(Season 1, Episode 10 – “Red Brick and Ivy”)

“I’d hate to be a state’s attorney. Jane’s always pulling crap like this but they always win.” – Lisbon

So I hope everyone enjoyed this series finale episode of The Mentalist. After what the team pulled in this one, everyone will be arrested and sent to jail. I mean, come on. It’s one thing to “go against the rules” and be a “maverick” and “think outside the box,” but to get a confession out of a guy by locking him in a room, holding a gun on him, and pretending to shoot someone? That’s probably not in the CBI manual. Even Lisbon acknowledged (the above quote) that it was shaky.

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(Season 1, Episode 9 – “Flame Red”)

“                                                 “ – Jane, to victim’s daughter, who’s wearing headphones

Patrick Jane can be a real wiseass. He’s not even cop — or whatever the people who work for the fake law enforcement agency CBI are — and he just makes incredibly goofy comments to victims’ family members, suspects, and other complete strangers. I guess not being a cop gives him a little leeway to do this, but it sometimes gets to be a little over the top. I wonder how he would have felt if cops joked after Red John killed his family, though I have to admit his wiseass-ness is what makes this show so good. And most family members find it oddly charming.

Tonight, Jane investigates an arson murder. Was it the wife? Was it the friend that was having an affair with the wife? Was it a dead friend back from the dead? Or was it the former child star?

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(Season 1, Episode 8 – “The Thin Red Line”)

I can see why this show is the number one new show of the season. When you can get a show that combines a police procedural, add a quirky twist to it, and cast as the leading guy someone who is likable and an audience favorite in everything he does, that adds up to “hit.” As I’ve said before, the show drifts towards formula sometimes, and I think that’s always going to be a danger. But I love tuning in every week, and that’s something I can’t say about CBS shows like CSI (any of them), Criminal Minds, or Without A Trace.

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(Season 1, Episode 7 – “Seeing Red”)

Why do people in TV shows, when they’re being chased by an automobile, always run straight ahead? How come they don’t run off to the side, or down another street, or duck into a store doorway and instead run straight ahead, look back, and slow down and/or stop? That’s what happens to the victim in this episode. She’s run over and killed. Was it the weird, artsy boyfriend? The troubled son? The nervous daughter? The arrogant psychic? Or did the ghost of Christine come back and take over another car and start killing people?

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CBS

(Season 1, Episode 6)

“So you come from carny folk? It’s all beginning to make sense now.” – Teresa, to Jane

I’ve been wondering whether or not I like Patrick Jane as part of a team or if I want to see him on his own, solving cases himself. Do I like him helping other people, a la Bones or Criminal Minds or CSI? Or do I want to see him solving mysteries alone, like Columbo, Banacek, and or one of the gazillion private eye shows over the years. I was heavily leaning towards the latter because we’d get to know the character more and the other characters wouldn’t get in the way (really, the other people on this show are wrong too much and just seem to question people and don’t really “solve” anything), but then I decided that it’s fun to see this outsider with the odd techniques bounce off of the other investigators.

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CBS

(Season 1, Episode 5)

“Anything can happen on TV. The question is, where have you seen that done in real life?” -Jane, about his cell phone trick

I can tell you the precise time that I figured out who the killer was tonight. It was at 9:49pm ET. That’s pretty good for these shows, actually, to keep the audience guessing that long. But it also shows a pattern. The killer is never going to be the most obvious person (well, it kinda was last week). Tonight’s killer isn’t the best friend or the cheating fiancee or the scummy salesman. You know it’s going to be a character that probably had either a minor role and was kinda in the background, or someone who seemingly has nothing to do with the victim. This guilty party is both.

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AMC

(Season 2, Episode 13 – Season Finale)

“Congratulations?” – Francine, about Betty’s pregnancy

Wow, they really packed everything into this season finale, eh? You can’t say that fans were cheated out of drama. Not only do they increase the cliffhanger tension (I bet fans are already craving for Season 3, Episode 1), but they also made several secrets known to the people those secrets were being kept from, progressing those plots in a way I bet fans aren’t expecting.

And a few questions were answered for loyal viewers too…

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