Airs 1 January 2014 on the BBC; 19 January on PBS.

The first real trailers are online. The full set, incorporating clips from series 3 and interviews with Benedict, Martin, and Mofftiss, is in this playlist.

Just a little worried that the line about not caring HOW he faked his death so much as WHY means we might not get an actual explanation. This IS Moffat...

Yes, the fandom is very much saying, "Whoa, hang on there, John - you might not care, but we bloody well do!"

I think it was Gatiss who said in an interview that they're not going to dwell on the How, but I'm sure that they'll give us some explanation.

I'm actually far more concerned about Sherlock's nonchalant attitude to walking back into John's life. I don't understand why two writers who claim to be the biggest Conan Doyle fans out there can make Sherlock such an inconsiderate dick, when he was never like that in the canon.

I'm just glad that I'll be watching episode 1 (and 2) with two friends from the fandom. I'm worried that there may be much ranting after the first episode finishes.

Transcript!

Comments will have to follow later - possibly much later. I've just surfaced from writing the transcript, and the next episode airs in six hours!

I was disappointed by this episode on first viewing. At the end, both I and my two Sherlockian fangirl friends kind of went, “Hmm,” and didn’t have much else to say. However, it grew on me while I was working on the transcript, and it did have some glorious moments.

The men who drag Jim’s body off the roof put blue contact lenses into his eyes. As one of them takes the latex mask off its stand, Jim is (still) staring straight up. The camera angle changes to a side-on view, and Jim is now staring more towards the left. The angle changes back to looking from above, and he’s staring up again.

The Molly-snog was jaw-dropping, even though I rather jealously wanted to kill her to death with sticks!

I’d seen spoiler pictures of Derren Brown being involved with the cover-up of Sherlock’s fall but I also knew that the production team had filmed some fake scenes to wind-up or mislead the fans who were following them around when they filmed any outdoor scenes. When Derren appeared on screen I said to my friends, “Oh, I was really hoping this bit was faked,” and was annoyed for a while, but cracked up when I then realised that – in effect – his involvement was faked!

(The team also filmed a scene of Mycroft and Moriarty walking out of the hospital gates and shaking hands before parting ways. They never intended to use it – it was just to throw the fans off-kilter. Just before they filmed the scene Mark Gatiss had an idea, pointed to Andrew Scott and said, “Put the coat on him,” and so throughout the filming Moriarty was wearing Sherlock’s coat. The fans went into meltdown!)

I was very uncomfortable with the fact that Mycroft sat and watched his brother being tortured for so long without doing anything. I suppose it could be argued that he knew that Sherlock would only tell the torturer all his own secrets once he couldn’t bear the pain any longer, but it was still a horrible feeling. But as a friend of mine commented, maybe Mycroft didn’t dare make a move until he and Sherlock were alone in the room and stood a better chance of escaping. After all, would you really want Mycroft Holmes fighting by your side?!

Yay! The return of not-Anthea!!

For reasons which make no sense within the story, Mrs Hudson’s back door now opens the other way around! In Scandal it was hinged on the left – now it’s hinged on the right. Still, at least there’s a battery in the wall clock now – when early pictures of the kitchen were tweeted while the set was being built, it still showed the (wrong) time that it had during the scene in Scandal.

How can Mrs Hudson afford not to rent out the flat for an entire two years?

Great lines (after John has told Mrs H that he’s getting married):
MRS HUDSON: What’s his name?
JOHN: It’s a woman.
MRS HUDSON: A woman?!
JOHN: Yes, of course it’s a woman.
MRS HUDSON: You really have moved on, haven’t you?

The scene in the restaurant was hilarious while Sherlock was trying to make John recognise him – and the faux French accent taken direct from Benedict’s role in the Cabin Pressure radio series was a joy – but why have Mofftiss decided to make Sherlock such a dick? Having had some experience of people with Asperger’s (*casts a shifty glance around Nitcentral*), I don’t think they generally act as badly as he does here. It’s made worse by the fact that Sherlock frequently seems to realise that his idiotic plan is backfiring but still goes on being a dick.

Best line of the episode:
JOHN (unaware that his French wine waiter is actually Sherlock): Well, er, surprise me.
SHERLOCK (tetchily, in pretty much his own voice): Certainly endeavouring to, sir.

Mary is absolutely perfect – both as a character in her own right, and as John’s partner. John must have talked about Sherlock a lot during their time together but it doesn’t mean that she should automatically like him. She has been written beautifully by Mark Gatiss – I really hope that the Thompson and Moffat episodes do her equal justice.

I winced on Sherlock’s behalf when Greg hugged him. Sherlock isn’t long back from that beating in Serbia and being hugged that tightly must hurt, yet he tolerates it because Greg is his friend.

I and my two friends nearly shattered all the Christmas tree lights with our high-pitched hysterical shrieking during the almost-kiss between Sherlock and Moriarty!!

Nice touch: while Sherlock pins up all his maps and photos on the wall of 221B, his voiceover talks about the people he’s having watched, and one of the homeless network photographs the first man as he’s eating a sandwich on a park bench. The clip of the woman taking the photographs on a mobile phone is really brief – but the production team not only put her in scruffy clothing but went to the effort of making her fingers and fingernails dirty.

The scene between the Holmes brothers is superb, from our realisation that they’re playing Operation and not chess, to the gloriously subtle way that Sherlock announces that he knows that he’s different, and that it simply doesn’t matter.

(A brilliant Sherlockian artist has created a new version of Operation called Sherloperation based on the above scene!)

Great line:
SHERLOCK: I’ve written a blog on the varying tensile strengths of different natural fibres.
MRS HUDSON: I’m sure there’s a crying need for that.

The transitions between Sherlock at 221B and John in his surgery are hilarious, especially John’s raised middle finger while he puts a glove on, and the “F...” “... Cough” jump!

The old man in the surgery who John thinks is Sherlock disguised is beautifully taken from the canonical story where Holmes disguises himself as a book seller before revealing himself to Watson. Even the story titles are similar, with the adorable difference of Gatiss turning them into porn!

Howard shows the mysterious footage of the man getting into the Tube carriage car and not being there when the train arrives at the next station. But why did nobody consider that there are interconnecting doors between the cars? It’s not advisable to use them when the train’s in motion, but neither Sherlock nor Howard seem to even look along the rest of the train to see whether the man is in another car.

During the interminable wait for this episode, I really wanted it to make me cry – in whatever way, I didn’t mind – and it didn’t. But the bit that got me most teary-eyed was Sherlock’s smile to Molly just before he kissed her cheek. It’s possibly the most genuine smile he has given in the entire series so far.

The bonfire rescue was sensational and stunningly filmed. The music was gorgeous during that scene too. I can’t wait to get the soundtrack for this series for that track alone.

Yay! Coffee table climbing! That’s what was missing from season 2.

I had been completely unspoilered about the appearance of Sherlock’s parents, so I had no idea who they were at first, even when one of my friends delightedly murmured, “Ben’s parents.” For those who don’t know, Mr and Mrs Holmes are played by Timothy Carlton and Wanda Ventham, aka Mr and Mrs Cumberbatch, Benedict’s parents. Their names don’t appear in the end credits because someone from the press would inevitably have leaked it and spoiled the surprise.

While Mummy Holmes witters on, Sherlock steeples his fingers under his nose. The camera angle changes and suddenly his fingers are under his chin.

Someone on Tumblr pointed out that the Holmes parents are effectively cosplaying Sherlock and John. Mummy is wearing a long dark coat with the collar popped, and Dad is wearing a checked shirt and a jacket! Whether this was a deliberate thing by the costume department or just a delicious fluke is open to debate!

I love how John describes the Holmes parents as ‘ordinary’ instead of ‘normal’.

Howard told Sherlock and Molly that the proper term for Tube trains is ‘cars’ and not ‘carriages’, yet Sherlock describes them as ‘carriages’ when showing the video footage to John.

Sherlock is bewildered when there’s no train at Sumatra Road, but then works out that it’s further down the tunnel. But surely there must be at least two platforms and lines? If he already looked at the other platform before coming to this one, how does he know which of the two lines the train is on?

While typing the transcript, the scene between the boys on the Tube train had me in tears but for all the wrong reasons. Knowing that it was just Sherlock being a dick and pretending to be upset made me really sad, and I realised I was crying for the scene that should have been.

This time around we see Sherlock’s fall from John’s point of view, and we see how he disappears from John’s sight behind the ambulance station. There is No Way that Sherlock could have time to turn onto his back after that, especially when you consider how deep the airbag is. This is one of several reasons why a large proportion of the fandom is convinced that the Lazarus Option is indeed as phoney as the previous two (although the BBC have apparently announced that this is the real one. Personally I won’t be convinced until Gatiss says so). Another reason is that, from Molly’s perspective, she seems to see Sherlock fall past her window while he’s still quite high up, but surely she and the two men with her must tip the body out of a fairly low window so that John can’t see it from behind the ambulance station.

I will always giggle for the wrong reasons while watching part of the Lazarus Option. A day after broadcast, someone put up an animated and looped gif of Sherlock and the airbag going one way round the ambulance station while John and the cyclist go the other way ... and put the whole thing to the Benny Hill chase music!

After Sherlock has put the ball into his armpit, one of the ‘extras’ checks his wrist to ensure there’s no pulse. For some odd reason, another extra is simultaneously checking Sherlock’s neck. I would hope that that pulse is still there!

The explanation around John’s potential sniper makes no sense. He was “invited to reconsider”?! That would normally be a euphemism for “he was shot dead” but in Reichenbach we saw him pack up his gun and walk away – and the people who gave him this ‘invitation’ just let him?! Also, the sniper was in a position where he must have seen the airbag trick, so why didn’t he promptly shoot John (or even Sherlock) or, at the very least, make a phonecall to advise someone in Moriarty’s network that Sherlock’s suicide was faked and to ask whether he should take immediate action? But if he was in sight of the airbag, Mycroft’s sniper who was watching Moriarty’s sniper from one floor up (we see the latter through the former’s eyes, looking through a rifle ’scope) should have killed him instantly to stop him from taking action/reporting to a higher-up.

Considering that Sherlock can’t remember Greg’s name, it’ll be interesting to find out whether Anderson’s first name really is Phillip!

This very shippy fangirl looked extremely hopeful when the last scene in the Tube transitioned to the view of a hotel room door. I couldn’t help but wonder whether that was where Sherlock and John were celebrating their reunion ...

In the living room just before Sherlock faces the press, Mary and Greg are holding glasses of champagne and there are three more full glasses on the coffee table. Sherlock then pops the cork on another bottle and pours another glass. What’s wrong with the ones on the table?

I adore Sherlock’s wink to Mary after he’s told her that weddings aren’t his thing. He’s really human during most of this scene – from the gorgeous smile he gives John when he comes out his bedroom, to the passing smile he gives Greg as he walks across the living room, to the way that he doesn’t tease or torment Molly over her choice of boyfriend.

Does Molly have a key to 221? With all the press outside, I can’t imagine that the front door has been left on the latch.

I love Molly’s Sherlock-clone boyfriend and her determined announcement to Greg that she’s moved on!

Second best line of the episode:
JOHN: I asked you for one more miracle. I asked you to stop being dead.
SHERLOCK: I heard you.

Having had some experience of people with Asperger’s (*casts a shifty glance around Nitcentral*

That particular person will not be bothering us anymore....

From your mouth to God's ears, Rodney! ;-)

The Tube train carriage/car isn’t a real one. The crew weren’t able to borrow one from London Underground and so they built their own. Apparently it’s the wrong sort and doesn’t match the external shots, but it’s still an amazing piece of work.

I haven’t yet heard whether the tunnel and track were also a set or whether the crew were allowed to film in a real tunnel.

When first showing the Tube footage to Sherlock and Molly, Howard says, “The train never stops, and the man vanishes.” Later, Sherlock says that the train’s journey took ten minutes instead of five. Why doesn’t Howard know that if Sherlock does?

It also makes no sense that the rear carriage was detached and yet nobody noticed this when the rest of the train went back onto the original route. The front and rear carriages have cabs at the end; the CCTV footage should have shown the back of the train and its lack of a cab, and even if the footage missed it, London Underground staff should have noticed when the train returned to its depot.

Another bit that always makes me giggle now is when Sherlock, flailing over the top of the mother bomb in the Tube train, says matter-of-factly, “Turn that off,” in amongst all his panic-stricken noises.

Sherlock tells Anderson that he deduced that the man who terrorised young Claudette Bruhl into thinking that he was Sherlock in Reichenbach must have been got rid of, and that therefore his body must be in a morgue. I would have expected his body to have been buried in a shallow grave in the middle of a forest. And even if he was in a morgue, the only way that Molly could have found him would surely have been to send out a general message asking, “Have you got someone who looks a lot like that famous detective bloke?” or even attaching a photograph of Sherlock. Wouldn’t that have provoked some odd chatter which Moriarty’s people could have picked up?

Something I only noticed on the umpteenth viewing: after having his mind blown at the sight of look-alike and dress-alike Tom, Sherlock goes onto the landing and puts his scarf on. He then looks down at how he has wrapped it and throws up his hands with a really exasperated look!

Season 3 opener.
Written by Mark Gatiss.
Wow what a reunion Sherlock had with Watson with the way Watson reacted to Sherlock still being alive.
Mrs Hudson thought mistakenly that Sherlock and Watson were a gay couple. This may or may not been influenced either in whole or in part to Elementary having a female Watson in which they have been suggestions that she might get it on with the male Sherlock something that had been completely refuted by Elementary Sherlock Jonny Lee Miller.
Lazarus has been used as a code. Perhaps not coincidentally Mark Gatiss made his first on-screen appearance in Doctor Who in The Lazarus Experiment.
Quite an intense scene on the train with Sherlock defusing a bomb at the last minute.

I think, if anything, Elementary would have been influenced by Sherlock. Sherlock's Mrs Hudson has assumed that they're a couple from the first moment she met John in A Study in Pink.

However, from what I've heard, Elementary has never had any more intention of their Holmes and Watson getting together than Sherlock has. It's only a certain, very vocal, section of the two fandoms that want that to happen!

The production team has a strange obsession with Westminster Bridge in this series. During the motorcycle race to rescue John, Sherlock and Mary cross Westminster Bridge and are delayed by traffic on it. But St James the Less - which is a real church - is on the north side of the river and there's no need to cross the river. Also, Sherlock ought to have turned the other way onto the Mall after driving down the steps, because the church is south and slightly to the west of Buckingham Palace.

They incorrectly cross Westminster Bridge again in His Last Vow.

I was disappointed there was no giant rat in the episode.

It was clever, though, that the writers kept their promise that the Word of the Episode would be 'rat' by calling the suspicious characters Sherlock's rats, and having Moran as 'the big rat.'

Yeah, actually, it was pretty pathetic. They've said in a recent interview that they came up with the three words for the three episodes - Rat, Wedding and Bow - long before they had the slightest idea what would happen in the episodes, so they had to rather clutch at straws when writing them. I still can't work out how 'Bow' fitted into His Last Vow.