Sherlock - His Last Vow - Episode Review

My review of last week's episode: The Sign of Three

Though he may flourish among his brothers,

    the east wind, the wind of the Lord, shall come,

    rising from the wilderness,

and his fountain shall dry up;

    his spring shall be parched;

it shall strip his treasury

    of every precious thing.

~Hosea 13:15 (Sorry, I couldn’t resist.)

In other words, don't mess with the East Wind. And speaking of brothers, what in the world does he mean when he says "the other one"?

After the highs of the first episode, and the lows of the second, I really wasn't sure how to approach His Last Vow. I shouldn't have worried. It's a really tightly scripted episode, with impeccable pacing and a bundle of surprises, if somewhat lacking in dramatic tension compared to last season's finale. There shall be spoilers.

Sherlock has always, really, been about three things: power, love, and truth—and how they interrelate. His Last Vow brings all three into play, illustrating the show's vision and how it has changed. Must love obscure the truth? Is information the only form of power? Is truth naturally hostile to love?

Kaitlyn Elisabet Bonsell observes in a Breakpoint article that in A Scandal in Belgravia, Sherlock despises Irene’s use of sex for power. He scoffs, “you cater to the whims of the pathetic and take your clothes off to make an impression. Stop boring me and think. It's the new sexy.” According to Sherlock, mental prowess is a much more effective form of influence, and Irene's use of sexual attraction to shock is more than just immature, but boring. (Thoroughly agree—Miley Cyrus is such a reactionary.)

Sherlock - The Sign of Three - Episode Review

My review of last week's episode: The Empty Hearse

Warning: spoiler-filled rant ahead.

And…apparently the game is not on. It’s tradition that the middle episode of each season of Sherlock will be the weakest, but The Sign of Three is possibly my least favorite episode of all three season so far. The tragedy is, I know Steve Thompson – the writer – can do better. While season one’s The Blind Banker was corny, season two's finale The Reichenbach Fall was excellent.

But let’s get down to it: the first thirty minutes are great. We’re thrown back into the swing of things, as Sherlock starts to deal with the idea of life without single John. “It changes people, marriage,” says Mrs. Hudson, widow of a double-murderer. The wedding itself starts about twenty minutes in—naturally we completely skip any proceedings inside the church and fast-forward to the reception. A group of amusing flashbacks show Sherlock organizing the wedding, warning off Mary’s ex-boyfriend and having a brief Iron-Man-3-esque personal Short Round. Sherlock has a conversation with Mycroft which, once again, emphasizes how much the wedding is going to change the Watson-Holmes relationship.

Then comes the best man’s speech, which I expected to last about five, maybe ten, minutes. My first mistake.

Sherlock - The Empty Hearse - Episode Review

Okay, so yeah, I'm going to be talking about everything that happened. And what happened last season. If you want a spoiler free review...go elsewhere, and good luck. However, I will attempt to keep the third season spoilers above the break. If you’ve come here looking for a review pointing out some hitherto unnoticed aspect in a well-crafted, tightly edited essay, you’re looking in the wrong place—this is just my impression, over-long and rather self-indulgent. But fun to write.

So let's face it, we've been waiting two years to find out how Sherlock fell. Was it worth it?

The short answer is: yes.

The long answer? Well, it was always going to be a little anticlimactic to those who had spent any time immersed among the wildly varying internet fan theories. It turns out, my guess was pretty much completely correct…they didn't throw us a last-minute curve-ball, they didn't unveil a brilliant, unexpected solution, they aren’t smarter than us (we do, after all, outnumber them by a few million). The great thing is, though, that they are quite aware of that, and so decide to mess with our minds in other ways.