Fic: Bel Canto - 11/16 (BBC Sherlock)

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Title: Bel Canto
Rating: PG-13
Wordcount: 6.8k out of 126k
Betas: vyctori, seijichan, lifeonmars
Disclaimer: Do not own.
Summary: After years of waiting for wealthy patrons to faint, Dr John Watson discovers a far more interesting patient in the opera house basement. (AU through a Phantom of the Opera lens.)
Warnings: Violence, internalized homophobia, eventual character

Comments

[rachelindeed]

“Thank you, Mr Jamison,” John says sincerely. He gives his shoulder a gentle squeeze. “You’ve been a great help.”

No, Mr. Jamison. I don't believe you have.

Despite the Vernet mess, John still defaults to assuming the person in front of him is decent. He's not totally broken, which is nice, even when he's totally wrong. I think he's wrong, anyway. We'll see :)

It’s not the drink that has been poisoned. It’s the cups.

It's EVIL Birling Day :( And no one is Miss Marple.

Hmmm. I think Holmes would probably rather see the opera house wrecked than see his opera wrecked. Except that Mrs. Hudson cried at the thought of losing that job, and I like to think he'd put his masterpiece in the shooting gallery for her.

I also love that Mrs. Hudson's best defense of his behavior to John boiled down to: "He's less of a Machiavel and more of an idiot than you think." Yay?

I used to do theatre in high school, and I must say that scene of everyone going out for coffee, logistics and gossip felt very true to life, with nice period details (that bootblack!)

I'm not surprised they've lost their audience -- I was wondering about the intrepid audience, actually. This opera house pretty much would have lost me way back at the initial hanging; if not then, then definitely at the chandelier. Not to mention the near shoot-out with background fireballs at the Masquerade. I think probably for the last month or so they've been running on an audience of compulsive thrill seekers who enjoy taking their life in their hands with a side of Mozart, but they probably lost that demographic's attention when they closed down for a month :)

Really, though, the backstage milieu these last few chapters has drawn me in and made me care about these people, and I'm battening down the hatches for the Holmes opera.

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It is evil Birling Day! I couldn't resist the shout out.

I think Holmes would probably rather see the opera house wrecked than see his opera wrecked. Except that Mrs. Hudson cried at the thought of losing that job, and I like to think he'd put his masterpiece in the shooting gallery for her.

You pretty much nailed it. Also, he's back to being angry with the piece because of John.

I used to do theatre in high school, and I must say that scene of everyone going out for coffee, logistics and gossip felt very true to life, with nice period details (that bootblack!)

I also had theatre in high school, sans bootblack. We had an issue of illness and vomiting, so the winnowing of the cast came from that. And then Cabin Pressure provided a good mechanism.