Castle: PhDead (8x03)

Not as strong as the two-part opener. I think I'm already seeing some problems with mixing this whole Castle and Beckett separation in with the usually somewhat humorous tone of the show. I was pretty disappointed in some parts of this episode. Let's take a look.

Cons:

Both Castle and Beckett seem to have faulty logic when it comes to their relationship. Beckett is staying away from Castle because she can't "let it go," and has to keep hunting down leads on the people who killed her FBI teammates. But if these guys are really so evil, won't Castle be in danger no matter what? Even if he sits passively on the sidelines, which Beckett knows he won't do, he'll still be a target if Beckett keeps digging. The bad guys aren't going to leave Castle alone just because Beckett left to "protect" him or whatever. That's a load of crap.

Then there's Castle, who continually insinuates himself into the precinct's case this week, in order to try and impress Beckett. His logic is that since solving cases was what made her fall in love with him, he needs to solve more cases to impress her! What the hell? Obviously a screw has come loose in Castle's head. Beckett still loves him - he doesn't need to impress her with his smarts. She knows who he is, and she loves him. What he needs to do is respect her desire for space, if he wants a chance of really working things out. Castle's quest to impress his wife felt like a very desperate excuse to get Castle working with the NYPD again. Very weak.

The balance of humor and angst was really bad. One second we have Beckett and Vikram trying to uncover the identity of murderers while hiding their actions from the NYPD, and the next you have a truly horrendous attempt by Ryan and Esposito to look like college kids and get information out of a suspect. You have Beckett and Castle bickering like old times, but then a super angst-y talk about their relationship thrown right in to the middle. It's unsettling. I can't tell what sort of tone this episode was going for.

Wow, now that I start writing about it, I'm realizing that I really wasn't a fan of this episode. But let's talk about what did work.

Pros:

The case itself, if you ignore the annoying framework with Castle and Beckett, was actually very solid. We have a murder victim who at first appears to be an escaped convict, due to his orange jumpsuit. Later, we find out that he sort of is an escaped convict, but not from a real prison - from a prison experiment run illicitly by the head of his university's psych department. Much like other famous experiments in the past, in this test some students are designated prisoners, and others are designated guards. Psychologically, the guards begin to act like guards, and the prisoners begin to act like prisoners. The victim had escaped from this experiment. In the end, we find out that another one of the "prisoners" had escaped as well, killing the victim because of a lost scholarship, before sneaking back in and re-imprisoning herself. This was a clever case, with a lot of interesting twists and turns.

Despite being annoyed by the unbalanced tone of the episode, I did love the scene in the makeshift prison between Beckett and Castle. They solve the case just like they have so many others, by simultaneously shouting out the solution. They were almost back to their old selves. It was fun to see this, even if it didn't quite work in the larger scheme of the episode and of the season.

Alexis was the #1 best thing about the whole episode. If we keep up with this trend, she's going to basically steal the whole show. I loved seeing her work cases in the first two episodes, but this was her finest work yet. She poses as a college student to get close to one of the prime suspects. I loved the scene where she was flirting with the suspect, and then the minute she gets what she wants from him, she just shuts him down. Castle was also funny as the protective father - he let Alexis go into a frat party dressed like a slutty angel (Molly Quinn looked seriously hot), but then second-guesses this risky decision and follows her inside. He even ends up playing beer pong with the college kids!

The prime suspect, who turned out to be innocent, was really funny. He saw right through Ryan and Espo's lame attempt to pass as teenagers, and he was appropriately smarmy when flirting with Alexis. Castle was also a riot as a college professor, getting horribly indignant when the suspect insulted his writing during his guest lecture.

All of this stuff was really funny, and it would have fit nicely into a typical C-plot episode of this show. But it's hard to balance that humor with the more grim and upsetting themes of the season. We'll have to see if they can strike a balance in the coming weeks. How long are they going to drag out Castle and Beckett's separation? I guess we'll find out!

6.5/10