The Mentalist: The Red Tattoo (6x05)

Another episode that propels the Red John plot forward! And hey, did you see that promo for next week? Things are seriously heating up!

A man is found dead in a hotel room, and it turns out he's a member of Visualize. Ray Haffner (representing Visualize) is going to be working on the case, which of course makes the team very uncomfortable. Having a Red John suspect work side by side with the team is a genius way of setting up some great tensions throughout the episode.

The case is nothing all that special. The clues seem to indicate that the killer was in two places at once, which of course makes no sense, but upon further investigating Jane discovers the answer, just like he always does. The victim, along with being a Visualize member, is also a gymnastics coach who had been having a long affair with one of his male students. It turns out that the student was going to reveal the affair and make the guy sound like a pedophile, and during an altercation, the teacher got knifed. He made his way up to the hotel room, where he bled out from his wound.

In the process of solving the case, Cho meets a girl at the gym who then comes to the CBI to ask him out. She seems to genuinely like him, and Cho decides to go out for coffee with the girl. However, Jane turns up and discovers that she's a private investigator. Cho is pissed, and manages to force the girl to reveal her client: Visualize.

Or... maybe not. Jane confronts Cooper, another Visualize representative, and accuses him of attempting to bug the CBI. When Cooper seems totally ignorant, Jane realizes the awful truth. The private investigator had been hired by Red John! They rush to find her, but they are too late. She has been attacked and is close to death before Jane shows up. When he arrives, the woman manages to give Jane one very important bit of information: her attacker (potentially Red John) has a tattoo of three dots on his shoulder.

So, this episode had a lot of great elements, but I'll start with the weakest part: the case itself. All of this intrigue about secret affairs and business resentments was pretty run of the mill. It wasn't terrible by any means, but nothing special or unique really came out of it. Worse, when Jane finally explains how the whole thing went down, it seems very anticlimactic. It doesn't seem like anyone working on the case really cares whatsoever about the outcome. The case simply worked as a vehicle for a lot of more interesting things.

Let's take a look at those interesting things: for one, we have the involvement of Haffner on the case, which I already mentioned was a smart move. This guy is pretty unsettling, what with his compliments to Lisbon and his general hatred towards Jane. Do I think he's Red John? Well, I wouldn't place any large bets on it. But there's something fishy about that guy, and about Visualize in general.

Speaking of Visualize, the presence of this creepy cult was another thing that made the episode strong. Visualize is so creepy, and nobody is creepier than its leader, Bret Stiles. Stiles wasn't actually in the episode, but his presence was very felt. If I had to go with gut feelings, I'd say Stiles is Red John, or at the very least knows a lot more about Red John than he's letting on.

Cho. Cho was freakin' glorious in this episode. Rigsby is blissfully married now, and he wants his friend to be happy as well. At first, good ol' stoic Cho appears to have no interest in romance, but then he does decide to go out on a date with the girl. When she ends up being a private investigator, he is ruthless and efficient, not allowing his personal feelings or embarrassment to cloud his judgment. This was Cho at his best.

And then of course there's the fact that we're taking large steps towards resolving the Red John plot. The team has learned that Bob Kirkland is dead, and now we have this new information about a tattoo. What does it all mean? Well, I've seen a lot of theories, but I'm not sure if we'll be able to figure out the full truth before the powers that be want us to. I'm looking forward to next week!

7.5/10