The Sign of Three turns out not to be Mary joining Sherlock and John in adventures, but her pregnancy that the great detective has deduced. If The Empty Hearse was all about celebrating the return of Sherlock Holmes, then this episode was about how his and Watson's relationship has irrevocably changed. It was all paid off with a powerfully poignant finale in which it dawns on Sherlock that John is starting a new chapter in his life without him. But then through Sherlock's eloquent speech the episode flashbacks to previous adventures between the two that shows why the Baker Street sleuth values their friendship so highly.
When Sherlock starts off his speech by attacking the principles of marriage and insulting everyone in the room you feel that might be it.
Lestrade says to Molly, "What's the worst that could happen?" But instead the majority of the episode is humorously based around Sherlock's best man speech, and his terror at delivering it. With an episode set around John and Mary's wedding, you'd fear the worst and think that tragedy would soon befall the celebration. Whilst it at times struggled to manage its tonal shifts, this was a strong character-driven episode that further cemented the brilliant chemistry of Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman in the lead roles. After the explosive hijinks of Sherlock's return, we were in more unfamiliar territory in The Sign of Three, a rambling and riotous caper that mixed the sitcom pairing of Holmes and Watson, a wedding murder mystery and a heart-breaking finale. Sherlock detectives will deduce a possible significance from this being the only one of the 13 episodes to use an original title without any alteration.īut even if the worst were to happen, fans of this super-intelligent and hyper-entertaining show – which reached new heights of action and emotion in The Six Thatchers – will note that Conan Doyle, after his Final Problem, had to bring the character back by popular demand.First a rebirth, now a wedding.
Ominously, the last episode in this run, which airs on 15 January, is called The Final Problem – the name of the Conan Doyle story in which Holmes dies. Moffat and Gatiss told the same press conference that they were unsure if the remaining cast could be united for future series. But soon afterwards, it emerged that the context was uncanny: the actors had actually separated shortly before filming. It’s unclear how Gatiss specified the sound in the script but, for King Lear, it was written as the hardest line in theatre: “Howl, howl, howl, howl!”ĭuring a Q&A session after a premiere screening on 19 December, Freeman and Abbington discussed the weirdness of a real-life couple acting the tragic end of a relationship. And with Mary taking a bullet meant for Sherlock, Martin Freeman’s Watson let out an extended, escalating, animalistic moan. And thanks to the dramatic impact achieved by director Rachel Talalay, the murder of Mary matched the death of M in Skyfall.Ĭonfronted with a dead friend, her widower and their motherless baby, Cumberbatch’s face (mainly required to remain blank) painted a picture of pain and confusion. The episode felt very Bond overall – Holmes has never done so much running towards or away from explosions. A new sub-plot involving the historical decisions of a villainous woman in Whitehall also logically seemed to lead to Thatcher, but the script again opted to give the BBC press office a quiet holiday. In one respect, Gatiss has even depoliticised the original, which is filled with references to immigrants and refugees, “the outcasts of Europe”. But the point, as Sherlock immediately realises, is that the vandal has no political motivation: he’s looking for something hidden inside a head. Here, the French emperor’s replacement with the former British prime minister has led to some muttering about the BBC’s supposed leftwing bias. The Arthur Conan Doyle story on which Gatiss based his script has busts of Napoleon being smashed by an intruder. But although the franchises have to some extent overlapped, both tending towards tragicomic love stories, viewers knew that as Amanda Abbington lay slain on the floor she would not shimmeringly regenerate into another actor. Sherlock co-creators Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss also work on Doctor Who, which was awarded the other prime seasonal slot on the BBC on Christmas Day.