(Check out Castle on my website, www.seriesmonitor.com/castle).
It was the best episode of the season, and without a doubt, one of the best episodes the series has seen.
Last night's episode of Castle was masterful combination of exceptional writing, directing, acting, camerawork. It was full of powerful, series defining scenes, and brought an end to multiple storylines spanning several years.
The lead team for Veritas sent very strong signals when the press release was announced on April 21. The episode was penned jointly by Rob Hanning, the expert on dark episodes featuring the long running storylines, and Terence Paul Winter, the series' second most frequent writer, and directed by Rob Bowman, the series' best and most frequent director who has directed no less than 8 season premieres and finales. And boy, did they deliver.
Let's recap the entire episode, because doing only parts of it doesn't do it justice. I'll share my thoughts as I go, and try to leave the theory spinning until the end.
As is typical of episodes featuring past events, Castle began with a recap which I believe is the longest and most comprehensive we've seen in the series. It was 94 seconds in length and featured all the main story arcs we've come to know in the past 3-4 seasons. The volume of content and its comprehensiveness immediately told me that a lot of ground was going to be covered in this episode, and this was definitely the case.
In the present day, the first camera shot we see is of a car tire belonging to Kate's van passing through a puddle. The lighting almost makes the water look red, like blood. The next camera shot shows the deep orange sky as Kate parks the van. Immediately following that, we see the van's transmission being thrust into Park, with the indicator lights also being red.
The thing I want to point out here is that two of those camera angles didn't add anything to the story or show anything significant in their own right, but they showed precise symbolism and attention to detail. The analogy of not judging a book by its cover applies here. This was an excellent opening few seconds, so the initial skepticism about this episode, for me, was quickly diluted.
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| Kate's van tire passing through the puddle |
Shortly after, we see a man in the alley Kate had parked in moments before, get picked up by a town car. While this was occurring, Kate was snapping photos, and two of those camera angles got right up close to the eye she was using to peer through the viewfinder. Again, not a truly necessary camera shot, but it added a lot to the scene thanks to the detailed emotions it conveyed. Kate's pupil was fully dilated, capturing every bit of detail possible. The car leaves, Kate leaps from her seat, and we see the transmission indicator lights. Again, great touches by Bowman and the camera team.
In the morning Kate receives a call from her fiance, and the love and connection between them is instantly visible, almost tangible, before the subject changes to Kate's activities a few hours prior. Both characters immediately turn off the charm, their voices lower, and the intensity lifts. Good actors just change their tone of voice and hope that's enough. Great actors send tingles down the spine of the viewer while altering their mood and increasing the odd heart rate. Needless to say, Stana Katic and Nathan Fillion sit squarely in the "great" category for their performance in this scene and the episode.
Off to the alley where the body of Jason Marks is located. Kate hears the name from Ryan just as she rounds the corner. She freezes immediately, almost as if there's a force field surrounding the body. The mood, intensity and heart rate of the viewer lifts again. The body is slumped in a position eerily similar to that of Johanna Beckett. Another unique camera angle shows the distance between Kate and the body in between the closeups of her facial expressions as she struggles to process the scene in front of her and ask the questions she typically asks upon arrival at a crime scene. She departs hastily moments later. The closeups of Kate are much more abundant in this episode, and Stana Katic's expressions in said shots are nothing short of stunning.
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| Kate distances herself from the body |
Back at the precinct, Ryan and Espozito discuss their progress to date, with the news of the hour being the sighting of one of Kate's longest arch-enemies, Vulcan Simmons, who was in the car with the victim she'd photographed in the alley the night prior. Moments later, the elevator doors open and Castle disembarks. The relief to see each other on both Kate and Castle's faces is immediately apparent. They do what they do best, formulating their theories together, with Castle coming at the situation from a different angle and netting a good result.
Gates interrupts soon after. She had done her research, and she knew that Simmons and Kate is like hell in a handbasket. She understood with absolute clarity that this guy was important, but she was also aware that a case is only as good as its weakest bit of evidence. At home, Kate gets a call from Ryan, informing her that they couldn't arrest Simmons due to lack of evidence. Yet another dead end in a mystery that has slowly deepened over the last 5 years. While Castle sleeps peacefully, Kate trawls through photos she's taken in the weeks prior, searching for clues.
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| Vulcan Simmons |
Kate and Castle arrive at the garage at the same time, and this time the victim's body is free of force fields, with all the team up close. Among the group is Captain Gates, who has left the office for what could be described as a change of scenery. Ryan and Espozito take Castle aside and reveal that witnesses has seen someone matching Kate's description in the area during the night. Kate comes clean in the precinct, telling Castle what happened. The elevator dings, but with a much less friendly cargo, namely Gates' Internal Affairs successor Captain Marcus Donovan. At the same time, a visibly worried Lanie calls, stating that Simmons was killed with her gun. Again, note the camera angles and Lanie's position while she talks on the phone. Another great touch by Bowman and the team. Captain Gates is given the same news at the same time by Donovan, as he addresses her using her first name. But before he can lock down the building, Kate slips away, and a defiant Castle sits innocently in the break room. After a short interrogation, strategically positioned Ryan and Espozito hold a conference on the way to the elevator, revealing the presence of Michael Smith, further deepening the mystery.
Later, a dressed down Kate takes Castle by surprise at the swing set where he proposed to her almost a year ago, and where Kate sat in the pouring rain after failing to get to the bottom of her mother's death a year before that. I thought the use of that location was a great idea, chiefly thanks to the highs and lows that have occurred there, and in addition because it's the only place outside of their homes or the precinct that they seem to frequent. Kate comes to the conclusion that she has, in her words, overplayed her hand, and that it's highly likely that she will pay the price. Castle once again comes up with another idea, and enlists Espozito to track down the doctor who signed Smith's death certificate on May 19 2011. The hospital he works at is the couple's next destination.
At the hospital, Kate's photo appears on the news - the responsibility of which Kate and Castle attribute to Senator Bracken. As they are fleeing, Castle's burner phone rings, with Smith on the other end. He instructs Castle to meet him at the parking lot they've met at on previous occasions. Smith reveals that a former associate of Bracken had made a recording of a conversation they had in order to protect himself. Both Smith and Bracken had been trying to locate and recover the tape for over a year but had come up empty. Jason Marks was about to reveal information to Smith that would have ended Bracken's career, but Bracken had him killed before he got the chance to divulge. Smith gives a clear warning to Kate and Castle to run, or they'll be killed.
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| Captain Gates talks to Ryan and Espozito |
In a shady hotel room, Castle leaves to source a car. As Kate prepares to dye her hair, she pauses to admire her mother's ring which resides around her neck. A creak arouses her suspicion, and she steps into the living area to see none other than Senator Bracken standing in front of her. What follows is one of the better good vs evil faceoffs you'll see on television in the last few years. Bracken leaves the room and his armed henchmen proceed to set up Kate's death. They force a sedative into her mouth and begin pouring alcohol down her throat to frame an alcohol induced suicide. Some more wonderful camera angles here. But Kate was smart. She didn't swallow the pill, and she went along with the setup until she got the window of opportunity to escape. Both her captors went down, but one gave her a pretty solid blow to the head with a bottle.
Sorry, this wasn't well done at all. The bottle's impact didn't even move Kate's head! Yes this is Hollywood but this should have been executed more realistically. That aside, Stana Katic's acting during the scene, especially as the concussion and alcohol overcame her, were very impressive. But the symbolism here was excellent. In the season 5 episode, titled "Kill Shot" where Beckett was nearly overcome by the bottle, but this time she beat it. Shortly after she collapses, Kate is picked up and carried to the car by Castle and they drive north towards Canada.
The next sequence of scenes is critical to understanding the sequence of events that has brought the series to this point. Kate is recounting memories in her sleep, the most prominent being that of Montgomery finding Kate browsing the archives section. They don't appear to have met before, but Montgomery is well aware of his connection to Kate and her mother though Kate wasn't aware at the time. He tells Kate that the answers to an unsolved case are probably not in the archived case files. Instead, he directs her to Johanna Beckett's personal items. The series enters a turning point in its history with the realization by Kate when she wakes up that it was Montgomery who made that recording that Smith and Bracken have tried and failed to locate. Castle and Kate turn the car around and head back to New York.
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| Captain Montgomery talks to Kate in a flashback |
At Kate's apartment, Ryan and Espozito provide the simplest of distractions allowing Castle and Kate enough time to get to the box of Johanna Beckett's possessions. In her haste, Kate drops the box and everything spills onto the floor. My cynical side flew into life here, because it's exceedingly rare that anyone drops anything on a television show or in a movie. It just doesn't happen. Especially a box full of vital personal items -- unless -- there is a reason for it. Yes, Castle discovered the Johanna Beckett's appointment book and the code she had created as a result of the drop, but I'm not certain that that's the end of it. I'm thinking Castle may have spotted something else among the pile which will come to fruition later on. I could be overthinking this, but this series has left far more subtle clues in among it previously..
Meanwhile, in the journal, Castle interprets an appointment in the appointments book in a different way, discovering that Johanna Beckett had been planning to give a tape containing evidence to her husband. The door is promptly flattened, with Donovan's men charging through and taking Ryan, Espozito, Kate, and Castle into custody.
Back at the precinct, Kate and Castle share a kiss in their most intimate moment together in the episode, when Kate, for a change, is the one to spot the outlier that holds the key to solving the case, just like Castle has done dozens of times in the past. It's the family of elephants that has kept her company all these years, that have kept the evidence secret. The team waste no time in playing the tape.
Again, a nice touch of detail here by the creative team. In every single recording I've heard in a television show or movie, the good guys press play and the incriminating voice is right there. But, finally, someone has done it right! This tape had the sound of footsteps, people walking around, chairs moving, breathing, and doors opening and closing - 17 seconds of it in fact! But the proof is in the pudding. It is revealed that the then District Attorney William Bracken was aware of the antics Detectives Roy Montgomery, John Raglan, and Gary McCallister were up to back in the day, and was blackmailing them to, one must assume, get a slice of the pie. It all blew up in their faces when the trio killed undercover FBI agent Bob Armen in the process of trying to kidnap gangster Joe Pulgatti. To cover their backs, they pinned the murder on Pulgatti, who proclaimed his innocence. Lawyer Johanna Beckett was the only one to reach out and help Pulgatti, but before she was gunned down by hitman Dick Coonan, it seems that Montgomery's conscience got the better of him, so in order to secure his wellbeing he made the incriminating recording, and later used that as leverage to protect himself and Kate.
In Washington, Bracken is addressing the media when Kate rounds a corner in the background. I loved this contrast between the corner she froze at when she came across Jason Marks' body, and the corner she rounded as she slowly and deliberately approached Bracken. Finally, Kate could slap the handcuffs on the man behind it all, and bring him to justice - something her mother was struck down attempting to do. As Bracken turned around and placed his hands behind his back, you could see the weight ascending from Kate's shoulders. It was a beautiful moment, and one of the most powerful television scenes I've seen in my time. The only thing missing here was Kate reading Bracken his rights.
The stairs Kate escorted Bracken down were an important piece of symbolism for her and for the series. The man who had ascended to power by stepping on top of, and crushing, countless others in the process, was now back down the bottom, where he began and will stay. When Kate handed Bracken off to Ryan and Espozito, this was an acknowledgement that they had played a part in bringing Bracken down from the top of those stairs. This was masterful directing. While this occurred, Castle stood off to the side. You could see the elation in his eyes as he watched the woman he loved finally get the closure she had been seeking all these years, while he himself helped point Kate in the right direction and give her new avenues to pursue when he had Dr. Clark Murray take a look at Johanna Beckett's autopsy report behind Kate's back in 2009 - an act which nearly ended the then brief relationship. The final scene in the episode shows Kate and Castle embracing as Bracken heads for the cells in a patrol car.
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| Senator Bracken is escorted down the stairs by Kate |
Overall, this episode was excellent. It went well beyond my expectations in many different areas. There is no series on television which has a romance as well developed and nurtured than that of Castle, and this was on show in Veritas. Castle's procedural format is very unorthodox in the way that it dedicates only two or three episodes per season to the storyline that's been with the series since day one. I've long been a critic of this format because it has taken 5 years and involves a storyline which, by the standards set by other series, is not as complex because the creative team has told it in barely a dozen episodes. Continuity has at times been spotty, and with months between episodes, remembering what happened any period of time ago is difficult. But what is unquestionable is the quality of these episodes, because they are all among the best television the series, and the drama genre has to offer. The weekly switches between "dark" and "light" themed episodes always works like a charm, and no other series has anywhere near the amount of success Castle has had in executing this approach.
I was also very pleased to see Reuben Santiago-Hudson return for an appearance. The visual flashback as opposed to something written down or a memory, made the whole story fit together much better. In the third season finale, Montgomery said to Castle that he first found Kate after hours, with a flashlight and a bankers box, studying the case. The flashback didn't seem to be completely factually correct because there was no flashlight or bankers box in sight. This could have been done a bit better.
The symbolism throughout the episode was also outstanding. I've pointed out several in the recap of the episode already, but one I haven't mentioned is the title: Veritas. The inscription on Johanna Beckett's headstone, and the saying Kate mentioned, is Vincit Omnia Veritas, which is Latin for "Truth Conquers All Things." The word "Veritas" is the name of the goddess of truth from Roman mythology. Veritas is the daughter of Saturn, who, among other things, is the god of liberation. Veritas is the mother of Virtue, the meaning of which is self-explanatory.
What I'm gathering from the title is that the Johanna Beckett storyline has now ended in the way we know it. This episode revealed to us the perpetrator, gave us the evidence, and an arrest was made. Theoretically, that's that, but there are still some unanswered questions which will continue to eat away at me over the Summer break, and which leave some doors open for exploration in later episodes. Some of these questions include why Johanna Beckett did not have the tape on her the night she was murdered. She must have known not to take it with her. Also, the reincarnation of Michael Smith didn't seem right. Furthermore, another of his (and presumably Montgomery's) associates was revealed, in the form of Dr. Oliver Pressing. What's known is that Smith had a lot of faith and trust in both Montgomery and Pressing. It's likely the relationship won't be explored unless Pressing or Smith do resurface, either dead or alive.
Thirdly, was it really an associate of Bracken that tortured Simmons? The reason I ask is that we saw no gun being taken from Beckett's apartment, we saw no torture scene, and we don't have any idea why Bracken would want to interrogate Simmons considering he would know all there was to know about him anyway. I'm not accusing Kate of the murder because of the lack of evidence, but I don't think it can be ruled out either. And lastly, the documents that Cole Maddox was about to collect before he tripped the boobie trap which blew up, killing him and destroying the documents. What was in them? Surely there would be more than a bank account number in the name of Bracken. They may no longer be relevant unless there was evidence that would help further convict Bracken when he sees his day in court. Montgomery's and Kate's last line of defense was those documents, so they must still be relevant in some way, shape or form. The tape recording came out of nowhere in this episode, adding further fuel to the fire surrounding these documents. I have more questions too, but I won't bore you with those.
What I'm seeing here is that there's more to come, but it may gravitate away from Johanna Beckett, with the focus potentially being on the conviction of Bracken. After all, Castle isn't Castle without an overreaching story arc, so it wouldn't surprise me if a new arc appears from nowhere in the (fingers crossed) Season 7 premiere. We will just have to wait and see. What I do hope, however, is a storyline other than 3XK, which I loathe with a passion. The series needs something that caters for new fans of the series while also tying back to the series' roots. I'm sure the creative team will think of something, but one idea I would be in favor of is Castle working to decipher Johanna Beckett's code.
I could go on for another 4 hours (the length of time I've been writing this piece) with my thoughts on Veritas and the series in general, but I think now's a good time to end and turn the floor over to you all in the comments. Before I go, I must shout out to series creator Andrew Marlowe, episode writers Rob Hanning and Terence Paul Winter, and director Rob Bowman. The actors, Nathan Fillion, Stana Katic, Jon Huertas, Seamus Dever, and Penny Johnson Jerald, along with the supporting cast, deserve a huge pat on the back for their excellent work in this episode and throughout the season. Musical magician Rob Duncan also deserves a mention for his wonderful score, and the camera crew, editors, and all the other behind-the-scenes crew members deserve to be congratulated on a job well done. I mustn't forget the network that makes this series possible - ABC, and ABC Studios.
As always, thank you so much for reading. I'm really looking forward to a light-hearted Castle-style wedding to close out the season. Be sure to share your thoughts in the comments below because I'm sure you'll have plenty, and check out Castle on my website, www.seriesmonitor.com/castle.
Jimmy.
