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*

What Sherlock Doesn’t Say to Molly

 (Sherlock meta by waytoomanyhobbies)

 In light of Sherlock finally saying those three little words to Molly, I’ve been going back and tracing the progression of his feelings for Molly. And one of the things that stood out to me started with that often analyzed Sherlolly question… “Was Sherlock really oblivious about the coffee invite?" Because there is one thing that Sherlock has never said to Molly despite having ample opportunity to do so.

We’ve noted for ages that for all his supposed obliviousness Sherlock is socially perceptive enough to realize that John’s questions about Sherlock’s dating status could denote a romantic interest, and Sherlock immediately and politely shuts that down lest it create some misunderstanding or trouble with his new roommate. Not that John meant it in that way, anyhow, but an ounce of prevention…

So if Sherlock can recognize those social cues, how does he miss Molly’s date invitation? One could argue that Molly’s invite was more subtle and at a time when he was rather distracted by the experiment that he was conducting at the time… except for one rather large fly in the ointment.

For someone who is supposed to be oblivious to Molly, Sherlock is awfully damned observant. His reaction to Molly’s explanation is equally problematic if we are supposed to believe that Sherlock is completely oblivious.

That is not the face of a man who is just going with the easy explanation. Even as Sherlock starts to turn back to his notes, his eyes are warily fixed on Molly and his expression and body language seems quite suspicious and nervous, rather like a man who has just discovered a large cobra that looks ready to strike. He knows there’s more to this and that Molly is about to make a move. This would be the perfect time to lay things on the line, as he later does with John, but instead he feigns complete ignorance.

We’ve thrown out plenty of theories about his actions here before, but I think that in light of the progression between Sherlock and Molly it’s worth a few new thoughts. I am honestly not sure if Sherlock knows why he plays dumb at this moment. As Mrs. Hudson points out in S4, Sherlock is actually all emotion… however in S1 Sherlock is firmly denying his emotions to the point that you have to wonder if he’s even convinced himself.

For as concerned as Sherlock was about his observation that Molly had put on lipstick for him, he’s equally concerned when he observes that she has taken it off after her failed invitation. And it is not at all inconceivable after all we’ve seen between them that a primal part of Sherlock actually enjoyed the fact that Molly was putting on that lipstick for his benefit.

He doesn’t want her to push for something he thinks is beyond his capabilities, but he doesn’t want her to completely lose interest in him either. Sherlock knows how to give Molly a compliment to get in her good graces, as he does in the very next episode, but he doesn’t do that here either. A compliment this soon after her invite could provoke another invite. So he needles her instead, trying to provoke her into continuing to wear lipstick around him.

At heart I really don’t think that Sherlock is behaving this way because he’s a cold bastard who’s merely trying to use Molly at the beginning of the series. I think that would have been his way of rationalizing his behavior in the first two episode, but I also think that from the beginning Sherlock at least subconsciously wants Molly’s romantic attention. There could even be a conscious recognition of this desire on his part that he is internally at war with himself over, because there is a pattern of behavior here that continues even as their relationship escalates.

Let’s skip ahead to the next big development in their relationship. The Christmas party where Sherlock discovers that Molly’s regard for him is deeper than just a little meaningless flirting… after he humiliates both of them in front of their friends by trying to deduce her. She’s dressed to the nines, she’s carrying one specially wrapped present, and she’s wearing that sexy red lipstick for someone–and Sherlock’s deductions make it crystal clear that he does understand the psychology behind a woman trying to draw a man’s attention to her lips. The "Jim” incident made it clear that Molly wasn’t just sitting around and pining for Sherlock, and he might even have reason to believe that Molly has moved on after that particular scene in the lab. It’s only after he has behaved like a complete bellend that Sherlock realizes that he was the object of her affection all along.

Sherlock giving his first ever apology in the series to Molly was a beautiful and important moment. Sherlock goes beyond that though by giving Molly a Christmas present in return.

After all the horrible things he’d said, Sherlock gives her a tender kiss on the cheek while wishing her a Merry Christmas. Leaving Molly (and the rest of the world) to wonder what to make of his actions. Was he so cruel before because he was jealous? Was he overcompensating for having just been a total jerk to her? It’s not like Sherlock bothers to clarify with something like, “I’m flattered Molly, but I’m married to my work." Is that because he’s trying to spare her more pain, or because he, himself, is confused especially with how Irene has been trying to stir his libido?

Between the kiss, Sherlock’s lewd ringtone, and Sherlock identifying Irene at the morgue by "not her face”… Sherlock is definitely not giving Molly the impression that he is a man who is married to his work. No wonder she’s looking for a little clarification on the subject while they are working alone in the lab.

And this was Sherlock’s golden opportunity to tell her if he didn’t want her affections, because he didn’t have to make the answer about Molly. There is nobody around to make the situation humiliating. He could have simply answered, “Molly, I think you should know I consider myself married to my work, etc."

Because at this point Sherlock knows how Molly feels about him. All the Christmas deductions plus the "three x’s… sign of romantic attachment." And yet again, Sherlock doesn’t say it.

For someone who had zero trouble saying those words to John when he thought John might have a romantic interest, Sherlock goes out of his way to never say those words to Molly, even after he knows she is romantically interested in him. Even when Molly thinks that he is in love with Irene, Molly is still that helpful and loyal soul he can rely on. He’s not going to lose her help in the lab or on his cases, so none of his potential earlier rationalizations for not telling her would apply anymore.

Instead, Sherlock goes on to tell her things like, "You can see me.” “You do count. You’ve always counted, and I’ve always trusted you." "If I wasn’t everything that you think I am, everything that I think I am, would you still want to help me?" And let’s not forget his answer to "What do you need?" Obviously the only way to answer that was, ”You.“

So Molly helps fake his death (and keep it secret for two years) and lets him use her bedroom for a bolthole, so I think we’ve reached a pretty high level of trust between them by the beginning of season 3, where Sherlock gets yet another scene where he could have said those words.

Yeah, so if Molly considers "have dinner” a viable ending to that sentence, Sherlock has obviously still never mentioned his “no dating” policy to her. They have a day filled with crime solving, meaningful looks, Sherlock’s heartfelt thanks, declarations of Molly being “the one person who mattered most”, another kiss from Sherlock, and an offer to take her to dinner after all… until Sherlock and Molly finally have to acknowledge that she’s currently engaged to another man.

And do you know when else Sherlock would have had an opportunity to tell Molly that he was married to his work and not interested in romantic entanglements? During whatever off-screen conversation they had about saying “I love you” to each other during the whole bomb threat scene. Of course, with the way that Molly was beaming the world’s biggest smile and rushing towards Sherlock’s favorite spot in the ending montage, I think it’s safe to say that Sherlock never said those words to her then either.

“I saved Molly Hooper!”

 (Sherlock meta by waytoomanyhobbies, thequietone0008 and celticmoonbeam)

celticmoonbeam:

My thoughts on the end of the ILY scene….

She said it. The timer stops. Mycroft steps forward and tries to comfort his brother. “Sherlock, however hard that was…” (Of course we’ll never know what he was going to say, but in my head it was “you did the right thing.”)

But Sherlock cuts him off. “Eurus, I won. I won. Come on, play fair. The girl on the plane. I need to talk to her.” Then, with a little more emotion, “I won. I saved Molly Hooper!”

Why does Sherlock want to move on so quickly? My take on this… With the other two challenges, he thought he’d won, only for there to be a sudden twist. The Governor was dead, but because he didn’t die by John or Mycroft’s hand, Eurus still killed his wife. Sherlock identified the Garrideb brother who was a murderer–only for Eurus to kill the two innocents.

I think he is terrified of another twist, one that results in Molly’s death after all. He wants to move Eurus on quickly and get back to the girl on the plane and make sure that Molly stays safe in her kitchen. I think his desperation shows through when he says, “I saved Molly Hooper!” He wants her to be saved–no surprises, no tricks. Because it would be very uncharacteristic of Eurus to spare Molly after all.

But then, Eurus shows her hand. There was a twist indeed–fortunately not one that will cost Molly her life. This was psychological torture. Molly was never in danger, and Sherlock just hurt her for no reason. He just damaged their relationship–maybe irrevocably–not to save her life, but just for his sister’s whim. And he’s just been forced to realize how very much Molly means to him. He loves her. He loves her and even though she’s alive, he may have lost her all the same.

He lost the game because he didn’t see through Eurus’s ploy. Molly is his blind spot.

thequietone0008:

OMG that’s exactly it . He was ensuing there were no after effects like the other two.. And look at his reaction to the countdown ending.. compare to the boy on the phone at the art gallery . Done over…next.. even gallery owner was more sickened.

waytoomanyhobbies:

So much yes! Sherlock is obviously terrifed for Molly throughout this scene. Molly is the woman who repeatedly saves him, and he both relies upon her and loves her–as he realizes during the scene. This is a Sherlock who is desperately trying to save Molly this time.

Downplaying Molly’s importance seemingly kept her off Moriarty’s radar, so it is a logical strategy for him to attempt here. As celticmoonbeam pointed out, Eurus has twisted both of her previous “tests” to hurt him. He can’t let that happen again with Molly’s safety in the balance. So trying to distract Eurus before she can turn this around is the most natural way he could respond here.

Sherlock is thinking so loudly in that moment that you can practically hear his thoughts screaming, “Get Eurus’s attention off Molly. Cajole Eurus into not cheating again. Make Eurus move along before she can go back on her word!”

And, while Sherlock knows that Molly can see through his facades and bullshit, he’s in uncharted emotional territory now. Platonic love took him time to wrap his head around, and he’s just been thrown into the deep waters of romantic love in a terrifying way. Someone previously described this scene as their feelings… their “I love you"s … as having been ripped from them, and that is such a perfect description. He never expected to be someone’s best friend even, let alone the love of someone’s life. He’s been denying for years that emotional entanglement had any meaning for his life, and now he’s forced to admit that it most certainly does have meaning to him and how human he is.

He’s going to have all the normal fears. Can he even do this whole relationship thing? Does he want to or feel ready to, knowing how painful it can be (Mary’s death devasted everyone, but Sherlock nearly killed himself trying to bring John back from it per Mary’s request) and how vulnerable it can make him? Will Molly even still want him after all the pain he’s caused her? He hasn’t had time to process any of it yet, and he’s trying to protect that fresh emotional wound that Eurus has made. (I think that is another reason he cut Mycroft off.) Instead, Eurus’s twist is to rub that emotional wound raw.

As Benedict Cumberbatch said Sherlock’s weakness is failing to see what’s right in front of him. Oh how many times that has bitten him in the butt regarding Molly! Meanwhile, Eurus doesn’t understand how to make connections with others, but she certainly can recognize them between others and exploit them.