CASTLE “The Fast & the Furriest” recap

Richard Castle has a new Über-fan, and his name is Moonshine. Kate’s not jealous since Moonshine is a bit of a gorilla.

I love episodes where Castle has wildly-speculative theories, and “The Fast and the Furriest” was chock full of them. Cabals of sentient apes, a pitbull named ‘Badass’, and of course, Bigfoot. His guesses even reached to Perlmutter, who was snarkier than usual. Rick had a point when he said, “Yes. Let’s go to a crime scene and ignore the evidence” – there were huge Yeti-like prints at the scene, and were summarily dismissed. Two of my very favorite vignettes in this episode were when Rick tried to put pictures of his own on the murderboard.

The victim was involved with several Bigfoot experts, one of them played by  Once Upon a Time’s Raphael Sbarge. He and his wife mirrored the relationship between Castle and Beckett, being believer/skeptic. This launches another philosophical conversation between our leads regarding their view on belief in the unknown. The fact that they had it in bed (in their jammies) was a definite plus. It was lovely to hear what kinds of things Beckett treasures in everyday mysteries.

At one point, Rick and Kate go for a hike to find the wooded area where the attack occurred. They end up falling into a pit (Rick references his knee injury established in the last episode), a trap laid by Bigfoot hunters. For the third time, Castle gives his partner a ‘leg up’, and she leaves him there with a power bar. I really wanted to include a still from that scene, but they all looked really dirty when freeze-framed.

The current-day murder tied into an older crime. Ann was investigating her former roomate’s death, and that led to her own demise. The human murderer essentially ‘framed’ Bigfoot, as he knew the ties she had to investigations of the creature. It ended up being her employer at the ape sanctuary, the same man who had a fixation with Justine as her college adviser.

The side story involved Alexis, who’s been stealing food from the loft because she used her allowance to help fund a friend’s humanitarian project. She was afraid to tell her father because she knew she’d get a lecture about how people take advantage of the wealthy. Her explanation leads Castle to open his mind to Alexis’ investment.

While this episode was pretty light, I enjoyed the silliness that was inspired by Castle’s flailing guesses. Knowing how serious next week’s episode will be, I think the writers were giving us a proverbial calm before the ‘Still’, as it were.

Tune in for the next episode, “Still” – which will most likely end up being another landmark in the series. It airs on ABC – Monday, April 22 at 10pm/9pm Eastern.