For just the second time in Castle's history, no one actually died in a standard procedural episode. The first time this happened was in the penultimate episode of season 1, which concerned the kidnapping of a child, but "Dead Again" took things to the next level. The episode was written by Rob Hanning and directed by Bill Roe.
The ironies and humor came thick and fast, with the 'victim', Alan Masters, a safety inspector, surviving a total of three deadly encounters. Lanie insisted the guy was dead each time, but it wasn't long until he got up and continued to live.
Do you have an explanation?
No, but your husband sure does.
Resident serial theorizer, Rick, had a field day trying to explain the phenomenon that is Alan Masters. Nathan Fillion was at his best in these scenes but guest star Jonathan Silverman deserves his share of the credit for one of the season's best guest performances. I do think this case was a golden opportunity for the creative team to bring the rarely sighted but hilarious Sidney Perlmutter - the possible ways to deploy the character within the episode were almost endless, including getting Lanie and Perlmutter working side by side.
The case itself was reasonable but was overshadowed by the episode's humor along with some more LokSat stuff, which I'll discuss shortly. While doing an outstanding job with most of the humor and the immortality theme, writer Rob Hanning gave the game away when Rick pried from Alan the name of the attractive woman he had his eyes on. It was always going to be Gwen who tried to poison, electrocute and shoot Alan - it was only a matter of time until it was revealed.
Oh my gosh, is that what we sound like?
What was completely unexpected was seeing Lanie and Alan fill each others' sentences while constructing a theory, just as Rick and Kate did quite regularly in Castle's earlier seasons. While the last couple of episode featured Rick and Kate getting some quality couple time together, LokSat reared its ugly head once more, and the pair spent their time together in this episode focusing on the next stage of that journey.
Vikram, the resident tech analyst who only shows up when LokSat is covered in the episode, managed to track down the elusive Caleb Brown. Better yet, Caleb confronted Kate at the precinct where the pair exchanged heated words and veiled threats, but Kate won the day eventually, with the episode's final hour showing Caleb waiting for Rick and Kate to arrive at home where he handed over a phone which was being used to give him orders. He was quite clear in saying that the phone had to be at a specific location at 8am every third Monday in order to work. By my count, the Monday three weeks from now shares the date the eighth season - and possibly series - finale - goes to air. Who would have thought!
Despite the comedy throughout last night's episode, the fact that a man survives three attempts on his life is rather ominous foreshadowing. Since the very early days when Rick and Kate were investigating the murder of Johanna Beckett, there have been more attempts on their lives than I can count. This is television though, and most main characters on these sorts of shows endure this type of thing too, but Kate especially has had more than enough close encounters. Season 3 finale anyone?
Thanks as always for reading! It's a short and sharp review but that's all this episode needed. As always, don't forget to drop your thoughts and theories in the comments below, and check out the press release, promotional photos and promo for next week's episode here.
