My overall rating of "The mentalist"'s Season 3: 4/10.
So first of all, I do think that the premise of this episode is very strong: it breaks up the monotony of the usual case-of-the-week with something that is higher-stakes but not Red John-related, and it builds off existing plot continuity rather well, saving the story from the vacuum of episodic, unrelated plotlines. Moreover, there are a few quite praiseworthy elements. The problem is, it's executed very poorly, and the strong elements sink together with the rest.
The return of the killer psychologist is great - while he's not necessarily the one character I would've loved to see more of, he's certainly an interesting one and his presence and allusions to all the processes happening outside the usual framework of a "The mentalist" episode are a welcome bit of grounding for the series. However, while leaning on that bit of continuity the authors pass up on another, and conjure up Rachel without us having met her before. Yes, it's a given that the case from "Pilot" (the very same killer psychologist's, incidentally) is not to be taken as Jane's first nor second on the job, and we're in fact to believe that there are cases getting resolved even outside the scope of the episodes we do see, but it's certainly a missed opportunity to increase audience investment by harkening back to another remembered plotline. And it's not like the reveal would've been lessened this way, as we know who the villain is very close to the beginning, even if we don't necessarily know her backstory, so having actual prior backstory would've been a boost... Don't get me wrong, Rachel is an amazing villain, both strongly-written and well-acted, I don't really have many complaints, but taking any character from "Red Tide" or Ashley Johnson's one from "Seeing Red" (her incidentally being a similar-looking actress) , or perhaps a villain (or some relation thereof) from an actually good episode such as "Ladies in Red" or "Blood Brothers" would've been a better choice...
Further, let's talk about Rachel's plan. The whole "capturing Lisbon" part is stupid, too unlikely to pull off, especially alone - what if Lisbon wouldn't be there, or would have a teammate?.. It also sure is convenient that even though Rachel's deranged, she doesn't actually do any lasting damage to anybody - as far as psycho torturers go, she's practically a humanist saint, which breaks credulity. Also, what if the firemen arrived and extinguished the building, what'd she do? It's also stupid that she's killed at the last second, and by none other than Hightower. That final confrontation was actually cool when Jane's plan failed, but they had to immediately segway onto a happy ending - and then again, why did Rachel even care that much about Lisbon's death? And Jane sure could've done more with his knife once she got close, but gotta keep him sympathetic, I guess...
Jane's capture is badly done. So is Rigsby's strange, cringeworthy gunpoint negotiation. Hightower recognises Rachel easily by a photo without having seen her in the past, but Lisbon's team don't IRL; but remember her and her case's details by name alone?..
I guess I should hope for a Rachel prequel story further on in the run, but what are the odds it'll be there?
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