Summary: The skilled actors of the TV show “Castle” bring to us a season finale that, properly understood, will make each of us look in the mirror and wonder what’s become of us — as citizens, as Americans. Who kidnapped Richard Castle minutes before his wedding in the Season 6 finale? This post explains not just who, but why — and how this was the natural (and inspiring) culmination of the show’s entire plot arc. The answer tells us something about America’s predicament, and a path to our future. Spoiler warning!
Contents
- TV is a mirror to our fears & dreams.
- Understory of “For Better or Worse”.
- What to expect in Season 7.
- Lessons for America.
- Other posts in this series.
- For More Information.
- Beckett gets the last word.
A mirror to our fears & dreams
“Man will only become better when you make him see what he is like.”
— Anton Chekhov (Russian doctor, playwright, author; 1860-1904), in his notebook.
Hit films and TV shows provide a mirror in which we can see ourselves. They project our hopes, fears, and possible futures — so we can watch without involvement. This allows our emotions to freely flow so we can experience different paths.
The Season 6 finale, “For Better or Worse” (episode 23), brought to a natural climax the plot arc of the entire series. Minutes before his wedding to Kate Beckett, an attack on Richard Castle leaves his car a fiery wreck, his location and condition unknown, leaving Beckett stunned with grief. Who did this, and why? The answer will transform your view of the Castle series, and illuminate the predicament facing America today. The predicament facing each of us individually as citizens. It’s below the fold; there are spoilers.
(2) Season 6 finale: “For Better or Worse”
“Oh, wow. You’re engaged to a douche.”
— Rogan O’Leary (Beckett’s husband), speaking to her about Castle.
In this episode Castle had an epiphany, a flash of insight revealing the course of his life. An insight of the sort that changes lives. He met Beckett’s secret husband, Rogan O’Leary (she married him 15 years ago in Vegas). Rogan is what he was in Season 1 (five years ago): a bold alpha, attractive to women, living a life of adventure.
During their adventures, Castle came to see himself through Rogan’s eyes: an over-weight, somewhat lethargic, beta orbiter humiliating himself by following his fiancée around the country to beg her husband for a divorce. His rail-thin, hot fiancée who — after five years of spurning him — heard her biological clock ticking, and decided to settle down with a rich nice guy.
Naturally Rogan treats Castle with contempt, derisively calling him “man parts”. Which Castle meekly accepts.
Rogan instinctively knows about Beckett’s years of toying with Castle, her many “boyfriends”, and the serial deceits (details here) and lies. Especially “forgetting” that she was married (exquisite from the woman who mocked Castle’s two divorces by saying “I’m a one and done girl”).
While solving their weekly crime in a desultory fashion, Castle ponders this revelation. He sees his transformation from the ruggedly handsome, rebellious, action hero of Season One into a beta. He supports Beckett’s every whim and apologizes if he bruises her ego. Castle realizes that Rogan sees the real Castle, and that he shares Rogan’s contempt for what he has become. {Some readers have replied that Rogan’s a bad guy; see a response here.}
But we all have the capacity for self renewal. Castle repeatedly has forged new versions of himself. From high school prankster to millionaire novelist to A-team detective. Now he resolves to do it again. The second half of his life will begin with the creation of a new man with a new name, a clean break with his old ways (no matter how difficult for a world-famous author with millions of fans). He uses his incredible Rolodex of contacts to arrange the faking of his death. And his rebirth.
(3) Predictions for Season 7
Beckett and the gang fruitlessly hunt for Castle and his attackers. His mother and daughter remain distant with Beckett, oddly unmoved by Castle’s death. When asked all they say is “That’s how he’d want us to live.”
In episode 6 Beckett will hook up with one of her younger-than-Castle tall handsome ex-lovers. Probably Josh Davidson, the motorcycle-riding, helping-the-poor-in-Africa cardiac surgeon. In the season finale she’ll receive a note from Castle, wonderfully written, explaining all and wishing her well in her life. He’ll write this while fishing in the South Pacific, or on a break from meditation in the Taktsang Monastery.
Meanwhile the mysterious Garret Ward (from season 6 episode 5, “Time will Tell“) plays pinochle in the psych ward of Bellevue, waiting for his next dose of Thorazine. Despite what that episode implied, he was not a time traveler. Beckett and Castle will not have 3 kids. Beckett will not leverage Castle’s money and connections to become a Senator.
Will this be the course of Season 7? Probably not (see a more likely guess here). But this is what Castle should do. This version of Castle could inspire us.
Note: this is, of course, not a “spoiler”. Excerpt perhaps as a harsh revelation of a new perspective to shippers of Kate Beckett. And perhaps also to those of Richard Castle. But this is a complement to the actors of “Castle”, showing the depths of their portrayal to these characters. See more details in the comments.
(4) Lessons for America
“America is no longer, what it could be, what it once was. And I say to myself, I don’t want that future for my children.”
— Barack Obama on, 6 August 2008. See the video here. Like a Hallmark card, most of what he says is correct. Like Hallmark cards, it means little.
We, America’s citizens, share Richard Castle’s predicament. Once bold and unruly, America has become rich and successful but also complacent, docile, even tame.
The most eloquent comments on the FM website — by, I suspect, the smartest commenters — say that America cannot reform itself. Logic and fact supports their analysis. But I believe otherwise. We can re-invent ourselves. If the Second Republic (built on the Constitution) has died, then we can build a Third — a better one, as the Second was better than the First — on its ruins.
As with Castle, the first step must be to see what we have become. Profound contempt is necessary, a nausea with what we have become — esp. by comparison with what we were and should be. Only from there will effective collective action and political programs become possible. Like Castle, we already have the strength to reinvent ourselves; we lack only the will.
Weber points us toward Nietzsche as the common source for serious thinkers of the twentieth century. He also tells us what the single fundamental issue is: the relation between reason, or science, and the human good. When he speaks of happiness and the last man, he does not mean that the last man is unhappy, but that his happiness is nauseating. An experience of profound contempt is necessary in order to grasp our situation, and our capacity for contempt is vanishing.
Weber’s science presupposes this experience, which we would call subjective. After having encountered it in Nietzsche, he spent the greater part of his scholarly life studying religion in order to understand the non-contemptible, those who esteem or revere and are therefore not self-satisfied, those who have values …
— From Allan Bloom’s Closing of the American Mind
, chapter “Values”.
(5) Other posts in this series about “Castle”
- What the TV show “Castle” teaches us about America, and ourselves, — About our myths.
- The TV show “Castle” challenges us to see our changing values. Most fans decline, horrified.
- “Castle” shows us marriage in America, a fault line between our past & future.
- “Castle” shows us a dark vision of Romance in America.
- Richard Castle shows us the dark reality of justice in 21st C America.
- “Castle” shows that many of us don’t defend New America because we don’t like it.
- The bitter fruits of our alienation from America — more lessons from “Castle”.
(6) For More Information
The Chekhov quote is from Interpreting Chekhov by Geofrey Borny (2006).
If you liked this post, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter. See all posts women and gender issues., and especially these…
- The feminist revolutionaries have won. Insurgents have arisen to challenge the new order. As always, they’re outlaws.
- The war of the sexes heats up: society changes as men learn the Dark Triad.
- A look ahead at the New America, after the gender wars.
- Love in the new world, after the gender wars.
- Taylor Swift shows us love in the 21st century.
- Women have won the gender revolution.
(7) Beckett sees the flaming wreck of Castle’s car
