A commonly agreed-on theory is that Cobb’s totem was his wedding ring, not Mal’s spinning top. I agree, there’s evidence. That’s not what this is about.
This is about Ariadne. She’s the introductory character to teach us about this world by asking questions, who catches on quick and has genius solutions. My theory: She’s an extractor. She’s been doing this a long time, which is why she “caught on faster than anyone” Cobb knew. She was hired by Michael Caine’s character to extract whether or not Cobb actually killed his daughter. He’s the one who offers her as the new architect for Cobb’s job. She’s a plant. She’s constantly pushing for information, stalking his subconscious while acting the newb. She’s pushing him emotionally, challenging him on purpose to expose the truth. As she builds the dreams, she keeps revealing bits and pieces to him to LET his subconscious in. To let Mal in and reveal the truth about her death. She learns the truth and reports back to Michael Caine, which is why he’s there to welcome his son-in-law at the airport, with open arms.
This is also about Saito. Business man who wants Inception performed on Fisher as corporate espionage. He’s also there to work inception on Cobb, alongside Ariadne’s extraction. Saito took out the crew’s old architect, so they needed a new, better one. This brought in Ariadne as planned. Saito’s job was to learn from her whether or not Cobb was a murderer, and plant information accordingly. To kill himself or be set free.
The riddle is consistent in each level. “You’re waiting for a train -“
Also consistent is “old man, filled with regret, waiting to die alone.”
The entire movie Cobb struggles with reality. He’s constantly spinning Mal’s top - not because his reality is in question, but hers. In the deep subconscious, where he meets Old Saito, the man starts with “I’m waiting for something” a subtle start to “waiting for a train.” Then swaps to “old man filled with regret waiting to die alone,” because he knows Cobb is innocent, and he spins Mal’s top as a visual to say Mal isn’t real, she’s a dream. Cobb is wearing his wedding ring in this scene. He touches it, and knows this isn’t real. The reminder of the train and which reality is real is the beginning of Inception; repeated each layer going through the dreams, building to change his mind. If they had learned Cobb truly was a wife-killer, Saito would have ordered his men to take the wedding ring off while he was unconscious, before bringing him in for this conversation. The Inception of “your world isn’t real” from his own totem’s point of view. But he wasn’t a killer, and they didn’t take his ring. “You didn’t kill Mal” and “you deserve to be free” and “don’t feel guilty” are all by-products of the Inception Saito had been performing on Cobb all along: DON’T DIE ALONE. It could have been very easily changed depending on whether Cobb killed Mal; “filled with regret, waiting to die alone” could have been his life in jail once the plane landed in America and he was discovered as a murderer. The Inception could have been DIE ALONE, rather than DON’T. Small and simple. Primal emotion. Perfect Inception.
Michael Caine said at the beginning, “come back to reality, your children need you.” He believed Cobb hadn’t killed his daughter because he truly understood how her mind worked, that she wanted to hide from reality. But he needed proof, and for Cobb to learn it too. Not just in his mind, but in his heart. He set this whole thing up so his grandchildren could grow up happy with a father who was finally at peace. He loved them.
Saito’s payment for the job on Cobb was the corporate espionage of Cobb performing Inception on Fisher. All of that really happened too. They waited for the perfect timing. Michael Caine was the mastermind, the one who’s been teaching mindscapes for decades, and knows exactly what to do every level of every dream to get the solution he wants.
Ariadne is straight forward and blunt. An extractor.
Saito is subtle and calm. An inceptor.
Michael Caine: Master of the Mind.
Cobb ended up at peace, with his family, in reality.
okay so everyone says that Cobb's wedding ring is his totem for figuring out whether he's in a dream or not, but what if it's his kids' faces? When we first see James and Phillipa, we only see their backs, and they run away. Same for when they appeared in the 'Mr. Charles' scenario; we only ever see their backs, then they run off. But when Cobb escapes limbo at the end of the movie and returns home, he takes out the top to spin it. We realize he has no wedding band on, BUT, we also see the kids faces for the first time in the entire movie. After he sees their faces, he abondons the top, and doesn't care whether it stops spinning or not. It could just be from the joy of seeing his children again, but there's also a chance that his children's faces subconsciously became his totem.
-my friend Elisa, the genius that cracked the case
Why everything in TST seemed weird – INCEPTION Theory
*** very long post ahead, sorry for flooding your dash ***
There is an almost endless list of things that seemed wrong or off in The Six Thatchers. By now I don’t think I have to sell that idea to anyone in the fandom. I’m convinced the people involved in the show put in a great deal of effort to make everything so different from what we know from previous Sherlock episodes. The question is: WHY? Why change well known aspects from the 221b set? Why go through all the trouble to create special overlay effects when transitioning between scenes? I’ll tell you why: If you look closely you’ll see that not everything is off. Many things, yes. But not everything. Someone went through a lot of trouble to make a distinction between reality and altered reality/whatever you want to call it, possible. If they were going to use parts of TST in TLD – which I believe they are because OH BOY OUR DETECTIVE IS LYING HERE – they would make sure the truth would come through if you know what to look for. And we do.
What I want to do here is tell you about a theory I came up with two days ago – it took some time to wrap my head around it, find support and write it all down.
Rewatching TST with the belief that there must be a way to determine which parts are fake and which are not gave me an interesting sense of déjà-vu. The whole episode reminded me of the 2010 movie Inception (hence the title of my theory).
I think the writers are trying to perform an inception on us. In the movie Inception, Cobb and his team invade people’s dreams in order to steal information. However, their most difficult assignment is not a theft – it’s planting an idea in someone’s head which will subconsciously influence their perception of reality and their behavior (or here: which will make us believe completely idiotic things like Mary suddenly dying a hero) just to create an even more powerful rug-pulling moment. A shattering climax. And we know for sure they are going for that.
Planting ideas - We’ve heard that before. What if everything in TST that seems off is just part of a scheme to set the audience up for Johnlock? To show us things even the casual viewers find wrong, set it all right in the next episode, pull the rug and confront us with what they have been going for all along – which is John and Sherlock in a relationship. It’s difficult to do, it’s even more difficult to pull it off in a way which would make even casual viewers believe this is the right thing to do. What if this is why they created an episode which seemed so wrong in the first place? What if we are being manipulated without knowing it? A planted idea which sticks – the idea that John and Sherlock together is how it should be – anything is better than the complete chaos we saw in TST. WHAT IF we are part of an Inception? What if this inception is part of setting the audience up for the big moment of revelation? Telling us a bunch of lies to make the final truth more palatable. What if we are the ‘victims’ and the Inception is being performed on us?
Also, what struck me is this: The dreams Cobb creates in Inception feel totally real. They are such perfect copies of reality, that to be able to tell if they in a dream or not, Cobb and his colleagues carry special items which enable them to differentiate between reality and dreams. They call it a totem. It’s a well-known object which has very distinct qualities in reality which radically change and seem off in dream/ in a place which isn’t reality. By looking at their totems they can determine whether what they experience is real or a dream.
In order to pull of the kind of revelation they are going for the audience needs to be able to rewatch TST and see exactly which parts we have been lied about, right?
The lie is literally projected on us. Why? Because we get hints throughout the episode that even if we are presented with fake/surreal versions of reality IT’S NEVER COMPLETELY MADE UP. WE ARE BEING TOLD THAT SMALL CHANGES ARE MADE IN ODER TO MAKE IT PLAUSIBLE BECAUSE YOU CAN’T EXPLAIN EVERYTHING AWAY. You were told – but did you listen (pun to my username totally intended).
In one of the first scenes, Sherlock watches the altered account of Magnussen’s death which clears his name. They didn’t change everything, just one tiny detail (who shot him). They changed literally 4 seconds of footage in that clip. The rest is real. However, we also get this shot. The viewer takes the place of the screen on which we saw the altered version of events. We are there. The beamer is literally projecting an altered version of reality on us! An altered version, not a completely fake one. The outcome stays the same (Magnussen dies) but the events which led there are altered.
We hear the merchant story three times. It always ends with the merchant being unable to outrun death. But what are Sherlock and Mycroft telling us here? Sherlock himself says that he never liked that story. And Mycroft? He says Sherlock wrote his own version. An altered version, where the merchant did succeed, Sherlock wrote an optimistic ending but all in all not a completely fake account of the events. Sherlock altered the version of the story and gave it a happy ending – the merchant runs off and becomes a pirate. What happened before the key moment – meeting death in Samarra – stays the same. Different outcome, same story. The writers are telling us that Sherlock wants happy endings, more specifically: he wants his personal happy ending.
So we know now that what people are going to see is an altered version of reality and also if Sherlock doesn’t like a story he will rewrite it. And the writers told us that creating BBC Sherlock is their attempt to set things right. They are literally doing the same thing Sherlock does here – telling a seemingly dark and hopeless story but rewriting the ending.
Let’s find some more things that support the idea that the whole episode is actually an inception being performed on us (the viewers). Let’s focus on the part where Cobb in Inception talks about totems.
I think that the writers have given us totems in TST so we can find out what’s real and what’s not. Because we are supposed to figure it out – if not, how would they be able to create an I-told-you-so moment, which is again something Steven said in an interview, so we know they are going for that, too. They are actually being nice – they are using things we’ve seen before, similar tells/totems to the ‘dream’ in TAB.
A totem is a well known object with distinct qualities. Well known objects in Sherlock are the signature skull painting and the actual human skull on the mantelpiece. And those have been changed! And the writers and set designers made those deliberate changes public. They talked about it, tweeted about it. If these changes were unimportant they would simply not talk about them. They are telling us to pay attention because – and here comes a crack theory – the skulls and also very over-the-top scene transitions can be used to determine which parts are real and which are fake. Again, I don’t believe that it’s all a lie. Like the events revolving Magnussen’s death and Sherlock changing the merchant story so it would have a happy ending, I actually believe the frame of TST is real. They only lie about details.
In TAB there is a ‘Victorian version’ of the skull painting showing both a skull and a young woman looking in a mirror. In TST we get the creepy glowing skull painting which is seen in countless shots. And if we can’t see the painting there is the human skull which has now added spectacles, another hint that reality is being obscured.
But what can we as a viewer (and also Sherlock himself) take as an indication that something is imagined? Which totems/tells are being used to enable us to see what’s real and what’s not? Let’s take a look at things the writers and Arwel have kindly been pointing out and let’s also look at everything that’s different from how the show normally is. Keep in mind, totems are well known items which are altered if you’re in a dream. Which are the totems and tells we are given?
1. The new, glowing skull painting. If it’s visible (and sometimes it takes up about half of the screen) something is fake/a dream. The more clearly it is visible, the more Sherlock is altering realitiy.
2. If other objects which create a changed version of reality (such as mirrors, cameras, magnifying glasses, spectacles, and also events seen in the windows of a bus or a plane) are visible, it’s a fake version of reality, too. There’s also a great post by @sherchemistlock about the use of mirrors in TST. This basically means: every time we see an objects which is known to reflect/alter vision/reality, we are not being told the whole truth. A part of is is withheld (but not all of it is fake – more on that later).
These objects are being used as totems/tells:
SPECTACLES: Most important here: The skull on the mantelpiece. If it’s missing like in TAB (where it is replaced by a tiny hound statue btw), and if it’s wearing spectacles like in many shots in TST, it’s all imagined. Mark even tweeted a picture of the skull wearing spectacles, which means it must be important.
MIRRORS (which show you a flipped version of reality): John and Mary only lie on their correct sides in bed IF YOU SEE THEM THROUGH A MIRROR.
BINOCULARS: Sherlock’s looking though something else, changing his natural vision and therefor reality. Altered account of events, too.
And also:
CAMERA (or: creating a picture of reality) Mrs Hudson can’t get a clear picture in this scene. Mrs. Hudson, who, moments before Sherlock jumped off St. Barts said “Oh god John, you made me jump”. Mrs. Hudson who’s been foreshadowing events from the start, creating parallels to John and Mary’s marriage by using her own husband’s life, who predicted that Sherlock would leave the wedding early, who is basically an oracle – MRS. H. CAN’T GET A CLEAR PICTURE HERE BECAUSE IT’S NOT REAL. There is no happy-family-baby shower party. Because there isn’t actually a happy family.
Going by this theory, which scenes are definitely altered? Some of the cases, especially the actual six Thatcher case (since we see Lestrade in front of the fake painting). The baby shower scene. Sherlock babysitting Rosie at 221b while John and Mary take a nap (skull with spectacles can be seen there). John ever meeting the woman on the bus since he later plucks the flower from behind his ear while looking at his reflection in the bus’ window. He never met her, therefore he never cheated with her. We are being led to believe he did. This makes the viewer dislike John and like Mary better. A part of the inception perforemd on us is making us believe he’s a cheater and she saved Sherlock’s life.
And also, if the transitions between scenes create an overlay that seems weird, it’s also fake. I specifically mean every scenario that doesn’t make sense in the ‘real world’ and instances when it seems like characters are in two places at once. This includes pieces of the bust projected on Sherlock’s face, walls exploding behind Mycroft, the Thatcher shrine looking like it’s submerged in water, Vivian Norbury being led through a hallway while a shark swims through the picture and Sherlock’s face being on fire. Probably many more scenes which I can’t all remember. Those are all fake.
Note that only half of Sherlock’s face is covered. Maybe only half of this is fake. After all, there was a six thatchers case which we can read on John’s blog. Maybe this TST case is made up, Sherlock based it on the version that has already happened. Also, this looks like he is wearing a mask which only coveres half of his face. Again – we can still suspect that some parts of reality are altered but some are probably true.
Sherlock has his eyes closed, imagining things while we see events projected on glass (also, remember the mirror-illusion in TAB?) Notice how the picture is split in half – we see almost equal parts of Sherlock and the case. Could this mean it’s a half-truth?
The altered reality Sherlock has constructed literally breaks apart at this point
And his eyes are closed again while there is the allusion of half of his face being on fire, indicating again that half of what we see isn’t real. He always has his eyes closed, it really looks like he is making it up.
In the picture with the Thatcher shrine, reality is overlapping with the aquarium-scene or the pool-fight with Ajay. Not sure which, but this kind of overlay also indicates that what we see is not real.
Everything involving the aquarium also doesn’t seem right. It’s too bizarre to be real. The bullet flying in slow motion. Mary being able to jump in front of Sherlock in time even though we don’t see her near him in this picture. Vivien Norbury using lines from other episodes. Vivien being led through a hallway while a shark crosses the picture. It sounds like a story Sherlock is making up.
If we can use the totems and editorial tells to say which parts are fake, we can also use the lack of totems and tells to determine what is real.
AND SOME PARTS ARE! This scene with John where they are in 221b discussing cases would be real. The skull is clearly visible. Even though it’s been seen wearing spectacles only minutes before, here they are missing. No totem = no alteration. Reality. It makes sense that John and Sherlock would work cases together after Sherlock came back from the tarmac. They seemed on friendly terms at the end of HLV. Hell, in TAB John basically promised Mycroft to look out for Sherlock, they get in the same car. Solving cases together makes sense.
Many things outside 221b could actually be real – they are missing the totems, the clear signs that they are fake. When Sherlock talks with Craig, the IT guy, all totems and overlay effects are missing. This could be real. Everything with Ajay is missing the totems and tells, too. In fact, I’m talking about the whole AGRA, Mary and Ajay scenes. In the pool fight scene for example, we get the cool fight effects and only a touch of drama – nothing out of the ordinary. We also get Sherlock’s flashback to John destroying the memory stick at his parents’ house. And when the scene is finished? There is no weird or special overlay to the next scene (Tblisi). Ajay shoots the light, leaving Sherlock literally in the dark about Mary and her past, and the screen goes dark and lights up again Tblisi. I repeat: there was no special overlay, no totem no nothing. In fact, if you watch this on your own you might realize that the whole “something is off” feeling that accompanies us during this episode is absent in this scene. It makes sense because it’s real (except for the fact that Sherlock is lying to Ajay about who destroyed the memory stick).
I also think the last scene with Mrs. Hudson in 221b is real. Can’t see any weird objects which obscure reality lying around, the fake portrait on the opposite wall isn’t visible at all and even thouugh it’s a bit blurry here it seems like the skull is sans spectacles.
By applying the theory that every time we see some sort of totem the scene is part of the inception – either a wrong skull, an object which blurrs or changes reality if you look through it or also if pieces of one scene are plastered or transformed into another. And if the tells are missing, we are confronted with reality.
So the last part of the episode which involves Mrs. Hudson and Mary’s ‘Miss Me’ message could be true – no inception here. And what do we get? We get Mary shaking her head when she says “Save John Watson”. We get Mary telling Sherlock to go to hell. If we believe she did in fact not die a hero but died the way Mycroft predicted (‘Agents like Mary don’t reach retirement age. They get retired in a pretty permanent way)… If we take that and watch the ending, we don’t see a Mary who sacrificed herself. We definitely don’t see a heroic act and a herartbreaking ‘being Mary Watson was the only life worth living’. We see a villain. What if that is the Inception? Make the viewer believe the worst of John and the best of Mary? The rug that will be pulled before the final revelation?
Maybe this thing has turned out as confusing as the movie inception itself… However, tagging some people whom I saw talking about stuff that’s real and that’s fake in TST:
@sherchemistlock who I saw talking about mirriors in TST, @softjlc who made an amazing post about continuity errors which are actually signs meant for us, @the-7-percent-solution who wrote the amazing dual timeline theory, @fringesci who also believes not everything was fake and @shag-me-senseless-watson, @just-sort-of-happened @sherlock-overflow-error in case you are looking for stuff to add to you TST masterpost , @teaandforeshadowing
Mal was right. Mal and Cobb really were dreaming, so when she jumped off the roof she didn’t fall to her death, but really she survived and just simply woke up. The totem no longer worked, since it was Mal’s and Cobb touched it, so when he spun it to see it fall in reality it only fell because it was no longer a totem because Cobb had compromised it.
In this theory, there is no possible way for Cobb to lose. Maybe he lives his entire life out in a dream, with his projection family, and one day he wakes up to see his real family.
But my theory (yes, theory inside a theory) is that Mal was at the house in the end sequence. It’s fairly obvious that the house is pretty big, and you don’t see the entirety. My theory is that Mal was in the house living a completely and totally normal life with her kids, they just didn’t show it.
There are so many possible ways to justify how this theory would end, but the reality of the situation is that if this is true, Cobb and his family will get a happy ending.
This isn’t as much of a theory as it is a reality.
Cobb will get a happy ending.
That’s it.
You grow old in limbo, but then you’re born again.
But.
Only roughly 67% of people die of old age, whereas 25% die prematurely of illness. Now, lets say that dying of illness will result in being born back again in limbo, but 8% of people die in accidents. This means that Cobb will likely be reborn again and again, and then eventually die of an accident.
Cobb will make it out someday.
No time passes in limbo, so someday, somehow, Cobb will get back to his family.
Keep in mind this is only relevant if you think that Cobb was still dreaming and stuck in limbo, which I do not.
Since I think the inception theory is a thing and I also think that not only Xiumin and Suho are dreaming but the other members as well, I’d like to add something.
I don’t know if you’ve seen the movie and I’m not sure if anyone’s mentioned this before, but at the beginning of the move there is this scene where the dream collapses and water starts flooding the dream. That’s the moment Cobb wakes up!
I assume Suho’s going to wake up as well when the water hits him.
There are alot of theories for this movie and they all do make sense in ways. But in my opinion I don't reckon the ending really matters within the storyline... I mean if you think about it logically, it was left as a cliff hanger, for us as viewers to interpret what reality is ourselves, possibly, within our own lives.
