Captain Tightpants is Castle

[BrotherMan]

Just watched the premiere episode of ABC's new buddy cop show Castle starring Nathan Fillion. The premise: A smart, savvy, sexy NYPD detective is unfortunate to be partnered with the smug and cavalier writer. Why you'll keep watching: Nathan Fillion. Everyone else is dressing.

Richard Castle (Nathan Fillion) has a problem. He just killed off his main character after a series of very successful books. Fortunately for him a person familiar with his work starts killing people. After first being questioned by police about the murders, he gets attached to the unit investigating the crimes. Kate Beckett (Stana Katic) is the no nothing, intelligent is the lead investigator who gets stuck with the smarmy writer. Hijinks ensue. Requisite sexual tension is applied (humorously, I might add).

Only one episode so far (no word on Hulu availability). I give it a "cute enough to keep watching" rating.

[Ensign Steve]

Really? I love Captain Tightpants as much as the next guy (unless the next guy is BrotherMan) but the trailers for this show just did not do it for me. Seems too hijinks heavy.

[Anastasia Beaverhausen]

I really enjoyed it. Castle and Beckett had a very Booth/Bones type of repartee.

[Farren]

Speaking of which, I just started watching Bones. Its fun, but Bones' character is inconsistent at times, like the writer's want to make her seriously empathy deficient, but get nervous sometimes about the character alienating the audience too much.

[Dingfod]

I really enjoyed Castle as well, but recognize it too follows a recent trend in television I've already noted at FF, crime-solving geniuses teamed up with hot female detectives or FBI agents.

Bones, the character, is presented as resembling borderline Aspbergers or an austistic savant, one who cannot easily read other people. I've bored of Bones, the show, but still watch it because I'm bored and boring.

[SharonDee]

I enjoyed it; how could it miss? Nathan Fillion! I don't think I'll be able to watch it at its current time slot, though, because I'm supposed to be in bed by then. I hope it's available online, either at Hulu or ABC.

I had hoped it would be on the same time as Heroes so I could have a reason to tear myself away. No such luck.

[BrotherMan]

You're in luck, SharonDee! It's available via ABC! I don't know how I missed it last week but I have just rectified that.

It continues to be witty and charming. The characters come across as overly witty at times but I don't think it to be an overall detriment to the show. With only two episodes in there aren't any obvious crutches the writers use. (My concerns were the Writer's Club Poker Game and the Castle in Trouble gambit.)

So far, I'm liking all of the cast and their different characters. Castle is smart from his perspective but he still has a lot to learn about the "real world" of detective work. Beckett isn't the jaded heel-worn detective, no doubt due in part to her femininity (the character can display compassion even to a perpetrator) and her pathos, why she became a cop.

The separate ensembles of Castle's family (daughter and mother) and the detective squad are a welcome addition; not forcing the entirety of the show to rest on charisma of the main characters.

I'm going to keep on watching.

[livius drusus]

It looks like it's a shoe-in for renewal. I'm still watching, but I'm getting increasingly disappointed. My main problem is Beckett. I find her less and less believable and authentic as a character.

Like she'll spout some cliche to the grieving survivor while Castle looks on in warm amazement at the soft side of this hard woman. It's tinny and cheap.

[Dingfod]

I'm still watching. It may happen, but I'm not turned off yet.

[wei yau]

What about The Unusuals? Is that renewed?

[BrotherMan]

Originally Posted by livius drusus

Like she'll spout some cliche to the grieving survivor while Castle looks on in warm amazement at the soft side of this hard woman. It's tinny and cheap.

Aside from the not-buying-the-too-pretty-and-delicate-cop thing, I'm okay with them working on the not-jaded hard-as-nails cop angle.

But really, I'm not watching this for her. It's all about Tightpants, people.

[livius drusus]

It's not the angle that bothers me. It's the painful platitudes that are supposed to indicate surprising depth when it's neither surprising nor deep. It's really surface stuff, yet Castle has to react like she's just done this great amazing profound character revelation.

On the too-pretty-and-delicate note, I was also really, really annoyed by that episode when they go to the fancy party and he gets her a dress because all she has in her closet is some decade-old prom leftovers. Meanwhile, in the every day Castle world, the character is dressed super stylishly at all times. That same episode she wore a totally hot trench and she posed in it like a mannequin.

I get that awkward, rough girlcop in Hollywoodish translates to elegant and willowy model and I'd be willing to suspend disbelief if there were any consistency at all to the way she's described versus the way she's actually presented.

[BrotherMan]

But it is surprising! And deep! We've been conditioned to expect our cops to oscillate between been there, done that, shot them and so wrapped up in their job that they can't have a fambly. They're supposed to have a macabre sense of humor; they're supposed to have an insular morality, us against them attitudes. Beyond even that they stopped being people, so long have they stared into the abyss they've stopped caring about the people left after tragedy. How can you be so cavalier when one (very pretty, very dainty) female cop fights against that nature!

Okay, maybe not. But I think it takes a special kind of writer (or team of them) to portray what they're trying to get at here. And, honestly, this team of writers aren't from the top of the drawer. The twisty plots are more like gentle curves and the surprises seem more like that birthday cake you're not supposed to know anything about, wink-wink. Thankfully, Captain Tightpants is Castle. Without his charisma to carry everything this show would have been dead long ago.

Everyone in the squad room is wonderfully clothed. It's like they make a bajillionty dollars and take courses in Looking Fashionable and Everyday Practical. And I wasn't about to say anything about that trench considering what happened to me the last time I mentioned a woman's coat.

[Deadlokd]

Originally Posted by Cynical-Chick

I really enjoyed it. Castle and Beckett had a very Booth/Bones type of repartee.

Except that Booth and Bones are likeable and almost believable. And the storylines are more interesting.

Originally Posted by livius drusus

It looks like it's a shoe-in for renewal. I'm still watching, but I'm getting increasingly disappointed. My main problem is Beckett. I find her less and less believable and authentic as a character.

Like she'll spout some cliche to the grieving survivor while Castle looks on in warm amazement at the soft side of this hard woman. It's tinny and cheap.

It's incredibly tinny. Fiction writer being allowed into a crime scene? I don't think so! Hell, detectives allowed into a crime scene before crime scene officers? I don't think so.

And I just can't like Beckett. Or Castle.

In Oz, they put it on after Bones and are marketing it as a great crime fighting team, Bones and Castle. Half of that is true.

After last night's episode of Castle, I won't be watching it next week. It was the Voodoo one, but there was a disturbing lack of depth to the storyline and no zombies. How can you have a voodoo storyline without zombies? You can't. And Castle has fucked up the investigation almost every week and he's still allowed to tag along? GTFO!

I guess I have to try CSI: Miami next week. But god help me, it's got David Caruso in it. So I guess I have to get a movie out for Sunday nights now.

[Anastasia Beaverhausen]

CSI Miami? You might as well commit hara-kiri.

[Deadlokd]

inorite?

[viscousmemories]

I just stumbled on a video of Nathan Fillion and Stana Katic discussing this show so I searched here for a thread, which now I have found.

So if I hate Bones (and I really really do) will I hate this?

[BrotherMan]

Probably. Best to watch an episode to be sure. (I think they're available on ABC's site.)

[livius drusus]

This is worse than Bones.

[Dingfod]

But I'll keep watching, because I'm bored and boring. It's better than American Idle or America Lacks Talent, but I watch those too. FML

[BrotherMan]

Tonight was the night. For a brief shining moment Captain Tightpants was Castle who was Captain Tightpants. It happens early in the show and there are luls to be had for those brave enough to see it. Later in the show Castle Tightpants has a Dr. Horrible moment (no, not as the Hammer or anything involving his hammer) whereupon he lets loose with a maniacal cackle that Bad Horse would envy.

[Ensign Steve]

Jonathan Frakes directs "Kill the Messenger" set to air on 11/9.

[Dingfod]

Originally Posted by BrotherMan

Tonight was the night. For a brief shining moment Captain Tightpants was Castle who was Captain Tightpants. It happens early in the show and there are luls to be had for those brave enough to see it. Later in the show Castle Tightpants has a Dr. Horrible moment (no, not as the Hammer or anything involving his hammer) whereupon he lets loose with a maniacal cackle that Bad Horse would envy.

To his daughter who asked what he was, Castle said "I'm a space cowboy." I laughed out loud and told my wife that was his costume from Firefly and Serenity. I wish notsosure had been tuned in, she's a huge Captain Tightpants fan.

[BrotherMan]

The line that cracked me up was her "Didn't you wear that, like what, five years ago?"

[Dingfod]