Wizard's Blog

Castle DVD cover

I'm a fan of the new police procedural TV series Castle, starring Nathan Fillion.

It seems that there always has to be something special about the main characters in these shows  - Adrian Monk (Monk) has OCD, Shawn Spencer (Psych) was trained from a young age to be observant by his cop dad, Patrick Jane (The Mentalist) used to be a fake psychic...  What makes Richard Castle (the main character in Castle) special is that he's a writer.

Now I realize that doesn't sound like it makes him very special, and to be honest it doesn't.  He consults with the police and won't let them accept the obvious solution to a crime because it "wouldn't make a good story".  This is obviously ridiculous - in real life it's almost always the obvious solution; the last person to see the deceased or the closest person to them is usually the killer.

It gets a bit better in the fact that as a famous writer he has access to important and unusual people that the police normally wouldn't have access to.

Nevertheless the show is well written, acted, directed etc. and is fun to watch.

What I think is really interesting about Castle, though, is the relationships between the characters.  Although the main character is a man, he's completely surrounded by women.  The other main characters are Detective Kate Beckett, Castle's daughter and mother.

As a young(ish), white, male, middle class westerner I'm about as privileged as I could be¹.  One of the ways I'm privileged is in the way books, movies, TV shows etc. are written from a male point of view.  I'm not a feminist, but once you notice how male-centric a lot of things are, it gets annoying.

Which is why I think Castle is interesting - he's flighty and irresponsible where Beckett is responsible and serious; deliberate role reversal?  The climax of the show is usually the confrontation with the perpetrator, and Castle is always told to stay in the car out of harm's way while Beckett dons a bullet proof vest and kicks in the door.

Although The Mentalist also has a female detective and a male consultant, it's not the same because Patrick Jane dominates everyone he comes in contact with, so Lisbon never really gets any spotlight.

To be honest I started watching Castle because I enjoyed Nathan Fillion in Firefly.  I continued watching it because it's enjoyable.  Now I'm appreciating it on another level.

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1. short of being fabulously wealthy [↩]