Tuesday, February 18, 2014

TV Recap: Castle 6-15 - Smells Like Teen Spirit

I love the fact that Castle can take a scary subject (or a potential one) and make it light and fun.  Also, was it me or was Castle more a part of the episode than he has been in recent weeks?  No sub-plots might have helped give that impression since the last few weeks he’s been mostly off on his own and not really fully involved in the investigation.

The episode starts with two girls in a cab who get a Face Time call from a friend.  She’s calling to tell them she’s running late.  But then she hears a noise and something strange starts to happen.  Next thing we know, she’s pulled up and out of the frame and then her body drops to the floor.

No, that’s not strange enough.  When Castle and Beckett arrive at the scene, the victim’s bedroom, they learn that her blood is smeared on the ceiling of the room.

Of course, Castle and Beckett don’t learn about the video until they track down the two friends.  They had their cabbie call 911, but it doesn’t take the team long to track them down, especially since they and the victim go to a private school – one that Castle used to attend but was kicked out of right before his senior prom.  Anyway, the girls tell about what they saw and then mention “the cafeteria incident.”  They refuse to say anything else but send Castle and Beckett to the principal.

The principal turns out to be the same one from when Castle went to school there.  He insists on calling Castle Mr. Rogers, which would have been his name in high school until he legally changed it for his first novel’s release.  The principal reluctantly shows them the video of the incident, which shows the victim and her two friends harassing a girl.  Then, as the bullied girl shakes in rage, tables and chairs fly toward the girls who were harassing her.  Yep, we’ve got a real life Carrie on our hands.

The bullied girl has left school as soon as she heard about the murder, so the hunt is on to find her.  Meanwhile, they start digging into the victim and learn she has credit cards in her own name but pays them off by herself every month.  And the charges are quite large.

When we finally track down the bully victim, she’s at an institute devoted to the study of telepathy.  After what happened in the cafeteria, she’s sure she has it.  And she’s afraid that she did kill the victim even though she doesn’t know it.  She wished the victim was dead.  Could that be enough?

Beckett doesn’t think so and probes a bit more.  From that, we learn that the harassment started one day when the bullied student ran across the murder victim in the Russian classics section of the school library.  It’s a section rarely used, so Beckett spots a book obviously pulled out regularly.  The book is hollowed out, and inside are German barer bonds worth $2million.  When they ask the victim’s parents where she might have gotten them, both deny it, although the father is obviously hiding something.

Thanks to the serial numbers on the bonds, they are able to track them back to a Chinese mobster who was a client of the victim’s father.  But the mobster didn’t commit the murder since he was out of the country.  In fact, he got out of the country in such a hurry he sold his house for well below market value.  His realtor says that one night, his patio furniture started levitating and spinning around, which freaked him out.  That was the night he was robbed.

And it corresponds to a night the victim was out late, according to the charges on her credit cards.  In fact, all the nights she was out late, parents of her school mates were robbed.  That’s how she was getting her money.

While investigating the mobster’s house, they find traces of blue paint.  The same blue paint that a student they talked to earlier was using to create the posters for the school dance.

Castle and Beckett go to his house, and they see objects spinning through the window.  They walk in to find the bullied student in the middle of the objects.  However, the boy who lives there then walks in and confesses to setting up some pranks.  He used his love of special effects to rig things in the cafeteria to try to get the victim to leave the bullied student alone.  The victim figured out what had happened, and she blackmailed him into helping with the robbery of the bonds and one more thing – creating the video where she faked her death.  The same one that her friends saw when she really died.

Using their phone record magic, they determine that she showed the video to one of her friends earlier, and the friend used it to establish an alibi after she killed the victim.  And those two friends were the victim’s accomplishes in the robberies.  The killer wanted out, but the victim wasn’t going to let her.

The final scene takes place at the school dance as Castle and Beckett, who had both missed their prom, crash.  They have also spent the episode trying to come up with “their song” for their first dance at the wedding.  As they dance to a song I didn’t recognize (darn the lack of knowledge of pop music of any era), they both talk about how they love that song.  Suddenly, their song is born.

Also, the bullied student and the boy who set up the pranks to help her find each other and start dancing.  Is love born?  As an aside, Beckett mentions to Castle that when they went back to the boy’s house, they found none of the wires and magnets he used elsewhere to explain the floating objects in his living room.  And one of them did shatter and break.  Honestly, from the way Beckett said it, I couldn’t tell if she was attempting to give Castle some hope that it was real after all or if she was telling the truth.  It seemed more like humoring Castle Beckett than serious Beckett.  Thoughts on that?

Despite the potential scary subject matter, I found this to be a rather light and fun episode.  I loved the reference to “Stephen” just like Castle really did know Stephen King (I miss those writer references).

The thing that got me the most was the principal calling Castle “Mr. Rogers.”  It took me a few seconds to remember that Castle changed his name as an adult.  Rogers would make sense because Martha’s last name is Rogers and that’s the last name he would have been given at birth.

Speaking of whom, no Martha and no Alexis this episode.  I really want to hear how the break up with Pi went.  No Gates either.  Is it just me, or is she in even fewer episodes than normal this season?

Overall, another good episode.  What did you think?  Hit me up with thoughts in the comments.

2 comments:

  1. Liked this episode and I did not find it potentially scary at all. Loved the light heartedness and fun because Castle took everything so seriously and was crushed when it all made logical sense - except for Kate's remarks to him at the end. So just how did those objects levitate and spin around in the living room! Leaving it open like that was fun. They did that in another episode but I don't remember which one or the subject. I think it was the time travel one.

    Loved how Castle was intimated by the principal at the beginning. And Kate was loving every minute of it!

    I did not figure out who the murderer was in this episode. It was pretty convoluted. You did a good job of recapping! I did figure as soon as I heard there would be a dance and that neither Castle nor Beckett went to their prom that they would crash this dance - and find "their song". I don't know what it is either. Give me the old Frank Sinatra standards any day!

    I hadn't thought of it until you mentioned it, but you're right in that Gates hasn't been around a lot. I was kind of surprised they showed a new episode seeing as how the Olympics are still on and it was in direct competition with the ice dancing finals. I stuck with Castle and watched the videos on NBC.com.

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    1. Not only has Gates not been around much, but they haven't really used her for much of anything when she has been around. The season has really spotlighted Esposito and Ryan more. Not that I'm complaining because I like the characters, but I wonder why.

      They weren't going for creepy overall with this episode like some of them, it was definitely more light hearted. Not complaining about that in the slightest. I loved Castle with the principal, and Kate loved every second of it. It was the time travel episode they left open ended. Second time this season. I wonder why when it used to be they closed everything up by the end of the episode with stories like this one.

      I watched Castle last night and the final hour of the Olympics tonight thanks to my DVR. I was a little surprised they aired an original episode last night myself, especially since we only have 7 more to go if they do a traditional 22 episodes. It seems like they always sneak in an extra episode or two of the show, however, so we might be getting more. We'll just have to wait and see.

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