Remember a couple of years ago, in the season three finale of The Mentalist, when we were supposed to be led to believe that Bradley Whitford’s character, Timothy Carter, was Red John? And then it turned out he wasn’t? I wasn’t convinced then .. and I’m even less convinced of Sheriff McAllister being Red John this season.
After everything we’ve learned up to this point about the elusive and infamous Red John, it turns out that everything lead to a cowardly, sniveling old coot with no remarkable traits to his name other than his fear of pigeons. There were several clues that led to McAllister being Red John throughout the season, but that’s not what I have a problem with. What do I have a problem with? Where do I start? …
First let’s consider everything Red John’s been up to since the first season of the show, and how we’ve gotten no answers to them whatsoever:
- Why has Red John been toying with Patrick Jane, essentially following him and continuing to make his life hell and reminding him of what he’d done to his family?
- What’s with his smiley face mark? Not a single insight into what made him use that as his calling card. What about the name “Red John” for that matter?
- The Blake Association seems to like to clear up loose ends quite quickly — wasn’t Red John a big ol’ loose end/canon that could ruin their organization? Why didn’t they just get rid of him long ago?
- All along we were led to believe Red John had a connection with mentalism in some way, perhaps having supernatural skills of mind reading. Not a peep of that, other than McAllister strangely interested in wanting Jane to know how he knew who was on his Red John suspect list.
- What about of all of the Red John disciples we’ve seen throughout the series. What the bloody hell did they see in this guy? How was this coward even remotely able to call people to sacrifice themselves for him?
- Why was Brett Partridge killed? I get that his tattoo served to allow McAllister to (very temporarily) elude the authorities, but that’s not why he was killed. …
- THIS was the guy eluding Patrick Jane all this time? Really?
- This now means Jane has killed two people due to being Red John suspects. How the hell could he ever be allowed back near the CBI?
There’s probably more, but to get into it all would just make me more sad. I think what pisses me off the most is that we’re supposed to believe that Red John is this guy who fled from Patrick Jane like some petty criminal, leading up to him actually attempting to … oh God, I can’t believe this happened .. call 9-1-1 for help. It can’t be. CAN’T! BE!
I’ve just decided that I refuse — RE-FUSE — to accept that McAllister is/was Red John. He’s simply not worthy of the title. Timothy Carter was a far more convincing Red John than McAllister in every way, and even then I wasn’t convinced. I get that creator Bruno Heller said that Jane’s list definitely had the name of Red John on it, but either Heller’s lying or it’s NOT McAllister.
Am I missing something here? Was Heller making a point that Red John should never have been such a big deal on the show, so he went and made him a wuss? Or will we start to follow a hell of a lot more clues into who the real Red John is, once we see what Bertram’s encrypted file translates to? Maybe that’s just the start to a whole new ongoing mystery for the show?
I’d still like to hold onto the Patrick Jane as Red John theory. I know a lot of people seem to hate that one, but this episode did nothing but enforce it in my eyes. How about McAllister’s “who are you?” question to Jane? The way it was asked, and then the way Jane answered, for someone like me who’d like to hold onto the Jane=John outcome, it sure felt like a hat tip in that direction. Jane’s Red John persona is so buried that McAllister questioned him that way to be sure it still held.
I get that a LOT of people are just done with the Red John plot and would be happy to see it end, and I can sympathize with that. But this isn’t how you go about it.
SRC: cliqueclack.com/p/
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