Sherlock's rather disappointed with the quality of the bad television in Taxon, as a matter of fact: it's just not bad enough. Manufacted fake telly just doesn't have the heart in it--it's like when science fiction channels try to make B-movies. One can't try to make a B-movie or a bad television show. He misses Jerry Springer.

He says none of this to Metody. "Is he?" he says with mild disinterest. "Do they let people like you into the police force where you're from? Or is it things? I don't have an exact taxonomical grasp of what half of us are, biologically."

This is said casually, offhand--like it's a foregone conclusion that Metody isn't entirely what she claims to be, an open secret. Which it is to him. Many things are foregone conclusions to him.