If Sherlock is in love with Molly (a woman) why did he imagine her dressing up like a man, acting like a man in his mind palace?

   (Sherlock meta by thenerdyfan and waytoomanyhobbies)

thenerdyfan:

Shots fired Sherlollys. Your move.

waytoomanyhobbies:

It’s not a difficult question for Sherlolly in any way, shape, or form. On a functional level it was a way of handling the misogyny of the Victorian Era when a woman wouldn’t have been allowed to become a doctor. And on the thematic and subtextual levels it only strengthens Sherlolly.

Let’s go back to an old Moffat interview with The Guardian from 2012 for a moment [x]

But how did Moffat and Gatiss solve the most vexing mystery, Sherlock’s sex life? “There’s no indication in the original stories that he was asexual or gay. He actually says he declines the attention of women because he doesn’t want the distraction. What does that tell you about him? Straightforward deduction. He wouldn’t be living with a man if he thought men were interesting.” 

Moffat is not saying that Sherlock, like Austin Powers, misplaced his mojo. “It’s the choice of a monk, not the choice of an asexual. If he was asexual, there would be no tension in that, no fun in that – it’s someone who abstains who’s interesting. There’s no guarantee that he’ll stay that way in the end – maybe he marries Mrs Hudson. I don’t know!” 

I included the entire section pertinent to our discussion, but I bolded his main points. Between the two paragraphs Moffat confirms that Sherlock only lives with John because Sherlock is not attracted to men and it will therefore pose no distraction for Sherlock, who is trying to avoid romantic entanglements as a conscious choice in his life. Other folks interpret Sherlock differently, and that’s great. Putting aside Moffat’s apparently limited understanding of asexuality, I do see Sherlock in this series as Moffat described him here.

That immediately explains why Sherlock starts out TAB by picturing Molly as a man… he is trying to suppress his attraction to her. This fits the type of tension that Moffat describes as interesting, Sherlock’s temptation and struggles to fight against his inherent desires. Molly is so threatening to Sherlock’s celibacy that he needs to mentally deny her womanhood and imagine her in a less threatening form.

Despite Sherlock’s attempts at burying this attraction, he is very much succumbing to it. That’s why John, the more socially perceptive side of Sherlock, immediately recognizes that Molly is a woman. (You can also see parallels to the A Scandal in Belgravia Christmas scene where Sherlock is the only one unaware of Molly’s romantic attachment to him.)

Sherlock himself can’t keep running from it, and his realization of Molly’s true sex (her sexual nature and identity) is tied to the denouement of the mystery. Part of this whole mental journey is Sherlock allowing himself to see Molly’s in this new light. “This is a war we must lose." Sherlock has been at war with himself about how he sees and treats the women around him, and Molly is important in this war he must lose.

Molly has a very special role in TAB. She is a woman he desires to do better by–hence his fixation on Molly’s anger towards his drug relapse carrying over into the Hooper persona as a result of his guilt. A woman both demanding and deserving of his respect and his attention. A powerful and intelligent woman whom he envisions in a key role amongst the avenging brides in this power struggle between men and women.

It’s an internalization of the sexual power dynamics at play. Molly is the woman who saved Sherlock’s life from Moriarty, inextricably linked with those events in his mind… and while mentally reexamining these cases, he’s also confronting his growing and changing feelings for her from accepting her as a skilled colleague to acknowledging her as a desirable woman.

And for the record, it’s not shots fired when you’re inviting us to explain a subject that we love to discuss and have discussed at some length multiple times in our tags. *shrug*