Above All, Be The Heroine Of Your Own Life

happy pride month to this post specifically

Should have worried more about his mental condition.

Murder mystery detectives aren't supposed to be sexy. They're not supposed to be alluring, or to be a POV character whose eyes you see things through. A detective is supposed to be like a cool weird bug that's crawling around on and around you and you're like ooh aren't you shiny and fun to look at- no wait don't go in there DON'T GO UP IN MY SLEEVE NONONONO don't snoop in there!

Truly fascinating description. I have no idea what is going in the detective fic you read but never once has it entered my mind while watching Rust Cohle detect nihilistically around the Lousiana coast that he was anything other than a desert prophet born in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Hercule Poirot is a cool shiny bug that sees no reason to not venture into your sleeve. The concept of being killed for being in the wrong place at the wrong time does not exist for him personally.

doubly funny that I saw a compilation of all the corporate accounts like "aw thanks elmo, we're doing well" meanwhile all the flesh and blood real human people are extremely not okay

this is the energy that jim henson would be proud of.

Always reblog this. Elmo and his friends will be there in your times of trial and doubt, to help you through your torment

have you guys heard about the greenland shark. some crazy shit happening there.

this is the vibe i bring to the party actually

The way that most of Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories’ most horrible villains are rich dudes that are abusive to women, in a time such as the 1880’s, compels me.

There’s a whole subset of Sherlock Holmes stories that could be labeled Asshole Guys Try to Control Women’s Money.

Yup, there’s a huge number of times where Sherlock Holmes is the ONLY person to take a young woman’s complaint or worry seriously and finds out someone is up to some serious evil.  Holmes also shows a lot of compassion and empathy with the victims over and over again.  (This is why I find “Secretly a woman” or “Trans” Holmes headcanons much more convincing than “sociopath” Holmes.)

This is also the basis for a lot of speculation about Holmes’ family life.  The idea that he has been a victim of abuse, or his mother was abused (or even murdered by his father.)  There’s definitely SOMETHING that makes him very aware of how dangerous isolated families can be, and the dark things that can happen behind closed doors.  Plus, of course, the motivation to devote himself to stopping crime.  And yes, so much of it is of the personal type. 

dude see this is one aspect of the original books i NEVER understand why modern remakes (cough cough) don’t go all in on. Like, in the 21th c we HAVE all the dumb forensic shit that made Victorian Holmes stand out, but we STILL DON’T HAVE uh….you know, compassion for women and minorities, or the willingness to believe them, adequate community support for domestic violence or hate crimes, etc. etc. which you’d think is exactly where a renegade consulting detective would come in handy. A good modern day Sherlock Holmes remake, instead of trying to convince us that Holmes is some super genius for being better than fingerprint analysis or whatever, could have him just be…a good person who helps out people the police can’t and won’t help. There you go. That’s how to write a relevant modern Holmes.

One thing that annoys me is how much the BBC version of Sherlock (and the fandom around it) focus on police cases or cold cases.  In the stories, Holmes’ bread and butter cases had fuck-all to do with the police and in a few stories, he actively works around/against them, or outright lies to them.  Of the many, many things I wish that show had done differently, this is one is particularly obnoxious since it’s such a gimme.

#my favorite murder in holmes canon#is when they straight up witness a lady murder her blackmailer#do nothing except destroy his other blackmail material#and then straight up lie to lestrade about it#sherlock holmes#more of this in modern adaptations pls (via @cactusspatz )

Let’s not forget the time Holmes helps a young woman who’s being catfished by her own stepfather to steal her inheritance, and when the villain sneers that the law can’t touch him, Holmes grabs a horsewhip out of sheerest chivalry.

So, the most canon-accurate iteration of Sherlock Holmes in the last few decades is actually Benoit Blanc….