The Mentalist: Forest Green (6x18)

Not so sure about the case, but I liked a lot of the character stuff! Let's get going.

A woman is found dead near an all male exclusive country club. This woman is not one of the listed employees at the club, nor is she a guest of any of the members. Still, Jane is sure that she was murdered in the grounds and dumped nearby. During their investigation, they discover that many of the members of this club are rather shady characters; they are all quite wealthy, and some of them are willing to step above the law to succeed.

One such man is anxious because his assets have been frozen, and he wants to make an escape. Jane lets slip that the FBI let him off of murder charges, so this guy goes to Abbott and tries to bribe him. Abbott pretends to accept the bribe, and with Wylie's help they are able to trick this guy into thinking his funds have been freed up and he can flee.

In order to catch the murderer, Jane says that he will use the murder victim's broken cellphone in a magic act for the guests of the club. He'll say it's in the lost and found. That way, when the murderer sees the phone, he'll want to get it from the lost and found so that the FBI can't use it for evidence. Jane does the magic show, with Lisbon as his assistant. However, nobody comes to collect the phone. Instead, Abbott goes into the room where the team had discussed the magic show plan, and he begins talking to the empty room. He says he knows that the murderer is listening through a recording device, and that he's willing to strike a deal to get the murderer off, just like he did with the other guy.

And so enters... the lawyer of one of the prominent club members! Turns out, he wanted to blackmail his client for prostitution. The murder victim was actually a prostitute who worked at a brothel that was actually on the grounds at the club. When the girl turned up early as he was trying to plant evidence in her cabin, this lawyer chased her down and killed her. The murderer falls for Abbott's trap and they arrest him, just like they arrested the guy who tried to bribe him earlier.

The subplot shows that Lisbon and Pike are still having a fun time together. He takes her out to a fancy dinner and says that he's been promoted. In order to accept the promotion, he'll have to move to DC. He doesn't want their relationship to end. Lisbon says he has to take the job, since it's such a great opportunity. Pike asks Lisbon to come with him to DC.

What do I not like?

Well, some of this felt like it was a repeat from the countless other episodes we've seen where Jane puts on a show to draw out the murderer. There have been so many episodes in the past featuring a bunch of rich people that Jane has to catch using subtle trickery and playing on their money-grubbing desires. It felt a bit stale.

Also, I liked the fakeout at the end just fine, but I get so annoyed at this show's insistence on tricking the audience. I think we'd still have a fun time if we knew what the plan was, going in. Every once in a while, they can let us in on the secret. Otherwise, it's just a constant celebration of how brilliant Jane is and how he fooled us all. Yeah, we get it.

But on the smaller level of character development and some individual moments, I actually thought this was a great episode.

First of all, the biggest thing to notice is of course the Jane/Lisbon/Pike triangle. They are doing such a nice job of toeing a subtle line. We have Jane asking Lisbon about Pike, and even orchestrating their schedule so that Lisbon won't have to miss her date with him. He tells her that she deserves to be with a good guy. All of this, if played a certain way, could just be something a good friend would do. But you can just see the tightly restrained jealousy in Jane's demeanor, and the way he can't quite look at her when Pike is the topic of conversation. The poor baby isn't trying to fight for Lisbon... she's not a piece of property. He's trying to let her be happy, because he knows that he doesn't have the emotional capacity to be there for Lisbon the way she wants, and the way that Pike might be able to.

We leave on this cliffhanger. It seems unlikely to me that Lisbon says yes, or if she does say yes, it seems unlikely that she'll end up actually going with him. If this season is the last one, we'll have to end it on some note that Jane and Lisbon have a future together. If we have one more season, then hopefully we get to see Jane tell her how he feels, and then we can get the ramifications of that.

Abbott again proves to be more interesting than I ever would have initially guessed. Even though it was obvious that he was just working on a plan with Jane, it was still really cool to see him go over to the dark side just a little bit. He's an intriguing guy who's definitely willing to bend the rules to get results. Ultimately, he ended up being a better boss for Jane than any of the CBI's higher ups ever were.

Wylie and Cho had some cute moments, but Fischer seemed practically useless here. I'm hoping for more of her very soon. The best bit for me was when Cho asked Wylie for a sketchy favor and Wylie automatically knew it was for Jane and got to work, no questions asked. Wylie is a pretty chill guy. He'd need to be, to handle being around Jane.

I guess we shall stop there! Whether or not this show gets renewed, I hope we have some sort of definitive moving forward on the Jane/Lisbon front before this season ends.

7/10