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After all these years, Patrick Jane finally got the man who killed his family and he did not hold back.
that being said this show is going to be drastically revamped starting next week. people will be leaving the show. in other words the ratings are down this season from last season and the corporate fucks are going to kill the show. oh well it should technically be over and done with tonight.
'The Mentalist' regroups and moves forward, in time[/spoiler]
that being said this show is going to be drastically revamped starting next week. people will be leaving the show. in other words the ratings are down this season from last season and the corporate fucks are going to kill the show. oh well it should technically be over and done with tonight.
'The Mentalist' regroups and moves forward, in time[/spoiler]
The sixth-season hit resets after solving its Red John mystery.
The Mentalist is redefining itself.
In last week's episode, the FBI started shutting down the California Bureau of Investigation, home to consultant Patrick Jane (Simon Baker) and a team of law-enforcement agents. Tonight (CBS, 10 p.m. ET/PT), the show will resolve Jane's central quest to find Red John, the serial killer who murdered his wife and daughter.
And next Sunday, the sixth-season drama will jump ahead two years in its characters' lives, with the CBI out of business and its former members scattered. Jane isn't even in the country.
Red John "has helped define who (Jane) is as a character completely from the very beginning. It's been the driving force and the objective of my character is to find this guy," says Baker, who also directs next week's episode.
He compares the time jump between the two episodes to the development of a young child, with changes to the characters becoming more dramatic with the passage of time.
"You see how things have manifested over those two years. You see some real shifts in character and approach to life," Baker says. "It really does deal with the idea of what's missing in his life and how he's lost his mojo. It's a coming of age in a way."
BIG CASE: What about Red John?
MORE: What does Robert Bianco say about this week's episode?
The Mentalist joins a number of other shows, including Desperate Housewives and Fringe, that have pushed the calendar ahead to change their characters. Series creator Bruno Heller wanted the series to have time to examine how Jane deals with life after his main focus, Red John, is no longer a factor.
"A dark cloud has been lifted from him. . We wanted to see what Jane is like without this burden, a more joyous and happier Jane, a Jane who is free to think about what to do with the rest of his life," he says. Romance and happiness may be possibilities.
Two years after the end of the Red John case and the dismantling of the CBI Sacramento headquarters, former senior agent Teresa Lisbon (Robin Tunney) is in northern California and married former agents Wayne Rigsby (Owain Yeoman) and Grace Van Pelt (Amanda Righetti) are in San Francisco. (Both characters will be written out later this season).
Another team member, Kimball Cho (Tim Kang), is in Austin, the previous stomping ground of FBI agent Dennis Abbott (Rockmond Dunbar), who is assigned to close the CBI after its infiltration by a secret society of corrupt California law enforcement agents, including the man at the center of the Red John manhunt, CBI director Gale Bertram (Michael Gaston).
Dunbar will be a series regular going forward, as will Emily Swallow, whose Kim Fisher character will get the better of the brilliant Jane in a battle of manipulation, Heller says. Yeoman and Righetti eventually will be leaving the series, as has been rumored, but not until much later this season.
'What was so interesting about Bruno's take is that he wanted to do it in the middle of the season," says Glenn Geller, CBS' executive vice president of current programming . "I think when the audience sees and understands what the time jump is about, how the character processes what has happened, how the other characters move forward, it's going to feel very natural."
The Mentalist is averaging 11.1 million viewers, down 4% in viewers and 13% in young adults compared with last season.
When The Mentalist returns after the end of the Red John story, "Jane has run away. He wants nothing to do with his old life at all. Lisbon has fewer options because she's a cop. She has to be a cop. She has made a new life for herself, (but) after two years she finds she's thinking about Jane all the time," Heller says.
The initial geographic separation between characters won't keep them from interacting. The show "redefines the relationship between Jane and Lisbon in a real and adult way. That's a really strong element of the show," Baker says.
"The new world that Jane and Lisbon inhabit is a world of higher stakes and bigger strategies. They won't just be solving crime in California," Heller says.
He says a revamped Mentalist could tell stories for some time.
"What the show really lives on is Baker's talent," Heller says. As long as Baker is enthusiastic and up for the challenge, the show can run as long as you like."
