"you were up early this morning." "you assume that i slept."

[chicafrom3]

I'm not thrilled about this plot, since everybody in the audience knows Holmes won't be leaving New York for London and the writers have to know the audience knows that.

Nevertheless, Sherlock and Mycroft working out their sibling rivalry by hitting each other is pretty wonderful.

And then Joan gets her moment of being awesomely observant with the trees on the terraces, which was a pretty great moment.

"I'm sure he puts his earbuds in one at a time, just like the rest of us."

Sherlock's deduction of why the dude on the video isn't Gale was kind of charming. Is that weird? That I found it charming?

Mycroft and Joan actually have a cute banter going on. Still don't ship it.

"Just remember you have a partner now. So I can still work the case if you go to dinner. Right?"

"Having never loved a moose, I imagine you must have to catch it in the right mood."

Oh, that's an interesting twist in the case... (And that's William Sadler, isn't it? It is! Hello, William Sadler!)

"Partner, remember? I can cover for you!" She's determined not to give him an excuse for ducking out on Mycroft. It's kind of adorable.

"I know exactly who killed her!"
We're only thirty minutes into the episode, there's no way you know exactly who killed her.

And now for a super-awkward dinner with the Holmes brothers.
Ugh, bringing up Dad is such a blatantly emotionally manipulative move to make. And then it gets even more blatantly manipulative with "he'll evict you and deny you access to your trust fund".
Ugh, and then you bring up Joan to complete the manipulation trifecta.

Yep. You never catch the killer thirty minutes in.

Aww, Holmes reassuring Watson that she handled the suspect correctly.

Okay, this is the thing I love most about this show: Sherlock is faced with a personal crisis which will affect Watson as a side effect. What does he do? HE TELLS HER EVERYTHING IN THE BLUNTEST TERMS POSSIBLE.

"What if it's really about the murder about Ian Gale?"
PLOT TWIST.

Oh, God, this means they actually did have the right killer thirty minutes in, just the wrong victim.

And now Joan gets the exposition speech. She's so good at it, man.

And then Sherlock gets his closing speech explaining to Mycroft that he's not going back to London and how to pass that information on to their father. ♥ It was a foregone conclusion, but not played as badly as I was fearing.

"You're so different now, Sherlock."
"You are essentially the same."

...BUT WAIT. Mycroft's not on the up and up? IS HE WORKING WITH MORIARTY? WHY IS HE WORKING WITH MORIARTY? THE FUCK?

WHAT WAS THAT ENDING?

And next week an unstoppable serial killer who will probably not defeat Holmes and Watson.