I do not like this White Collar turn. It throws so much of the past episodes into the trash, so I hope it shows the strain within the next episode. Otherwise it's a different show from what I signed up for, and I'm not patient with that.

You mean Neal's "I'll always be a criminal" epiphany? That seemed like a big and random left turn.

Yep. Way to go to back up on all the character development, of oh...the entire seasonseries. Unless it's shown to be bogus (aren't recovered memories?) and fast, I'm so not interested. Not even with tension about when it's going to be shown bogus, if that's further in the future than next week.

Yeah, I'm kind of pretending it didn't happen because it doesn't make sense to me.

White Collar was off to me again. There wasn't enough followup on what should be a huge revelation from the previous episode, and some of Neal's lines felt weirdly forced in a show that's traditionally chemistry incarnate.

It feels weird.

It fell in okay with my strategy of denial. Peter and El pleased me greatly. I don't think a butler would actually condone verbing butle (buttle?) like that, but that's rather beside the point.

There were a couple points where Neal's performance felt very jarring. I think it was at the end, when he was announcing they were the law to the bad guy--it felt very...announcey. It lacked immersion in the world for me. And I had accepted the preceding car commercial, so...

But I would rather they had gone back on the revelation of the week before than ignore it.

I honestly had forgotten about the revelation. Because, wow, my memory is bad. I sort of remember the line you are talking about feeling off...

The car product placement was obvious to the point of being hilarious.

At least it's a fancy car. I'll give them and Covert Affairs (which I actually watched with both eyes for a change, although while kettlebelling) credit for using Beemers and Jaguars to be poseurish, instead of world-class spies posturing in Hyundais.

I do not like this White Collar turn. It throws so much of the past episodes into the trash, so I hope it shows the strain within the next episode.

I just caught up with a marathon viewing of all the episodes of the new season yesterday and have been thinking about ita's comment since then.

I think this discordance actually fits in with where Neal is at - he's losing his damn mind. Close to shutting down completely due to overwhelming emotional stress and hyperanxiety.

I mean, think about it: he lost his only known family when Ellen died (violently); he found his father; went through the insane emotions about learning about him, and his own past; discovered that his father is a coward who basically framed the only person he ever trusted; he sold his soul to save that person out of tortured guilt; he continues to have to commit crimes in order to keep himself and Peter (and Mozz) safe; the person that he's sacrificed his own integrity for doesn't trust him; his new handler is murdered, and he feels responsible; and then a psycho-pharmacological mindfuck by an academic whose theories include that the guiltier a criminal feels, the more likely he is to lapse.

I think he just doesn't want to deal anymore. He's increasingly resentful of having to take care of people, and is building a wall so he can stop feeling all this horrible guilt. I think that this will be the emotional arc of the season, and the only one that can save Neal is Neal. Which I think is kind of cool, rather than another iteration of Peter saving Neal or Neal saving Peter. Or Mozz saving Neal.

He just seemed so vulnerable and tortured during the recreation of the drug induced psychiatrist thing. The fact that he went back to his childhood when confessing to Peter was telling, too - he just wants to go back to when he felt safer. Maybe even make different choices all the way back then.

Also, I think the redhead museum lady is totally playing him.

I don't know. Am I giving too much credit for emotional depth for an eye candy show?