Is the “naked Sherlock in Buck House” sequence from A Scandal in Belgravia?
I loved the opening, etc. The entire episode was all very well done in terms of dialogue, pace, editing, but that episode really really annoyed me.
I suppose I learned much, much more about the unexamined cultural and personal assumptions running loose in Steven Moffat’s psyche than I wanted to know.
And, of course, Moffat “didn’t get it”.
He’s a brilliant writer, esp of dialogue, but he seems to have the habit of always knowing far less, psychologically, than he ought to know, given all his supposed Oxbridge cred. And what I have read of his own remarks strongly suggests a sensibility of “if you don’t like it, then it’s all about my perspective, and there’s something wrong with you.”
And of keeping things way too busy, so that you don’t have time to dwell on the the plot holes and groaners, and the cheap shots; and esp thereby habitually choosing to throw away or ignore depth or any sort of “trueness” because Moffat’s got so many catchy and clever moments. As great as this series can be, if it weren’t for Freeman and Gatiss, and Cumberbatch’s skills, the writing might turn into nothing more than high-class cotton candy.
That episode was great TV in its way - or would have been, had it been a cultural stand-alone. But it wasn’t a cultural stand-alone.
It drafted off the energy of something entirely greater and quite different, and was also a complete insult to its source inspiration, A Scandal in Bohemia, and to every reader who ever loved that story and understood it.
Thinking about the way the episode played out still makes me cringe, in spite of many admirable aspects and moments. I quit watching Sherlock after that. Not out of some sort of “boycott”; rather, the dialogues, acting, and cleverness were generally better than the stories as a whole, so much better that I just wanted not to watch any more of it for a while. I wanted no more Moffat writing for a while.
Also, to me, this Moriarity is a /fail. He’s too much psycho (not in itself a prob) and not enough smart. This is the guy with the deep plans and the long game? Not to me. He’s just great for dramatic confrontations and unpredictability.
Just a personal reaction to how Moriarity is written this time 'round.
Someday I’ll get back to the show, I presume.
Watching Cumberbatch, Freeman, Graves, Gatiss, etc can be an enormous pleasure.
Oh well. Just me bitching. Tell me to shut up now, someone, please.
Only: Will the real Irene Adler please step forth?
@f00l That’s the episode. I don’t like Moriarty, to the point that I mentally block every scene he’s in. That goes double for Eurus. I would, however, very much like to see the pilot for Sherlock, which was apparently never broadcast.
@OldCatLady
To me, the fun of the series is just watching Holmes interact w Watson, Homes and Watson interact with everything, all with lots of quips and jokes, and with the overarching weird paranoia engendered by quick shots of “Moriarity” playing the dark angel, and “Mycroft” standing in for the angels of light, if you want to trust them to be on the side of good. And it’s all frequently quite silly, and quite fun, esp since we get to look at Cumberbatch, and since the POV is usually that of Watson, as it must be.
After all, if you are inside the genius’s head and POV dramatically, the genius won’t be so startling or entertaining, and this genius’s frequently missing moral perspectives will sting a good bit more. Watching thru the eyes of Watson, a man with a conscience and empathy, who can be a good deal stronger, mentally and emotionally, and sometimes more on the scent than Sherlock (as is demonstrated in the first episode, A Study in Pink, means there is a “human” path to follow w thru the stories.
The plots are frequently beyond silly. These are “mysteries” as a mere skeletons on which to hang a lot of comments on brilliance and asbergers jokes, and on which to hang a million quips. And on which to turn the original stories inside out and make them into a fun scavenger hunt for references.
If the whole thing weren’t so fast paced and quip-filled, the jokes not so fast, and the staging, acting, and editing not not so stellar, the series would be an empty glass.
I don’t mind the actor who plays Moriarity so much; he’s no doubt doing the best he can with the material as written. The prob with the character of Moriarity comes from the writer’s room.
The actress who did “Irene Adler” in Sherlock was pretty damned brilliant in the role as written. She was great-looking, teasing, challenging, quick reflexed, dominating her screen time.
The prob was The Role As Written.
The original Irene Adler was a true early version of what would become feminists, tho she had no apparent politics or activism beyond her wish to choose and control her own life. She supported herself with care and discipline for her notable art (a great musical gift), and otherwise mostly lived quietly, after having learned earlier to her cost how easily the rich and powerful would lie and resort to deceit to buy themselves a bit of brief entertainment.
She was not, and would not have been, party to anyone else’s scheme or ploy. She did not seek to manipulate. She did not fall in love with Holmes, tho she respected him. And she outwitted only those who sought to outwit her.
She never worked for anyone else or in their schemes during the period Holmes dealt with her, nor sought his help, nor needed it.
Whereas the modern Irene, as presented in the “Belgravia” episode is a scheming and nastily blackmailing dominatrix, with dark political intentions, a full-on operator working for larger dark powers to whom she owes fealty all the while, and busy falling in love with Sherlock, because, of course, she can’t help herself. And, inevitably, he likes her or has some degree of feeling for her, and so he is tempted to help her out of a scrape now and then. In short, the modern Irene may be insanely talented and have quite a career, but she is anything but moral, and anything but independent, in career terms or ethical terms. She has mortgaged herself to everyone in sight, and her primary skill is staying one step ahead in a game that was never “her” game.
It’s as big a story corruption (tho a much lighter one) as if Sherlock were written as a murdering psychopath.
And Moffat couldn’t see what everyone else noticed the minute the episode was broadcast. First - that the writing and pacing and acting and editing were all excellent- the writing in particular.
And second, that his homage has essentially ethically trashed the original story, not only by turning one of Doyle’s most admirable characters into a brilliant scheming owned-person, but also by turning the Adler character into a clever sex-goddess for schoolboys, every Oxbridge-bound heterosexual male’s fantasy older " bad girl" who uses amazing sex-appeal to control everyone and everything else, but who will, in the end, obviously, fall for our protagonist. She just can’t help it.
If Moffat had done this to some other character, it might have been only merely another amusing dramatic turn. But Moffat has shown these tendencies before, in interviews as well as scripts. A quip matters more than a truth. Depth is to be warded off. He’s so good at some things that you can’t help wanting him to be better - to turn out stuff is us great, instead of just amusing.
Oh well. Another rant. Again, time to tell me to shut up.
Wikipedia
Jane Clare Jones, a doctoral student of feminist ethics writing in her blog on The Guardian’s website, criticised episode writer Steven Moffat’s representation of Irene Adler, arguing that her sexualisation was a regressive step. She writes, “While Conan Doyle’s original is hardly an exemplar of gender evolution, you’ve got to worry when a woman comes off worse in 2012 than in 1891.”[31]
Jones argues that while Conan Doyle’s Adler was a “proto-feminist”, Moffat undermined “her acumen and agency … Not-so-subtly channelling the spirit of the predatory femme fatal [sic], Adler’s power became, in Moffat’s hands, less a matter of brains, and more a matter of knowing ‘what men like’ and how to give it to them … Her masterminding of a cunning criminal plan was, it was revealed late in the day, not her own doing, but dependent on the advice of Holmes’s arch nemesis, James Moriarty.”[31]
It’s not that he wrote a character like that. The character is amusing.
It’s that he took Irene Adler and wrote her like that.
Adler can’t just be her own character in her own right, wittily modernized. Since she is prob Doyle’s most admirable female character in the Holmes books, Moffat has to make her into the ultimate schoolboy sex object, owned by others.
Since he’s done similar elsewhere, I kinda think those might be the terms in which he views the universe.
I was a little horrified when I first watched that episode. I was like, “Wow, Moffat really is somewhat deaf and blind to do that.”
He was hurt, and responded by insulting the intelligence of those who criticized him.
@PlacidPenguin just offering real alternatives.
marketing people are used to acting like they’re actually listening to engineers, so they’ll ignore this.
Casual sexy
Intriguing sexy
Blond sexy
Politically sexy
I think Sherlock is on AMZN. Which episode had him dragged naked to Windsor Castle…
@OldCatLady
Not what you want, but it’s still somewhat humorous.
@PlacidPenguin That’s it. Buckingham Palace. How could I have been so mistaken? I don’t think, however, that I could have said the closing lines.
@OldCatLady
More, to your taste, perhaps:
“For God’s sake, drop your sheet!”,
what, ho?
/giphy sheet drop
@OldCatLady
I’m not advocating payback at the f00l, but think of things which go quack…
@PlacidPenguin
@f00l is a quack. Didn’t you know?
Besides, @OldCatLady started it. See the deals thread for proof.
/image quackwatch
Is the “naked Sherlock in Buck House” sequence from A Scandal in Belgravia?
I loved the opening, etc. The entire episode was all very well done in terms of dialogue, pace, editing, but that episode really really annoyed me.
I suppose I learned much, much more about the unexamined cultural and personal assumptions running loose in Steven Moffat’s psyche than I wanted to know.
And, of course, Moffat “didn’t get it”.
He’s a brilliant writer, esp of dialogue, but he seems to have the habit of always knowing far less, psychologically, than he ought to know, given all his supposed Oxbridge cred. And what I have read of his own remarks strongly suggests a sensibility of “if you don’t like it, then it’s all about my perspective, and there’s something wrong with you.”
And of keeping things way too busy, so that you don’t have time to dwell on the the plot holes and groaners, and the cheap shots; and esp thereby habitually choosing to throw away or ignore depth or any sort of “trueness” because Moffat’s got so many catchy and clever moments. As great as this series can be, if it weren’t for Freeman and Gatiss, and Cumberbatch’s skills, the writing might turn into nothing more than high-class cotton candy.
That episode was great TV in its way - or would have been, had it been a cultural stand-alone. But it wasn’t a cultural stand-alone.
It drafted off the energy of something entirely greater and quite different, and was also a complete insult to its source inspiration, A Scandal in Bohemia, and to every reader who ever loved that story and understood it.
Thinking about the way the episode played out still makes me cringe, in spite of many admirable aspects and moments. I quit watching Sherlock after that. Not out of some sort of “boycott”; rather, the dialogues, acting, and cleverness were generally better than the stories as a whole, so much better that I just wanted not to watch any more of it for a while. I wanted no more Moffat writing for a while.
Also, to me, this Moriarity is a /fail. He’s too much psycho (not in itself a prob) and not enough smart. This is the guy with the deep plans and the long game? Not to me. He’s just great for dramatic confrontations and unpredictability.
Just a personal reaction to how Moriarity is written this time 'round.
Someday I’ll get back to the show, I presume.
Watching Cumberbatch, Freeman, Graves, Gatiss, etc can be an enormous pleasure.
Oh well. Just me bitching. Tell me to shut up now, someone, please.
Only: Will the real Irene Adler please step forth?
@f00l That’s the episode. I don’t like Moriarty, to the point that I mentally block every scene he’s in. That goes double for Eurus. I would, however, very much like to see the pilot for Sherlock, which was apparently never broadcast.
@OldCatLady
To me, the fun of the series is just watching Holmes interact w Watson, Homes and Watson interact with everything, all with lots of quips and jokes, and with the overarching weird paranoia engendered by quick shots of “Moriarity” playing the dark angel, and “Mycroft” standing in for the angels of light, if you want to trust them to be on the side of good. And it’s all frequently quite silly, and quite fun, esp since we get to look at Cumberbatch, and since the POV is usually that of Watson, as it must be.
After all, if you are inside the genius’s head and POV dramatically, the genius won’t be so startling or entertaining, and this genius’s frequently missing moral perspectives will sting a good bit more. Watching thru the eyes of Watson, a man with a conscience and empathy, who can be a good deal stronger, mentally and emotionally, and sometimes more on the scent than Sherlock (as is demonstrated in the first episode, A Study in Pink, means there is a “human” path to follow w thru the stories.
The plots are frequently beyond silly. These are “mysteries” as a mere skeletons on which to hang a lot of comments on brilliance and asbergers jokes, and on which to hang a million quips. And on which to turn the original stories inside out and make them into a fun scavenger hunt for references.
If the whole thing weren’t so fast paced and quip-filled, the jokes not so fast, and the staging, acting, and editing not not so stellar, the series would be an empty glass.
I don’t mind the actor who plays Moriarity so much; he’s no doubt doing the best he can with the material as written. The prob with the character of Moriarity comes from the writer’s room.
The actress who did “Irene Adler” in Sherlock was pretty damned brilliant in the role as written. She was great-looking, teasing, challenging, quick reflexed, dominating her screen time.
The prob was The Role As Written.
The original Irene Adler was a true early version of what would become feminists, tho she had no apparent politics or activism beyond her wish to choose and control her own life. She supported herself with care and discipline for her notable art (a great musical gift), and otherwise mostly lived quietly, after having learned earlier to her cost how easily the rich and powerful would lie and resort to deceit to buy themselves a bit of brief entertainment.
She was not, and would not have been, party to anyone else’s scheme or ploy. She did not seek to manipulate. She did not fall in love with Holmes, tho she respected him. And she outwitted only those who sought to outwit her.
She never worked for anyone else or in their schemes during the period Holmes dealt with her, nor sought his help, nor needed it.
Whereas the modern Irene, as presented in the “Belgravia” episode is a scheming and nastily blackmailing dominatrix, with dark political intentions, a full-on operator working for larger dark powers to whom she owes fealty all the while, and busy falling in love with Sherlock, because, of course, she can’t help herself. And, inevitably, he likes her or has some degree of feeling for her, and so he is tempted to help her out of a scrape now and then. In short, the modern Irene may be insanely talented and have quite a career, but she is anything but moral, and anything but independent, in career terms or ethical terms. She has mortgaged herself to everyone in sight, and her primary skill is staying one step ahead in a game that was never “her” game.
It’s as big a story corruption (tho a much lighter one) as if Sherlock were written as a murdering psychopath.
And Moffat couldn’t see what everyone else noticed the minute the episode was broadcast. First - that the writing and pacing and acting and editing were all excellent- the writing in particular.
And second, that his homage has essentially ethically trashed the original story, not only by turning one of Doyle’s most admirable characters into a brilliant scheming owned-person, but also by turning the Adler character into a clever sex-goddess for schoolboys, every Oxbridge-bound heterosexual male’s fantasy older " bad girl" who uses amazing sex-appeal to control everyone and everything else, but who will, in the end, obviously, fall for our protagonist. She just can’t help it.
If Moffat had done this to some other character, it might have been only merely another amusing dramatic turn. But Moffat has shown these tendencies before, in interviews as well as scripts. A quip matters more than a truth. Depth is to be warded off. He’s so good at some things that you can’t help wanting him to be better - to turn out stuff is us great, instead of just amusing.
Oh well. Another rant. Again, time to tell me to shut up.
Wikipedia
It’s not that he wrote a character like that. The character is amusing.
It’s that he took Irene Adler and wrote her like that.
Adler can’t just be her own character in her own right, wittily modernized. Since she is prob Doyle’s most admirable female character in the Holmes books, Moffat has to make her into the ultimate schoolboy sex object, owned by others.
Since he’s done similar elsewhere, I kinda think those might be the terms in which he views the universe.
I was a little horrified when I first watched that episode. I was like, “Wow, Moffat really is somewhat deaf and blind to do that.”
He was hurt, and responded by insulting the intelligence of those who criticized him.
@cranky1950
Are you TRYING to encourage her?!?
@PlacidPenguin just offering real alternatives.
marketing people are used to acting like they’re actually listening to engineers, so they’ll ignore this.
@PlacidPenguin See
@cranky1950
/image cumberbatch oomph
@Kidsandliz
