metaphor

No, I enjoyed it more than I expected to, especially after the huge disappointment I felt last week. I actually laughed out loud at certain points, which I haven't done in a long time while watching Castle. I liked the energy. (Mostly. I thought the Beckett/Vikram investigating scenes were really discordant with the rest of the episode. Maybe that's what they were going for, but they took me out of the episode at times.) I thought Nathan was fantastic throughout the episode, both in the more comedic moments, and in the times when Castle's struggle shone through. And I think those glasses can stick around. I liked Beckett's love eyeballs and loving looks, because Stana really has those down pat. I even enjoyed Alexis, as implausible as it is that Castle would really drag her around to potentially dangerous places that way, and even Vikram, who provided some light in those really serious Loksat moments. I also liked Castle with the boys. But all of the above does require me to handwave the overarching break-up plot. I've read a few well-articulated posts on Tumblr trying to explain why Beckett's behavior makes sense, but I remain largely unconvinced. I see where they're coming from, but seeing her in "badass and determined" mode in the face of Castle's confusion and pain leaves me troubled with her choice.

Ha. I was coming here to say that as well. Surprising. Then again, TVLine tweeted that 90% of those who responded to their survey on whether fans plan to stick with Castle plan to stay, if not till the wheels fall off, at least till the winter finale. So perhaps we're really down to Castle's core audience at this point.

I thought the official Richard Castle twitter account was bent on ignoring this latest Caskett development, then they went and posted this: @WriteRCastle: What’s your favorite rom-com moment where the guy wins back the girl? Asking for a friend. Oh, Castle.

Dropping off this link to another one, with slight spoilers for the season, with a sneak peek from tonight's episode. At least Castle isn't improbably undercover. And I have to say I love Professor Castle's look, a lot.

Yet more of AH and TPW talking about the "breakup" (their words) here. Also includes a sneak peek from tonight's episode with Beckett and the boys. A couple of answers to questions that have been bandied about in threads here: How will the precinct feel about the split? WINTER: Figuratively, mommy and daddy are fighting, and it has a toll on Esposito, on Ryan, on Lanie and also on Alexis and Martha. They’re not trying to take sides, but they’re deeply affected. What’s exciting about what we’re going to be doing — and you’ll see that in episode 3 — is that we kind of have this return to the fun even though Castle and Beckett are in this new paradigm of their relationship. Will we get to see more of Castle’s stepmom? HAWLEY: We will definitely get to her but spoiler alert: we’re not going to get to her in the near future. Also: How will this affect the DNA of the show? Will Castle and Beckett have separate storylines? HAWLEY: It’s not so much giving them separate storylines, although Beckett is obviously going on a secret mission of sorts. It does give them some separate issues that they’re dealing with but at the same time, it’s still ultimately about their relationship and it’s still them figuring out how this new paradigm works between the two of them where Beckett is trying to keep him at a distance to keep him safe and not let him get on to what she’s doing and he’s of course intent on winning her back. In terms of the dynamic at the precinct, nobody really understands why this is happening, and Castle doesn’t even really understand why. Beckett just basically asked him to trust her that she has something to work out, so there’s definitely some unsureness going on but Castle is determined and therefore we have a lot of fun with that and you know, Beckett is in love with him so that doesn’t go away even though she’s got this thing going on. WINTER: And this is going to sound cheesy and I apologize in advance: The thing about it is that Beckett is “breaking up” with Castle out of love. It’s not because “I can’t stand to be around you” or “I don’t think this is working out” or “I want to see other people” — that’s not what it’s about. It’s out of love. “I want to keep this man safe and the only way to do it is to put distance between us.” That’s the struggle that we’re playing around with, especially in the first third of the season. I think this lends some credence to the theory that something happens around 8.07 or 8.08 that makes Beckett rethink her stance. Though going by hal, it doesn't result in a reconciliation, so I don't really know.

As someone who's been pro-Alex/Charlie from the start, I'm really enjoying this season. I love how their relationship is mutually supportive. I also really liked Alex's storyline in this episode, and her standing up to Dr. Lavine. And I never thought I'd say this in the beginning, but a dose of Dawn is always welcome. I'm a bit confused: Is Maggie really leaving Hope Zion?

Sandaxf posted a synopsis of 8.05, The Nose. They really will be working cases together in every episode, it seems.

Ha. That made me laugh, verdana, because that's exactly what I thought. Oh, we'll know why by episode 7, won't we? Goodness. I think I'm still a bit broken by the episode. I'm usually much more (quietly) positive about the show than this.

Promotional stills from PhDead. That center still. Whiplash, indeed.

I had been banking on 8.09 as the fall finale because I really can't imagine "Cool Boys" focusing on Castle and Slaughter as the send-off episode to the hiatus. Unless Slaughter is there to reveal something heretofore unknown about Castle's time away. It's funny; on tumblr people seem to be predicting a reunion or a pregnancy as the big shift. I'm a bit more wary and think they might shift to Castle's time away at that point. Castlecentric drama, this time, to balance out the scales again.

Molly also said: @MollyQuinn93: @castlefan1012 Alexis will definitely support her dad, but she is smart enough to know there is something larger afoot. Regarding the long winter hiatus, I sure hope they end on a good note with the fall finale. I guess it will be episode 8.09, since it's likely Hanning's episode will open sweeps.

Yes. I liked that scene, as well as the one where Castle saves the day with his gun contraption. But then that just makes me think of how much I agree with him that they can figure anything out together, and my irritation with the contrivances of the episode ending returns.

So there has been some character development.

If we go by the showrunners' comments, the reason for Beckett's moving out isn't very clear to Castle. TVLINE | And just to be clear, Rick was never looped in on the stepmother Rita of it all? He also believes Allison Hyde was in fact leading all of this? HAWLEY | Correct. He thinks that it’s over. But he knows that it opened a door that Beckett had closed inside of her. Now she’s obviously trying to close it again and he wants to help her, but he doesn’t know that she’s got a new obsession. He just knows that it all blew up in his face. And thinking about that makes me even sadder for him.

Per TVLine, Stana's contract is for all 22 episodes of the season. So I think we can expect to see Beckett in every episode, just not always in scenes with Castle as in previous seasons. And if Stana's also gotten one day off each week (which is likely), overall screentime can be expected to drop some. On the upside? She's not gone. I would be too, if she were.

I thought the discussion about absence and increased libido was supposed to portend the separated Caskett dynamic. So maybe that's partially why they had her be his wife.

Apparently, we're up for another big shift in the fall finale: WINTER | Here’s the thing: The end of [Episode 2] is a whopper. I mean, the way Stana and Nathan played it was amazing. And we both understand that people are a little leery now of what the show is going to be, and they should be. But if they [stay tuned] and see what we’re doing and see how that energy comes back, I hope they’ll be pleasantly surprised about what opportunities are in store for us now that we’ve made this choice. This thing is going to constantly evolve, which is something we promised when we took over the show. It’s not just going to be this dynamic from here to the end of the season. By the time we get to the end of our fall finale, there’s another shift and change that’s going to happen that’s incredibly dynamic. And that will lead us into even more interesting storytelling that will bring them together in a fun way. TVLINE | So, we don’t have 20 episodes of angst ahead of us. HAWLEY | No, no, not at all. As hard as it might be to believe, Episodes, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 are a lot of fun. We’re doing the standalone cases, we are keeping continuity with Beckett’s journey, but we’re also putting Castle and Beckett in situations together that have electricity to them, and we’re having some fun guest characters. As Terence said, by the time we get to our fall finale we’re shifting the dynamic again, so the audience is along for something of a ride, but one that ultimately is really fun.

A couple of post-mortem (how fitting) interviews with Winter and Hawley: GMMR TVLine

First post-mortem with Hawley and Winter for this ep -- with Marisa Roffman. “Hard choices are being made, painful choices are being made — with painful repercussions — but what drew them together will continue to draw them together,” Hawley said. “The fight for that relationship will still exist. This season will be about the journey of that relationship. Happiness is not dramatic. At the end of the day, they’ve been through so much together.” “Between the two of us, we’ve written about 25 episodes, and they’re some of the most shipper-friendly episodes in the history of the show,” Winter pointed out. “I get [any upset feelings]. The show means a lot to us, too. And that’s why we’re going to protect it. And that’s why it’s always going to be about Castle and Beckett and the love story.” “There’s fun,” Hawley said. “I was here in [seasons] 2, 3, 4, before they got together. So the spark of that will they, won’t they, and how clearly they were in love with each other was palpable. That energy was palpable. That’s what this is about. It’s about that energy.” I think that last part is what some fans are worried about. Hawley may be attached to that WT/WT energy, but they've grown so much since then (or at least I thought they had. Until this episode.) And I really don't know how you snap back to that fun dynamic given how painful it must be to both parties to have to be apart like this. And then there's this from tvline, which annoyingly put the word divorce in the link of its article. Apparently, this is what the writers were going for: TVLINE | I felt like she was almost speaking to the audience at that point. Like, “Put down the pitchforks, everyone….” HAWLEY | Look, the most important thing for us is to A) tell a compelling dynamic story, but B) protect these characters. When we first started talking about doing this, the thing at the forefront was: How do we do it in a way that hopefully nobody gets mad at the characters? They can get mad at us, but… Beckett is doing this for the right reasons in her head, which is, “I have this obsession that I don’t know how to deal with yet, but if I go down this road with Castle, he could get killed.” We’ve just seen what happens when these people know you’re looking into [LOCKSAT], so she makes a conscious choice to do it without him, because she knows that no matter what she says to him, if he knows what’s going on he’s going in there with her — and she can’t have that.

I'm actually curious and will be waiting for that at 11 PST, just to see what they thought they were doing. It's funny, though, the blind item called it possibly Fall TV's most divisive event, but I feel like there won't be much, if any, taking sides. The blame will be laid on squarely on one person, and as much as I love Beckett, I kind of think it would be justified given how they wrote those last five minutes.

Yep. After seeing the ending, I was even like... when you said what you said to Vikram earlier, did you just mean the captaincy? Because by the end it was her professional life she got to keep, while she left her personal life in tatters. And all after Alexis said she was family. Very curious to see how Alexis will react to this move.

Maybe it's the shock of seeing it actually play out onscreen despite having been spoiled for weeks if not months now, but I'm kind of broken up over this episode. That conversation with Rita in the end... it seemed to change courses in the middle, tried to veer in that direction, but it wasn't enough to make me feel like Beckett was putting Castle and their relationship first with her choice. She needs to find justice for her friends, to keep digging into the case, and is prepared to walk away from the life she's worked so hard to create while she figures it out. It feels like such a huge step backward for the character, and no matter how much they say that it's a part of her, that it can't just magically go away, I'm disappointed in how they framed her choice in this episode.

He's already said it in media interviews, but he's saying it again on Twitter: Seph Darkheart ‏@SephDarkheart @AlexiHawley can we expect it to be gritty all eason? it had a bit of a #thefollowing dark vibe to it Alexi Hawley ‏@AlexiHawley After tonight, we swing back to our (mostly) stand-alone, fun, case of the week type shows...

So glad this show is back. Loving the Charlie and Alex dynamic, and little Luke is such a cutie.

Wasn't PhDead supposed to be 8.04? I wonder about the emotional throughline when episode order is switched around.