A frozen DB is found at a construction site and we get to see Beckett (Stana Katic) getting ready for work, with her gun, watch and necklace with ring on it. Wearing her red coat and blue top (those being Superman's colours!) Castle (Nathan Fillion) arrived at the scene before even Esposito (Jon Heurtas) did. "My first cold case" he quips. Lanie (Tamala Jones) agrees with him, it's not funny but it's true. The DB wasn't there last night and Castle comments they may as well be looking for ruby slippers (those worn by Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz.) Beckett adds the bit about the flying monkeys dumping her there. Castle comments on the killer's MO: he froze her since he either wanted to keep her as a souvenir or he dumped the DB, Beckett concludes cos he didn't want to be reminded of her. They need to look her up and Castle asks if that's in the facial recognition database as he's seen on the Discovery Channel. Cue lots and lots of old fashioned files!
Esposito says maybe Castle can download them an App from his phone enabling their search to be carried out easily. Ryan (Seamus Dever) posits there are plenty of ways to disappear, quoting Shrodinger's Cat (as does everyone, as did Patrick Jane (Simon Baker) in the Mentalist. Castle believes there's got to be an "explanation - a story that makes everything make sense." They know the ending so how did she get there? It takes a long time for a body to unfreeze, his turkey took a while. Beckett has to get in she wasn't a turkey but a person, well that was obvious, clearly she's never heard of the word, allusion before. She's been Id-ed as Melanie Cavanaugh, so they don't need to trawl through the files. Not that Beckett would have, she'd have found a way to get out of it.
Lanie finds she was killed by blunt force trauma and her prints were in the system, she was a drug addict. (So how come Lanie didn't ID the possible murder weapon.) Castle says she was stored in a freezer and Lanie finds she was frozen within 2 hours and has been missing over 5 years. Beckett immediately notices Melanie had a troubled childhood. Castle already gleaned her file, he's a speed reader. Well you've got to be if you're a writer, but other times it just comes in handy for never-ending essays and articles! He gives her the 'Castle notes.' Melanie married Sam Cavanaugh and had 2 children. Why would, as Beckett says, Castle miss out anything important, she's the one who more likely does that.
Melanie was gone 24 hours before Sam reported her missing. In the past she ran away but always returned home and Castle refers to her as the 'runaway bride.' Castle: "Some people love the institution, hate the day to day." He just hasn't met the right girl. Plenty of marriage talk in this episode. They check out Sam's apartment, but common sense dictates that he doesn't really have to be there after 5 years. Also why didn't Beckett run a background check on Sam. The fact he didn't report her missing until later should have been red flagged, but no, she's too casual by far and I've said it before, how did she do her job without Castle. Probably relied on Esposito and Ryan. She's a detective always demanding facts and evidence, yet she just assumes things.
Roger moved in 8 months ago and tells them Sam was murdered. See a background check would have revealed that, also wasn't she meant to be prepared before she jumps in questioning people. Recall the first 2 episodes where she said she doesn't like to investigate until she questions. Laborious policework, her way. Ryan finds Sam was shot outside a store. Castle: "...odds are long, unless connected." Which is another clue cos his murder was connected to Melanie's disappearance. He's got 250 pages which would make him believe it. He'd call the book, 'A chill runs through her veins', hence the title. Another best seller for him. Esposito likes the title.
Castle accompanies Becket to Melanie's parents where she has to break the news to them and Ben Davidson, (Bill Smitrovich) her father says the policeman on the case believed she ran away but she'd never leave her children. Sloane, (Peter Jason) the policeman says she's been found, but Beckett corrects him, her DB was found. He was looking for a missing person not a murder. Sam cooperated with the investigation and of course he'd let CSU into the apartment cos he'd conveniently disposed of the body. Melanie was meant to be in Philadelphia with her druggie boyfriend. Beckett shows Sloane Charles Wyler's photo (Charles Malik Whitfield) Sam's best friend. (In the photo, the clothes Charles is wearing are the same ones he's wearing when they interview him.) Castle was right, Charles wasn't an impartial observer!
Beckett hates cops like Sloane where things need to fit into a box conveniently for them. Castle asks why she wears her father's watch. Would've thought the writers would have him observe that in the pilot episode. Esposito finds a homeless man saw a yellow truck at the construction site, which is owned by Bolland (Jerry Kernion) who found the freezer in the storage and he dumped it. Castle said he should have denied first before saying there's no evidence he did anything. Beckett was going to argue all night with him about what he's done wrong, etc, before Castle stops her to ask questions. That's effective policework for her going on endlessly about the morality of what Bolland did. If it wasn't Sam, then who?
Castle stands with the freezer open at home, waiting for another clue from Alexis. (Molly Quinn) She asks what made him stop paying for the storage space? Charles just told the detectives what Sam told him. Melanie had a boyfriend, Kevin Henson (Channon Roe). Captain (Reuben Santiago-Hudson) tells Beckett to check him out. Castle says Melanie was leaving Sam as he was having an affair. Kevin put her on a bus and was in rehab when she went missing and was killed, cos she stopped calling him. Sam's best friend would know about Sam's lover. Charles lied to them but it was a long time ago. Beckett tells him her children deserved to know what happened to their mother. (Personal comment from her, since she wants to know the same thing about hers.)
Elizabeth Forte (Erin Matthews) worked with Sam at the bank. Castle of course sees through her and says she'd only end the affair if she was scared: of being found out, taking it to the next level and Forte admits she was afraid of Sam. He asked her what she'd do if his wife wasn't in the picture. They're both dead so it doesn't matter, which riles Beckett, cos it matters. Beckett looks at the whiteboard and she can't figure out how Sam killed her. Castle and Alexis play laser tag in the apartment and Beckett drops by, cos let's face it, she hasn't been there before and she was curious. Martha (Susan Sullivan) face mask in tow asks if they're entertaining.
Beckett feels like "Alfred in the Batcave for the first time." Castle attributes Batman more to Beckett cos the loss of a loved one leads to crime solving. She calls him the multi-million dollar crime fighter. She looks at what Castle calls his 'murder board', like hers, only his is fake. Beckett can't find the answer and needs proof, she needs to know what happened. Castle needs to finish the story, she has the ending, the killer and now they have to put it together with facts. They didn't have a baby sitter so Melanie had the children to look after. The doorman didn't see her leaving, so she was killed in the apartment. Of course Sam would need transport in the form of a truck and he's got that with Charles. That was glaringly apparent! Castle likes to "walk the crime scene." He once needed to figure how to throw someone off the Empire State building and that was around the time Sleepless in Seattle was out, lonely women mistook him for Tom Hanks and he got laid... that's a story Beckett doesn't want to hear. Yet he always manages to get something in there about him sleeping around!
At Roger's apartment Castle tells her they're married, Beckett doesn't want to pretend to be married and if they are; she wants a divorce. This was the only exciting part in the entire episode; when they walked the CS. Sam would have put the DB in the bath, what if the children wanted to use the toilet. Castle believes the DB was already in the freezer and Roger adds he would've needed a truck. Had to sign for deliveries in the building and Delores Marsh (K Callan) signed for a freezer she didn't order. She mentions telling the older detective the same thing and Beckett thinks she means Sloane but obviously it's Davidson. Charles has many trucks (about time) and he helped Sam cover her murder. Sam told him it was self-defence and he went along with it for the sake of the children. (Castle and his blue shirt again! Sorry digression!) Charles paid storage for 5 years, was he meant to keep on paying. Well he's paying now is what I said.
Castle and his cold comment again. Captain says Sam got his karma, case closed. But castle had to ask why Sloane would go back to the apartment and question the neighbour if he wasn't investigating a murder and doesn't mention Delores's name in his report.. Delores says the old man came back a year ago. Meaning it was Davidson. Beckett has to do her job and arrest him. A cop can't decide how a story ends, it's not a novel. If Castle wanted her to drop it, then he shouldn't have mentioned that to her, since she didn't pick up on it to begin with. Davidson realized the same thing, that Melanie never left the apartment alive. "A father might follow his daughter's murderer," but he didn't admit he killed Sam. Melanie's mother Julie, (Kerrie Keane) was frought everytime Sam bought the children over.
Castle has "Spidey sense" as far as Alexis is concerned and Beckett admits it was her mother who was stabbed. The detective put it down to gang-related, a random event and didn't want to think outside the box. She wears her father's watch, he's 5 years sober, for "the life I saved;" and her mother's ring, for the "life I lost." That she states is backstory for Nikki Heat. Castle preferred her when she was a hooker by day and cop by night. Castle "until tomorrow" and not goodnight since it's more hopeful and then says goodnight when she's gone. He gets Esposito to show him Beckett's mother's casefile, cos as we know he'll solve her murder. Something Beckett wasn't able to do. As we see Beckett go through the same ritual of removing her watch and necklace this time round.
Admittedly not the best episode so far, very much Beckett orientated with references to children losing a mother and how getting to solve the crime was the most important thing for them, just as it would have been for her and her mother. Only she couldn't solve it herself, wonder if she tried hard enough. Most times Beckett can't think outside of the box either, since clearly that's something Castle does.
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