Two puzzle pionts regarding John in TST and TLD explained

 (Sherlock meta by Ivy Blossom)

Q: Hi Ivy, I don't mean to treat you like a magic 8-ball, but you *have* magically explained a lot of things that hadn't quite come together so fluidly for me about TFP, so I want to present you with my two puzzle points about TST, instead. OK, so point 1 is why do you think Sherlock told John Mary's the better partner, whether that's technically correct or not. And point 2, how do you read John's growly wail and blaming/rejecting Sherlock to the point of thinking he's monstrous after Mary's death?

Ivy Blossom:

I’ll break this into pieces.

Why do you think Sherlock told John Mary’s the better partner? 

Sherlock is teasing John when he says Mary’s a better companion. That is some classic British affection Sherlock is demonstrating, generally known as “taking the piss.” You’ll notice in that scene that at no point does Mary actually think Sherlock means that they should leave John behind. They are teasing him.

John is the most important person in both Mary’s and Sherlock’s lives, hands down, no question. He is the man they both love. They are in the potentially awkward position of having to share John’s time, commitment, and affection. Suggesting they could just take off together without him is kind of wry commentary on the truth of this situation. Because they absolutely wouldn’t.

How do you read John’s growly wail and blaming/rejecting Sherlock to the point of thinking he’s monstrous after Mary’s death? 

I think John’s growly wail is a raw expression of wordless horror, shock, grief, and despair. He is beyond thinking, words, or hope in that moment.

John is at an all-time low when Mary dies. He is unhappy and behaving in ways he is deeply ashamed of when she absolutely out-heroes and out-nobles him. John has always been ready to die for Sherlock, but Mary did it for him. He had been betraying her, probably hating her at times, giving up on her. Now he will have to carry his guilt for the rest of his life. He is devastated, freshly grieving, and full of self-loathing. On top of that, this grief has pulled open his once-healed wounds from his soulmate’s suicide.

It’s not really a surprise to me that he takes it out on Sherlock.

John is a guy who believes that Sherlock can do anything, and is capable of miracles. Two years after Sherlock’s death, John is still asking him to not be dead. The faith John has in Sherlock cannot be underestimated. So when Sherlock promises that he will protect Mary, John absolutely believes that he can, all the time, and from anything. It isn’t fair to blame Sherlock for her death, as it was Mary’s choice to do what she did, but in his grief and guilt, there’s some logic in his reaction. A superhero, his superhero, has inexplicably failed him.

I’m not going to excuse how John treats Sherlock. I think that’s sort of the point of it, really: John does inexcusable things. He has the capacity to make very bad choices and hurt the people he loves. Usually he can keep himself on the straight and narrow, and even be a moral compass to those who need one, but when John is bad, he is terrible. This may actually be why John is a moral compass. Because he knows exactly what it means to be pointed the wrong way.

The violence John enacts against Sherlock in The Lying Detective is hard to watch, but it is not out of character. John is a violent man who is drawn to violence. His best self would never fail to restrain himself, but he is not his best self in The Lying Detective. He is his worst self, and this is it. These are his demons.

I don’t think this side of John is a surprise to Sherlock. I think he knows what John at his worst is capable of, and how harshly he judges himself for it. There’s something lovely about that, in spite of all the ugliness in the episode. Because John feels put on a pedestal, having betrayed Mary and never getting the chance to tell her and endure the consequences, which he certainly deserves. Sherlock knows him inside and out, a fact John is confronted with over and over in The Lying Detective. Sherlock knows him completely, even this terrible and dark corner. John’s dark corners are, in the end, useful to Sherlock. John is a loaded gun, and Sherlock is very comfortable with that.

In the end, Sherlock understands and accepts that noble, heroic, moral John Watson has the capacity to lash out and destroy the people he loves best. And John comes to understand and accept that mean, cold, brilliant, sociopathic Sherlock Holmes is a damaged, lonely, terrified, and loving man. They are ambiguous, they are contradictory and in constant conflict on the inside. That’s what fuels them, it’s what makes them strive to be better, and what makes them the legends they are.