**WARNING: RED JOHN REVEAL SPOILERS FOLLOW**

Remember a couple of years ago, in the season three finale of The Mentalist, when we were supposed to be led to believe that Bradley Whitford’s character, Timothy Carter, was Red John? And then it turned out he wasn’t? I wasn’t convinced then .. and I’m even less convinced of Sheriff McAllister being Red John this season.

After everything we’ve learned up to this point about the elusive and infamous Red John, it turns out that everything lead to a cowardly, sniveling old coot with no remarkable traits to his name other than his fear of pigeons. There were several clues that led to McAllister being Red John throughout the season, but that’s not what I have a problem with. What do I have a problem with? Where do I start? …

First let’s consider everything Red John’s been up to since the first season of the show, and how we’ve gotten no answers to them whatsoever:

• Why has Red John been toying with Patrick Jane, essentially following him and continuing to make his life hell and reminding him of what he’d done to his family?
• What’s with his smiley face mark? Not a single insight into what made him use that as his calling card. What about the name “Red John” for that matter?
• The Blake Association seems to like to clear up loose ends quite quickly — wasn’t Red John a big ol’ loose end/canon that could ruin their organization? Why didn’t they just get rid of him long ago?
• All along we were led to believe Red John had a connection with mentalism in some way, perhaps having supernatural skills of mind reading. Not a peep of that, other than McAllister strangely interested in wanting Jane to know how he knew who was on his Red John suspect list.
• What about of all of the Red John disciples we’ve seen throughout the series. What the bloody hell did they see in this guy? How was this coward even remotely able to call people to sacrifice themselves for him?
• Why was Brett Partridge killed? I get that his tattoo served to allow McAllister to (very temporarily) elude the authorities, but that’s not why he was killed. …
• THIS was the guy eluding Patrick Jane all this time? Really?
• This now means Jane has killed two people due to being Red John suspects. How the hell could he ever be allowed back near the CBI?

There’s probably more, but to get into it all would just make me more sad. I think what pisses me off the most is that we’re supposed to believe that Red John is this guy who fled from Patrick Jane like some petty criminal, leading up to him actually attempting to … oh God, I can’t believe this happened .. call 9-1-1 for help. It can’t be. CAN’T! BE!

I’ve just decided that I refuse — RE-FUSE — to accept that McAllister is/was Red John. He’s simply not worthy of the title. Timothy Carter was a far more convincing Red John than McAllister in every way, and even then I wasn’t convinced. I get that creator Bruno Heller said that Jane’s list definitely had the name of Red John on it, but either Heller’s lying or it’s NOT McAllister.

Am I missing something here? Was Heller making a point that Red John should never have been such a big deal on the show, so he went and made him a wuss? Or will we start to follow a hell of a lot more clues into who the real Red John is, once we see what Bertram’s encrypted file translates to? Maybe that’s just the start to a whole new ongoing mystery for the show?

I’d still like to hold onto the Patrick Jane as Red John theory. I know a lot of people seem to hate that one, but this episode did nothing but enforce it in my eyes. How about McAllister’s “who are you?” question to Jane? The way it was asked, and then the way Jane answered, for someone like me who’d like to hold onto the Jane=John outcome, it sure felt like a hat tip in that direction. Jane’s Red John persona is so buried that McAllister questioned him that way to be sure it still held.

I get that a LOT of people are just done with the Red John plot and would be happy to see it end, and I can sympathize with that. But this isn’t how you go about it.

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I admit that I’m one of those odd folks who held very strongly onto the theory that Patrick Jane is actually Red John. Though I’m unable to cite the interview at the moment, I was sure at one time that The Mentalist creator Bruno Heller had said that the Red John story was intended as a series-long arc, whereby his identity would not be revealed until the show’s finale episode. It turns out that what I likely actually read — and perhaps what Heller meant — was that the Red John saga would end with the series, not that we’d know his identity at that time as well. Now that we know Red John’s identity will be revealed very soon and that this is likely not the show’s final season — and that Heller has said time and again that the “list of seven” includes the actual Red John — I’m definitely ready to drop my Jane-is-John cruscade. Not to mention Heller has gone on the record as saying my old theory is flat out wrong.

With the clues The Mentalist writers are throwing at us lately, it’s clear we’re at the home stretch toward the Red John reveal. The question is, though: who are these clues intended for?

As I said last week, I quickly deduced that the strange mention of “Carmen Lee” was meant to subtly say out loud “poem poem.” With the way Patrick reacted to that interruption, one would assume he was reflecting on it more than usual. Does that mean that Red John was throwing these clues at Patrick, or that it’s only meant as a fun guessing game for the viewers?

Something else that I noted from that episode — and something that’s been cropping up several times this season — is the presence of pigeons, or doves. Pigeons were present when Brett Partridge fell dead, in that abandoned house. They also showed up in an odd shot during last week’s episode. Then, in this week’s episode, they once again appeared toward the end, as Sheriff McAllister exited the bell tower of the church. Obviously the pigeons are not a coincidence, but what are they trying to tell us? I set out to find out.

Like with the Carmen Lee clue, I did some simply Google-foo to find out what the meaning of these birds might be in relation to what we already know. I’ll save you the minute details, but remember that familiar William Blake poem, “The Tyger?” It’s not the only poem Blake’s written. Search for “William Blake dove poem” and you’ll turn up one called “The Land of Dreams” — comes up quite quickly and easily, actually. In that poem is this:

Among the Lambs, clothed in white
She walk’d with her Thomas in sweet delight
I wept for joy like a dove I mourn
O when shall I again return

Thomas. Anyone on the list named Thomas? Yep: Sheriff Thomas McAllister. Hey, I’m just pointing out what I’m finding from the clues here, but it sure seems purposeful and in-your-face to me. In fact, it seems so obvious that one could easily conclude that it’s all a big, fat red herring.

There’s something else I wanted to point out from the clues lately. Remember at the end of last week’s episode, when Jane and Lisbon were listening to Sophie’s recording, we heard her note that her patient was suffering from “acrophobia.” Go back and watch that scene again, if you’re able. Now keep this in mind: conveniently, we’re left with only Sophie’s audio notes to work off of: that’s no accident. Why would we, the viewers, need to be left with audio-only notes of Sophie’s session with Red John? Think about that. Now consider that line where she supposedly says “acrophobia.” Jane makes a point of noting that acrophobia is “fear of heights.” Why did he bother to do this? Who doesn’t know that? Nobody — it was meant to lead us. Also note that, during the audio playback, they cut to scenes of all of the currently living suspects as Sophie rattles off personality traits of Red John … except when she notes acrophobia. That’s because we, the viewers, are being led to believe she said acrophobia, when in fact she said “agraphobia”: fear of sexual abuse. Jane is either knowingly pursuing the wrong phobia, or he’s purposely leading Lisbon in the wrong direction and knows, in fact, that it was “agra” Sophie said, not “acro” — they do sound very similar. The fact that this wasn’t written down anywhere means we only have to go on what it sounded like Sophia might have said, and what Jane himself says she said. Then again, didn’t Lisbon ask if the transcribing service kept copies of Sophie’s notes? What happened to those?

Take those clues and evidence with you as you see fit. I’m still not sure anyone can rely on what’s thrown at us, but it’s been fun watching for and collecting these clues, even if they don’t lead in any one particular direction. Maybe later I’ll wish I flat-out pointed toward McAllister as the prime suspect, but for now I’m sitting back and seeing what else turns up.

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You may recall that I’m a huge supporter of the idea that Patrick Jane himself is Red John. I won’t get into that again here, because it can be a long conversation that sometimes upsets a lot of long-time Mentalist fans. Something else I’d gotten into at one time was my second-favorite theory about Red John: that he is forensics investigator Brett Partridge. Now, as you can see from the above image, it seems Partridge is on Patrick Jane’s radar as a person he’s met in the past (more specifically, someone he apparently shook hands with, as Lorelei Martins seemingly let slip out last week).

So, as I usually do when the thought of Brett Partridge coming back to the show comes up, I contacted actor Jack Plotnick for comment. Here’s how the basic back-and-forth went:

Me: Did you happen to catch what was written on Patrick Jane’s notebook at the end of the most recent episode? So NOW do you have any idea if you’re getting a call back?

JP: No… WHAT was written on his notebook???!!!!!

Me: Well, Jane is making a list of all the people he’s met that he suspects could be Red John, since he now has the hint that it’s someone he’s met before, or at least “shook hands” with. There’s a close-up of his notebook at the end of the last episode, and the first name: Brett Partridge. Did your character shake hands with Jane? I can’t remember! So I take it you’re still not called back?

JP: Nope, not yet…. Thanks for the heads up!!!!

Revealing? Not at all, really, unless you consider the possibility that Jane’s list is completely meaningless and he’s not going to pursue it at all, at least this season. Or it could mean that Partridge isn’t a contender at all, and the real Red John will show up before we’re ever able to get to investigating Partridge. To be honest, I mostly found it very cool that someone we’ve been suspected as possibly being Red John was noted on the show. I’ll just go ahead and think they’re shouting out to ol’ CliqueClack there … let me think it.

Another name on that list you might notice, one that had come up in the past here, as a possible Red John contender: Virgil Minelli. But where’s Gale Bertram?

How about the other names on that list? Any of them strike out to you as very good contenders for being Red John?

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