Castle ‘Death Gone Crazy’ recap: Filler, but filler done right

This week’s episode of Castle dove right into the world of reality TV, sex tapes and the risks wrought by publicizing one’s life online. While the team investigates the murder of Beau Randolph, founder of show College Girls Gone Crazy, Castle has to come to terms with the fact that Alexis now owns a website to which she uploads vlogs with personal information.

But let’s talk about the case first: Randolph is found dead in the women’s bathroom at the bar where his company is throwing a party. Strangled to death with a bra, it seems as though Randolph has plenty of enemies, both male and female, who would’ve been glad to commit the murder themselves. The list of suspects covers everyone from his ex-girlfriend, to his bodyguard, to a man who protested against Randolph’s show, to his bodyguard again, to a lot more people. But let’s start from the beginning.

Apparently, Beau had a change of heart when a woman with whom he’d had a one night stand with, coincidentally the protester’s daughter, ended up pregnant. He decided to get his act together, insisted on being present in the child’s life and, finally, he decided to shut the whole company down. This did not sit well with his second-in-command, Troy, who seemed to consider it a personal affront. Or enough of an affront to kill, in any case.

Moving on to Alexis. Googling himself, Castle came across her website, Confessions of a Columbia Freshman, and was appalled and worried at the information she displayed there. He asks his daughter to show up at the precinct, and when she does, the two end up arguing and Alexis storms out angrily. However, she later goes to the loft and they discuss the dangers of posting too much information on the web for anyone to see. I really liked the way Jason Wilborn handled Castle and Alexis’ different points of view and approaches to the situation, for in a way there were both right. It is dangerous to have so much of one’s life online, but it’s also something that present generation of young adults and teenagers has gotten used to living with.

Also relevant to this recap: they discussed this over ice-cream. Is it any wonder I love the Castle family?

Ryan, Esposito and Lanie were also in the episode. Esposito spent most of the episode singing praises about Randolph’s (female) bodyguard/spy. This reinforced something I already knew: the sight of Espo flirting with anyone but Lanie pisses me off. Ah, the woes of a fangirl. For objectivity’s sake, I will say that the two had great chemistry and it was fun to watch him drool over every single detail of her life.

All in all, “Death Gone Crazy” felt very much like a filler episode, but with the great writing that even filler episodes display in this show.