![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
goddamnit Arthur
May. 25th, 2023 11:59 amI swear the more attention you pay to The Final Problem in particular the more things you find that just do not make sense and yet nobody seems to have ever addressed this unless it's in some completely unobtainable article from an obscure magazine from like 70 years ago or something but given that all these 'scholars' are obsessed with Holmes being unable to do any wrong ever I doubt even that. Like why does Holmes clear off before handing over his evidence of Moriarty's guilt? He literally puts it in his 'death note', how to get the evidence to the police, did it never occur to him that's something they probably needed way sooner? Why does he make it so clear to Moriarty he/the police can't do shit until 'after Monday'? Why does he flee to some foreign country and then to a really desolate place just right for Moriarty to murder him there if he's actually so afraid of him and so convinced Moriarty is going to kill him? Why for that matter does he keep running about all over the place instead of hiding in some safe place in England even before he leaves for the continent? Why does he leave Moriarty to the police when he thinks the police aren't capable of dealing with him? And if Holmes's evidence is what will convict them, how can the police arrest the 'gang' before they actually have the evidence? They can't just arrest them and hold them for days on the basis of nothing which is exactly what they seem to have without Holmes actually giving them the evidence (even on the monday they have not got Holmes's evidence still, they can't have it if it's 'in pigeonhole M' and they need Holmes's written instructions on where it is/how to get it). And why would Moriarty need to kill Holmes to silence him if the evidence is elsewhere? And why the hell is everything hinging around the word of one man anyway, one man who is not in the police? I'm sorry but as great as Holmes is, he's one amateur detective who is very clearly obsessed with Moriarty to an unhealthy degree and who cannot possibly be correct about Moriarty being basically responsible for practically every crime in London as he claims, that is simply not possible. Yet the police take him at his word, basically try to arrest everyone on his say so, don't bother to get any actual evidence from him before trying to arrest them. Frankly they look corrupt as hell. And if Moriarty is so brilliant that he has escaped detection for years, why would he suddenly leave this paper-trail of evidence linking him to every crime and to every person who commits the crime, which is what Watson is trying to claim Holmes has? And how do you fit all of that into one "envelope", are we supposed to believe Holmes magically invented modern computers and tiny USB memory sticks to go with them or something? And if Moriarty is so desperate to kill Holmes where are the actually good assassins with the airguns i.e. Moran and co? Supposedly he makes all these attempts on Holmes's life... with the most useless incompetent assassins ever. If he knew where Holmes was going to be as Holmes is saying he must do for him to make these attempts on his life, he would have good assassins there, not resort to using some rando on a roof chucking bricks at him (or are we also saying Moriarty is actually so bad at maths as well as plotting crimes that he'd not realise the probability of killing Holmes with a brick thrown from a roof is almost non-existent?) And why does Holmes not even seem to consider those at worst were just 'warning shots' but there's also a very strong possibility they were just coincidental accidents/incidents and nothing to do with Moriarty. Like I can't believe Watson, a doctor, who knows about Holmes's drug use, who knows Holmes has had a total breakdown before, never at least wonders if Holmes isn't just imagining at least some of this and ascribing things to Moriarty that are absolutely nothing to do with him particularly when Watson never once sees any of this, never meets Moriarty, never does more than glimpse someone who may or may not actually be Moriarty and when everything bad claimed about the man is filtered through Holmes and Holmes only.
And who the hell is Inspector Patterson and why does he seemingly vanish without trace and why if the evidence was enough to convict everyone in the gang are Moran and at least two high-ranking others still not only at large but not suspected by anyone even years later even when an acquaintance of this 'brilliant marksman' and former intimate associate of the Napoleon of Crime gets ~mysteriously~ shot dead, and why if the rest of the gang were all tried and found guilty including of involvement actually with Moriarty did Watson need to write a story to try to shut Colonel Moriarty up anyway and where is the actual evidence of any of their guilt even in that story because that is literally all 'Holmes said this so it must be true' and no actual evidence at all (like he could have mentioned a couple of other cases that were proven to be linked to Moriarty, cases we'd already heard of before, but no, even that didn't happen, there is literally no evidence other than what Holmes claims to be true anywhere. Same in The Valley of Fear also too, it's literally just Holmes's word for Moriarty's involvement there also). Also if Moriarty was always pretty distant from the actual crimes how could he possibly be tied to these other people and most of those crimes anyway? Most of those people probably had no idea who he was, it probably would have been people like Moran or someone even lower down the chain who dealt with them, not Moriarty. Moriarty is supposed to be brilliant, as smart as Holmes if not even smarter, and all of this just undermines him so much and then that in turn undermines Holmes too because if Holmes is as brilliant as Moriarty only actually Moriarty turns out to be very stupid then that means so is Holmes.
Also that Watson is meant to be married at this time and then he promptly clears off with Holmes leaving his wife behind and neither of them ever once seem to think 'hey if this gang is so desperate and so vindictive, might they not try to target Mary?' seems extremely callous (as does Holmes's attitude to 'Porlock' for that matter. Sucks he's no longer useful to me, I hope Moriarty doesn't kill him even though I've asserted Moriarty kills all of those who let him down but hey never mind, I'll soon forget about him.)
And honestly it really is infuriating how little sense any of this makes and how it does really start to look like Holmes was actually either a/ a very cold calculating murderer who tried to fake evidence and deliberately lured Moriarty away to murder him which is a horrible interpretation, or b/ he was basically insane and imagining most of this and at the very least he was definitely extremely paranoid probably as the result of drug use. Oh and also the whole police force is probably corrupt either way. Which is not really a great interpretation either, even though it fits.
Another one of our dog friends died yesterday, I am so sad again. Sweet old lady Millie the (I think) staffy x jack russell, both of them breeds that can be pretty iffy with other dogs especially but she was the gentlest soul and one of my dog's first friends. RIP darling girl, you were a very good dog.
And who the hell is Inspector Patterson and why does he seemingly vanish without trace and why if the evidence was enough to convict everyone in the gang are Moran and at least two high-ranking others still not only at large but not suspected by anyone even years later even when an acquaintance of this 'brilliant marksman' and former intimate associate of the Napoleon of Crime gets ~mysteriously~ shot dead, and why if the rest of the gang were all tried and found guilty including of involvement actually with Moriarty did Watson need to write a story to try to shut Colonel Moriarty up anyway and where is the actual evidence of any of their guilt even in that story because that is literally all 'Holmes said this so it must be true' and no actual evidence at all (like he could have mentioned a couple of other cases that were proven to be linked to Moriarty, cases we'd already heard of before, but no, even that didn't happen, there is literally no evidence other than what Holmes claims to be true anywhere. Same in The Valley of Fear also too, it's literally just Holmes's word for Moriarty's involvement there also). Also if Moriarty was always pretty distant from the actual crimes how could he possibly be tied to these other people and most of those crimes anyway? Most of those people probably had no idea who he was, it probably would have been people like Moran or someone even lower down the chain who dealt with them, not Moriarty. Moriarty is supposed to be brilliant, as smart as Holmes if not even smarter, and all of this just undermines him so much and then that in turn undermines Holmes too because if Holmes is as brilliant as Moriarty only actually Moriarty turns out to be very stupid then that means so is Holmes.
Also that Watson is meant to be married at this time and then he promptly clears off with Holmes leaving his wife behind and neither of them ever once seem to think 'hey if this gang is so desperate and so vindictive, might they not try to target Mary?' seems extremely callous (as does Holmes's attitude to 'Porlock' for that matter. Sucks he's no longer useful to me, I hope Moriarty doesn't kill him even though I've asserted Moriarty kills all of those who let him down but hey never mind, I'll soon forget about him.)
And honestly it really is infuriating how little sense any of this makes and how it does really start to look like Holmes was actually either a/ a very cold calculating murderer who tried to fake evidence and deliberately lured Moriarty away to murder him which is a horrible interpretation, or b/ he was basically insane and imagining most of this and at the very least he was definitely extremely paranoid probably as the result of drug use. Oh and also the whole police force is probably corrupt either way. Which is not really a great interpretation either, even though it fits.
Another one of our dog friends died yesterday, I am so sad again. Sweet old lady Millie the (I think) staffy x jack russell, both of them breeds that can be pretty iffy with other dogs especially but she was the gentlest soul and one of my dog's first friends. RIP darling girl, you were a very good dog.
