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Castle: Secret's Safe With Me

“Even on the worst days, there’s a possibility for joy.”

A direct homage to Storage Wars, this week’s case of the week centered on clues found in a storage unit. Other than the fact that we got to see Ash on our television screens again, the case itself fell into typical Castle fare -- convoluted with a guilty party that comes out of left field. What this case did, however, was give us an opportunity to watch how things are changing in this world, especially for Castle.

Caskett are still finding their boundaries with each other. He answers her phone; she gets annoyed. He looks through her desk for a pen; she tells him to stay out of her stuff. She is more than willing to spend his money and make promises about the characters in his next book; he goes along with it all, but reluctantly. They can’t kiss each other goodbye at the precinct, so they come up with the handshake. I am sure that many fans are going to go wild over the handshake scene, but for me it felt off. I can’t put my finger on why, but there was something about Stana’s performance that didn’t ring quite true for me. What saved it from going completely OTT was the sweaty palm bit at the end.

While rummaging through Beckett’s desk, Castle finds a stick man. Beckett won’t tell him where it comes from, so in typical fashion, Castle begins to spin stories around it. Only when he tells her that she can tell him when she’s ready does she. And, the story is absolutely lovely. Much better than anything that Castle could come up with.

Speaking of change, we finally got to see the softer side of Gates. Our tough as nails captain going all gooey at the sight of a doll and her gushing all over Frozen Heat were hilarious. We got a brief glimpse of this side of her when she told Beckett that she knows about Montgomery and is not going to do anything about it, but now we’ve seen the full blown aspect. My guess is that the writers are setting a precedent so that when she accepts the Caskett relationship, it won’t come out of nowhere. It doesn’t last long, but it was so much fun while it did.

Although the friends at the precinct are presumably still in the dark (I’m not convinced they actually are), the secret is out at Castle’s house. Turns out that Martha spotted Beckett in the closet back in the first episode and has known about the new romance almost from the beginning. As so often happens when we are worried about something, neither Martha nor Alexis seemed all that concerned about Caskett’s sex life. Martha shrugged it off, only commenting that she thought Alexis has a right to know. Alexis, in typical teenage fashion, is too wrapped up in her own life change to give much thought to it.

Life is changing for Alexis as well as for Castle. She is now off to college, living in a dorm without her dad to check under the bed for her. After being a snarky little thing through much of the episode, Alexis finally comes clean with her dad just as she is saying goodbye to him in her room in what was, finally, a very sweet scene. However, I do think it is time that Alexis leaves home.

This was standard Castle fare with a few good moments. Two out of four shattered glass eyes.

Tidbits:

-- The conversations with all the women supporting Alexis and her need to have her stuff around her amused me to no end. I am so not a girl in this regard. I don’t do stuff.

-- The victim’s financials came from New Amsterdam Bank. This is the bank in which Castle and Martha were held hostage in “Cops and Robbers.”

-- We’ll all have to wait and see to see if “Eunice” turns up in the next Nikki Heat book.

-- As intuitive as Castle usually is, it took Gates to point out that the murderer actually wiped out an entire family.

Soundbites:

Castle: “How did you know that?”
Martha: “Mothers know these things.”
This is so very true. How do mothers know these things??

Auctioneer: “Sold right there to Pretty Boy for $3,600.”
Pretty Boy is perfect!

Beckett: “Take your hand off your tool, Marco.” Any lingering concerns we had that Ryan and Esposito are not friends again were put to rest as they both start to snicker.

Alexis: “How can you be so smart and so clueless at the same time?”
Castle: “Practice?”

Castle: “I’ve worked a lot of murder cases, waiting patiently for the day I could unequivocally exclaim, the butler did it!”

ChrisB is a freelance writer who spends more time than she ought in front of a television screen or with a book in her hand.

5 comments:

  1. I'm with Castle, for once it's FUN to be able to say "the Butler did it!" (only thing missing was "in the dining room with the candlestick") :p

    Very sweet "monsters under the bed", but did expect a bit more of a reaction to Caskett from Alexis!

    Gates going all gooey over a doll?! WEIRD!!!

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  2. This episode was...not good. The butler came out of left field, yes, but all the other little twists were so obvious I was actually yelling at my TV. Of course it was 317 and not 'Lie.' Of course the guy bidding on the storage unit had some inside information. Of course whatever they needed to solve the case was in the doll. Oh my God, are they really that dense?

    Plus I really, really missed the awkward 'I'm sleeping with Beckett' conversations Castle was supposed to have with Martha and Alexis. Martha just randomly is all "Oh, I know." And we don't even get to see him telling Alexis.

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  3. @CrazyCris -- I agree that Gates with the doll was weird, but I liked seeing that side of her. Like I said, I'm sure it's the writers setting up the inevitable discovery.

    @sunbunny -- I agree with you completely. I struggled to write this review without moaning in every paragraph. The case was definitely one of the weakest they've ever done. I simply hate it when the killer is someone who has been on screen for a total of about fifty seconds. It feels like the writers cheating us.

    And I was very upset that both Martha and Alexis found out without there being some fun involved in it. I was actually hoping that the reason Alexis was being such a pill was because she was jealous of her dad finding someone just as she moves away -- it would have added an interesting dynamic to this season.

    The scene I loved was Beckett telling Castle about the stick man. Their changing emotional connection is going to be fun to watch.

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  4. Another great review ChrisB

    a) OTT : I've learned a new cute thing about you Brits

    b) actually, did like the hand shake scene

    c) but the no monster under the bed at the end got me, my eyes are still wet. Really love all the characters on this show.

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  5. Loved the handshake scene..so cute and hot.
    Gates was a bit off but if they can show her back to her old self but a little nicer maybe it'll work.
    Loved Martha knowing about Caskett..but why didn't we see Castle tell Alexis? It's kind of a big deal.
    The mystery felt a bit silly.
    Anna

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