“Not bad?”

Castle isn’t a bad show, certainly much better than what I expected, and while it won’t win any sort of medal for originality it does at least prove to entertaining.

The entertainment value of the show rests squarely on Nathan Fillion and he carries more than his share of the work load here. It would have been easy for his character to come off as self-centered douchebag but Fillion plays him with a good sense of arrogance, intelligence and charm that make the character very enjoyable to watch. It’s his sense of enthusiasm though that really makes the show more bearable than it should be and the show’s strongest quality. Stana Katic is beautiful and another show she may have been perfect but on Castle she seems to get enveloped by Fillion’s charisma and charm. I can see that they were going for the straight laced sharp shooter but she’s dull. I actually enjoy the relationships with Tamala Jones who plays a medical coroner and Jon Huertas and Seamus Dever as detectives. All of them play more straight laced characters but seem to give them more life and personality than anything Stana can deliver. Susan Sullivan and Molly C Quinn play Fillion’s family and they’re quite enjoyable. All the characters on the show are enjoyable except for Stana and it hurts the show most because she’s supposed to carry the weight of the show with Fillion.

The actual premise of the show and the stories are nothing special. The show is built around Fillion and Katic and it’s supposed to be about their sizzle but the murders and crimes they’re solving are so far run of the mill and not together all that exciting. I don’t think I’ve seen a cop show that does more paper work than Castle. The cases and crimes don’t need to be outlandish but they need to be interesting and here Castle fails. That’s a serious no-no for a cop show but the show seems to embrace’s it corniness and basically sweeps the cases under the rug in favor of witty banter and popcorn moments.

Overall Castle isn’t a bad choice but you could certainly do better.

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