RSM review: Castle Episode 3:12 Poof You’re Dead

Below is my recap of Monday night’s (Jan 10, 2011) episode of Castle: Poof You’re Dead. All editorial comments have –ed next to them and I tried to put them into parenthesis. I had a lot of fun trying to capture the action. This was another really good episode. Where last week’s murder mystery part of the show left me wanting, this week’s was what the movie Prestige could have been if it hadn’t been horrible (in my humble opinion). Hope you all have watched the episode. If not, feel free to read through (because Castle isn’t really about solving the crime, but rather enjoying the characters) but then head on over to hulu or iTunes or abc.com and watch the episode. I promise you will enjoy it.

(This episode is airing opposite an auburn football playoff game, but as I am not a fan of college football, I don’t entirely care. 🙂 The husband, however, is and has been keeping up with the score from my iPad as we watch Castle– ed.)

Again, the Bachelor ran over a minute into Castle’s time. Pooh. — ed.)

We open with a woman entering a magic equipment backstage. She moves the curtain and finds a dead body floating in a water tank.

Cut to cell phone ringing. A woman’s naked arm reaches for it. It’s Lanie. She gets her cell, and then another one rings, it’s Javier’s! The Lanie/Esposito romance! Lanie warns Esposito not to wink at her or smile at her or user his puppy dog eyes at her. He responds by taking a cell phone photo of her in bed.

Castle is on the phone with someone as he walks to the crime scene. Esposito walks up next to him. Castle tells him not to date someone you work with (I don’t know for sure, my son woke up — ed). Esposito says “who knows?” and then Beckett walks up.

Lanie says that he’s been in the tank for 8 hours. There’s signs of drowning and struggle.

A suicide note is found, mentioning that the magician was in financial trouble.

“Mr Drake did not kill himself!” The assistant who found the body is adamant that he would not have killed himself.

The last month, he’s been working on something. He’d been tired. A month ago, a guy came into the shop, pushed Mr. Drake into the display case, and said he’d sue him for all he’s worth.

Esposito reports that one of the neighbors saw a while van pull up outside the shop during the last day.

Only relative is a brother in Poughkeepsie. E and R haven’t reached him yet.

Castle is wearing e-ray specks. Says to Beckett that he can see her naked. Beckett, smirks, and says “How do you like my navel ring” Caste’s face drops.

Ryan, says to Javier, you’ve got a secret. E says, how did he know? Ryan says it’s right here in the paper. Castle and Gina are fighting, according to page 6. That’s what Castle was talking about to Esposito this morning.

In interrogation, it turns out that the gentleman who’s threatened to sue the magician, is angry because the magician accidently spilled the beans by reading his mind during a magic act. It was about a trip he’d taken to Atlantic City with “Rita”. Only trouble was, his wife’s name wasn’t Rita. Castle asks him if it took the magician long to read his mind. 🙂 (to which the angry man answers “no” and Castle smiles).

As Castle is wondering how Mr. Drake got the information. Picked his pocket? Beckett says “like this” and produces Castle’s iPhone 4 Castle “that’s more like it!”. Just then, it rings — it’s Gina. Castle Clicks the phone off (which means Gina goes to voicemail — ed). Beckett makes a “hmm, what’s that about” face.

E and R enter with information that finger prints found on the suicide note are from a fellow magician whose license Mr. Drake’s worked to get revoked. This magician had injured an assistant in an act.

In the park, Beckett and Castle walk up to said magician. When Beckett shows her badge, the magician does an a-la-kasam, smoke, disappear move. Castle looks around. Beckett goes to the box he’d been standing on, and slides open the top, revealing the magician. Beckett ”A-la-kazam Jackass”

His fingerprints are on the suicide note left on Zalman Drake’s shop. He was drowned in the water torture tank in his shop. He gave him the note. The other note on the paper, the one you can only see under a black light. It’s an invoice for services rendered. Got him something illegal. C4.

Zalman was a genius trick designer. Rumor was he was designing tricks for a famous magician who had Vegas acts and just happens to be in NYC on tour (I missed the name of said magician — ed).

Esposito saw this show “ya we loved it”. Everyone says “we”, and Esposito, says ya, he and his buddy, Rae. Ryan wants to know who this friend is that he’d take to see a magician. 😉

The famous magician is rehearsing. (Is that Gilles from Dancing with the Stars? Yes, it is!). Beckett and Castle walk in. Beckett flashes her badge “all access pass”.

The famous magician declines using C4 as it is too volatile. To unpredictable. It kills. Cannot be controlled. He suggests Beckett Check Zalman’s workshop. What workshop and where is his workshop?

As Castle goes on about the C4 and its implications, Beckett – “It’s magic, Castle, not the cold war.”

Beckett’s cell rings, It’s Lanie. They walk in to autopsy to find a very dressed up Lanie. Castle says “dressed to the 9s and in a big hurry” he wants to know what her big plans are. Lanie counters that she’ll tell him if he tells her what’s going on with Gina (see page 6). She called them to tell them Zalman was murdered and then put into the tank. Why cover up the murder?

Castle comes home, and Martha and Alexis are reading the paper. They call him a caveman for not telling him about Page 6. Castle says he and Gina were fighting about how much they’ve been fighting. Castle asks “can I change the subject” as he pulls a quarter out of Alexis’ ear. She says “come on Dad, what am I six? At least pull out a twenty” as she does so from his pocket.

Next morning, Castle run in to a Beckett in a hurry, she’s found the magician’s workshop. From his credit cards records, Zalman had hired a town car and it dropped him by he docks. Footprints lead to a brick wall, with a trick brick that opens the wall. Zalman’s fortress of solitude.

Beckett says her grandfather would have loved this place. Iron maiden, Guillotine. She notes that castle reminds her of her grandfather has he’s trying a magic box on his head. Wheelchair tracks lead to some papers.

Door opens, and in enters Zalman, very much alive. Castle “Best Trick Ever.”
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Beckett asks him to keep his hands where she can see them. He claps and the lights come on. They wonder why he’s here. He says his name is Edmond Drake. The brother from Poughkeepsie. He’s a twin. He entered through the Iron Maiden. It’s the entrance from the other room.

He’s the identical twin, who wears glasses, a fact that Castle notes is the worst disguise since Clark Kent. He thinks that Zalman killed his brother to take over his life. Beckett is skeptical that anyone would do that to become an accountant in Poughkeepsie.

In interrogation, Edmond says he came down to the city because he had a feeling something was wrong.

Castle asks why he never got into the family business. They did have an act together as kids, but he didn’t have the skill. It was only amazing to people who didn’t know they were twins.

Castle can’t imagine that Beckett is letting him walk away. What’s she supposed to charge him with, being a twin? Castle says “being a twin in a magic murder.”

Esposito calls from the workshop. The tracks are wheelchair and specific. They are trying to match them. And traces of C4 were found on the workbench).

Castle is sure that Edmond is Zalman.

Lanie has done a fingerprint match, and the body is Zalman. Castle is disappointed. But she did find rabbit hairs (although Castle identifies them as old man hairs) as well as other organic chemicals and a nerve agent (but not enough to do much).

Esposito walks in from the hallway “Hola chica, I’ve been meaning to call you, to talk about…” and he comes around the corner, and sees Beckett and Castle. Lanie cuts him off. E covers quickly.

Wheelchair tracks trace to a Thaddeus Magnus. Drives a white van. Government protestor. Castle worries we’re talking a Timothy McVey type of terrorist.

after C and B leave, Esposito goes in for a kiss from Lanie. (Oh my! — ed)

Thaddeus is an old man. He’s surprised to hear Zalman has been killed. Thaddeus worked for him, not the other way. According to Thaddeus, If anyone killed him, it was those guys he worked for. They came by to meet him at the store later on.

Zalman asked Thaddeus to make a mechanical arm that could trigger a switch remotely. He said this was his greatest magic trick ever, and he was being paid a fortune to get away with murder.

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Beckett lays out that a magician would be the ideal person to plan an attack. The people who killed him probably thought it was safer to kill him than to pay him and take a chance that he’d rat them out.

Castle is researching how many explosions happen in he city every day. His cell phone rings, and it’s GIna. Martha wants him to answer it. Instead, he makes it “disappear.” Martha asks him what’s going on. Castle says that everything is “just fine, ordinary” Problem is he doesn’t want ordinary. He wants magic. And neither he nor Gina want to admit it.

Organic phosphates, nerve agents. = Jet fuel.

Castle comes to the precinct and has come to the same conclusion as to the target that Beckett came to = a famous billionaire whose plane blew up over the Atlantic. (Frankly, I don’t know where this person came from, I missed him being introduced earlier –ed) The team are watching a video tape of the launch of the plane. A white van drives up disguised as a caterer. “Zalman” gets out, with the “catering box” and installs it in the plane. The same plane broke up over the Atlantic. Perfect murder.

(Or is it? Perfect disappearing act, perhaps? — ed)

Esposito is on the phone (with Lanie?) and he signs off as Ryan walks up. They are going over the background of the billionaire. He gave away more money than Oprah. He had only one hater. Naomi Waldon-Dahl, his wife and former fashion model. He caught her having an affair, and their prenup states that she gets nothing. They attended a gala where the magician (Zalman) performed. Did she ask him to make her husband disappear permanently?

In the interview, Naomi says she wouldn’t kill her husband because she wouldn’t get anything. All of his accounts have been frozen by the district attorney’s office. The billionaire was being investigated by the SEC. They thought he was stealing all of his money.

So, what better way to disappear than to hire a magician.

In the cockpit, they switched out real Dahl for “Dummy Dahl” with Thaddeus’ fake hand. They made it look to the world like Christian Dahl was still on the plane. Used the catering box to get him off the plane with no one seeing him. Controlled the plane remotely from the box on the van.

Therefore, Dahl is very much alive, and only one person in the world knows it. So Dahl has to kill Zalman himself. (ya, the hubby and I called that one — Ed). But now what? Dahl did everything publicly so something over the top might be in order.

(Would he attend his own funeral? — ed)

Castle and Beckett attend Dahl’s funeral. How could he resist attending his own funeral. As they discuss how they will find him? In walks Dahl with long hair, a beard and thousand dollar shoes.

In interrogation, Mr. Dahl wonders what he has been charged with, ditching a plane in the ocean? The charge is premeditated murder. Staging a shooting was too cumbersome. The rabbit hair from his gloves were found on Zalman. Then Dahl starts to see something. (Does he see Edmond? – ed) Behind the two way glass, is the “ghost” of Zalman . Mr. Dahl jumps up and says “I killed you.” And..they’ve got him.

Beckett ”A-la-kazam Jackass”

The famous magician worked with Edmund to make him up to look like the dead Zalman. The two are discussing the fate of Zalman’s magician life’s work.

Ryan walks over with something for Beckett to sign. Where is Esposito, she asks. “Take a guess” says Ryan. Castle and Beckett say “with Lanie”. Ryan comments that he can’t believe they still think we don’t know. Beckett decides they should continue to keep it from them.

Castle’s phone rings. He goes to answer it and talks to GIna. Beckett overhears him breaking it off with Gina, and walks away trying not to disturb him.

When he’s off the phone, CAstle asks Becket her plans, if she’s heading home to see Motorcycle boy. Which he corrects to “Dr. Motorcycle Boy.” No, he’s on shift, so Beckett was going to try to catch the comfort food truck. After a pause, she stops and invites Castle to join her. He gladly agrees; Macaroni, etc. Then as they enter the elevator he thanks her for not brining up Page 6 and asking him what was going on. Beckett pulls a bouquet (magician’s) from her sleeve and tells him “not a problem”.

Elevator doors close.

End.

(Then a preview for an amazing episode next week filled with Beckett’s Mom’s murder, and kissing between Castle and Beckett! — ed.)