Sherlock – The Reichenbach Fall (BBC One)

WARNING - Before reading further, this is not only a review but an analysis of the episode and it's plot so it is almost all spoilers. Only read if you don't mind the plot spoiled or if you have seen the episode.


After giving myself a chance to consider the clues and available information in the third episode and to absorb it, you may say that I have become a teensy bit obsessed with the puzzle of this episode. I fear that no matter what the solution may be, I personally will be disappointed that I no longer have something so deliciously tricky to think about.

As any good Sherlock Holmes fan should know, the great detective was controversially killed off during a plunge with his nemesis Moriarty over the Reichenbach Falls so any fans watching this modern adaptation would be aware that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was pressured to resurrect the sleuth; Therefore Holmes had to survive, he just had to. Also, that and the fact that there is to be a third series of ‘Sherlock’ and this was announced after the airing of the third episode of the second series so there were few surprises in these facts.

The skill with which Steve Thompson, Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss weaved the twists and turns of the original story with a modern edge make it truly compelling viewing; I was considering it long after the credits had rolled. From start to finish it was a rollercoaster of a tale and in all honesty, from the moment Sherlock found that Moriarty was back, he looked like he knew that the outcome would be hard. In fact, his plunge from the building at the end of the episode felt inevitable from the moment he set foot on the roof.

The beginning of the episode shows a less than impressed Sherlock Holmes(Benedict Cumberbatch), receiving gifts from grateful parties for his work in solving various crimes, including the case that makes his name – the recovery of the ‘Falls of the Reichenbach’ painting by Turner. He has become well known due to his work and is no longer seen as a private investigator due to his fame. At each gift Sherlock is unimpressed, guessing as to what each gift is before handing it to John Watson (Martin Freeman) with the insistence that he doesn’t want them – implying that he solved the crime not for the reward but only for the solving of the puzzle which is what truly interests him and sustains him – like an addict with a craving, he is never satisfied unless he has a case. He is even seen solving cases from long ago when he mentions a case that the Bow Street Runners failed by ‘missing everything’ – The Bow Street Runners were disbanded long ago – this seems to be an indication that he is in desperate need of something to do.

In a gloriously barmy, yet infinitely playful sequence Moriarty (Andrew Scott) manages to break into The Bank Of England, The Crown Jewels and to release the prisoners from their cells in Pentonville Prison simultaneously. He dances wildly, relishing every moment of his crime, despite the fact he could be captured any moment there seems little urgency in his actions and the music, Rossini’s ‘Thieving Magpie’ sets a suitable backdrop to his almost balletic actions. At the crescendo of the music and on bursting into the room where Moriarty is currently perpetrating the crime the police find him swathed in the crown jewels, sat atop the throne wearing the crown and remarking calmly ‘No rush’. This scene in itself is worthy of several watches, not just for clues but for the sheer impudence of it all leading you to feel humiliated yet strangely admiring the clearly deranged man.

Moriarty has his day in court and Sherlock is to stand against him but due to his haughty manner and usual trait of treating everyone like idiots he ends up in prison for contempt in what appears to be the cell beside Moriarty which could seem somewhat dangerous. Despite an enormous amount of evidence against Moriarty he pleads Not Guilty and his defence offers no appeal so he is expected to be sentenced.
Sherlock comes into contact with an investigative journalist who apprehends him in the restroom at the court, Kitty Reilly (Katherine Parkinson) wants the scoop, the story behind the great detective and in a mouth-watering scene that is almost like a seduction or battle (the two can be so similar) between the two characters circling each other and sizing each other up. Sherlock ends the brief encounter such as it is without any physical contact but with three words "You repel me". Now, to my mind, these words are either throwaway and that people like her did indeed repel him but repel seems like a funny choice of words so I was led down the path of thinking that it wasn’t perhaps the words but what they are when put together – You repel me sounded a lot like ‘Europa me’ or ‘Europe Help me’. With Europa being one of the moons of Jupiter and Moriarty’s three words ‘I Owe You’ this led me to Io, another moon of Jupiter and both moons are classed as ‘The Galilean Moons’ and with the magnetosphere of Jupiter, repel...maybe I’m just reading too much into that. Once I saw that there is a crater on our moon called ‘Reichenbach’ and the fact that mercury is mentioned it seemed like a lot of celestial bodies were being discussed, but again, perhaps I am reading too much into it.

Sherlock is at home when Moriarty is freed and ignoring warnings from Watson he puts the kettle on, almost welcoming Moriarty. Playing his violin Sherlock is calm as Moriarty creeps up the stair in Baker Street, only pausing on hearing the footsteps but both continue somehow knowing each other has nothing to fear. Their exchange takes place over tea in a very stereotypical English way and despite Moriarty sitting in Sherlock's seat there is little fear between the two. They discuss a world with locked doors where the man with the key is king and Moriarty claims to have a key that can open anything, indicating his opening of the vault, the prison and the crown jewels to advertise his key. Moriarty’s discussion of fairy tales only highlights the horrors to come and after a series of veiled threats and the statement ‘I owe you’ he leaves, having carved ‘I O U’ into an apple. The apple seems very in-keeping with all of the themes of the episode; falling angels, the fall of man and with the fairy tales (apple in Snow White – another Grimm fairy tale). Also interestingly, Moriarty’s cup and saucer were the only things that he touched in the room other than the apple and knife and as the tea cup was very distinctive and Sherlock’s was plain – perhaps DNA was extracted following Moriarty’s departure?

John is urged to see Mycroft by surreptitious means and he finds that there are a series of executioners living around Baker Street that appear to be a threat to Sherlock.

Sherlock is thrown into another incident involving the kidnapping of two children and due to Sherlock’s deductions, footprints in linseed oil and Hansel and Gretel similarities the case is solved and the children are recovered – traumatised and poisoned with mercury painted on sweet wrappers voraciously eaten during their hunger but alive.

After Sherlock and John are allowed to question the little girl about the crime she is sent into screaming hysteria even when seeing the face of Sherlock which led me to believe that Moriarty had perhaps either worn a mask or used someone in the kidnapping that looked a lot like Sherlock. Considering the effects of mercury include sensory disturbances and confusion, it would not have been too much of a stretch to believe that Moriarty used someone who looked like Sherlock to kidnap the children or supervise them in the disused factory – perhaps with the right treatment the little girl could have become terrified by Sherlock just because of the experience. This hysteria of the little girl sows the seeds of doubt in the head of the police, coming to the conclusion that the crimes solved by Sherlock may have been orchestrated by him and that he may be a fake. This combined with a hitman being shot because he saved Sherlock and shook his hand appears to indicate that the executioners are not there to kill Sherlock but to duel to get to that which Sherlock holds the secret.

Moriarty is trying to throw doubt on Sherlock at every turn, a small germ of doubt in the police’s mind, to a wider spreading idea in the head of the public – the media having a field day highlighting that the police trusted him and therefore adding disbelief on the competency of everyone - degrading Sherlock bit by bit until he is believed by no one, including casting doubt in the head of his firm friend.

On the arrest of Sherlock however, John manages to get arrested too and the two escape the clutches of the police together – briefly passing a sign on the wall with angel wings that reads ‘IOU’. This escape leads to the death of another of the hitmen but not before exacting the information from him that the key code was planted in the flat making his part in the crimes seem all the more real.

The pair try to track down Rich Brook who has sold a ‘kiss and tell’ story to the papers all about Sherlock and on finding him and the investigative journalist Kitty they are told that Moriarty doesn’t exist and that Rich Brook is an out of work actor that Sherlock has paid to pretend to be Moriarty to make it seem like he is not responsible for the crimes. Watson is understandably shaken and Rich Brook seems a benign sort of character, cowardly and fearful, producing 'evidence' that he is not Moriarty but a children’s TV presenter (presumably because neither Sherlock or Watson would watch kids TV). Even Sherlock seems to doubt his own mind and Watson is cast into a tailspin, wondering what to believe. Is this man with the super human intellect really who he thinks he is?

Sherlock then does several uncharacteristic things – he goes to Molly for help, tells her he trusts her and for once admits that someone other than himself is right showing some sort of humility. He finally asks for help, knowing that if he is to ‘die’ that there are people who can’t know about it and John is one of those people so he can’t ask him for help. Molly shows unwavering trust despite the doubts swirling around the great detective and she agrees to help regardless.

It seems that Mycroft, in an effort to get Moriarty talking, may have shared the stories of Sherlock’s life – he is the only one close enough to know Sherlock being as they grew up together and know each other's weaknesses. John is scornful of Mycroft that he may have inadvertently caused his brothers potential demise and despite the lingering worries in his head, John still believes in Sherlock.
They consider breaking into records and restoring Jim Moriarty, if only they had the key which they believe to be in Baker Street but then Sherlock comes to the conclusion that the rhythmic tapping on his Moriarty’s knee could be the key – being a series of 1 and 0 (also potentially pointing the IOU aspect) relating to the rests and beats – and that the key is therefore in Sherlock’s mind as he memorised it, being the observant fellow that he is. He then invites Moriarty to ‘come play’ with him on the roof of St Bart’s hospital. It may be nothing but at this point the sleeve of Sherlock’s shirt as he put his phone back in his pocket did not have a button despite him claiming at the beginning that all his shirts have buttons and I thought that maybe he had been wearing the diamond cufflinks he was given but had used them for something. There were quite a few references to diamonds throughout the episode; the diamond used to break into the crown jewels, the crown jewels themselves, the diamond bracelets on the cab TV screen.

While sitting in the lab, John receives a phonecall from paramedics saying that Mrs Hudson has been shot and Sherlock seems nonplussed. John calls him a machine for seemingly being uncaring but this particular bit seemed reminiscent of the original story where Watson was called away to help an ill woman but he seemed to know that there was something a bit odd about the claims. Leaving Sherlock behind in the lab, John rushes to see Mrs Hudson only to find that she is ok and realising that Sherlock wanted him out of the way, he hurriedly returns to St Barts hospital.

As Sherlock sets foot on the roof of the hospital to meet Moriarty, it is almost as if the situation was inevitable – his fall from grace, his forced suicide. Moriarty is determined that Sherlock should die in disgrace but the problem is that without Sherlock, Moriarty will have no one to play with and he needs stimulation that he can’t get from anyone other than Sherlock. With each thinking they have the upper hand is becomes clear that Moriarty is more of a threat to Sherlock’s friends than he is to him and Sherlock's weakness of always wanting things to be clever may not be the only thing that can make the detective dance with the devil so to speak. The episode gives us something that we don’t often see on TV, the circling of two adversaries, fighting with their brains and intellect rather than pummelling each other into submission – cerebral battles somehow always come across as sexual and arousing in many ways and like any true seduction, submission of one party must be unavoidable. Moriarty’s weakness is his boredom, his pride and his misjudging of Sherlock. It’s left to the viewer to decide whether Sherlock really is that clever as to show the double bluff of the key code not existing as it is portrayed that only ‘ordinary’ people would think a single line of code would bring down everything. In order to bring about his earlier ‘magic trick’ you need some willing participants and this seems to point to Sherlock having similar people for his ‘magic trick’.

The baton shifts between the two, Sherlock almost crumbling and going so far as considering killing Moriarty but he finds that Moriarty has been one step ahead again and has hitmen set up to shoot John, Mrs Hudson and Lestrade, his only friends (Molly is not mentioned but is someone he trusts and so would not give Moriarty that ammunition) if he doesn’t kill himself, completing Moriarty’s fairy story.

On the brink of the precipice, Sherlock laughs in what seems like realisation that as long as Moriarty is alive and Sherlock has him that his friends are safe as there must be a way to call off the hit. Moriarty wants Sherlock to make a choice and believes him to be ‘on the side of the angels’ but Sherlock assures him that they will shake hands in Hell as just because he is on the side of the angels, this in no way means that he is one of them. Only then does Moriarty realise that Sherlock is certainly not ordinary and in a sort of cutting his nose off to spite his face act, to stop Sherlock saving his friends he kills himself. This puts him across as being completely insane and ruthless, sacrificing his life just so that Sherlock has to make a choice whether to save his friends and die or live and to have blood on his hands but they both know that they are more alike than either of them would ever care to admit.

On Moriarty’s death, Sherlock seems to have no other option but to jump if he has any feelings for his friends at all. He steps onto what appears to be a bloodstained roof wall and prepares to jump just as John arrives in a taxi.

From here on in there is a lot of speculation from me as to how the subsequent events play out. Sherlock phones John as he is exiting the taxi and demands that he stand in a particular place and to keep looking at him no matter what happens – this appears so that he will both deflect the gaze of the hitman from Sherlock and by witnessing Sherlock’s demise, however traumatic, it will keep John safe. Between John and Sherlock there appears to be some kind of shed but at the angle Sherlock is standing John cannot see Sherlock hit the ground. Sherlock speaks emotionally and frankly to John and in another uncharacteristic act, he cries. A tear roll down his cheeks, perhaps not because of his own death but perhaps at the death of his friendship as it is very hard to continue seeing people once you have faked your own death. He wants John to tell everyone that he was fake and even proposes that he researched John before their first meeting to impress him – which seeing as Sherlock doesn’t usually make these sort of claims seem somewhat odd. The fact that he says that his research was a trick – ‘just a magic trick’ – does seem to also point to the fact that what John is going to see has been orchestrated.

Not only does John not see Sherlock fall but at a precise moment, which could also have been orchestrated, he is struck and whirled around by a cyclist – disorientating him. Despite potential concussion he staggers to his friend, desperately clawing at the people around the body to check the pulse as he just can’t believe his friend his dead. To all intents and purposes, Sherlock lies on the stretcher, drenched in blood and his eyes gazing glassily into space and he is rushed away by paramedics.

A few odd things happened around these events; what looks like a laundry truck or a bin bag truck appears to have been present at the fall and as John rushes to see his friend the truck drives silently away, this could have provided something of a soft landing for Sherlock being prepared earlier and would get him away from the scene quickly should he need. I thought at first that the cyclist had spun John around to face another direction where a mock up of the scene with the body was provided with willing participants and so when he stood up he was distressed and disorientated but ran to the body on another part of the street but this seemed unlikely as the view was exactly the same from above. I also thought that Molly had the body of someone who looked like Sherlock (perhaps the man who assisted in the kidnap of the children to make Sherlock seem guilty and perhaps Moriarty had killed him once he was no longer needed and the body had been retained) and that she had pushed the body from a window at the scene on the command. The idea of the bouncing ball and the word repel made me feel like I was missing something and that Sherlock was trying to find a way to ‘bounce back’. He could also have used the ball to make his pulse appear to have stopped as there is some way of faking this by placing an object at a particular place on the arm to make the pulse seem to have stopped – so perhaps he jumped, was cradled by the truck to soften the blow then fell onto the pavement from just a few feet. With help from someone maybe he could arrange for the blood to look authentic at his head and then declaring him dead would have to be from another willing participant – generally, Sherlock would never trust that many people but this is no ordinary scenario and he may have allowed people into the plan because his feelings for John, Mrs Hudson etc were far greater than his fear of lack of control over trust? Once ‘dead’, Sherlock would have to trust people in order to keep his secret. He may have been experimenting with the idea of faking his own death and maybe Mr Hudson knows more about it that expected as, at Sherlock’s graveside she remarks that his “keeping bodies in the fridge” and specimens was something she considered odd but maybe she was trying to hint to John that he was ok?

Maybe the police were in on it too and either Sherlock’s phone was tapped or he was using it to record the conversation so that he would be given an alibi of sorts for Moriarty's body, LeStrade certainly didn’t seem in any hurry to arrest them and John was able to walk in and see Mycroft without apprehension so perhaps the police helped to arrange things – again this would mean Sherlock trusting people to which he is unaccustomed.

The body lying on the pavement was definitely not Moriarty as it was the baby blue eyes of Benedict Cumberbatch that stared into the sky – this particular scene though may have been from John’s perspective and he saw what he expected to see as he was disorientated but this seems unlikely.

There were lots of little references to flying animals; a bird in the seal on the envelope sent to Sherlock and the children, just after Sherlock’s fall pigeons scattered from one of the upper windows, an outstretched bat on Sherlock’s mantelpiece. As in the second episodes references to coffee there seemed to be a lot of instances of tea being drunk, spilt etc but this may have been to highlight our seemingly unflappable tea drinking stiff-upper lipped image. Sherlock also seemed to be more well mannered than usual – saying Thank you several times and shaking hands with people. I also liked the reference to Diogenes in the name of the club that Mycroft attended.

All in all and all theories aside, 'The Reichenbach Fall' was a televisual triumph and for all it’s serious and intelligent content there were moments of humour and wit peppered throughout to lighten the subject matter. The chemistry between Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman is palpable and makes them so very irresistably watchable. They swap from carer and client to friends to brothers and their respective roles change depending on situation but always with a warmth that seems that they can win through everything so it makes it all the harder to watch Watson try desperately to keep his composure over the death of his friend and his faith in him is still unshakable in Watson’s request that he make it stop and that he can find him still alive – it is something that will keep him going. Mark Gatiss should also be congratulating himself with his clipped and smooth performance as Mycroft, holding all the pieces together and despite his brother's intellect he has a similar mind as well as the connections with which to make things happen. Despite their differences, they are much stronger together than they are apart. It was a wholehearted success for the BBC, the actors and the cast and crew and a tremendous treat for us. Long may there be quality television such as this and I for one cannot wait for the next instalment to find out exactly what happened. I can hardly wait...