The Mentalist: Red John’s Footsteps [season finale]
By fred | May 20, 2009
(S01E23) It’s almost a requirement, as the season ends we need to get back to that series arc that turn Patrick Jane, otherwise light and funny, into a dark and dangerous character. Because as he said before, and I’m sure he means 100%, when given the chance, once he’ll find Red John, there won’t be no such thing as the law and bringing him to justice, all that will matters is revenge, and making sure he pays for what he did.
But of course, that is only for in a few years when the series will end, and until that we have a long road ahead of us, made of little (or not so little) clues as we did get with this episode. A new murder to investigate, and one that will be linked to the infamous serial killer of course, but one very unlike all his other crimes, in more than one way.
With this one, we got much closer to home, finding out that Red John wasn’t working alone after all, and then there was the blind girl. Okay, we’ll come back to this later, but first the accomplice. I have to say that I didn’t see the “twist” about his identity coming as soon as I’m sure some of you will have, but in retrospect I should have. Even though to better fool us they addressed Jane earlier on Jane’s ways when it came to this case, the fight between him and Lisbon was quite out of character for her, almost sounding a bit forced.
But what was really a giveaway was the sheriff’s otherwise stupid behavior. I know there was a girl’s life at play here, but trespassing with a civilian while having received a direct order to make sure he wouldn’t do anything even remotely illegal?? And he didn’t even seem the least bothered by any of this, which meant he had his own reasons.
I liked that Jane wasn’t blinded by his rage or anything like it, and staged the whole thing from the start. It’s a lot more in character for him, and that was another clue for us : all episodes end up that way, Jane tricking the killer one way or another. All that was good, but a few things didn’t seem to work/make sense to me.
Like what happened after wards, when the guy woke up from the dead and started to shoot all around. First, who’s the stupid cop who didn’t make sure he couldn’t get free?? He’s a cop, he will have keys and whatnot on him, that’s obvious. But then, why did Jane had to be the one shooting the guy?? They probably wanted it that way, him otherwise so non-violent and scared of a dog barking inside a house, but that doesn’t excuse everything.
Multiple cop cars everywhere, so I assume lots and lots of cops all around the place, and after not one but two gunshots were fired, you don’t see a soul?!! The place should have been filled with cops, pointing their guns at Jane (armed) and/or the guy trying to reach his gun again, but there was no one. Lisbon didn’t even took her gun out, and the others probably didn’t mind the gunshots. Seriously, WTF!?
It’s got nothing to do with this, but it’s like how we’re supposed to find it very normal that the poor kid one day woke up with a pig’s head in his bed, even though he locks all the door. Dude, who cares about the locks on the door, how about that huge dog!?? The one barking like crazy as soon as he hears anything? Where the Hell was he that night?
And then, there was the blind girl. Now, as soon as they started to read that letter, my idea was that it was Red John’s, that he planted that here for Jane, all part of his game. I honestly thought that the idea that there really was a girl and the letter was actually true, was much less probable, so I was pissed that on one even seemed to consider the option.
I got even more shocked, when she turned out to be blind. While we didn’t get a full tour of her house, she is blind and said she’s pretty much alone except from when a serial killer is drinking tea with her, and I failed to see anything such as a computer-like device. So, excuse me for asking, but how did she get to “read” that business card exactly?? How about writing the letter?
I look as much as I could, but she didn’t seem to have much except for a piano and books. So I kept thinking something was wrong with this — also wasn’t the letter already opened when Rigsby took it out of the mailbox?
Now, it seems she really is blind, so I guess it would be fair to say she can’t be Red John, but he used his fake name to order his signature to be drawn in the sky, and there just happened to conveniently be a letter bringing them here ?? Nope, I don’t buy it. If she’s not it, she’s Red John’s real partner in crime, she lied about his kindness and the letter, and she played everyone, including Jane.
Besides, that teacup certainly looked a lot like hers, back at the farm in front of the monitor from where Red John was watching everything, wasn’t it? Well, maybe she is faking it after all, and not blind at all? I just thought Jane would have picked up on that if that was the case…
What did everybody else think?
Posted in Reviews
Shows: The Mentalist
I could not agree with you more. I too believed the letter to be a trap. Especially since it was a) to convenient to be there exactly when they opened the box and b) it had no signature (no handwritten one) which usually letters do have. Now I have to say that perhaps it is easier for a blind girl to just type one on a computer with a braille keyboard, but again no computer present in the house…All very misterious! It is as if Red John purposely led Jane to the girl. If she is not his accomplice she may be a piece in the puzzle…Red John may be using her. I also find it strange that Red John watched the entire thing on the two monitors while Jane was in the basement…Why did noone see him leave. We saw he watched them when Lisbon came in. So he was still there. Then when the cops showed up he was gone. There were no trees around the farm house so how could he have disappeared like that? Did he have a cop uniform? Very mysterious…