The Final Problem

starksexual asked: Hello! You see, I was thinking about the video that Moriarty /supposedly/ uploaded on John's blog... What do you think is its purpose?(if it has a purpose at all, other than showing off) I have a few things in mind, but it all depends on the time it's been uploaded (after or before the Fall)... I just wanted to know what are your thoughts on it, given that you have a quick mind to create theories. Thank you! You're brilliant!

(The hacked blog entry is here, and a YouTube version of the video is here.)

I think the main point of that was to freak us out before Reichenbach. And to mess with Sherlock and John’s minds as well, if you want it to make sense within the story.

I haven’t heard of anyone finding any major clues in that video. To be honest, I hope there aren’t any. They didn’t even reference the blog hack in the show, and I think that means it would be kind of a cheat to have anything very important in the video. John’s blog is really fun for adding a little bonus information to the show, but a lot of people who watch the show will never read the blog. My personal feeling is that the big mysteries should be solvable by people who have seen the episodes but don’t necessarily read the supplemental material online. Otherwise, we’ll end up with a block of viewers who feel confused and a little cheated when answers are revealed.

As for when Jim uploaded the video—it was definitely before the fall. The date on that blog entry was 16 March. Earlier that same day, everyone was goofing around making stupid puns and idle death threats in the comments of John’s Hounds writeup.

As far as we know, the only thing that was taken from or planted in 221B any time recently was the wireless camera in Reichenbach, but I don’t think Jim handled that personally considering the name of the wireless network the camera was connected to.

Actually, the interesting thing to me is that we do know something was planted at Baker Street less-than-recently. Remember where Sherlock found Carl Powers’ shoes in The Great Game? They were left in 221C— Mrs. Hudson’s unoccupied basement flat. Since Jim was the one who killed Carl and kept the shoes all these years, and since Carl’s shoes formed the very first connection between Sherlock and Jim, I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that Jim had decided to handle that task personally.

I don’t know if anyone’s done a full comparison between the way 221B was set up in Jim’s video, Series 1, and Series 2 yet. (I certainly haven’t attempted it.) But unless someone finds evidence that Jim’s video was definitely shot after the start of Series 2, I’m somewhat inclined to think it was old footage that Jim shot when he left Carl’s shoes in 221C.