The Mentalist: Red Rum
By fred | January 14, 2009
(S01E12) There was both a mix of good and bad in this new episode of The Mentalist, I thought. In fact I find myself a little conflicted, because I’m not sure which one took over, I can’t tell whether or not I mostly liked this episode or not. Of course, that’s all part of an aftermath process, because the reality of the moment, as I watched the episode, was that I did enjoy it.
This show is about Patrick Jane, of course. Sure there’s a murder to solve every week, and a team of CBI agents to actually work the case, as Jane himself is only a consultant, but the reason we watch is Jane, and this week while remaining more subtle than we’ve seen him during the first episodes of the series, he was using his abilities more than in recent episodes, and pulling out some “tricks” again.
For instance while everyone got to talk with the parents of the missing boy, Jane threw a rock in the air and managed to grab one of the boys’ bike and get them to point him in the direction of the body. This is exactly the kind of things that you expect from him, the reason you’re watching this show, for him to do such things, and I always enjoy it. On a side note though, what the Hell is wrong with the kids and/or their parents in this town ?? They all found a dead body and yet said nothing to anyone ?
You gotta “admire” the dad’s patience though, because he killed his son, tried to make it look like the “witch” was the one responsible, and then didn’t say a word nor do nothing to point people in the direction of the body he left there. Many people would have tried to point the way and reveal themselves that way.
Anyways, while I liked that Jane did his little tricks and eventually caught the killer, and I also loved the interactions we were given about the team, especially Cho getting all scared that the witch did indeed put a spell on him. It contrasted with his usually very “cold”, straight and stoic attitude, and yet perfectly fit the character. Plus, it gave us many great lines such as this one :
Cho: “Kimball,” she says, “You shall kneel before the Lord of beasts.”
Rigsby: That’s scary.
Cho: Yeah.
Rigsby: Yeah, if you’re a 12-year-old girl at your first sleep-away camp!
Cho: You had to be there.
That whole aspect of the show actually worked very well this week, up to Jane giving some ashes to Cho to make him feel better in the end. But there are a couple of things I didn’t like :
- Details, maybe, but when Rigsby and Van Pelt went to the victim’s locker there was a picture of a girl there, and they didn’t seem to care. Couldn’t this have been a girlfriend ? Hence someone that might have needed to be questioned or something ? Seemed odd to me they didn’t care, while I was wondering if it was the witch or someone else…
- Sure, we had some nice B-plots for the CBI team this week, but it also felt like they were not doing much, if anything. I mean, they’re supposed to be cops who don’t need Jane, yet he was leading the way, from the moment he walked them to the body, up until he caught the killer in the end. It seemed the team was just trying to follow his lead, not even understanding it all, as Lisbon apparently didn’t know who the killer was until she pointed her gun at him.
- One thing I’m starting to really dislike on this show, is how every single time it’s the same : Jane figures out the who, why and how about the killer, but he can’t prove anything. So he sets up a trap, to get the bad guy to confess, one way or another. This week it became easy to guess the father was the killer at some point, but even if you hadn’t figured that out, when he asked to talk to the family you knew it was because he knew which of them was guilty, and was about to trick them so that they could confess, one way or the other.
Sure, this week was done without much of a show, it remained subtle and was filled with humor, Jane talking as God being the highlight of it obviously, but I really wish soon enough it will end another way, he won’t have to pull some trap to catch the bad guy. Actually, I’d love it for once that while he figures out the mystery, the team could be the one to come up with the solution for the case — which doesn’t have to include a confession, by the way.
Either way, still a great episode and a fun hour of entertainment, no question there. What did you thought of this episode ?
Posted in Reviews
Shows: The Mentalist
