Red John isn't afraid of death.

Season 4 finale;

PJ: "Go to hell"
RJ: "As you well know Patrick, there is no hell.When I die I won't be punished."
This conversation shows that RJ knows he is going to die sooner or later,still he doesn't care, and still he continues to live his life on the edge.

RJ kills for the immediate pleasure of the act, and he does it in a way to offer fear to the people.He is a SHOWMAN.
Killing is his business.Cutting his victims open with his knife, feeling their fear.He watches them die and he feels nice.So I suppose that his adrenaline is at the maximum when he kills, he feels pleased and his feeling the heat.
And remember the episode where Jane has fugue, there is a firefighter that is stabbed to death and his wife stated: "My husband was addicted in adrenaline.Definitely when he was stabbed, it was the greatest excitement of his whole life."
I believe same goes to Red John.When he dies, he feels it, he feels the pleasure.This is my point of view.Remember Dummar, end of season 1, he got shot by Jane, and he died laughing and saying "Red John". Now this is a proper way to die for a psycho.

Red John has phobias like everybody else.Phobias that may seem ridiculus to others.Still I can't see a good reason why RJ is afraid of dying.

And by the way, how many fears Red John has?
A)Fear of birds.Even Sheldon from Big Bang Theory learned to tolerate birds eventually.
B)Fear of heights.Very common fear.
C)Fear of death.
D)Fear that someone is better than him.(He kills to punish those who expose him just to prove he is better)

Accepting that there will most certainly be plot holes within the Red John story line that may never be resolved (if a show runs long enough, there will almost always be some continuity errors), I think it's more that fair to say that some of the gaps here go well beyond oversights or that can be dismissed (in the minds of the writers) as minor details.

There have been many postings outlining many, many questions to be answered - and some of these may simply the natural product of unresolved curiosity.

However, there are some clear holes in what have been central elements of the story line, plot elements which remain unresolved but that must have been considered by the writing staff at the time they were written, even if RJ wasn't determined until later within the show:

- The connection between Visualize & Red John, and how Bret Stiles in particular was so well versed in all things Red John, as well as the events at the Farm

- How Red John was able to generate such a loyalty among his minions, even, for some of them unto the their willingness to die for him

- How Red John did, indeed, come up with the List of 7 - or perhaps, more importantly, why he offered those names up to Jane & the CBI

- Why CBI Senior Management, each in turn, was so willing to report on Jane to Bob Kirkland / Homeland Security

There are hundreds of other questions, each of which hold our interest at different times, but these points have been major recurring elements within the plotline of the show.

Even the JJ LaRouche's 'Tupperwaregate' was brought to a meaningful and compelling close - do we really think that the core plotline will be left so open ended?

There must be more to come.

Remember when we were so excited for a new mentalist and they showed us a re-run??
I remember bc i was pissed !!! But , now i see why bruno showed that exact episode.

It was called blood feud, it was about rigsbys dad getting shot in CARSON SPRINGS.
Now if you watch "red johns rules" we learn that janes hometown was indeed CARSON SPRINGS!!!
Crazy right ?
I know it doesn't prove Rigsby is from there just because his dad is but come on...thats a clue to me .

Also, where is Janes dad? Ive heard he is a manipulative "wicked" man but where is he?

So Red John had thousands of followers.... if that encrypted list is BA members, there's no way it even listed 1/10 of the members.  Also RJ had followers who were not BA members (outside of law enforcement) such as Lorelei Martins and Todd Johnson.  Its not believable if they caught or killed everyone even in 2 years.  When RJ died, did everything just crumble?  Regardless, they are still RJ followers out there and they would want revenge against Patrick. 

Thomas McAllister was not Red John, he was one of RJ's disciples who was assigned the task by the leader of Blake Association(obviously Red John) to assume character of Red John(something we have seen before, Timothy Carter S03 finale ring any bells).There is no way that Red John who is a character who has been developed and slowly increasing in complexity for the entire mentalist series is suddenly revealed as McAllister in an episode which quality can be compared to the shit from my ass. 

On that basis you can say Bruno Heller is just trying to trick us.. again. However he did include something which stuck out for me in S06E08, it must be subtle though because I don't seem to see anyone else picking up on it or thinking much of it.Brett Partridge is the real Red John. You would already know a lot of other strong reasons to believe so accumulated yourself and/or read in many popular theories, on top of them this is what cemented BP being RJ for me, or at least McAllister definitely not being RJ.Notice these things in S06E08 final scene:1. A man standing watching the child playing.2. His stance/posture.3. His resemblance (in build/posture) to Brett Partridge.4. Listen to the audio.Here is the part in the final scene I refer to. (if doesn't near the end of the video at first then skip to about 57sec-1min and watch to the end).http://youtu.be/cfbXiMoeRsc?t=57s

More on the List of 7 & How Red John got Jane's List

Cynicism tells me that if the Red John reveal is actually real (and I'm very much hoping that it is not - the theories posted here are far more interesting and well though through), then we won't really ever find out how RJ got the list because it was not thought through as a plot element that was ever planned to be revealed (which is almost unfathomable to me - this is no small part of the story). 

That said, if we presume that there will be better closure coming, I'm in the camp that says the original list of 7 wasn't real (not in fact Jane's list at all).  I think we see a partial list of Jane's suspects in an earlier episode (in his notebook) and it's different from the List of 7.  I may be wrong, but I don't believe we ever see Jane revealing the List of 7 to anyone (or to the viewer) prior to RJ's DVD being played. 

Now, presuming he's looking to trap RJ, and knows that by revealing the list to Lisbon & the Team it will become known to RJ that he has done so, I picked up that scene at the end of season 5 differently. I think it's more likely that Jane reviewed the DVD in private (in fact I think that's evident from the scene when he shared the viewing with Lisbon), and when he did so, it gathered photos of the 7 to reveal to Lisbon as the names were read by Lorelei Martins in order to 'confirm' RJ's list as his own and imply these are his suspects (as misdirection). 

Jane had previously revealed that he had a list of 7 names, and revealed one of those names, but did not reveal any of the others.  I think the intention then was for Lisbon & the audience to infer the two lists were the same - but we don't know that. Long story short - I'm not sure RJ ever had Jane's list nor intended to reveal himself as being on that list.

This isn't a theory! I
just wanted to point out some serious timeline issues:

Timeline wise the earliest
episode is S05E05 Red Dawn. 




As far as i know it isn't
possible to put an exact date on those events. The only reference in
that respect is the portrait of Arnold Schwarzenegger as Governor. He
was Governor from Nov 2003 until January 2011.

So if the picture as a
time reference can be trusted the episode must lie within that time frame. It is also said time lie about 1 year after the Jane
murders. So the time frame there is 2002-2010.

By the end of
that episode Jane has gotten the Job of consultant. Also Steve
Hannigan gets transferred and Grace is thrown into the mix as a
replacement.

Assuming there is no in between replacement we know
nothing about she must have gotten the job shortly after that
episode. The time in between can't be more than a few months.




In S01E01 Rigsby
actually wears the same leather Jacket as in Red Dawn, but got arid
of the Goatee.

On the second case of the double murder, Jane meets
Van Pelt for the first time. As he hasn't met her on the first murder
two weeks earlier in LA so she could have joined in the meantime. In
any case we are most likely only moths in from Jane joing the CBI.




Jane did join the CBI
about one year after the murder of his family therefore we must be at
about 1,5-2 years after the murder.

Now there is the first flashback
to Jane doing a psychic reading in the TV Show.




The caption tells us this
happened 5 years ago.
Therefore it must be 3 years prior to the
murders. The second flashback continues in the same TV show with Jane talking
about Red John. His voice keeps on talking while the camera cuts away to a BMV
driving in the moonlight. Then there is another cut to Janes house where
he walks up the stairs and discovers the note and the red smiley.

Now
if this is in fact the scene where he finds his wife and child this
cut must be a jump of about 3 years a head.