January 8, 2012

I have made a real effort to stay completely off the radar when it comes to what happened with Sherlock S02E01 A Scandal In Belgravia.

Except for a quick drive-by posting in my own livejournal (just "loved it") I've stayed away from commenting there. Partly because I hate people who think the internet gives them licence to be stupid whinging idiots. Partly because I believe in staying positive about life in general and that spouting poison bullshit is a great way to get poisoned yourself. Also because I have this forum, read by very few, where I can be all ranty and venty and stupid, and get it out of my system. But in the case of the new episode of Sherlock, I stayed away because I do obsess over the show and I did love every single moment of it. And somehow this put me in the wrong for a lot of people in my fandom.

Apparently, I am now some sort of freak because I didn't immediately dip into my bucket of personal issues and paint the episode with them. I was deeply disturbed to watch my fandom go from being exhilarated to disappointed to downright mean and bitchy in less than a week. It looked like a whole bunch of people who couldn't stand the idea that they could simply be happy with something, working hard to find something to complain about. Suddenly Steven Moffat went from a genius to a mommy-fixated misogynist who couldn't write a strong woman to save his life. Benedict Cumberbatch, who is without a doubt turning out to be one of the finest actors in our lifetime (no, not fannish squealing--watch some of his stuff!) is slagged off because he's not learned to play the violin in less than four lessons. (To be fair, the editing was off on a couple of notes, but when you've spent the last year and a half clamouring for Sherlock playing the violin, can't you just watch it and shut up?) Every lesbian with an agenda was suddenly blogging about the misrepresentation of their gender because Irene Adler was a dominatrix. Hate to tell you this, ladies, but sex IS power, and men and women use it all the time, and also, in case you didn't notice, this is bloody television. SEX SELLS. BDSM exists and people indulge in it, and some people indulge in it for money and power. If you haven't quite figured out how a hot chick in a teddy will get more viewers than a librarian with  rotten teeth then you haven't watched much telly. And if you think a woman is less than a man because she's good with a riding crop and likes to make a buck (or protect secrets) doing it, well, then maybe you ought to look at your own sexuality and how you feel about that.
Finally, the ultimate fan fail for me, being a slasher, was that in an episode that clearly stated that John Watson will do ANYTHING for Sherlock Holmes, fans squawked that there wasn't enough John/Sherlock. Sorry, fans, I hate to disappoint you, but you're not actually going to get an episode where John puts his dick in Sherlock's mouth. That's what fanficion is for, you berks!

I get being disappointed, I do. I'm trembling at the thought of what Steven Thompson is going to do to Reichenbach. While I've still watched the Blind Banker many times, and it has some wonderful set pieces (as did the Doctor Who ep he penned last year) I have found that his writing is a bit disjointed and sometimes what he'd like to portray doesn't always make sense. This is not random bitching because I am afraid of my own vagina or moaning in the "who shot first? Han or Greedo?" vein. A clear case in point is that in TBB he placed Sherlock on the street less than 1/2 a block from his front door at the exact moment that apparently the Chinese smugglers were scaling the front of the building and spray painting the windows on the outside. To be fair, this could also be blamed on the set designers as well.

But, and this is just my opinion, it seems to me that some people (probably, hopefully just a vocal minority) just couldn't bear the thought of simply being content with their show. After waiting for it for as long as they did, it was a bit like watching that guy who moaned all winter about the cold and the snow then turning all whiney cos it got so hot in the summer.

Get over it, fandom; you're embarrassing me.