The Mentalist - 18-5-4, S02E21

No wonder some people have such fear of clowns, when television and movies conspire to make them so utterly terrifying. The clown we saw in the first few moments of the episode not only stalked a man who was clearly scared out of his wits, but also shot him in the chest and cut off his finger. And if that wasn't scary enough, the make up was that of a killer clown, not the friendly variety...though perhaps that would have been even more upsetting.

As for the rest of the episode, I am getting tired, as I'm sure you have noticed, of Patrick Jane (Simon Baker). I still find him absolutely charming and clever, and he never ceases to get a smile out of me, but, despite his excessive pride, he is too perfect. He is too clever, never missing a clue, never failing to figure out what is happening. He is too good at too many things. In this episode, he proved himself an excellent chess player, as well as capable of talking to the insane without upsetting them, and we already know about so many other talents which he has. If he had not suffered from his encounter with Red John, I wonder if there would be anything to like about him at all since, at least a little, you can assume he's not quite as arrogant as he once was.

But maybe it's just that I miss the feeling that The Mentalist distributed focus over all the agents, rather than only on Jane with a side of Lisbon (Robin Tunney). Cho (Tim Kang) barely did anything except chase a suspect, and while I do love watching Cho case people, I prefer to see him in the interrogation room. We did not get a lot of that.

I can't even remember if Rigsby (Owain Yeoman) accomplished anything of note in the entire episode, and Van Pelt (Amanda Righetti) used her computer skills and that's about it.

I'm not saying that I didn't enjoy all of Jane's sparing matches with potential suspects, but, despite the fact that it is called The Mentalist, and the pictures in the opening are only of Jane, I don't want to watch the Patrick Jane show every week. Let's try a mix of 50% Jane, 50% Lisbon, Cho, Rigsby, and Van Pelt so that I take pleasure in Jane's shenanigans, rather than feel they are getting tedious.

But maybe this is just me. How are you feeling about the Mentalist of late? Too much Jane, or is that an impossible assertion?