Castle, "Watershed": Sharks in dem waters

And so I finally summon the will to discuss "Watershed." It's difficult to find a place to start, so I guess I'll just start with a quibble before getting to anything meaningful.

This chick.

I know that terrible actors are a hazard of the business. Hell, for Once Upon a Time, it's pretty much par for the course (though I digress), and while I recognize that Castle has, in the past, employed bad actors, something about this woman rubs me the wrong way. She's been in other episodes this past season, and I'm starting to get concerned that she might, dare I say it, became more of a cast regular. I really, really hope this is not the case, because when she delivers her lines, it's almost always rhythmic, as if she had to memorize them to a melody. Her performance is completely wooden, and it takes all the charm away from Esposito's little crush on her. I don't want to trash her too badly, because I recognize that she's a real human being, but usually we only have to put up with extras for one or two episodes at most before they disappear into the ether, and my patience with her has run thin. Please, Kendra Castleberry, who IMDB tells me is responsible for casting and who, incidentally, has an excellent name, don't bring this chick back. If there has to be a recurring tech chick, hire a better one. That is my plea to you and the writers.

Though in light of the rest of the episode, tech chick is at the bottom of my list of issues, which I will now attempt to tackle.

To be honest, I walked away from this episode mostly happy with it, but within a half an hour of viewing, things that were wrong with it began surfacing rapidly: Why are Beckett and Castle so concerned about the stability of a relationship that's been going pretty strong for five years, and why is that that they consistently seek counsel with everyone but themselves? How has Castle not grown beyond his inner petulant child in all this time? Why is it that Beckett's only concern about the DC job seems to be Castle rather than everything else in her life? And then...the proposal, the cliffhanger, and the unanswered questions.

I guess I'll start with the Caskett.

I know that Beckett's had concerns over the direction of her relationship with Castle for a good while now. As far as I can remember, this has been clear since "Squab," and the fact that she's not simply taken the time to sit down and talk to Castle about these concerns has been a source of irritation for me since they've come up. I recognize that she's a commitophobe -- hell, she's recognized it, and her father has recognized it -- but that doesn't excuse her behavior. And while I can't remember Castle expressing similar concerns in other episodes (this season), he voices them in "Watershed," and the fact that he doesn't bother to have a frank conversation with Beckett either made it all the worse. This an outgrowth of one of my largest gripes with Caskett and, indeed, the whole of the series: that the Caskett is written like a teenage angst fest, despite it being written by adults, acted by adults, and more than likely aimed at the 18-45 demographic. It was one thing when it was just Castle acting like a lovesick teenager, but when Beckett started doing it (thinking of "The Limey" opening as the most glaring example) it started to get a bit ridiculous.

At first, I was overjoyed to learn Beckett was hiding her trip to DC and the job offer from Castle, but this is because, as stated previously and often, more than anything I just want Beckett to be Jordan, and flying in and out of the city to do something while telling no one is something Jordan would definitely do. The similarity to Jordan temporarily blinded me from the reality of how immature this behavior is, which isn't a quality I generally associate with Beckett (or Jordan). It's not to say that this is anything new -- as brave as Beckett is in her professional life, she seems to be fairly cowardly personally, sabotaging relationships and leading (it would seem) a fairly solitary life outside the precinct. I feel there's an argument to be made that after her mother died, she devoted most of her energy to cultivating her work life over her personal one, which more or less stagnated personal growth. Moreover, I can understand that she was scared, that she was half-hoping to be turned down so that she wouldn't have to deal with upending her life, and she was hoping to keep the offer buried in case things didn't pan out, but once the jig was up and the cat had left the bag, her inability to have a real conversation with Castle about it was stunning in its patheticness. This is real stuff that she really has to deal with, and her response is to see her father (and I'll address my problems with that scene further down). Really, Beckett?

Beckett is not, however, the largest source of the gripe. Castle owns most of the territory in that department, as he has since the late-s4 arc.

Note the height difference.

We'll start with the most obvious: the initial fight scene. I just...this scene. First off, right off the bat, I absolutely hate how it was filmed. Beckett is made to look the subordinate in this relationship through both her body language and her positioning, and this really bothers me, because Beckett and Castle's relationship has always been characterized as one between equals, and this scene clearly does not reflect this.

Pay attention to their heights and the amount of space each is taking up in both these POV shots. On the left, Beckett has negative space all around her, and Castle looms above her (his head is cut off at the top of the frame). On the right, Castle's head hits the top of the frame, while Beckett's is well clear, and he has no negative space. This gives the impression that Castle is in control (given he is not lost in space, and given how much height he has over her), and that Beckett is subordinate to him.
Compare with:

There are literally hundreds of examples I could pull in which the height difference between SK and NF is not accentuated, and this is just three from this episode (if you want a fourth, scroll up). One could argue that part of the reason Beckett is so short in that fight is because she's not wearing heels because she's in her apartment, but that's ridiculous on two fronts: one) we've seen her in heels in her apartment before, so one can't make a character argument, and two) her feet are not in frame in this scene, so what's on them is largely irrelevant to the viewer (e.g. she could be on a Scully box and we'd never know)
This tells us that the height difference is a completely conscious choice

I've never felt that Beckett has been disempowered (as a woman, or otherwise). Despite the name of the series, she's arguably the lead character (with Castle her foil), and I can't think of a single scene in which she was shown to be subordinate or weak. One of my highest praises of the show has been the equality between Beckett and Castle, which is something I can't say of other shows that come from a vaguely Sherlockian place. I generally compare Castle to The Mentalist in this regard (possibly because I started watching both shows around the same time): Lisbon has never been on equal footing with Jane, and she always "solves" cases by essentially clinging to his coattails. In their team, she contributes almost nothing except exposition and firearm skills, acting more or less as Jane's bodyguard as he Sherlocks his way through crime scenes. This is not at all the dynamic of Beckett/Castle. Their shtick is figuring things out together (often, blurting things out together, concurrently), of contributing equally to the process. Their sexual/personal relationship is also played this way, as the coming together of two equals. Yet, this scene utterly violates that by casting Beckett as a woman scared to tell her boyfriend about her job offer because she knows he'll get "upset," by shooting her as clearly subordinate to and smaller than (and thus dominated by) Castle. It's so different from the tone of the rest of the show, from Beckett's characterization (since when is she scared and weak?), from Castle's (since when is he domineering, especially over Beckett?), it's honestly almost shocking.

Further, Castle does nothing to re-empower or reassure her. He instead acts as a self-righteous ass ("You're damn right I'm upset"), storming from her apartment and leaving her alone with half-finished dinner prep and the continued, roiling fear that she's going to lose both the job she's put a decade of her life into and him on top of it. He seems surprised when she points out that this isn't about him, then proceeds to make it about him -- "I'm sorry, tell me how this isn't about us?" It's not to say I couldn't be sympathetic, given he's just found out Beckett's been lying blatantly to his face (ergo, is there anything else she's hiding?) and given this job offer does spell the end of their relationship in its current state (and in order to maintain it, will more than likely require a major change in his lifestyle as well as her own), but it's clear from Beckett's body language that she's terrified of how this job will impact her life, and within a few hours of the blow-out, he should have called her to apologize, recognizing that the world does not, in fact, revolve around him and that they are both wronged parties and that they need to talk. But because he does not, I can't not be angry with him for the childishness with which he takes her news, and his inability to recognize how much this job offer must mean to her.

His behavior reminds me a lot of his actions in late-s4, where his response to learning that Beckett remembers every moment of her shooting isn't horror at the fact that she has to live with those images but indignant, self-righteous anger because she hasn't mentioned the "I love you." It doesn't even seem to occur to him that maybe remembering the fall from the podium and the bullet burning through her chest is a traumatic memory for her, that in light of it his "I love you" wouldn't be something she would want to spend much time considering, especially given it was prompted by his fear he would never have another chance to tell her that while she was alive to hear it (this idea is handled infinitely better by Crossing Jordan, which I will probably one day devote a post to). I mean, seriously, Castle, you told her that because you thought she was dying. For the love of god, why would she want to bring that up?

He has this tendency to make everything about him, and it's infinitely infuriating to me. The fact that his solution to the problem of their relationship is to propose to her is even more infuriating.

Really, Castle? She's in the middle of a life crisis, and you spring this on her?

Again, I think I know where he's coming from. He doesn't know what direction they're going and, by extension, she must not know the direction they're going, so he decides that the best way to give them both a firm direction is by giving her a ring. In doing so, he's stating "I'm committed to you and this relationship, regardless of what you do with your life or where you decide to go." I get the impression that he made this decision impulsively, probably on his way to meet her. And this is all well and good, but let's back up a moment.

First of all, Castle's been married like a million times, so I think it's safe to say that he doesn't imbue the institution itself with much sacredness. This gesture would be a lot more romantic if it didn't come from someone with his backstory/baggage. I don't know the circumstances of the other marriages, but it wouldn't surprise me if they were born out of exactly this sort of impulsiveness. And think about it for a moment: they're concerned about them now, after they've been through so much together already, and his proposed solution is not to hash out their concerns, but to stick on a ring on her finger and tell her he's committed? This solves precisely nothing. More to the point, he puts her in an extremely awkward (if downright appalling) position through this sudden proposal. If she were to say no, what would that say about them in his eyes and her own? He would inevitably read it as her rejecting him, and she would know that and be afraid of that, given we know she's afraid of losing him (she's afraid to even tell him about the job because she's afraid he'll "hate her"), so she pretty much has to say yes in order for them to continue to work. In this sense, his proposal is more a form of emotional blackmail than anything, forcing her to commit to him presumably for the rest of her life right while she's attempting to figure out how she's going to deal with the rest of her life as a (wo)man in black.

And I'm going to be honest here, her fears aren't completely unfounded either. What amazes me in this episode is that Esposito noticed something is wrong with Beckett without her having to say a word to him about it, while Castle only figures it out when he finds the plane stub (and it wasn't that hard to read; she was very subdued in a lot of the precinct scenes, and I can't imagine she was much cheerier at home). I feel like Castle is so wrapped up in himself he's incapable of even noticing the subtleties of Beckett, which isn't really acceptable given how much he claims to love her. And now he wants to marry her, when he clearly doesn't entirely trust her (see: "Squab"), when he feels he has to "scratch and claw for every inch," on top of his inability to read her body language?

I'm sorry, but that is just ridiculous.

And while I'm on the subject of Esposito and the precinct, I don't understand why Beckett's only expressed concern about her taking this DC job will be Castle, arguably the easiest of her problems to deal with (I mean, come on, he's a writer; he's mobile; on top of that, he's rich as sin, so even if he didn't move, flying up to and staying in DC for extended periods of time wouldn't be hard for him to do). Why doesn't she seem to care about the fact that she's going to lose her found family, that she's going to lose her relationship with Esposito and Ryan as it is in its current state? The closeness between Beckett and Esposito has been a minor theme since the beginning, with him acting as big brother to her and Ryan as little brother. Hell, Esposito helps her deal with her PTSD, not Castle. And in "Watershed," again, it's Esposito, not Castle, who notices immediately when something is up with her, which speaks to their closeness, or, at least, his perception of their closeness. Yet we don't see Beckett angsting about losing him, or Ryan, or Lanie, or the precinct, just Castle. This is another one of those bizarre fish eyes, where the sum of her life seems only to be Castle, rather than the greater weight of the friendships and achievements she's forged through her career, not to mention her relationship with the city she's spent most of her life within (because there's a certain New York pride that its denizens are imbued with, which is not something I can say for DC). This is the kind of two-dimensionality that drives me up a wall.

Along those lines, we have the treatment of Martha Rodgers and Jim Beckett, which was as flat as if they'd been steam-rolled.

The reason I say this is clear to anyone who watched it, so I'm not going to spend a lot of time here, but suffice to say that both of them acted in these scenes as nothing more significant than one of those shoulder consciences in a Looney Toons cartoon. Jim's was especially annoying, given it wasn't entirely dissimilar to Royce's voice from beyond in regards to Castle ("To Live and Die in L.A."). I could go on, but there's honestly not even a need; it's painfully obvious just on casual observation how flat their roles were.

And that brings me to my final point: the flatness of the episode as a whole. Beckett and Castle's concerns are completely one-sided, hers especially, given they're fish-eyed to involve Castle and Castle only. Both of them act childishly toward each other, making it difficult to take them seriously as adults, let alone as the serious characters they've proven to be in other episodes (Beckett especially is almost always written as a serious character, and Castle many times dropped the sillyness to act the grown-up). Their parents, brought in in cliched "consult the older and wiser" scenes, were flat and devoid of any charm that could distinguish them from the obvious plot devices they were. Beckett's final interrogation, for her "final case," is written in a completely cheesy way, to the point where it's almost hard to watch.

Another factor contributing to this flatness that I haven't mentioned is the transparency in how its written. There are two questions driving the plot of this episode: will Beckett take the job, and what direction is the Caskett going? By the conclusion, neither of these questions is answered, and only one of them is addressed with any certainty (the proposal). I would hazard to guess that the reason this episode is written the way it is is because the writers are themselves uncertain of the direction they're taking Beckett with this DC thing, and by ending the way they did, they bought themselves the summer to figure it out (because although it's implied she's taking the job through the whole "last case" thing, it's never truly confirmed). The cliffhanger felt easy and obvious, and thus was completely uninteresting.

It's not to say the episode is terrible (that designation is still pretty much reserved for "The Limey" and "Headhunters"; sorry, Adam Baldwin, I love you, but you couldn't save that trainwreck), but for a finale that is going to greatly impact the greater arc of the show, it certainly suffered from heavy underperformance, and I was extremely disappointed with it. Further, it's starting to make me question my investment to characters who are written with such flatness with such consistency.

At this point, I can only hope that s6 opens much more strongly than s5 ended, and that they go a more interesting route than simply having Beckett say yes.

Alternatively, Beckett, you could choose, as your parting gift for Manhattan, to shoot Bracken in the face.
Then I would literally forgive everything.

Castle: On "Still," bottle episodes, and how I would have done it

I guess I'll just start off by saying that I didn't necessarily dislike "Still." I responded to it much the same way I responded to "Squab" and a lot of Castle this season -- enjoyment but a lot of disappointment. I hate to talk about the show exceedingly negatively, because, as I think I stated previously, I love the show and I love the characters, so it's my hope that soon we'll be delivered another gem I can shower with affection. But I can't do this for "Still," and while I could just as easily say nothing, I really want to talk about it, so I'm going to do that, my tone be damned.

"Still" was, obviously, a bottle episode, employing my least favorite of all bottle techniques--the Clip Show. I think there's been only one example of the form that I've seen actually work, and that was when it was so nicely subverted by Community (though, to be honest, as much as it claimed to be a bottle episode, "Paradigms of Human Memory" didn't really seem to be one; it more seemed to just exist as a parody of the form). Clip Shows are annoying for obvious reasons, especially for someone like me, for whom characterization is sacred and rerunning is a way of life (and I'm by far not the most extreme example of it; I've known people to have seen an episode nine times within twenty-four hours of its airing, though I don't even know how that was done). There's huge appeal in reviewing past moments, but I bought the episodes on physical and/or digital release for exactly that purpose, and a Clip Show episode fails to capture the joy I find in reexperience while also becoming an episode that is itself hard to rewatch. I look to new episodes for fresh content, to reruns for fulfillment, and to fan communities and YouTube for compilations and clip shows, and it's always disappointing to get one of these from the show itself -- which often, due to the constraints of it being a broadcasted episode, leave out both the best and the most subtle examples anyway. Clip Shows also tend to cheapen the moments they excise from their context, and it was especially disappointing to see some of my favorite dramatic moments, such as those from "Countdown," "Knockdown," and "Knockout"/"Rise," being brought up in that fashion -- rapid fire, with the addition of the cheesy voice-over from Montgomery, which was a speech that in its context I truly loved.

In that vein, just from the standpoint of characterization, Clip Shows create a bizarre sort of fish eye perspective of the character's life. How is it that the moments these characters think of all have to do with something the audience has seen before? Why is it that when Beckett looks back on her life, as she tries to cope with the fact that she's going to die, she sees so many moments associated with her mother's murder, but not the actual crime scene of the murder which we know through backstory she's seen? Why doesn't she think of any part of her life prior to Castle's canon, such as her time in Russia, time with her father immediately following her mother's death, time in the police academy with Royce, or time between canon, such as her recovery in the hospital and the conversations she must have had with her father following her shooting? Limitations of the form tell us exactly why -- because these scenes don't exist to be drawn upon, and since it's a bottle episode, they're not going to go out and film them -- but this is precisely the problem. It's painfully obvious what the episode is (a bottle episode), and it has the effect of immediately flattening the characters. The act of reminiscing feels flat because it is flat, because the memory that these characters have is shortened immediately to incorporate only the happenings of the last few years, and it excludes all of those quiet moments that never would have been in an episode (something like Beckett and Castle taking coffee out on the balcony as the sun rises over the city, or them sitting opposite each other at the precinct, Castle typing into his laptop and Beckett filling out paperwork with a half-empty cup of coffee at her elbow, and after two hours one of them wonders aloud about the possibility of stopping to get a sandwich). Suspension of belief in a Clip Show becomes infinitely more difficult to retain, and it often feels to me like it's even uprooting some of my investment by exposing how shallow characterization can be.

But in the interest of not being completely negative, I'll say that I latched onto the few moments of legitimate dramatic tension in "Still" with a crack addict's desperation, and I savored them as such, because the reality is that characters having to come to terms with Impending Mortal Peril is easily my second or third favorite plot device. Further, I genuinely love the premise of the episode -- that we start with an idyllic morning, one in which the world for Beckett seems both bright and peaceful, and by noon she's suddenly faced with the fact that probably won't live to see the sunset. I love that Castle, as her Loyal, Loving Compatriot, refuses to leave her side or let her cede, mentally or physically. I love the implication that Esposito would put the Big Hurt on their bomber without any hesitation if it meant saving her. If the episode had been done with the same plot, but none of the Clip Show, "Still" easily could have made my top five list, no question. I would've eaten it up and waxed praise like a raving lunatic, complete with exclamation marks and scene by scene analysis and shoving a rerun into my morning. I might not have slept last night. That is the kind of love I'm prepared to have, so being denied that level of joy by something as lazy as a Clip Show just sours my view, especially when a plot that has the potential for emotional intensity instead becomes more of a joke fest.

This leads me back to what I'm fairly certain I brought up earlier in my discussion of "Squab," which is my feeling that Castle tends to skip over opportunities for depth and real character-character/viewer-character connections in favor of shallow humor. Again, I love Castle when it's funny, and it can be exceptionally good at it. I honestly think Castle has done some of the strongest parodies or "inspired by" plots I've seen anywhere, and I would take "Scared to Death" over Scary Movie any day of any week. But I'd again like to point out that Beckett/Stana Katic is capable of delivering an extreme amount of intensity, from regal, somber grace to burns-like-fire, homicidal rage, and it's disappointing to so rarely see that side of her come out to play. This is part of the reason I so love Joss Whedon's approach to television, because his characters constantly exist in that dynamic between funny and not even close to funny, between rage, neutrality, and an almost disquieting level of misery. Buffy Summers is a character I could never find enough positive words to lavish with, and a big part of that has to do with how dynamic her role is allowed to be. She can be hilarious one scene and depressing the next; she can go from a character that is extremely sympathetic, brave, and giving, to a character who is dislikeable, weak, and selfish, without ever going OOC. Jordan Cavanaugh is, to a lesser extent, like this, which is why (or part of the reason why) between these two characters I've never found an equal.

I've often complained that Beckett is simply too perfect to be wholly sympathetic. She's a paragon of goodness. There is no better way to illustrate this than by looking at her actions in episodes like "After the Storm" and "Recoil," in which she, for no explicable reason, allows the man who ruined her life to live. I cannot even begin to describe how I lamented when Beckett saved Bracken from the bomb in "Recoil," because there, truly, was the opportunity for Beckett to be dark and interesting and different. I don't know that there's ever been a moment where I was more disappointed in a character or a plot-point than then. I can't even think of the mytharc anymore without thinking of that scene. I can only hope that the finale sees Bracken's death (and that "Still" was made a bottleneck in part to help fund the finale), and that Beckett has some part in it. That would make me indescribably happy.

But, at any rate, "Still" sharply brings into focus how frustratingly, unrealistically perfect and unflappable Beckett is, as she stands stoically on a bomb arguing trivialities with Castle. On the one level, I can reason that she's able to do this because she's choosing to box away her situation by throwing herself into the comfort of shared memories and old, stupid jokes, but on another I feel that that is completely unrealistic and I wish that she was able to actually react. There was no claustrophobia, no fear, no indignant rage over her rapidly impending death, no lamentation, hardly any tears. She waits to meet her death with a grim stoicism that borders on apathy. Here again, for the second week in a row, Beckett was given the opportunity to flash back on past events in more than just a surface-y, Clip Show level -- to rage that she survived a bullet wound and a tiger and a bombing once already, that despite her decision to remain a moral being and keep the person she hates most alive, she is still going to die here in a freak accident, and she has to wait, tortuously, for that grisly death to come, while her partner feeds her false promises and the bomb unit under her feet gives up.

Just thinking about it, there are a hundred things I would have done differently with this episode. It would have been a lot more interesting to have Beckett actually break down, to have to deal with being unable to move as terror builds pressure in her blood. That coupled with rage toward herself for the decisions she's made and to the universe for stripping her of her life when she'd only so recently gotten it back would cause her to eventually lash out at Castle, to finally blow loose the misgivings she's had over their relationship in a petty attack aimed toward reducing her stress. Poor Castle would be doing his best to remain positive in the face of increasingly grim circumstances, trying to balance his own terror and sharp, internal keening against her needs, but would find himself at a loss at her sudden outburst, at once gaining piercing insight into his behavior and her perception of their relationship. Beckett would see immediately that she's hurt him, and the rage would drain away for just a moment as she rapidly, if somewhat shortly, apologizes and retracts back within herself. After she's saved, late in the night, Castle would tentatively return to her concerns, appreciating deeply how close he'd been to losing her and filled with the desire to make things right before time slips away from them, before either of them have a chance to step on another bomb.

To heighten emotional tension, just at the climax, when there's ten minutes to go, I'd have Castle bodily removed from her, on the insistence of the bomb squad leader. Castle would refuse, for the first time showing anger himself, because he finds himself suddenly, hotly enraged by the fact that Beckett's going to die and there's nothing he can do about it, and he can't even be there with her till the end. He too would be thinking about almost losing her to some gunman two years ago, thinking about the endless, stupid risks, about the fact that he's only just gotten to connect to her with the intimacy he's always wanted from her. He can't bring himself to walk out the door and say goodbye. He can't cope with the fact that this morning he was making hearts in her coffee, coffee she was never able to drink, and by tomorrow he's going to have to try to figure out what to do with the clothes she'd tossed casually over his dresser the night before and with what he's going to tell her father and what's going to happen when he goes into the precinct and sees her desk precisely as she left it. Then Beckett would look him straight in the eyes, suddenly strong and brave and stoic, and she would beg him quietly to leave. And Castle would have to stand there looking at her, wanting more than anything to reach across the spray-painted line and kiss her and carry her home, but be unable to so much as touch her, and then he would have to leave her. And then I would have done a big, wide shot of him walking off frame and out of the room, leaving Beckett in this vacuous, silent space. And then, finally, she would have broken completely, shaking and sobbing even as she stands perfectly still, lost in enough negative space to make Sherlock jealous. Fade to black.

Castle would call the precinct, tell them what's going on, demand they give him something he can use to break the code. On having his wild epiphany, he would break away from the bomb squad leader, who would try and fail to restrain him, and he would run full melt back into the apartment and back to Beckett. Her grief would immediately be replaced with rage upon his re-entrance, for his failure to respect her wish that he not die with her, for continuing to try to seduce her with false promises for survival, when by her count she's less than two minutes left, terrified afresh now not just because she's going to die, but because she knows that Castle will not have time to clear the building even if he were to listen to her and run. She hates him for forcing her to shoulder his death in addition to her own, and she rages against him in a bitter, grief-stricken torrent. Castle, angry at her now both for having accepted her death and for being angry at him, lashes right back at her, but shortly, and tells her that he came back because he's willing to gamble his life on how sincerely he believes himself to be right about the code word, and that she does not, in fact, bear the weight of the world upon her shoulders. He tells her that she isn't going to die. Maybe he even makes a meta joke about them having Plot Armor, because they're the main characters in his book. Beckett, having quieted in the face of his passion, love, and conviction, points out that he killed off Derrick Storm. Castle, having no adequate response, simply holds up the bomb remote and punches in the code. When it disarms, Beckett is still frozen for a moment, waiting for the blast, but when it doesn't come she abruptly falls sobbing into Castle, raging at him for being an idiot before he cuts her off by kissing her. She meets him with aggression born out of the terrified, electric energy still coursing through her soul and her blood, and they spend a long time like that, lip-locked and appreciating their ability to touch each other again. They break apart once the bomb squad leader re-enters, and then they both shakily return to their feet and walk out of the apartment.

Meanwhile, Esposito and Ryan, who had dashed to their car the second Castle had gotten off the line with them, are racing to the apartment, both filled with the unspoken dread that Castle had indeed gone back into that building, and that both him and Beckett are now dead. When they arrive to find that the building is not destroyed, for a moment they think that maybe they don't have the time right, that they got there before the bomb was set to blow, and that they're both about to witness something awful, which Ryan verbalizes to a small extent by starting to say something like "Javie, I..." and being unable to finish the thought. Just as he says this, in the background we see Beckett and Castle exiting the building, and then the two cops run to meet them, relieved at first, then, within a beat, overjoyed. Cue happy reunion and cop humor.

Again, that night, Beckett and Castle would finally have a moment, finally start a frank, adult conversation. Whether or not it'd be something included in the episode, I'm not sure. Probably I would just have them start it, and then do the typical close-up reaction thing, and then I would imply that they do indeed have it, fade to black, and next episode they seem healed.

And that is how I would have written "Still," more or less. I also would have had no music, at all. It would've been one of those episodes marked by its silence, offering, hopefully, a gravity and nakedness similar to that in "The Body" (Buffy). Just thinking about "Still" being produced in this fashion, instead of the Clip Show route they chose to go, makes me sadder about the episode than before.

Please, for the love of god, let Bracken die in the finale.

Re: Castle "The Squab and the Quail"

(this post contains heavy spoilers for Castle, late s3-s5)

I lied yesterday when I said the only thing I wanted to talk about was Sherlock. The reality is, I also really want to talk about Castle. So that's what I'm going to do. Tomorrow will more than likely be when I get to Sherlock and his boingy curls...

At any rate, to Castle. Castle is one of those shows I've been following for a few years now. I didn't bother to give it a chance until I was strong-armed into doing so after the s3 finale, mostly because I took one look at it when it came around as a mid-season replacement (as I recall, anyway) and said to myself "Ugh, another clone." And the reality is, I wasn't exactly wrong: it very much is another clone, and for all its quasi-frequent bouts of extreme gloriousness (thinking of a few choice gems, most notable of which was probably "Close Encounters"), the show suffers from several unfortunate syndromes, not the least of which is its plots. Don't get me wrong, the show has all the most important ingredients to turn me obsessive (quite successfully), starting with Kate Beckett (the Woman) and the Canadian population (SK and NF, former of whom has an accent that never ever stops making me laugh), and ending somewhere with Nathan Fillion (who is, as far as I'm convinced, impossible not to love, even when I was rooting for him to die in a horrible, grisly fashion during his stay on Buffy...sidenote, Xaaaaaandeeeerrrrrr nooooooooooo, Fillion, whyyy??). I have at least six Castle fics lying abandoned between two computers, one of which I'm still legitimately proud of and will hopefully one day actually finish. I have all the boxsets, and the books. I even have a puzzle I found once for $20 when I was wandering around the mall.

My point is, I love the show, I've thought about it a lot, and prior to the whole...Bracken...thing, I'd even devoted something like six+ hours to working out Beckett's mother's murder and who I thought the responsible party would turn out to be (spoiler: I was wrong). It's because of all this that I feel justified in criticizing it, and there are times, especially lately, where I almost can't contain myself. This is one of those times.

So "Squab and the Quail." I had approached Monday skeptically, given I'd seen the ads for the last minute episode switcheroo, and while I was overcome with joy at seeing Ioan Gruffudd again (given his association with the hole in my heart that was once Ringer; oh my soapy show, how I mourn you), that feeling died rather quickly upon seeing the rest of the ad, and the episode. I'll be the first to tell you, I was never a "Caskett" fan. Not ever. Not for half a second. Shipping has never been my thing, and the sorts of plots realized and/or unrequited romance lead to are just never good, unless Joss Whedon writes them, and, clearly, he's not writing this. Part of me longs to write a long, exploratory post on why Castle does a crap job of writing a compelling romance, but that is for another day, because while I didn't enjoy "Squab," it wasn't entirely because of the annoying "will she be faithful?""do I love him?" angst (though I could fill a post just on that). I didn't enjoy it because of one scene.

this scene, or, to be more precise, this moment

This is not because of the sneak attack kiss. That was stupid, but it wasn't episode-ruining, and, frankly, who wouldn't want to kiss Ioan Gruffudd? No, it was because, to reiterate, of this...

I had to pause at this point. I saw at that moment something potentially beautiful, potentially wonderful, potentially actually interesting, and as I saw it, I knew, without any doubt, that they'd never go there. And that thought was confirmed with a few minutes.

yep

So what, if you haven't already guessed, was the thing to which I'm alluding? More than likely, you've glanced the pictures below, and have guessed, but I'll proceed as if you haven't.

I'm all about character continuity and flow, and the more enigmatic, erratic, mistrusting, and self-destructive a character is, and the more they have to deal with the consequences of these traits, the more I am helplessly drawn in. Throw in Mortal Danger of the Constant Kind, Brave Self-Sacrifice, and Long Lasting Ramifications and that's it. My personal life is done for. This is why Crossing Jordan and Buffy together occupy the pinnacle of television to me. This is why I would follow Joss Whedon to the ends of Hell. This is why "Knockout" transformed me from interested to crazoid in the span of ten minutes (and is probably the reason that that was the episode that convinced my friend I had to watch Castle). And this is why "Squab" was disappointing, more so than it otherwise was. I'll now make my case.

"Knockout" and "Rise," AKA Sleepless Night and Endless Rerun AKA The closest Castle has ever been to Buffy

I'm not going to claim for a moment that anything about the s3 finale and s4 premiere was original, but, then again, I've never really cared for originality, and as far as I'm concerned, those two episodes were pretty fantastic. Maybe someday I'll talk about why I loved those episodes, but not here. For now, the only baseline point is that, to me, those two episodes were interesting and compelling, for reasons that should now be somewhat clear. I would also like to point out that while I'm not a fan of Caskett, I am a ridiculous fan of Beckett and, to a lesser degree, Castle, and there is lot to their relationship that I really, truly enjoy. As obsessed as I am with the Woman, she can only barely outshine how much I love her Loyal Friend and Compatriot.

With that said, it should come as absolutely no surprise that I loved the unliving crap out of "Kill Shot." While I recognize the episode's faults after many reruns, I still rank it just below "Rise" on my list of top Castle episodes. PTSD episodes are no more original than the lead character getting shot or getting cancer, but, as I said before, that doesn't matter, and that episode really helped cement Beckett as a permanent member of my favorite character list, which, incidentally, doubles as my dream team in the event of a zombie apocalypse. But as much as I loved "Kill Shot," as with "Rise," on its end I found myself disappointed that long-term trauma from Beckett's near-death experience wasn't going to be a thing. Castle is, at its core, more of a comedy, and while I wanted nothing more than "Buffy s6 v2: On the General Misery and Extended Free-Fall of Kate Beckett, NYPD," I knew that that wasn't going to happen. Still, "Kill Shot" planted within me a deep-seated hope that Castle was capable of being deep, of recognizing the trauma never completely heals, and of allowing Beckett to be more interesting, dynamic, and morally relaxed. The s4 finale pretty much killed that hope (as did "Recoil"), but "Squab" did as good as flatten it.

But why get so upset over squandered opportunity in an MOTW, and a fairly vapid one at that? Because it shows a clear amount of thoughtlessness, and a rather glaring crack in character continuity, as upsetting as the fact that Beckett has a scar from her bullet wound but not from the sternum spreader they used to sunder her chest.

but they cracked you open like a walnut...

I realize that there are several reasons Castle cannot be Buffy. It's a different genre, a different format, and it carries wildly different expectations. It could have chosen to be as intense and interesting as Buffy, back when it was still deciding what it wanted to be in s2, but the time has since passed (though why no one has taken this overdone "cop with dead mother" thing and ran somewhere brutal with it is beyond me...I guess Crossing Jordan is as close as there is at the moment). I accept what it's set out to do, even though I think potential is being thrown away ("Recoil," I'm looking at you). But it's one thing to not go there, to avoid characters falling into emotional pits by simply choosing to travel through roads that are pitless, and it's another to willfully drive over pits and pave them over. I say this, because this is Beckett, slightly less than two years ago.

this is them about to crack you open like said walnut

And this is Beckett a little over a year ago.

hey, look! negative space!

And this was Beckett Monday.

standing right in front of that window, no sweat

This should not be. There is absolutely no reason why she wouldn't have had a reaction similar to what we saw in "Kill Shot." In KS, Beckett isn't shot at or directly targeted. The mere idea of the sniper sends her spiraling. One could attempt to make the argument that she's since healed, but its been less than two years since she was dying on a table with small paddles around her heart, and every day she has to live with several scars from her ordeal (both from the bullet and the tube they jabbed through her ribcage). No one can just get over that, especially not so rapidly, yet she's standing in front of that window probably at most an hour after a sniper bullet came within a foot of her face. At the very least, she should've been nervous about getting near the window, and should have kept near the walls, no matter how much she wanted to save face. The fact that she didn't means the writers didn't think about her history, and the fact that they didn't think about it means that her integrity as a good, solid character has been breached. This is one of those small, yet completely inexcusable continuity breaks, because this scene so easily could have been done without a sniper being involved. The fact that they chose to go the route of a sniper without having any desire to work with what I feel would have been Beckett's very real reaction to such a situation disappoints me a lot. Not only would it have been interesting to see the continued affect her ordeal has on her, it would have immediately thrown into light how ridiculous Castle's jealousy and her concerns about his commitment truly are, and it could have led to a frank, adult, down-to-earth discussion about their worries -- which would truly be a first, given how immaturely their relationship is handled. (And speaking of Castle, I'm not going to forgive him either for it not even occurring to him that the whole sniper thing might have upset her at a deeper level than it might have anyone else...)

Castle is filled with little moments like this, filled with missed opportunities and depth exchanged for shallow relationship-oriented angst. Why this one is the one that stuck with me so hard, I can't really say; maybe it's just the timing, what with me now having this nifty outlet. I won't condemn the show for what it is, and I'll be the first to admit that the Ring and Rear Window parodies were both excellent and hilarious, but it seems a shame to me that week after week we don't really see much substance from two characters and two actors who are so obviously capable of delivering it.

So here's hoping the whole Beckett, pressure plate thing will turn out for the better. God knows I love Mortal Peril, even if it does make me think of that one She Spies episode...

Things left in seldom opened closets

Freshman year of high school I picked up the piano. I used to spend my breaks in a little closet of a music room, with my laptop positioned precariously on its top, and watch piano tutorials and think to myself “One day, I will be just as good as this guy.” The room was only a few inches longer than the piano, barely had enough space for me to scoot the stool back. I used to think, in those little moments of solace snatched between the general tedium of schoolwork, that I was actively engaged in finding myself. I played for several years, self-taught, with dwindling enthusiasm, until eventually the little electric Yamaha in my room became mostly relegated to the role of extended desk space, and I stopped visiting the closet. I've kept that Yamaha with me through several moves. Today I played it again, and I realized that I had forgotten almost nothing since I'd last played – I could still read, my fingers still remembered the songs I'd spent time learning, and I still screwed up in the same places. I realized that if I'd kept at playing all these years, with just an ounce of discipline, I would've been as decent as that guy in the videos.

When I was six or seven, my parents wanted me to learn the violin, but I stopped within two lessons, convinced it was boring. I own a guitar I only vaguely know how to play. My computer is filled with half-written stories, my desk filled with plans I never bothered to see through. Sometimes I look back at my brief existence and see a road of dead opportunities, of skills never achieved, of experiences never garnered, and I just get incredibly annoyed with myself, and I convince myself I will do better, but then I never do.

I often find myself in the position of feeling terribly unmotivated, and just as often it seems as if I'm surrounded by people with similar proclivities. While the characters I commit so much of my time to studying pursue their passions with a zeal encroaching on obsession, I consistently don't find that quality reflected in anyone I know personally, including myself. I generally chalk this up to my larger theory that television is a form of idealism, but then I remember that there are actual people – lots of people – who find the motivation to do things far more difficult than poke some keys for a few minutes every day. That being motivated isn't simply idealistic, and I can't excuse laziness through the actions of my peers.

Standing there today, going over the sheet music I'd printed out several years ago, I thought again of how easy it is to disappoint yourself. I remember most of the ways I used to project myself into the future: a famous paleontologist, trekking through the Gobi desert; a doctor; then a scientist. I used to see myself with capital letters behind my name, actively fantasized about how I would sign my paperwork and introduce myself. Used to think about my life split between a busy job and a quiet apartment, which I would fill with dulcet music and fairy lights and (eventually) multiple lovers. Now I try not to think about the future.

I don't forgive myself for my mistakes, but the thing about being unmotivated is that it has enabled me to live with disappointment. To accomplish much of anything, I often have to half trick myself, or I have to set up some sort of arbitrary award system. Read five pages? Excellent, take a break. Wrote a paragraph? Fantastic, watch through to ad break on Crossing Jordan. Establish a routine? Make sure I have to prove it by marking its completion on a calendar. It gets to the point where I wonder why I bother to engage in activity at all, if it's apparently so unenjoyable that I have to accept bribes from myself just to get it done. What amazes me is that no amount of self-hatred or screaming desire can seem to energize myself into doing anything. Why do I lament my lack of musical and artistic ability when I take no strides to improve them? Why can't the part of my head that understands and appreciates the difficulty of learning seem to establish communication with the part that controls basic motor function and concentration?

I suppose the answer lies in an extreme lack of discipline, established early on when my decisions to quit things despite lack of trying always went uncontradicted (though I refuse to be so trite as to blame my parents for my failures). Even the act of writing this rambling exposition is a form of procrastination, as I write this as a way to avoid working on the very things I've mentioned. But in defense, it does feel good to admit my weaknesses frankly and unapologetically, so that I may see rather nakedly how ridiculous I am. Maybe this is all just another trick – the act of admitting how pathetic I am publicly will cause me to remedy the situation out of shame (though one could debate how public an unread blog truly is). Or maybe I simply wanted to write about something, and through the myriad of possible topics, this one floated to surface. Whatever the cause, and whatever the result, all I can say for certain is that I almost always get a little melancholic when I watch Lindsey Stirling or Sherlock pluck their violins – and that sucks ass.