Oh GOD can’t they let Downton die now PLEASE?

WTF? Really?! Good grief. Looks like Fellowes needs some money.

thinking about the victorian boyfriends that deserved better 😔✊

I’m not even in the fandom, and still it hurts. Never seen the show, just recently discovered a few cut-out scenes of their storyline on youtube. And yet this hurts mightily. What a shame it ended the way it did. What an absolute travesty when one considers THAT potential.

lmao

Random facts that make you go:

Wait... what?

WTF!!! :O

Mofftiiiiiiiissss! *shakes fist forever*

Good catch, @waitedforgarridebs! I’d never seen that mentioned anywhere before. Really, really good catch. Absolutely brilliant!

The show must have some awesome location scouts, by the way. I mean, they did the same thing with their stand-in location for “Buckingham Palace” in ASiB where Sherlock is prancing around naked, wrapped in nothing but a sheet.

For their “palace” scenes they picked Goldsmiths’ Hall, in front of the infamous tapestry of Marc Antony and Cleopatra, whose sexy nakedness had been painted over (aka censored) IN THE VICTORIAN ERA (see here: x).

Mofftiss and their location scouts (ahem, see here: x) are insane that way, really.

I want a Mod!AU where Thomas works in a sex shop and is totally out, proud and open about anything sex-related and always jokes about with his mates/co-workers, always making up stupid nicknames for them (”Oi, Miss Fill-his Back’s-door have you taken care of the new shipment of dildos already? I don’t want our boss Mrs Pet-him-more to get all upset about it again.”) and generally having fun, goofing about, laughing and throwing condoms at one another’s heads.

And then, one day, Jimmy walks in with his girlfriend Ivy. And Jimmy is blushing, refusing to look anywhere or say a word, whilst Ivy quietly whispers that she wants to purchase a strap-on with a harness for herself because she’s out of ideas on how to keep Jimmy interested in bed.

Feeling a bit nostalgic about Thommy lately.

James Dean disproving the old adage “Never turn your back towards the camera” in various photos taken during 1954 and 1955.

H.H.Holmes is about the gay sex scene

Have you been wondering why they included a reference to real-life serial killer H.H.Holmes in s4 of ‘Sherlock’? Because I certainly have.

Here’s what I think this reference means metaphorically:

1. H.H. Holmes = a metaphor for Sherlock’s dad.

2. The murder hotel = a metaphor for gay bars and dark rooms 

Do you find this to be an outlandish or even offensive claim? Well, I hope I can convince you otherwise in the following post.

The reason why serial killers and their ‘deeds’ are used as metaphors on this show is the opposite of offensive, actually. It shows us how a mind that’s fraught with internalised homophobia works.

There are two serial killers mentioned in the episode ‘The Lying Detective’ (TLD):

A) Culverton Smith 

and 

B) H.H.Holmes.

Two men who have something in common (a compulsion to kill). But whose manner of giving in to that compulsion is described as being quite different (especially designed murder hotel vs. ordinary hospital in your day-to-day life).

Remember that ‘murder’ isn’t actual murder on this show! It’s metaphorical ‘murder’ (as pretty much everyone has realised by now, I think, after a look at the subtext in s1-3).

Ergo: A ‘serial killer’ isn’t a real killer. ‘Serial killer’ is a metaphor for a serial monogamist. Somebody who pursues one (sexual) relationship after the other. (We have talked about this, at the end of this thread here: x ).

Culverton Smith is a John!mirror. We all pretty much agree on that.

But whose mirror is H.H. Holmes? Why mention him at all?

We are told a few things about H.H.Holmes in the episode:

Culverton asks Sherlock: “He a relative of yours?” And even though Sherlock doesn’t really know the answer, this question in itself ties the murderer H.H.Holmes to Sherlock’s family on a subtextual level of coding.

Note that Moffat specifically used the word ‘relative’ here (word choice is always important with Moffat!). 

Why not use the word ‘ancestor’, especially in a 19th-century context? Weird, right? ‘Relative’ is something you call people who are much more closely related to you in the genealogical timeline.

Then there’s the fact that Moffat specifically chose a serial killer who had the same surname as Sherlock: the surname ‘Holmes’. This is something that traditionally happens with paternal relatives, right? With people like…your dad.

Don’t misunderstand me, please. I don’t mean that H.H.Holmes was literally Sherlock’s dad. I’m just wondering out loud what kind of mirror H.H.Holmes is in this episode. Who is he mirroring on a subtextual level?

There’s one last piece of evidence: 

H.H.Holmes was active in the 19th century.

On this show, the 19th century is used as a code for the 1980s. (We’ve talked about this here: x.)

The 19th century is the ‘childhood’ of the 130+ year old iconic figure Sherlock Holmes. It’s his meta-childhood.

The 1980s, on the other hand, are the the literal childhood of the character Sherlock on this show.

On the show, these two periods of time stand for each other.

In other words… A ‘serial killer’ acting in the ‘19th century’ is code for: a guy sleeping with a lot of people in the 1980s.

There’s also the fact that H.H.Holmes was active in America. And there are subtle hints on this show that whatever happened in Sherlock’s past that traumatised him so badly was actually something that happened in America. (We have talked about the fact that, in ASiP, the ‘dark’ case of Sherlock’s past arrives in London FROM AMERICA, and how Sherlock dismisses it as unimportant. Because in ASiP he is not ready to face the ‘dark’ case of his past…yet. You can read about that here: x).

Sooo…a male relative, who has your surname, who did something in the past that is also your (metaphorical) childhood, what do you call a person like that? 

Right. YOUR DAD!

Are you with me so far? 

(More about the gay nightlife under the cut…)

So:

Culverton Smith=John!mirror

H.H.Holmes = Daddy!mirror (ie, a mirror for Sherlock’s dad)

So, what about the gay nightlife and such?

Well…*cracks knuckles*…

In this scene, Culverton tells us that H.H.Holmes built a murder hotel with especially designed killing and torture chambers.

If we run that through our subtextual translator: 

H.H.Holmes (Daddy), the serial killer (=guy who was sleeping around), was getting his metaphorical ‘serial killing’ done in spaces that were specifically designed for said ‘serial killing’! 

I.e. his hook-ups didn’t just happen in everyday life, where stuff like this would just happen organically, so to speak. 

No, H.H.Holmes (Sherlock’s dad) INTENTIONALLY sought out spaces that were specifically designed for ‘serial killing’ (=serial hook-ups).

And Moffat added a splash of the dramatic (presumably laughing his arse off about it) by referencing H.H.Holmes’s hanging rooms and torture chambers, etc. 

I don’t want to bore you with the stories about the exploits of my own ill-spent youth. But even if you have never been to a gay bar, you can probably see how the mechanics of what you’ll find in its backrooms and a lot of what is going on in there can be described along the lines of ‘torture chambers’ once you run it through the same metaphorical translator that turned ‘sexual relations’ into metaphorical ‘murder’. 

Neat.

Culverton calls H.H.Holmes an ‘idiot’ for pursuing his ‘serial killing’ in that way. An idiot? Oh, wait didn’t we hear from Daddy himself that he was a ‘moron’?

Yeah, so at this point we have been told twice (!) that Sherlock’s dad was stupid to do whatever he was doing. Yeah…as I keep saying, this whole story has something to do with HIV/AIDS and the 1980s. I’m certain of it.

For the purpose of this meta, it doesn’t even matter if Daddy in the above scene  is real or if, like so many of us assume, this s3 scene is actually Sherlock’s dream/coma/EMP or whatever. 

But if this scene in HLV is, indeed, not real, then I can totally see Sherlock calling his father a ‘moron’ in his own mind. 

Remember: Sherlock is the potentially traumatised child here. He is probably angry and confused about his father’s behaviour. Sherlock is hurting. It makes sense that he would call his dad stupid for pursuing men for anonymous sex.

Anyway, the show tells us that there is a difference between the two men who are being compared here: 

Culverton (John) and H.H.Holmes (Daddy) are similar in some ways, yet different in others!

BTW, remember that, in s3, the show went out of its way to point it out to us that John and Daddy mirror each other.

But, and that’s the crucial difference, the two ‘serial killers’ go about their ‘serial killing’ in a different way.

Culverton (John) tells us that, to kill, he just needs a hospital. He finds the idea of specifically designed spaces for ‘serial killing’ (serial hook-ups) ridiculous. Why go to that trouble when you can just ‘find a hospital’, as he puts it.

In other words, this John!mirror tells us that to hook up with someone he just relies on his everyday life: 

He doesn’t need bars of any kind for his hook-ups. He hooks up with people he finds in his day-to-day life. 

And isn’t it a nice ‘coincidence’ *ahem* that Culverton just ‘finds a hospital’ and John works at a clinic? John’s everyday life pretty much IS a clinic. This is where John finds the metaphorical ‘victims’ for his metaphorical ‘serial killing’: they’re doctors and nurses and receptionists. They’re the people who surround him in his day-to-day life.

Nice, right?

A lot of us assume that s4 plays out entirely in somebody’s mind. (Some argue it’s John’s. Some argue it’s Sherlock’s. I come down on the Sherlock side of the argument.) If that is true, then TLD is a story about how Sherlock, in his own mind, is working out the similarities and differences between John and his dad and what that means for his attraction to John.

It’s also obvious that Sherlock is not happy with both, John’s and Daddy’s, lifestyle choices at all. (Otherwise why even use a violent metaphor like that?)

Whatever WE might think about Sherlock’s attitude towards that (Sherlock, you little old-fashioned prude!), the show seems to suggest that Sherlock thinks John’s type of ‘serial killing’ is disgusting at best and Daddy’s is downright vile.

So…I’m reasonably certain about the things I have stated above. I’m less certain about the following stuff. So let’s just call this the SPECULATION PART of this post.

You already know about my favourite pet theory from my ‘Follow the dog’ meta (here: x ): Sherlock’s dad was in a gay relationship with Uncle Rudy.

So, here’s me speculating a bit:

Sherlock’s dad was heavily frequenting gay clubs and bars in the 1980s and sleeping his way through the male portion of the population. All of this happened in America. One day he met a drag queen (remember Uncle Rudy’s cross-dressing!)…and when the wig and make-up came off, ta-daa, it was a man: Uncle Rudy. The two of them fell in love. But at that point it was already too late. We don’t know what happened exactly. But HIV/AIDS or a suicide or both (!) seem very likely.

Who of them exactly contracted HIV and what went down after that, we don’t know yet, but that’s another reason why the show is so full of references to Freddie Mercury, right?

We have talked about the fact that Moriarty is BOTH an embodiment of Love (unexpected, dangerous explosive love!) and Homophobia. (We talked about it at the end of this thread here: x ). 

In Sherlock’s mind, Moriarty is those two things, Love and Homophobia, at the same time. The two concepts have melded into one. And Sherlock has difficulty to separate them.

Now keep in mind that Moriarty literally takes the place of Freddie Mercury at least twice:

In other words, Moriarty (the embodiment of Love AND Homophobia) expresses himself as Freddie, puts himself in Freddie’s place, even puts on Freddie’s clothes…

Do you see how we are visually told here what the reason for this melding of the concept of Love and Homophobia in Sherlock’s mind is? 

It’s AIDS. It’s the 1980s. I’ve said it before (here and here and here), and I’ll say it again: That’s at the root of Sherlock’s problem.

And a context in which H.H.Holmes (=Sherlock’s dad) was ‘serial killing’ (sleeping around) in ‘specifically designed spaces’ makes this scenario all the more likely.

P.S. A few further notes:

If you look up H.H.Holmes on wikipedia, it will tell you that H.H.Holmes actually exclusively killed women. This factoid, however, is not mentioned on the show and doesn’t seem to be true for the version of H.H.Holmes they present on the show. I would argue that Moffat left this fact out on purpose because H.H.Holmes would otherwise not fit his intended subtext. I mean, why else leave this little fact out, right? 

So, the subtext we have decoded above is probably right.

Also, when H.H.Holmes is mentioned for the first time in the episode, they are, all three of them, taking a lift downstairs:

The screenshot here is brilliant.

Sherlock with his eyes closed is visually asleep. (He probably is, in a sense. I think he’s in a coma throughout s4 at the very least.)

John seems exasperated. Well, if we read John as mirroring both Culverton and Daddy, then sure he would be exasperated at the mention of H.H.Holmes’s, ahem, ‘deeds’.

And Culverton just speaks the truth, albeit clouded in subtextual symbolism.

Also, lifts…

On TV and in films, lifts (or ‘elevators’ for you cowboys in the colonies) are always, always symbols for access ways to the protagonist’s unconscious. (The unconscious being the ‘downstairs’ basically.)

@ebaeschnbliah had mentioned a while ago (can’t find where that was right now) the lift in the THoB episode, where the bins (=everything Sherlock has deleted, ie, his ‘lost’ memory) are kept downstairs in the basement.

I don’t know if anyone else has noticed this (I hope I’m not unintentionally stealing from someone), but this ‘lift to the basement’ scene in THoB seems to be a quote from ‘Inception’ (of all films). 

In ‘Inception’, the main character, played by Leonardo di Caprio, also keeps the trauma, that one traumatic thing that explains everything about his past, hidden in the ‘basement’ of his mind, a place you only have access to through a lift:

(This is a screenshot from ‘Inception’.)

I don’t want to start a whole discussion about ‘Inception’ here because this film and its parallels and quotes in ‘Sherlock’ definitely deserve their own post. (Please, please don’t do so in the comments to this post. This ISN’T a post about ‘Inception’. It’s a post about H.H.Holmes. So, let’s make ‘Inception’ a separate post sometime, okay? Thank you.) 

But the point I’m trying to make here is that basically you can only access your own traumatic past by taking a lift ‘downstairs’ in your own mind.

In other words, to even access this story about H.H.Holmes (=his dad) and his ‘serial killing’, Sherlock, in his own mind, has to take a ride to the symbolic ‘downstairs’ together with John and a John!mirror. 

Note that while Sherlock, John and the John!mirror are in the lift itself, they’re not deep enough yet. Culverton mentions H.H.Holmes while they are in the lift, but he doesn’t elaborate on the subject.

The whole story of H.H.Holmes is only told once they have exited the lift on what is presumably a lower level (basement) of Sherlock’s mental ‘building’ and are in the mortuary.

In conclusion:

Your take-away from this meta should be that we now know why H.H.Holmes was referenced in this episode, that John’s sex life is described by giving us Culverton and that the sex life of Sherlock’s dad is described to us by giving us the reference to H.H.Holmes.

The fact that this reference is pretty dark and violent says a lot about what is going on in Sherlock’s mind when he thinks about gay love. (Well, Sherlock is working on that. So, by s5 he should be able to separate love from homophobia.)

Also, this reading supports my favourite pet theory: that Sherlock’s dad was in a gay relationship with his best friend (and that that best friend could possibly be Uncle Rudy).

Other metas on this topic:

Daddy and Uncle Rudy were lovers in: The last part of my ‘Follow the dog’ meta series (which can be read as a stand-alone): here.

The 19th century represents the 1980s in: Why Victor Trevor was turned into a child and why he is also Redbeard: here.

The ‘dark’ case (as opposed to the ‘pink’=gay case) in ASiP: here.

‘Better out than in’ (More evidence that Daddy was in a gay relationship): here.

Why Sherlock’s trauma is about his dad (the Darth Vader mini meta): here.

Bob Frankland is a mirror for Uncle Rudy, who fell in love with Sherlock’s dad in America: here.

How Westie, his fiancée and his brother-in-law in TGG mirror the Mummy, Daddy and Uncle Rudy triangle: here.

All my metas can be found under my ‘sherlock meta’ tag or on my Meta Master List: here.

Tags: @ebaeschnbliah @raggedyblue @tjlcisthenewsexy @the-7-percent-solution @gosherlocked @spenglernot @sarahthecoat @possiblyimbiassed @loveismyrevolution @sherlockshadow @elldotsee @88thparallel @fellshish

Screencaps are from here: http://kissthemgoodbye.net

Except for the one from ‘Inception’ which was taken from here: http://movies.homeofthenutty.com/

Bringing this back because I was just linking to it yesterday.

by golly, drumfred peeps, it’s certainly not flawless, but i think i’ve got this as close as possible to a seamless loop so we can watch them kiss over and over again for as long as we want. 

i’m pretty sure i’ve now fulfilled my life’s purpose.

Mood for today ❤❤❤❤

vikings valhalla: harald sigurdsson - 1.01

Some more for good luck...ahem...science, I meant science.

And because all that left-over champagne is having an effect on me, I suppose.

Me : Watches Vikings Valhalla for the plot

The Plot :

Well, heeello...Happy New Year to everyone.

(Oops, how did THIS end up on my blog? My hand seems to have slipped and reblogged this...for science.)

Anyway, what a nice image to start the year to.;)