The mystery of "Himmmm"

Fandom frightens me sometimes. Often, if we're honest.

I've been digging around for the Sherlock Holmes project I mentioned before, and one of the things I ran into is The Johnlock Conspiracy. For those who don't know, this was a movement among fans of the BBC's 2010 series Sherlock who contended that the series was building up to a Big Damn Gay Kiss between the leads at the end, which was theoretically the conclusion of series 4. Lots of people contributed, but this particular lady seems to have been the biggest and most thorough, having contributed a 40-some-odd episode analysis of the show, via YouTube.

Shit like this terrifies me.

There's nothing wrong with her character analysis. Her take on the significance and motivation behind what the characters say and do on screen is completely valid. I think she's 100% right in some areas, particularly Moriarty. Jim Moriarty's obsession with Sherlock is both disturbingly sexual in tone, and disturbingly indicative of someone who sees sex not as a social interaction, but as the apotheosis of control over another human being.

There's also nothing wrong with hoping the series is building to a gay romance. "Queering the canon" of Holmes stories has been a thing for a long, long time. It tends to happen in any work where two same-sex leads have a deep and devoted relationship, and because homosexual leanings were so hidden and coded for such a long time, there's much more history of having to "read into" things than with heterosexual pairings. If that had indeed been where the writing in Sherlock went, I would have considered the relationship more than adequately set up in the earlier series. AFAIK the leads wouldn't particularly have balked; I don't know all that much about Freeman's career but as a human he seems pretty no-nonsense, and Cumberbatch has a history of doing very well as queer and neuroatypical characters, under the general philosophy of 'I'm an actor, I act like other people, these other people are interesting'. With respect to the creators, Gatiss himself is gay and Moffatt has written at least one pair of lesbian Holmes/Watson analogues, Madame Vastra and Jenny, into Doctor Who.

What bothers me is the rampant apophenia among the Johnlock Conspiracy fans, typified in this lady's analysis. I'm not saying that the Sherlock crew wasn't admirably detail-oriented. They were making a show about a character whose entire schtick was noticing tiny things in his surroundings, and the main viewing audience had been fans of these tales literally their entire literate lives. Continuity had to be on the ball at all times or else. There were, in fact, plenty of passing references, allusions, background gags, and Easter eggs that were just there to say, "We read all the stories! You will find this amusing if you did, too." There's plenty of material available if you want to compare and contrast to the original canon, and discuss how the implications of various things would have changed from Victorian times to the modern-day setting of Sherlock.

When you get to the point where you are interpreting literally every detail of every line of every story as support for your one pet theory, you have a problem. No piece of writing is that focused. Her TJLC videos spiral into such a terrible black hole that every side character, every suspect, is interpreted as a "mirror" of one of the main characters, and moreover their actions are used in support of the One True Theory. Random set and costume details are interpreted as "communication" from the production crew that the theory is right. And, the very hallmark of a tinfoil-hat conspiracy, denials from both the characters on screen and the creators off are interpreted as yet more evidence in favor of the theory, because everyone knows that lying liars who lie are just trying to throw you off the scent.

And the sheer entitlement. Dear God. When no Big Damn Gay Kiss happened at the end of series four, the wave of anger from TJLC people was unbelievable. The writers were doing it wrong. The fans deserved to have their theory validated. How dare they write the thing they said they were writing the whole time.

The accusations of queerbaiting, I feel, are unsupported. The people slinging them have a very narrow view of what constitutes a queer relationship. It is true that Sherlock and John did not end series 4 in a homosexual romantic relationship acknowledged both in and out of universe. On the other hand, Sherlock's "married to the job" speech in the first fucking episode pretty solidly establishes that he identifies as aroace, even if he doesn't have the vocabulary to say it in exactly that way. I don't know when "I'm not interested in anyone like that" started to translate to "you can ignore everything I say about myself", but it's just as rude and invalidating to do it to representational characters as it is to real humans, so. Sherlock followed all that up by repeatedly, vehemently -- and given everyone else's reaction, uncharacteristically -- inviting John into his work, which he characterizes as his greatest if not only passion in life, so he's clearly starting something he sees as significant. 

The amount of emotional and domestic entanglement that Sherlock wants out of John is huge and would seem to qualify for what the tumblkids call "queerplatonic". This relationship does progress over the course of the series, is explicitly acknowledged and discussed in-universe, is consistently reciprocated by John Watson, and IMNSHO, more than qualifies as what the creators have said since day one is going to be a "love story". There are more things in heaven and Earth, Horatio, etc etc etc. Not everything has to end with people tumbling into bed.

I would frankly consider it a more narratively interesting option than a romance, as it is far less common. Sherlock's central conflict is the same either way ("Oh god feelings WHAT DO"), but it changes John's somewhat. Rather than a relatively straightforward story about a man coming to terms with his sexuality, John instead has to wrestle with the idea that he might have found a life partner in this sort of relationship, rather than the traditional marriage-and-children context he was clearly anticipating. If concluding that yes, that is what he wants (and even marrying a woman who accepts the relationship, quite likes her husband's Most Significant Friend, and pushes both John and Sherlock to keep the connection alive) doesn't count as a happy ending, I have no idea what does.