RED JOHN EPILOGUE: (I really hope this gets filmed and happens on the show!!!!)  Please vote "Plausible" if you agree!


This would be the ultimate awesome:  In a few episodes from now, Jane's just minding his own business.  Maybe he's finally decided to start dating Lisbon, or whatever.  He sees (out of the corner of his eye) someone who looks a lot like Partridge, in some random resort town or something, while on vacation with Lisbon.

   He vary cautiously, but casually confronts him, Jane doesn't want Partridge to be able to see him until he is close.  Partridge now has bleached blond hair and a deep (but realistic) tan,  maybe an accent of some kind (Spanish, French, surfer Californian?  I don't know), but it is definitely him, and he plays dumb of course.  He pretends to not recognize Jane, except for a twinkle in his eye (much like Timothy Carter did). 

    Conversation ensues, etc.  Partridge admits that he's Partridge, but only admits that he is under some sort of "Witness Protection Program" in exchange for his participation with the FBI in ratting out as much as he knows about the Blake Association (as a former member).  Before he leaves, Jane asks him how he thinks McAllister pulled off being Red John for all of those years.  Partridge just can't resist and tells Jane his "theory" which explains everything (all clues connected) -- which only Red John would know, but which doesn't actually implicate himself, because it is just a "hypothetical," much like OJ Simpson's book, If I Did It.  But, anyway, "Brett" explains that he is bored now with chasing (read: being) RJ now and just wants to be a surfer/ESL teacher/whatever now, under the radar.  PJ has not recourse to kill, shoot, or arrest Partridge.  He has no weapon and he has already cried wolf twice, with two different "RJ"s.  No one would belief him, he would become the stupid, psycho, serial killer of suspected serial killers, claiming them all to be Red John -- how would that look?  Jane's hands are tied and he is in a stale mate.

     "Partridge" is able to leave and get away, bathed in anonymity, likely going to change his hair color or face again.  Before he leaves, still acting gregarious like he and Jane are old friends (except he seems much smarter this time) he yells back that maybe Jane's search for Red John brought something good after all -- he got to meet Lisbon, fall in love and have (adopted?) their young daughter (who we now see playing with Lisbon in the background). 

    Jane realizes that RJ/Partridge is much smarter than he and says out loud (soliloquy for the camera) that the real RJ provoked Jane to murder two "innocent" men; PJ realizes that HE has become a serial killer at the beckoning of RJ, who gets away scott free.

    A few days/a week/a month later, Jane receives a registered letter in the mail.  It is from Visualize -- a posthumous note from the desk of Bret Stiles.  (It was written in his will to have this delivered to PJ 6 weeks (or however long) after his funeral.  In it, he apologizes for never coming clean all of these years, cowardly trying to protect his empire from defamation, thereby protecting, harboring, and even supplying RJ with all of the resources/followers he needed, while Bret was under duress of blackmail form RJ (who was his son, nephew, foster child, whatever).  This explains why he loved/harbored RJ, "Brett Partridge" (not his real name -- chose it in honor of Bret Stiles and his love of William Blake: an homage to "A Brace of Partridges"), but, over the years Bret Stiles also grew to see Patrick as a worthy adversary and, daresay, even to love him like a son.  And so he wrote this note to let him know that.

   But it's too late, RJ has gotten away into a sea of anonymity, never to be heard of/from again.       

Come on guys, there are some episodes left before the season ends. patience is a virtue. before complain and talk really bad about the last episode, Heller, even the show. let's just wait... i don't like the idea of Mcallister being RJ either. but i think the best thing to do is wait. I'm sure that Heller will surprise us in the upcoming episodes.

here is a recent theory, i submitted in the afternoon.

http://www.whoisredjohn.com/See-a-theory-Red-John/15675 give it a look and let me know what you think about it...

Bruno Heller should be ashamed of himself. For years now, people have watched this show, gathered evidence and tried to figure out the identity of the character that loomed over the entire series. Heller, of course, browsed these and other pages and saw the time and effort fans put in resolving this mystery. Now we know that he didn't decide the identity of Red John until recently. This shows us that the clues that have been scattered around the show since the beginning were all completely random and irrelevant. Not a one managed to bring Patrick in RJ's vicinity, it was all surpluss. Now, I didn't follow this show religiously at all, I only watched the RJ themed episodes and not even all of them, but even I am pissed off at this ending. It is embarrassing and downright wrong. I can't imagine how true fans must be feeling, those who have devoted hours and hours into thinking theories up, then more hours elaborating and discussing details such as tea cups. Heller knew the approach fans took to this show and he still didn't offer them anything real, no vindication whatsoever. When he saw the proportions of his RJ story arc, he had an obligation to definitively choose RJ's identity and stick with it. He had that duty towards his loyal fans. Shameful.

Also, I reject the notion that Red John had to be a disappointment. This is a cheap cop out. Season 3 finale was brilliant and it offered a masterful RJ. Both the casting and Whitford's performance were impeccable. THAT was a Red John. Everything was done properly. This was pathetic and I absolutely reject the idea that it had to be a let down. It's a let down when your writing staff is poor and without a clear direction. It's inevitably poor when you dig yourself in too deep. Whitford was RJ for me, Berkeley was just unlucky to be cast in this odd joke of an episode.

The episode was butchered first with the dull and empty conversation between Jane and John ("I'm supposed to die, am I? It doesn't seem fair. - It is fair. It's over and I won." - the episode is filled to the brim with such gripping dialogue), and later on minutes of what could have been great head-to-head between two adversaries were wasted on scenes of running around. I think it speaks volumes that I was actually most impressed with scenes involving the FBI, ffs. If Heller weren't a hack, this would have been unexplicable.

Not only is it not enough that Red John turned out to be a weakling who begs and crawls without showing any heart whatsoever, the disappointment grows with the fact that Jane didn't really catch John. The ending tells us that, had RJ not decided to face Jane personally, he would never have been revealed. So essentially RJ brought forth his own demise and for all of Jane's mentalism and the sea of clues we came across during these 5+ seasons, it all counted for nothing as we needed RJ to break character and do something incredibly reckless and stupid. This doesn't require a leap of faith, it's insulting instead.

And now people still won't let go and they think the episode was fake despite being officially aired. This is what such a shocking ending does to fans. It was so poor that people are actually in denial.

To conclude, nothing worked in the episode and I wasn't even remotely pleased with Berkeley's RJ. He just doesn't fit at all. It's got to the point for me where ANY other character would have been a better choice. I would have preferred Grace as RJ to this.

I will echo the thoughts of some on here and say that, in the future, I will avoid anything that has Bruno Heller connected with it. I will watch the next episode to see if they'll explain anything, just one detail RJ-related, and then I'm done with the mentalist and especially with Heller.