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Review: The Mentalist - Red Bulls

The Mentalist
(S02E07) "This man ... I don't even know what he is. He is an accident waiting to happen." - Bosco about Jane

Don't adjust your computer screen. The picture above was not tempered with: Jane and Bocso are in the same area and are not at each others' throat! As Bob hinted at the end of his review of last week's The Mentalist episode, the "Jane and Bosco having to work closely together on a case" episode we've been expecting since Bosco joined the show has finally arrived!

Continue reading Review: The Mentalist - Red Bulls

Review: The Mentalist - Red Scare

The Mentalist
(S02E05) "Spooky!" - Patrick Jane

As soon as the introduction sequence played out, I was excited at the thought of seeing how Patrick Jane and more down-to-earth Lisbon would deal with a spooky case.

I knew Lisbon would not believe in ghosts but what about Jane? Would he believe in them for real or would he fake believing in them for the case or would he not believe in them at all?

This spooky episode, perfect for Halloween time, also finally (!) gave us some relationship advancement between Rigsby and Van Pelt.

Continue reading Review: The Mentalist - Red Scare

The Mentalist: Russet Potatoes

Simon Baker and Owain Yeoman as Jane and Rigsby in The Mentalist

(S01E18)
This was a fun episode of The Mentalist, reminiscent of parts of the psychic episode, "Seeing Red," in that we got to see Jane in a comfort zone of his, something that he knows well. The difference is that Jane believes in hypnosis.

And we got to see Jane do his thing tonight ... his hypnosis thing anyway. He was clever enough to put the tracer in Rigsby's pocket, but my favorite episodes of The Mentalist are when Jane knows whodunnit ahead of time and sets them up. When Jane is a step -- or two -- ahead of everyone else, he shines.

Continue reading The Mentalist: Russet Potatoes

The Mentalist: Carnelian Inc.

Simon Baker and Robin Tunney in The Mentalist
(S01E17) "This is a goat turd about six months old." -- Cho, about Jane's "fossilized worm"

Ah, a few things I love about The Mentalist showed up in tonight's episode: a quote from Cho, a setup from Jane, and Lisbon and Jane banter. Top that off with a couple of my favorite guest stars and you've got yourself a fun episode of The Mentalist.

Oh, and we can't forget Jane doing his Jane things: trying to get Rigsby and Van Pelt together in a car for three hours, monologuing about the beauty of the desert, teasing Lisbon and Faulk (the "Boom!" line) and smiling throughout everything.

Continue reading The Mentalist: Carnelian Inc.

The Mentalist: Bloodshot

Simon Baker as Patrick Jane in The Mentalist

(S01E16) "My other senses are heightened. They're super-heightened. I'm like Daredevil." -- Jane on his blindness


Now, this was an interesting episode of The Mentalist. We veered from the formula a bit, and I liked it. We got to find out a lot more about Jane's past, albeit Red John-free. Sadly, this episode was fairly Cho-free, as well, but we did get a lot of Rigsby / Van Pelt payoff.

Mostly what this episode was about, though, was Jane's questionable past: the lies he told to people, the money he unabashedly took, and the lives he ruined with his greed and his false representation of his psychic abilities. Jane is clearly carrying around a lot more guilt than just his family being killed, although that was obviously the defining moment for Jane.

Continue reading The Mentalist: Bloodshot

The Mentalist: Scarlett Fever

Margerite MacIntyre and Simon Baker on The Mentalist

(S01E15)
The Mentalist never fails to entertain, even when the case is obvious. There was something about the writing or directing of this show early in the season; I could peg every killer nearly the moment he or she was onscreen, because of the weird shifty thing they did.

Well, that didn't happen in this episode; instead, they dropped the biggest, most obvious clue in the history of procedurals. I kept hoping that it was a red herring, but no. I'm not saying that I didn't enjoy this episode; I loved the twists and turns the case took, but I hated knowing, absolutely knowing, who the killer was, in that different way than just the shifty stuff.

Continue reading The Mentalist: Scarlett Fever

The Mentalist: Crimson Casanova

Patrick Jane flicking Walcott in The Mentalist

(S01E14) "There's no business like Cho business." -- Patrick Jane

I'm not quite sure how The Mentalist does it. At the beginning of every episode, I want to think that it's just a typical procedural and that nothing really sets it apart. Usually, it is Simon Baker who wins me over and makes me think differently. However, tonight it was all Cho.

We started off with Cho questioning Walcott about his wife Claire's murder. When the weasel threatens Cho's job if he doesn't give the name of Claire's lover, saying that he can have Cho's job with one phone call, Cho deadpans, "That's impressive. The best I can get with one phone call is a pizza."

Continue reading The Mentalist: Crimson Casanova

The Mentalist: Paint it Red

stolen painting from The Mentalist,

(S01E13)
The opening of this episode was the Jane that I love -- random, bizarre, smart and observant, with no regard for convention. Did you catch the way he hammered away at Frank, the guy who found the dead body (Harry Lashley) with the woman he was having sex with?

Jane continued to be fun and outrageous throughout "Paint it Red," which made it one of the more entertaining episodes in a while for me. The case was relatively interesting, but Jane was so upbeat, divergent and ahead of the team -- love that! -- and the interactions amongst the team were top notch.

Continue reading The Mentalist: Paint it Red

The Mentalist: Red Rum

Patrick Jane riding a pink bike on The Mentalist
(S01E12)
The opening scenes grabbed me right away this week. The Mentalist is best when Jane is doing his divergent thing, and that's just what he does when the rest of the team goes into the flower shop to interview the missing boy's parents. He puts together the pink bike, the glance to the woods and the crows and finds the boy's body before the theme. Nice.

There were other parts of this episode that were throwbacks to the early days, when Jane was not only way ahead of the team, but also more over the top than some of the more recent episodes. Thank you, Bruno Heller!




Continue reading The Mentalist: Red Rum

The Mentalist: The Thin Red Line

opening scene of The Mentalist, The Thin Red Line

(S01E08)
I have a complaint about The Mentalist: there's just not enough Jane for me. Simon Baker is the heart and soul of this show and I crave more screen time for him, and more of the antics we saw in the first couple of episodes. Regardless, this is one great show and I won't hold it against the writers that they are attempting to go deeper with the rest of the cast; a good idea, really.

OK, maybe I have two complaints, and this one is aimed at the director: Is it possible to tell the actor who plays the killer to not be so shifty the second they get screen time? I knew whodunnit so early on that I actually second-guessed myself.

Continue reading The Mentalist: The Thin Red Line

Simon Baker returns to CBS & Wheeler gets a greenlight

Simon BakerAs someone who was a regular watcher of The Guardian, it makes me happy to see that the star of that show is coming back to the home screens. Simon Baker will star in the CBS drama The Mentalist. The pilot has been given the go-ahead by the network, which mean Simon could be back on the schedule by next fall (if the show is picked up).

The Mentalist sounds like it should be something like a Kreskin extravaganza, but it's not. Instead it's described as the story of Patrick Jane, a man with heightened skills of observation who uses his talents to solve crimes.

Continue reading Simon Baker returns to CBS & Wheeler gets a greenlight

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