However, The Final Problem went far beyond asking you to suspend your disbelief. It was poorly written, poorly executed, and confusing as hell. It seemed like the creators took a little bit from all of their favorite genres (horror, gore, comedy, etc) and then tacked them all together. It was a story constructed by my four year old out of Popsicle sticks and Elmer’s glue. None of it held together. I had the surreal experience of wondering what show I was watching. Had I accidentally turned the channel to Saw 7? However much violence has been in it in the past, Sherlock was never misery porn.
What a horrible, horrible waste. A waste of our time as viewers. A waste of Benedict and Martin’s talent as actors. To have gone from the quality of acting and writing and pacing we got in The Lying Detective to putting Martin and Ben into outlandish scenario after outlandish scenario where their skill cannot hope to be showcased? It was so insulting and a disgusting waste of the show’s potential.
If the finale of Sherlock season 4, The Final Problem, had you feeling like this:
You weren’t alone. I’ve got a post brewing about having to grieve and let go of a fandom that was once very near and dear to your heart, but without further ado, here were my top ten worst moments from The Final Problem. And trust me, it was hard to only keep it to ten. Spoilers ahoy!
Top Ten Worst Moments in The Final Problem
10. From the opening scene, it was already a mess. Clowns? Children running around? Bleeding portraits? Just to get Mycroft to admit to their sister’s existence? Oh, and that gun that was pointed at John at the end of the last episode? It was a tranquilizer gun, so don’t worry, he’s FINE.
9. The drone with the grenade on it that blows up 221B, but doesn’t injure anyone? Sure. Why not?
8. And then they’re stealing a boat… *insert GIF of me hanging my head in my hands*
8. And wearing preposterous costumes to get into a prison that Mycroft is in charge of…Yep.
7. Then we meet the psychotic sister, Eurus, who is able to use mind control (no you don’t need to know how, why would you need to know that?) to make everyone on her island prison do what she wants. And even though she’s been able to get in and out of her concrete island prison to start a texting affair with John, impersonate his therapist, and pretend to be a client for Sherlock, she stays…and has instead used Moriarty to exact an elaborate revenge on her brother Sherlock (NOT MYCROFT, I repeat, not the brother who has kept her locked away in the aforementioned prison for her entire life, but the brother who wouldn’t play with her when she was five) which has played out over the last four series. Uh, huh. Ok. Eurus, my girl, my pal, go to a tropical island and live your life!
6. And then we begin the Saw portion of our journey. We find out that there is a little girl trapped on a plane full of people who are asleep. (??????) Unless Sherlock, Mycroft, and John do whatever Eurus wants the plane will go down. To sum up, a lot of people die as a result. And we get this moment where Sherlock has to tell Molly that he loves her in order to get her to say it back to him so that Eurus won’t blow up her flat. Do you have a headache yet? Take a Motrin. It gets worse.
5. After Sherlock beats up a coffin in frustration (??????) and is asked to shoot either Mycroft or John, he turns the gun on himself, but that would end Eurus’ little game so she has dart guns (that are embedded in the walls???) come out and knock out Sherlock, John, and Mycroft before Sherlock can kill himself. And then she apparently transports them all back to the Holmes’ ancestral home for some more fun and games and we get this WTF moment:
4. John’s chained at the bottom of a well that’s slowly being filled with water, but first Sherlock has to figure out where his homicidal maniac sister is and what Redbeard is (his childhood friend Victor who Eurus drowned, but who Sherlock has turned into a dog to cope), so we get…this…special moment…
3. Remember that girl on the plane? The one they were all trying to save? Well, it turns out that that was Eurus all along and guys! Guys, guess what?! It turns out that all she needed was a hug from her brother to stop all those silly shenanigans. Phew, THANK GOD.
2. Since psychopaths can obviously just be cured with hugs and understanding they decide to put her back into the prison she was in before. Remember that one? The one where she could get in and out of all the time with her mind control powers? Yeah, don’t worry. Don’t worry! Sherlock comes and plays violin with her and her family watches and it’s really heartwarming and makes total sense. STOP THINKING ABOUT IT SO HARD.
1.But wait! Wait! Did you forget about John’s assassin wife who shot Sherlock and then jumped in front of a bullet for him and had a really shitty death scene where they basically erase her entire past and character arc and just make her so so thankful to be John Watson’s wife? The one who sent them a DVD posthumously telling Sherlock that he should get drugged up, put himself in danger, let himself almost be killed to save John Watson from his grief? Well, don’t worry she’s got ANOTHER DVD for her “Baker Street Boys”. *insert green puke emoji here*
To sum up:
I’ll leave you with the only part part I liked besides Hudders with her vacuum cleaner or Sherlock calling John family because Donald Trump is being inaugurated this week and we all need a palate cleanser. Not everything can be horrible right? RIGHT? Here, have baby Rosie being adorable with her Dads.
And all I have to say to Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat is:
