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Mark Baker

Castle 4-22: Undead Again

Allow me to set the scene for you. I have just spent the day at Disneyland with some friends. I am tired. I am spending the night at a hotel room down there so I can go back the next day. I arrive in time to watch Castle, so I settle in and turn on the TV only to have it be the zombie episode. And let me tell you, the make up on those faces was a little freaky. Fortunately, it didn’t keep me from having nightmares, but since I don’t do much horror at all, it did have me worried.

The episode opens with someone sneaking up on Alexis. It’s Castle, and he’s taking part in the game of laser tag they’ve been playing since she was 5. Game to 1000. But she’s not interested because she’s trying to figure out which college to attend. She’s debating between two far away colleges because she doesn’t want to have the option of running home easily. She wants to spread her wings.

Castle’s depressed about that and confiding about it to his mom when Beckett calls. He refuses to take the call at first, and Martha prods him about that. Finally, he decides to work one last case with her, but because of how hurt he is to hang it up after this.

So he arrives at the crime scene, a parking garage, to find the victim was a stock broker at a nearby financial firm. He was found by his boss with a bite mark and his head smashed in. The only other car is from someone who he beat out for a promotion.

This looks like an open and shut, easy case. Castle’s a bit bummed as they go to take down the killer. Only the suspect begs Beckett to kill him. He claims that not only is he not the killer, but he witnessed the killing and then was attacked and bitten by the killer – a zombie and is now worried about being turned into one himself.Read More »Castle 4-22: Undead Again

Once Upon a Time 1-19: The Return

There are lots of mysteries in Once Upon a Time, and one of the burning ones is who is August W. Booth. Last night did not answer that question, but it did shoot one theory out of the water. And we learn the fate of Rumplestiltskin’s son – sort of. Oh yeah, and we get a clue about what happened to Kathryn. Yeah, there was a lot happening as always. I feel like they are building up to a season finale or something.

Our story in Fairy Tale focused on Rumplestiltskin. We open with a shot of a boy chasing a ball. He’s not paying attention and winds up almost getting trampled by a horse and cart. The owner is yelling at the boy until he realizes who the boy is. Immediately, he starts apologizing. The boy almost leaves when his dad, Rumplestiltskin, shows up. He’s willing to let the merchant off with a warning, but then he realizes that his son skinned his knee. Enraged, Rumplestiltskin turns the man into a slug and then steps on him.

His son is quite upset by the change in his father as evident by the scene we just saw. He begs him to give up his magic, but Rumplestiltskin explains that the only way to do that is to be stabbed by the dagger with his name on it, which would kill him and give the powers to the attacker. His son makes him promise that if he can find another way, then Rumplestiltskin will follow it.Read More »Once Upon a Time 1-19: The Return

Castle 4-21: Headhunters

Once upon a time, Nathan Fillion was on a little show called Firefly. They have made references to it over the years on Castle, but as far as I remember, they have never had any of his co-stars guest on the show.

Until last night.

In case you were wondering what the big deal of Adam Baldwin guest starring on Castle was, now you know. He was one of Nathan’s co-stars on that short lived cult show. Frankly, I’d be curious to know how many people turned in just to see the two of them on screen together again. Now I’ve got to admit that I was a casual viewer of Firefly (before my boycott almost anything and everything Joss Whedon days), so I remember Adam Baldwin best from the just finished Chuck.

But I digress.

Last night opened with a homeless man walking up to a corpse. No, he wasn’t trying to figure out if he could still help the guy; he wanted to rob him. All that changed when he found three severed heads on the guy.

Cut to Castle, who’s trying to overcome a bad case of writer’s block. His muse of Beckett isn’t helping him at all, and since she is prepping for court, they won’t have a case to work on. Of course, he isn’t sure how much time he wants to spend with her, but that’s beside the point. Then he catches the breaking news of the case and decides that he needs a new muse.

This new muse is Slaughter, Adam Baldwin’s character. He’s a member of the gang task force, and he’s gotten this case because the victim was the member of a gang. (I think it was Irish.) Slaughter is a loner (just like Beckett was at the beginning of the series or so we think at the beginning). In fact, his last three partners have died, two on their first day as his partner.Read More »Castle 4-21: Headhunters

Castle 4-20: The Limey

A couple weeks ago, I stated that the rest of this season of Castle would turn serious. Looks like I was misled. Okay, so I’ll admit that this show has some more serious moments, but there were lots of light, fun moments as well. And lots of fallout from last week’s revelation.

Speaking of which, last week, TV Guide made an excellent point. Why didn’t Castle talk to Beckett about what he overheard instead of assuming her lack of acknowledgement meant she didn’t love him back. This week, Beckett compounds the problem. Is there any hope of our favorite couple?

The episode starts with a dead body on the floor of a hotel room. A man is searching for something while a maid is trying to get into the room. He finds it just in time and walks out of the room just before the maid walks in. She doesn’t think anything of it until she finds the body and lets out a scream.Read More »Castle 4-20: The Limey

Once Upon a Time 1-18: The Stable Boy

The big question of the season for me has been, what did Snow White do to Regina to make Regina hate her so much. That was finally answered last night. (And I really did think they’d hold that until season two.) It fits with the universe they’ve created, and I can understand much of what has come since. However, it was predictable. Which is probably why they focused more on Storybrooke.

What the story lacked in, well, story, it more than made up for in makeup and casting. They did a great job of giving us a younger version of Regina. And the actress they hired to play the young Snow White was amazing in how she captured the looks and mannerisms of Ginnifer Goodwin. If I didn’t know better, I would have said they used the regular actress, but the budget wouldn’t have covered the special effects needed to create her as a child.

And let’s start in Fairy Tale.

When we first see Regina, she is riding a horse and jumping over obstacles. Her father praises her, but then her mother appears and starts to berate her for not acting like a proper young lady. When Regina starts to argue, her mother starts using magic against her, first raising her off the ground and then squeezing her until she backs down.Read More »Once Upon a Time 1-18: The Stable Boy

Castle 4-19: 47 Seconds

Last night’s Castle featured two bombs and a near miss. Of course, only one of those was a literal bomb. Along the way, the episode reminded me a bit of Vantage Point as Beckett and Castle had to piece together what happened with bits and pieces of what others saw at the scene of the literal bomb.

It opens at the scene of a TakeOver Wall Street protest. This show rarely seems to draw stories from the headlines, so I was a bit surprised to see this story in the show since it was obviously a version of Occupy Wall Street completely with 99% signs. Anyway, our first shot is of a reporter and her cameraman who are ready to go live with a broadcast about the protests. They’ve just started the report when a bomb goes off. In the aftermath, 5 people are dead.

Our usual gang shows up, but they are sidelined. Since it involved a bomb, the FBI are the primaries, but they do ask the local police to help them. Helping them starts with interviewing friends and relatives of the victims to find out if one of them was a target. One was a man on vacation, another a mom with two young kids. The third we learn about was one of the founders of the movement. But that doesn’t seem to be the motive.Read More »Castle 4-19: 47 Seconds

Once Upon a Time 1-17: Hat Trick

I’ll admit, when I learned that Once Upon a Time was going to introduce The Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland into the mix, I was both worried and curious. This definitely stretches the definition of a fairy tale character. A series of books I enjoy with a similar idea has included characters from that story in its fairy tale characters. And at the same time, it could be interesting. Fortunately, it turned out to be both entertaining and fit into the framework they’ve created for the show so far.

I was going to break with tradition and start with Storybrooke, but there are a couple of things we learned in Fairy Tale that came up later in Storybrooke, so we’ll keep with convention.

Our first shot of Jefferson (aka the Mad Hatter) in Fairy Tale is of him running through the forest. He’s trying to get away from…his daughter Grace. But she finds him right away. Unfortunately, Hide and Seek time is over and they need to get to the work at hand – finding mushrooms to sell in town the next day.

When they get home, they find Regina waiting for them. Jefferson sends Grace into the woods to hide before finding out what the Queen wants. She wants Jefferson’s help in retrieving something from “there.” He refuses, stating he won’t leave his daughter. “You just don’t leave family.” He’s not even tempted by her offer of making sure Grace never wants again. These two definitely have some kind of history as Regina makes some references to his past, but we have no idea what it is.Read More »Once Upon a Time 1-17: Hat Trick

Castle 4-18: A Dance with Death

When I found out that they were planning an episode of Castle that centered around a reality dancing competition, I was actually surprised they hadn’t done one before. Since the show has Dancing with the Stars as a lead in much of the year, it seems like a natural fit. And while last night’s show within a show looked like it took more from the dancing shows on other networks, it was still lots of fun.

The episode opens during the taping of one of the semi-finals of A Night of Dance, a hot reality show that features amateur dancers competing for an undisclosed prize. Honestly, the prize doesn’t matter because the host has barely gotten through the introductions when the female contestant for that episode misses her cue. An assistant is sent to her dressing room and she is found dead from a gunshot.

Now before we get back to the story, a quick aside. If they didn’t film that opening scene on the set of Dancing with the Stars, I’d be shocked. It looked enough like it. They tweaked some things here or there, but for the most part, it had to be the same set.Read More »Castle 4-18: A Dance with Death