As much as I love The Mentalist, one pattern that almost always holds annoying true is that the biggest guest star is the murderer. It almost never fails. Marguerite MacIntyre from Kyle XY and The Vampire Diaries shows up in “Scarlett Fever,” and kills out of revenge for her daughter’s death. In Kaiser Soze style, Fred Koehler, who played Chip on Kate and Allie, murdered with fire.
So in watching last week’s Mentalist, you can imagine my confusion when a parade of guest stars crossed my screen — how was I supposed to figure out whodunnit when all that talent was there, getting in the way of my scientific formula?
I ruled out Jack Conley‘s character, Chief Donner, almost right away. First of all, he was definitely there for laughs, when Jane figured out his internal anger stemmed from the fact his wife kicked him out. Also, the poor dude is probably one of the most typecast actors in Hollywood — he plays a cop (or some type of law enforcement agent) in almost everything: — Supernatural, House, NCIS, Crossing Over, Harold and Kumar … I really need to stop listing them because it’s getting embarrassing, and I haven’t touched upon but maybe half of them. I suppose his saving grace is that he played the awesome Sahjhan on Angel.
I also didn’t suspect Roark Critchlow‘s character (reporter Mike Brewster) right away, though I did come to suspect him as the episode went on. I figured than unless you were a Days of Our Lives fan in the ’90s that you’ve probably never heard of the guy, although I was awfully glad to see good ol’ Mike Horton. Ironic that he ended up being the murderer….
Now, I did suspect Sean Maher‘s character, Wilson, of something, mainly the affair with dead Martha; after all, he was Simon on Firefly so you knew he had to play a part. But it wasn’t until Jane was kidnapped, just a split second before the reveal, that I realized he was also Jasper. Very nice twist.
I could definitely have gotten behind the mayor, played by Sharon Lawrence, as being the murderer. She was pretty dirty and also had a major role in NYPD Blue.
You could argue that each of these characters was really, really guilty of something (though your argument would be very weak for Chief Donner), just not the murder that was being investigated by the CBI. Either way, it was great fun watching the guest stars play their shades-of-gray roles with such finesse.
Clacked by Debbie McDuffee
on Jan 26, 2010 @ 13:00 EST5EDT
I’ve noticed before that The Mentalist tends to screw with the expectations of big-name guest stars, and I approve. I apologize for being vague here, but I can remember an episode where one of the guest stars (and potential suspects) was a guy who appeared to be mentally challenged (or at least slow). This same guy had played similar characters on 2 other shows (Boston Legal and another I can’t remember) where he turned out to be a bad guy, so I was expecting it here. Lo and behold, he’s not as slow as he appears in this show (as expected), but he’s also not the killer. Kudos, writers.
That same formula seems to be used in a boatload of shows. The wife and I know that if there’s a mystery to be solved, the most recognizable guest actor is usually the bad guy. It doesn’t even have to be someone who’s name you know. It can be some character actor you’ve seen in a zillion things but just don’t know his or her name. It’s kind of annoying.
I caught the Wilson/Jasper thing right away, during Jasper’s video. Very proud of myself! ;-)
He was completely covered up which was an obvious indication that it was a character we had already seen. And Wilson was the right build plus as you pointed out was a recognizable actor.