Hey, if Patrick Jane can make random observations during an investigation, I can make them in a post.
1. This week’s episode was one of the most entertaining of the series so far. Lots of humor and personality mixed in with the murder stuff. It also gave us two ideas for spin-off shows. There was a quick shot of the coroner’s truck outside of the murder scene, and it said “Napa County Coroner.” Wouldn’t that be a great name for a new CBS show? “Tonight on Napa County Coroner, Dr. March makes a shocking discovery during his investigation of a socialite’s murder; also, Sara goes to a wine tasting!” That could be the next top show for the network. The other spin-off idea could go to the sleazy pick-up artist. He called himself “The Woman Whisperer.” That could be an interesting show too. He solves crimes with the help of women. Much like Dr. Doolittle used animals.
2. Speaking of spin-offs, this is one of the few shows on the air right now where I would watch spin-offs featuring any of these characters. A show featuring Cho (Tim Kang) would be a lot of fun, and Rigsby (Owain Yeoman) and Van Pelt (Amanda Righetti) have a Bones thing going on. OK, spin-offs featuring supporting characters can be awful (A Man Called Hawk, anyone?), and one of the reasons we love these characters is because they are supporting, and their big moments are spaced here and there. But these are good characters.
3. I was going crazy trying to figure out who played the rich guy’s attorney in one short scene. It was the teacher from Boy Meets World. No, not William Daniels, Anthony Taylor Quinn.
4. I see they’ve broken out the thesaurus for the titles. We’re not going to get “red” in the titles every week. This week we had “crimson,” and next week we have “scarlet.” Coming soon: “burgundy,” “vermilion,” and “rust.”
5. As I said above, I love this show, but I can picture the plots becoming mundane and predictable. I guessed the killer is this recent episode the second I saw him. No clues or anything, just some sort of deduction I made by feeding all of this show’s elements and routines into my brain and figuring it out (translation: predictable writing). What I think could make this show go to another level is to make Jane more like Columbo. We see flashes of Jane figuring out things like Lt. Columbo, such as the back door being open in this episode and the way Jane figured out how someone got into a locked room a couple of episodes ago (lots of Jane’s deductions involve doors for some reason), but we don’t see it enough. Too many of Jane’s observations feature psychology or body language or feeling someone’s pulse. I want to see Jane capture the bad guys like Columbo used to, by figuring things out using real deduction. And we need to see Jane go up against more capable, intelligent murderers that can give him a run for his money. Isn’t it great to see Jane tweak the nose of some asshole or get under the skin of some executive jerk? And those people aren’t even the culprits. They should tweak the show a bit and make it a bit more clever.
Clacked by Bob Sassone 
on Feb 11, 2009 @ 15:00 EST5EDT
