Castle (TV Series) Linchpin (2012) User Reviews

Could have been better...

[roni_arg · 9/10 · 25 March 2012]

I liked this two parter, though I liked Pandora better. This closing is also fast paced, keeps the twists, but stretches a bit too much. The plot was promising and complicated, but it kind of falls apart when it all comes down to a single character. The one traitor is the person who designed a devilish plot to unleash WW3, did all the killings, was on everyone's back all the time without raising anyone's suspicions, ...well it is just too much.

It was entertaining and we all wanted to see how it ended, but the excess of computer tech, geeky stuff, magical databases, the good guy suddenly revealed as the incredibly evil bad guy, the hidden shooter who saves the hero at the last minute, the life changing confession that is left incomplete because the character dies...this all makes it a bit tedious.

I think the plot could have been handled much better and the Sophia character that resembled Beckett's situation with Castle could have been exploited way more.

A 2 parter doesn't have to have a bigger consequence than the last one.

[luke_coles · 7/10 · 21 February 2012]

Yes this contains spoilers. Nathan Fillion can do no wrong, and I love the show, but this one missed the mark in the end a bit. Maybe I need to watch the "Pandora" episode again but the ending fell a bit flat when I guessed who the traitor was just because they gave no clues to hint at who it was. Again I need to watch the first episode again in case there was a throw away line that hinted toward the real culprit.

The pacing was excellent and really pushed the story forward but When Beals' character (Sophia) all of a sudden is the double agent, she's Russian, and then reveals she knows something about Castle's mystery father? A little too much shoe horned into a minute of dialogue. By Beals/Sophia being the antagonist anything she said is now suspect and adds to the trouble of the shoe horned information at the end. "Castle and Beckett save the world" would be better as a joke than part of their characters history, they're detectives not super heroes.

Yes the sexual tension is a large component of the draw but it is wearing a little thin, they don't have to jump into bed right away, but a date episode where they have to deal with each other when they are not brought together by a murder could be an interesting episode. Beckett's unavailability for a relationship is a great tool, but if you go so many episodes without at least mentioning any progress made on the subject it becomes weak as a singular obstacle. I can see that Sophia's comments to Beckett about "Ruining their relationships spark by having sex" were meant to reinforce Beckett's trepidation with giving into her feelings for Castle, but because it came from the antagonist it means almost nothing and seemed more like the writers were asking the audience to hold on for the rest of the season before Kate admits she remembers that Castle said "I love you" in the season 3 finale.

This Season 4 has been a lot of fun, but the Linchpin here is that Castle and Beckett are getting left in the friend zone. The real Linchpin was a powerful family from China that could ruin the U.S. economy if their daughter is shot is a great premise but the plot of a double episode shouldn't be a tag-line, a little more could have made the ending a little less rocky.

I love the show and I will keep watching, but please, sometimes less is more, with regards to the plot, and appetizers are better than a tiny taste before dinner, with regards to Castle and Beckett.

Wow... and I thought it couldn't get worse after last week.

[preachboy777 · 1/10 · 22 February 2012]

Castle for some reason thinks that it has to keep outdoing itself, which unfortunately makes for horrible, schlocky television that is so overdone that I can barely watch it. My girlfriend and I were either laughing at how ridiculous these last two episodes were or seriously considering just turning it off. The only time I have ever felt like this about a show is when Stewie showed up on Bones season 4. Castle and Beckett didn't do much more than stand around and watch all the action for the entire episode. I like Castle, but the show needs to go back to its roots and stick to what it's good at... solving murders. This isn't 24. And they certainly shouldn't try to pack an entire season of that show into one episode of this one. Get back to the dead bodies, Castle. Now, we are going to go watch some Law and Order: Criminal Intent to detox.

"Reckless, immature, self-centered jacka**" (That's a line from the show)

[Jackbv123 · 3/10 · 16 January 2022]

During the last episode, both Castle was certainly all that and Beckett not much better. But so were the writers. My biggest complaint was that Beckett and Castle were idiots and should have been killed at least twice if not 3 times. And they do it again in this one.

In the last episode the CIA hijinks were stupid. Now it's just silly. Sophia gives Rick a clue. They agree that because it's a domestic bank, the CIA can't go after it. Trouble is that the CIA crew were way past that a long time ago. If they hadn't brought it up, it could have been ignored, but the writers want it both ways.

There are some interesting twists in the big crisis story. The problem is that Beckett and Castle were mostly spectators and victims except for one quick observation by Castle. This episode was a lot of hullabaloo just to make Beckett jealous.

Just ehhhhh...

[swiitchhfw-26543 · 5/10 · 7 February 2023]

* SPOILERS *

My first and foremost complaint about this episode is just all the clichés in it. Especially for a show about a writer who is often mentioning clichés in their other cases. A mole in the CIA, like we haven't heard this a billion times. The whole, I've-got-my-gun-pointed-at-you-but-I'm-going-to-sit-here-for-5-minutes-and-explain-every-detail-rather-than-just-killing-you conversation. I was just waiting for Castle to say "and I would have got away with it too if is wasn't for you mettling kids!" again. Which feeds into the next cliché: rather than just shooting Beckett and Castle, Sophia has to explain everything (with a stupid smirk on her face the whole time), which buys just enough time for them to miraculously be rescued at just the right moment. Oh, I also love how the CIA sits in a dimly-lit basement using Matrix-like graphics. (Insert eyeroll here). All in all, not the worst episode but not their greatest either.

Ugh really????

[courtneyjjjjjjjj · 2/10 · 4 April 2021]

Another example of the writers trying to force Beckett and Castle character development by putting them together in unrealistic life or death scenarios that they quickly get out of.

Castle and Beckett are so f-n boring now.