The Mentalist: Violets (6x16)

This was a cute episode! But not as cute as I thought it could have been, given that the setup involved Jane and Lisbon pretending to be dating. However, that might just be my shipper's heart, mourning the lack of PDA.  Let's go through what happened.

Basically, Jane becomes interested in a case involving art thievery. In order to catch the culprit, he arranges an elaborate con. Everyone takes on a role and pretends to play people involved in the art criminal world. Jane and Lisbon are boyfriend and girlfriend in this little scenario. In order for the con to work, they must use real stolen art that the FBI has confiscated because of ongoing investigations. In this way, they get the art thieves to sit up and take notice. We also meet a new FBI agent - a man from the art squad named Pike. He and Lisbon hit it off, and they decide to go out together after the case wraps up.

Wow, that was a short plot summary... I don't mean to be so lacking in the details. We can talk about some good bits here in a second. Let me just start with the few things that didn't totally work for me in this episode... even though overall I think it was a good one.

Firstly, I'm not sure if I buy how elaborate their plan was. Everything went very, very, right for them, which I felt was a narrative error. There was never a moment of risk for the characters. There was never even a moment where the audience thought there was a risk. We knew, start to finish, that Jane had it all worked out. And everyone behaved exactly as he expected them to. In a way, it seemed a bit too neat and clean, you know?

Also, this Pike guy is sort of bland. I was ready to be bitter about him because he gets in the way of Jane and Lisbon, but it's not that. He's just not very interesting. Sort of just... generic flirty nice guy. But maybe he'll become more complex later on? I'll try and reserve judgment.

But hey. The good stuff.

Jane and Lisbon! I loved it when they were acting like a couple. Just hearing them call each other by their first names was enough to make me smile. But beyond that, you have Lisbon's hilariously over the top fake character, and the little bit with Lisbon putting a blanket over Jane... and sadly, Jane's reaction to seeing Lisbon about to go on a date. All of these things make me think there must be hope for Jane and Lisbon yet!

Wylie. This kid is really growing on me. I love his hilarious enthusiasm for code words and his blind faith in Jane's plans. The way he read from Jane's notes was really adorable. I also find myself really liking Abbott. He knows Jane is unorthodox, but he just sort of goes with the flow and trusts in his results. It's probably not what the real FBI is like, but it sure is entertaining!

The bad guys. Not something I normally notice on this show... but I actually thought the criminals they caught were pretty memorable. In some ways they were just your typical thug-type characters, but they seemed legitimately menacing at the same time.

The victim's wife (girlfriend? wife? I can't remember) was also a lovely little character, despite the fact that I can't remember her exact relationship to the victim. The whole bit about the painting was very sweet.

Connected to this, I liked the relative straight-forward nature of this case. It wasn't about finding out who killed the guy. It was just about catching him. There was no crazy twist, no surprise ending. The wife/girlfriend didn't end up having some secret agenda. There was no character that popped up towards the end and changed all the facts around. In fact, Jane and the team were the ones providing the twists, and the bad guys were the ones having to roll with the punches. Despite the fact that I think Jane and the others were a little too successful, I still think it was a cool idea.

I guess I'll stop there! Cheers.

7.5/10