If by some chance last night was your first Castle episode – or maybe you’ve only just seen few of them – I’m going to refer you to the season 3 promo below. While “Death Gone Crazy certainly was a fun episode, the subtext is more fun if you understand a bit of the history of Richard Castle (Nathan Fillion). (Oh, and no matter what it looks like – Castle and Beckett (Stana Katic) didn’t start a relationship until the end of season four.) So, new Castle viewers – take a look. Regular Castle fans can skip it and just keep reading.
That is, you should keep reading if you are okay with SPOILERS for “Death Gone Crazy” and for episodes prior. Don’t worry, you’ll be warned If there are spoilers for later episodes when I’m spinning Castle Theory.
It didn’t take me long to figure out what the subtext agenda was for this episode of Castle. (There’s more than one, but I’ll leave the second until the end.) After the lovely swoop down through New York City to the first “Girl’s Gone Crazy” signs, I’m remembering “Head Case” from last year’s season four. As a reminder to viewers – on the off-chance that they forgot the show used this motif last year – Castle and Beckett had a little exchange walking to the body of victim Beau Randolf (Jordan Belfi) about dealing with him in the case with the missing head. The reminder was a clue, because “Head Case” gave Castle some eye-opening insight into Beckett – such as she believed that the great love stories were about “beating the odds.” (This romantic side of her kind of floored him.) As soon as they made the continuity reference, I knew this was going to be one of those Castle episode’s that seriously uses the case to reflex the characters’ issues.
Sure enough, Beau’s business partner Troy Strickland (Chad Donella) starts describing Beau as being more than just some kind of sleaze-master. The description of Beau? He grew up having no parents, never knew his father, mom ran off. He surrounded himself with beautiful women, the company was more like a family for Beau. Clearly this bit wasn’t just about Beau – especially given the comment by Meredith two weeks ago about Castle not sharing his feelings about not having a father. During Troy’s little monologue, there are two cut-aways from him. The first was a cut to Beckett taking a sideways glance at Castle when Troy says he think’s Beau’s childhood is what drove him. The second was to Castle having a slight jolt and focusing in when Troy says Beau surrounding himself with all the beautiful young women, was him “looking for something he could never find.” You can see when the camera cuts back to all three of them, that Castle is thinking about and relating to what Troy has said. This is a Castle hallmark – characters gain important information about each other through indirect means. Beckett might be surprised by how much she already knows about Castle. Perhaps it will occur to her that if Meredith felt she knew nothing about Castle it was because she was never listening. Just a thought.
In “Head Case ” it was clear that Castle took Beckett’s comments about love and romance and related it to himself and Beckett. Similarly, it’s clear in this scene that Beckett related the information about Beau to Castle’s fatherless childhood with an actress mom and Castle’s wild playboy days. If she didn’t, then they’d have to take away her detective badge.
However, that isn’t the only parallel to “Head Case.” In that episode Alexis (Molly Quinn) was going through serious growing pains after being rejected by Stanford for January admissions. She was spiraling into depression and throwing out all her trophies and awards. Castle was worried that he hadn’t prepared her to deal with rejection. The story was part of an over-all larger arc of Alexis growing up and Castle learning to let her do so. Castle’s concern about Alexis’s “Vlog” continues this arc. However, with Castle’s creator/showrunner being Andrew Marlowe, nothing is every given a focus without it having it come back into the story. Last year, Alexis and Castle processed through where they were as father and daughter over the season, ending with Stanford then accepting her for the fall term. By then, Alexis had matured a bit and could make her decision based on what was best for her. She decided Stanford wasn’t what she wanted. Trust me, the issue of the video blog is going to be revisited this season.
In terms of the case, I have to admit, I knew who did it pretty immediately. It was obvious from the opening that Beau was tired and disillusioned with the whole “Girls Gone Crazy” scene. (LOVED the music for Beau in this!) Again, there’s a parallel to Castle – when we first met Castle in the pilot,was tired of book tours and signing women’s chests in the pilot.) The whole thing about them having gotten into this together from the beginning and it being “good, clean, all-American fun” was the give away. Beau’s unhappy while his partner’s gung-ho added up to a major disconnect. As to why Beau was disillusioned, I tapped into the kid thing pretty fast. What else would make a man dump his girlfriend and want to invest in children’s programming. I didn’t figure out that the woman in pink, Candice Mayfield ( Gillian Alexy) was the anti-everything protest leader’s daughter, but once told I knew she was the kid’s mom. Nor did I figure out that she was pregnant. I was thinking more along the lines of Beau finding out that he was already a father, and that she’d been hiding it from him. That was an interesting point. It wasn’t an adorable baby or toddler that made him want to change. It was the very idea of becoming a father that changed him. Most of all I didn’t know how they were going to figure out that it was Troy. I thought the issue of a shaky hand-held camera being different from one on a tripod was a smart and subtle clue. I also thought Candice was a good red-herring, because if you hadn’t figured out the killer you knew Candice was lying about something…. If Beckett had been interviewing her, she probably would have caught that right away or at least been suspicious. What woman owning that outfit would have never heard of ‘College Girls Gone Crazy’ and Beau Randolf until that night? Especially since the city had a giant billboard of him in the middle of Manhattan.
However, episodes like this are usually less about the case and more about the underlying story’s connection to the characters’ journey – plus a lot of humor. “Death Gone Crazy” had the Castle humor in full-out mode, on all levels. If you’re an actor, Martha’s comment about “Method writing” was a definite laugh. Then there’s Castle “googling” himself – naturally. However the prize for absolutely hilarious has to go to “Jungle Boogie.” Oh my god, talk about a spit-take moment! I included the video because that scene was PRICELESS!
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That is now on my all-time top 10 hysterically funny Castle moments! As a side note to that whole scene, I think it’s been established that Beckett has a definite appreciation of the male form. So, later, when Castle catches her staring at one of the dancers it was completely in character for her. I also really loved the playing out of their built-in role reversal. In the earlier scene when they were walking through the “Girls Gone Crazy” party, she’d Castle that “it’s ok to look.” More importantly she has become a LOT more secure in her relationship with Castle. The other thing is Beckett is still Beckett.
That’s why I really enjoyed this little exchange between Beckett and Esposito (Jon Huertas) about Scarlett Jones ( (Kelly Hu). At some point I would love to know more about Beckett’s & Esposito’s history. It’s always been clear they have a deep bond and understanding of each other. I’d love to know how that came about. Anyway, Esposito asked Beckett if she could have Ryan (Seamus Dever) handle something instead of him because…he had plans.
Beckett: Really? Do these plans have a name?
Esposito: (looks at Scarlett’s picture)
Beckett: Oh, shut up, you didn’t.
Esposito: She broke a guy’s nose – you know she’s got to be freaky.
Beckett’s smile was pretty telling. She GOT where he was coming from.
It was fun to see the side of Esposito’s personality that has a touch more of Castle in it. His reaction to Scarlet was pretty adolescent – very much like Castle’s initial reaction to meeting Beckett. Ryan meanwhile took on the role Beckett would usual take playing against Castle, dryly noting his ridiculous behavior. For instance, when Esposito says “How’s the ‘inbreastigation’ going” as Ryan goes through the video footage from the ‘Girls Gone Wild’ video, Ryan, without even looking up says, “And…that, is why you’re still single.” It’s an interesting switch because so often Ryan is portrayed as being more like Castle and Esposito like Beckett. However, as I thought about it, the one area where it hasn’t been like that is in the area of women and romantic relationships. Just like the traits from different parents are mixed together in a child to make a different human being, it’s nice to have the reminder that Ryan and Esposito aren’t personality clones of Castle and Beckett.
So, now, what about this Scarlet Jones? I found the whole high-end corporate spy concept a bit difficult to believe, partly because of the payment in a trash bin, but mainly because she was so bad at it. Getting caught on camera like that was pretty amateur. Still, if Esposito can be seen as acting as similar to Castle upon his first meeting with Beckett, Scarlet did have the similar “kick-butt” characteristics that Beckett had in “Flowers for Your Grave” (the Castle Pilot.) However, unlike Beckett, Scarlet was more than ready to be a notch on Javier’s bedpost – or maybe he’d be a notch on hers. I’m curious to what viewers thought about that possible pairing continuing. My first thought was “Ying-Ying is a panda.” Like many of Beckett’s relationships prior to Castle, Scarlet and Javier are way too much alike for me to see anything long-term. While it’s good to have things in common – enjoying the same past-times, having similar values etc – that’s not the same as being alike. Two hot-headed, high-octane personalities in a relationship is not usually a good thing. I think Lanie (Tamala Jones) is a better match.
Another aspect of this episode that I really enjoyed was the playfulness it had talking about sex in general. While Castle and Beckett may not be making out like they did in “Always, from “The Mistress Always Spanks Twice” to “Lucky Stiff” the show has always had a playful spin on sexuality ( If you watched the promo, you definitely got a glimpse of what I’m talking about.) I’ve already mentioned a couple of moments in the episode, but in terms of Castle and Beckett in particular, I loved the interrogation of Tiffany Shaw. Ms. Shaw’s alibi was that she left her bra in the bathroom having “revenge sex.” Beckett isn’t buying it until Tiffany asks Beckett she’s ever had club sex. Beckett and Castle both have their own little reaction to the question. Castle’s was obvious – you could practically see the visions in his mind of Beckett in a bathroom. Beckett’s was subtle, her eyes gleam a bit. More importantly, whereas before her attitude was “yeah, right,” to Tiffany’s bra explanation, after the question she definitely sees it as possible. Apparently the idea of revenge sex was beyond her, but not club sex. It seems our detective might know something about it… at any rate, viewers can imagine that she and Castle will be having fun little discussion about that off-camera.
The wrap-up of the case – and the episode – was also indirectly about Castle and Beckett. Like Beau, Castle has always maintained that it was Alexis that made him become less wild. It was Castle’s abilities as a father that first made Beckett notice that there was more to him than just the annoying, childish guy that was following her around. The case gave Beckett some insight into what may have shaped Castle into the man she’s fallen in love with. Then there’s Castle’s reply when Beckett asks him if he thinks Candice’s extremely conservative father would be able to accept his grandchild. Castle says “Yes, because a father would do anything for his daughter.” Beckett ponders this before a small smile crosses her face. Whatever mental journey she went on, you can be pretty sure that the end of it involved something sweet about Castle.
Now for a little speculative theory. A line like, “a father would do anything for his daughter” seems to scream that Castle is going to be able to prove this point sometime soon. I personally think it will have something to do with the 3x killer – whom supposedly died in “Probable Cause” – except of course it’s 99% positive that he did NOT die and that it was all part of his plan. Now whether that will be part of the upcoming two-part episode or a different one is hard to say. However since we have to wait two weeks for the next new Castle episode I thought it’d be fun for people to post their ideas and theories about what’s coming up. When posting, IF you refer to a spoiler, please post a SPOILER WARNING before doing so. Ok? Great! I’m looking forward to reading what about what you thought of “Death Gone Crazy” and what you think might be coming up next on Castle!
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