier," half sentimental fluff about two old men in love.

Meta

The Great Heart

A ~very serious~ essay explaining why the only fitting climax for BBC Sherlock would be for John Watson to get stabbed through the heart.

Perhaps Such Things Could Come to Pass

An essay written for the Behind Closed Curtains No More fanzine in 2016.

The Game is Now

An informal write up of my experience in the original BBC Sherlock Escape Room. (Please refer to my friend Jones @queerholmcs for a write up of the Mind of Moriarty sequel).

Video Essays

TJLC Explained YouTube Channel

Both the original TJLC Explained videos from 2016 and the Retrospective series made in 2022. All the old videos can also be found on The Internet Archive, including those now blocked on YouTube!

[asoulwithadream]

Shoscombe Old Place / Part 2 - Sherlock & Co From the diary of ASoulWithADream…

I'm so excited that we're getting a three-parter after three-parter. They're brilliant and as the production quality increases exponentially, these drawn out adventures holding more content are so important to me.

Live Soul Reaction (my little on-the-spot commentary):

The episode sub-title just makes me think of Fast Car by Tracy Chapman. "🎵 You've got a fast car, I want a ticket to anywhere,"

John explaining the stupid social hierarchy, state-till-8's, the little 'I dunno's' of doubt, as if he still feels a bit confused or insecure about the whole situation with Carrie and him. The way he phrases it makes me think of superficiality.

"Like some big slobbery traitor!" I like how the roles have switched to Sherlock defending Archie from John.

Again with the card references!

Gary Lineker's mate. That's the second time HE's been mention. There's been an awful lot of emphasis on repeating motifs. Makes me wonder what else from last week's episode will feature today.

"You're invaluable, Watson!" "Awh." "Cheers!" <33333333

"Ah! Goodness! Hello Bob- UH, Robert Knob- Robert Norbertson! Ugh, spit it out, John."

"Just what she needs. Just… what she needs." Bobby you are not making yourself look more innocent you smoldering drama queen.

Sherlock swallowing a fly 😭

Lineker again!

Jump in the river. Jumping into a body of water. This is the third time. For fuck's sake.

"World's colliding. New friends, meeting old friends."

Who's calling John a twat on the internet???

Ash. Ash on the leaves, on the nettles, on the bark of the trees. Didn't Sherlock mention smoke? From the house, Shoscombe? Last week, he said it very explicitly. Smoke.

"It's a house for the dead." "A mausoleum." "Yes, a very tired one."

I SEE DEAD PEOPLE.

"Sherlock." "Yes, Watson." "Quick question." "Fire away!" "Are we… trapped? In a… four-hundred year old mausoleum?" "Trapped is a rather subjective term. We did CHOOSE to enter." "Sherlock." "Yes actually, I think we are."

Pick a tomb, mate! COS' I AM GOING TO KILL YOU >:(

"Brings a certain perspective, doesn't it? Being in here, with the long dead."

The way John realises that he's snapped just immediately forgives and dismisses Sherlock as the cause of their predicament really goes to show the bond they share, how they're able to adapt and just remain sane in their situation.

"What… feels like home?" "Baker Street." <3333333333333

"Rivers are just as doubtful, Watson. Just as unsure. They take the course they find easy, through the soft earth. That's why their paths are winding and splintered. They look for the easy way. Only the most determined bore through the hardest rock. Overtime, much, much time." More water, which could mean nothing. But seriously speaking, I love Sherlock's perspective on things, and how he reassures Watson with these beautiful metaphors, connecting their surroundings and the information he has consumed to describe his dear friend. <3

"Even the torrents that seem so wondrous to us will reach their end in a sea, a lake… a waterfall." HE SAID IT. Before I thought I was being delusional! Anything could be water, but the hesitation, the torrent he speaks of being a metaphor for both himself through John's perspective and the adventure that Moriarty will pose for them both, but especially for Sherlock Holmes!! I'm freaking out!!

"Shout out to Pro- ooh, Professor!" I AM DEAD. I HAVE TO PAUSE. IT CAN'T BE. WHAT I WAS JUST JOKING BEFORE. I'M BEING DELUSIONAL.

PROFESSOR JAMES MORIARTY.

JAMES MORIARTY.

MORIARTY.

WHO IS LISTENING INTENTLY, TO EVER WORD.

WHOEVER THAT ONE TUMBLR POSTER WAS WHO SAID "haha what if he got a shoutout" YOU WERE RIGHT. I'VE TRIED TO TAG YOU BUT I CAN'T FIND THE POST, BUT YOU WERE RIGHT. FUUUUUUUUUU-

"I can hear the corpses from the seventeenth century crying into the mic! I've lost my mind!" I doubt you're as much in shock as I am right now.

I was trying to appreciate their little pre-crypt banter and pep-talk, but I can not stop thinking about the ballistic missile which was the waterfall-shoutout section. Absolutely bonkers, and balls to the fucking walls. The balls are everywhere.

I better not see "42 - The Final Problem - Part One" on my Spotify on the 16th of July in the Year of our Lord 2024.

[holmesxwatson]

The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes dir: Billy Wilder, 1970

I only watched The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes for the first time a few days ago but it lights my brain up in that special way that I know I’ll revisit it a lot. Don’t get me wrong, it’s far from perfect, for one thing Colin Blakely’s Watson is a little too shouty for me, but it’s very worthwhile to check out despite its shortcomings, which I think mostly come from the fact that so much was cut from the intended script.

I absolutely love Robert Stephens as Holmes. His face is so good, he has a way of looking at Watson when he doesn’t know he’s being observed that is very soft. I thought I was hallucinating the beginning of this movie with Holmes telling the ballet dancer he’s gay and in a relationship with Watson. I thought it was going to be played for a joke, and it was a bit, but it didn’t just end there. Holmes and Watson have a conversation about the repercussions in a lengthy scene that turns very serious by the end. I can’t believe this was 1970 and no one has since tried to build on this specific dynamic in a more meaningful way. Someone needs to remake this into a mini-series exactly how Billy Wilder intended it to be, here’s hoping public domain can make it so.

[above: script page from the cut story The Curious Case of the Upside Down Room, where Watson creates a fake case to make Holmes feel better]

Also, the backstory of the making of this film is so out of control: Robert Stephens’s nervous breakdown and suicide attempt during the production, the amount of years Billy Wilder was trying to write it and get it made, the interference of ACD’s son, the Loch Ness monster prop that the crew lost in actual Loch Ness, the immense scope of the episodic story they were going for, the way it got cut down from its original 3 hour 45 minute runtime and how that cut footage was lost forever! (this is crazy! everyone go check your attics and storage lockers right now).

In one of the interviews I found, Robert Stephens says “if something is boring — if it’s three minutes long it’s too long, but if it’s interesting it’s never long enough…you don’t want it to end.” Big same Toby Stephens’ dad, big SAME. I didn’t want it to end. I read the uncut script and I am just floored at what we missed out on. Thankfully some footage and audio remain of some of the cut scenes (but still! check your basements too).

Just fully let it settle into your brain that they filmed all of these stories in the script, and then cut most of it away. Like that is mind-blowing to me, it existed at one point as it was fully intended to be. If this was made now during home entertainment times, they would have no problem releasing an almost four-hour movie, but at the very least there would be a big director’s cut dvd release and we would be enjoying all the small Holmes x Watson moments we deserve.

Anyway, in pretty short order I found a bunch of interesting links to stuff, details below. I also consulted my very well-thumbed Conversations with Wilder book by Cameron Crowe, but there wasn’t that much more information in there. I have Robert Stephens’ memoir Knight Errant and the TPLOSH blu-ray on order so I’ll add to this post if I find any more good resources. Let me know if I’m missing anything, and enjoy!

Full movie on YouTube (x) <-update: this link went private, but it's also streaming for free on Tubi and Freevee, and available to rent on YouTube, Google Play, and Apple TV

Original roadshow draft of script on Internet Archive (x)

Missing footage: Prologue [sound only plus stills] (x), The Curious Case of the Upside Down Room [sound only plus stills] (x), The Dreadful Business of the Naked Honeymooners [footage and soundtrack only, no sound dialogue] (x), alternate ending [sound only] (x)

Making of documentary that includes behind-the-scenes snippets of some of the cut scenes [this doc is in German, but you can turn on the auto-translate to English in the YouTube settings] (x)

Interview with Ernst Walter, film editor of TPLOSH (x)

Interview with Christopher Lee “Mr. Holmes, Mr. Wilder” 2003 (x)

My YouTube playlist with all of the above links in one place plus an excellent fan vid by Just Bee that I added to the list because it’s just so good (x)

Missing Movies: A Case for Sherlock Holmes from 1994 BBC Radio 2 on Soundcloud [includes interview with Robert Stephens and folks involved in the production] (x)

Articles about the lost Loch Ness monster prop (x) (x)

The soundtrack by Miklós Rózsa (x)