Biggest Unanswered Questions From Castle
"Castle" stars Nathan Fillion and Stana Katic as partners in crime (solving) Richard Castle and Detective Kate Beckett. Castle joins Beckett's team of detectives to gain inspiration for his next mystery crime novel. He dedicates the book's character Nikki Heat to Beckett, arguing that Beckett is his muse. At first, Beckett is heavily opposed to having a civilian in the field with her, much less a writer, but Castle proves his instincts to be helpful and warms his way into her heart. The two develop mutual respect for each other that eventually turns into a will-they-won't they romance. Spoiler alert: Eventually, they will and do.
When shooting Season 8 of "Castle," the cast and crew were unsure if the series was going to be renewed for another season. The writers seemingly chose to think positively as they initially wanted to leave the show on a cliffhanger. However, once they discovered that ABC was canceling the once-beloved series, they quickly had to wrap the story up in a tight little bow. The writers had to find a way to give long-time fans a satisfying ending to the story of Beckett and Castle's romance, otherwise known as Caskett.
Although rushed, the ending of "Castle" does what it can to give audiences the ending they deserved. However, due to its unplanned cancellation, there are many plot points that were left unanswered, and we're going through all those burning questions.
Who was killed instead of Caleb Brown?
Caleb Brown (Kristoffer Polaha) is first introduced in "Mr. & Mrs. Castle" (Season 8, Episode 8). The team investigates a murder on a cruise ship and Caleb works as the defense attorney on the case. His character is seemingly unimportant, with most viewers probably assuming at the time that they'd never see him again. Well, that was the wrong answer, because Caleb shows up a few more times and becomes an important character.
Castle learns that Caleb is in cahoots with the series main villain, Senator Bracken (Jack Coleman). Bracken is a dirty politician who also happens to be responsible for the death of Beckett's mother. The show spends all eight seasons uncovering the mystery surrounding Bracken and his various associates.
Once Castle learns of Caleb's arrangement with Bracken, he discovers that Bracken has another partner that he and Beckett never knew about — the mysterious individual nicknamed "Loksat." The team believes that they can turn Caleb against Loksat in hopes that his involvement can help them take down the mysterious figure. Unfortunately, Loksat discovers Caleb's betrayal and has him killed.
But wait, there's more — turns out Caleb's not dead and that he never turned on Loksat at all. It was all a ruse. Doesn't all of this make you wonder who Loksat killed in Caleb's place? It would have to have been someone he hated due to the brutal nature of his death. So, who was it?
Why didn't Mason Wood stop Castle in LA?
Season 8 gives audiences the big reveal about Loksat's true identity — it's none other than Mason Wood. Just to recap, Loksat is a former CIA analyst and partner of Bracken. He also had a hand in being directly responsible for the murder of Beckett's mother. Plus, he ran various drug operations. All in all, he's not a fun guy.
Castle initially meets Mason in "G.D.S." (Season 8, Episode 14). He is the organizer of a legendary yet secretive initiative called the Greatest Detective Society. When Castle takes a trip to LA with his daughter, he's recruited to prove his skill by solving a murder — only then will he be allowed to join their society. Once Castle solves the crime, he declines Mason's offer as he'd rather stay in New York to be with Beckett. However, it's during this trip that Castle discovers the name Loksat, and upon returning to New York, he and Beckett decide to secretly work together to uncover the mystery surrounding him.
While Castle and the audience don't realize that Castle already met Loksat, Mason certainly knows who Castle is, what he's doing, and that both he and Beckett will be a problem down the line. It's likely that Mason recruits Castle into his society as a distraction to keep him off the scent of Loksat. But when that doesn't work, why doesn't Mason just stop Castle right then and there? It would have saved him a lot of headaches down the line. Instead, Mason just lets Castle go. Why would he do that?
Does Ryan ever become a sergeant?
Detective Kevin Ryan (Seamus Dever) is one of the newest members on Beckett's homicide team. Throughout the eight seasons of the series, audiences watch a bromantic relationship develop between Castle, Ryan, and Ryan's partner Detective Javier Esposito, aka Javi (Jon Huertas). While Javi is typically the more serious of the two, Ryan tends to go off the deep end with Castle, buying into his more outlandish theories about their murder cases. As the series goes on, Ryan grows to become a husband and father, and along with Javi, he decides to take the sergeant's exam to further his career. For Ryan, his ever-expanding family puts pressure on him to make more money.
Unfortunately, Ryan discovers that he failed his exam right around the same time Javi finds out that he passed his. This makes Ryan suddenly spiral, as he always considered himself to be a good cop, perhaps even better than his best friend and partner.
Luckily, Ryan makes the decision to try and take the test again, as his looming family concerns still haunt him. However, with the cancellation of "Castle," we never get to see what happens with Ryan's career and finances.
What happens to the letter that Beckett writes to Castle?
"In The Belly of The Beast" (Season 6, Episode 17) sees Beckett go undercover as Elena Markov, a courier working for a drug cartel under Lazarus, aka Bracken. Beckett borrows this identity from the real Elena (Britt Rentschler), who initially agrees to work with the police in order to help take the organization down. However, the day before she's meant to go in, she attempts suicide and is hospitalized in a coma. Due to Beckett's ability to speak fluent Russian, she's asked to step in her place.
Naturally, things go awry when Beckett discovers that Elena is not a courier at all — instead, she's a hit woman for the organization. And with Beckett acting undercover, they expect her to carry out a job and murder someone. While she manages to fake her way through the assignment, Beckett is immediately recognized as a cop by one of Bracken's associates, Vulcan Simmons (Jonathan Adams). He begins torturing Beckett for information before assigning someone else to kill her. Luckily, she's saved by Elena who tells her (and the audience) that apparently, Bracken wants Beckett alive.
The episode is incredibly stressful, with Beckett believing that she might not make it out alive. When she fears it's the end, she writes Castle a letter detailing how much she loves and relies on him. She hides the letter in a book and puts her blood on it, hoping that if her team finds the room after she's killed, they'll know she was there.
However, once Beckett's returned to her team, they announced that the place she was kept in had been emptied. So, what happened to the letter? Did Bracken find it? Does Beckett ever tell Castle the romantic words she wrote for him? These questions are never answered.
Will Castle continue his P.I. business?
"Bad Santa" (Season 7, Episode 10) sees the D.A. force Beckett's captain to cut ties with Castle and the NYPD. He's no longer a liaison with the homicide department and legally has no right to take part in any more of their investigations. Because of this, Castle decides to get his P.I. license as he misses the thrill of solving crimes. The next episode sees him investigating the same case as Beckett, Ryan, and Javi, with a little competition brewing between who can solve the murder first.
Castle's private investigator business continues throughout Seasons 7 and 8, with Castle's daughter Alexis (Molly C. Quinn) working with her father. The two are often seen teaming up with another independent private investigator named Hayley Shipton (Toks Olagundoye). Hayley used to be a cop and works well with Castle and his daughter.
According to The Washington Post, if "Castle" had continued on for another season, Beckett wouldn't have been involved. Following news that Stana Katic was fired from the series, the writers had chosen to kill off her character. Therefore, Season 9 would follow the adventures of Castle and his P.I. business as he uncovers the reason behind Beckett's murderer (via Entertainment Weekly). However, this doesn't happen, which leaves us all with the question of whether Castle continues to work as a P.I. in the future, or if he's somehow able to join Beckett's homicide team once more.
Is Beckett a senator in the time jump?
In the episode titled "Time Will Tell," (Season 6, Episode 5) Beckett and Castle come across a man (Joshua Gomez) who claims to be a time traveler, much to Castle's delight. His name is either Simon Doyle or Chuck, depending on who you ask. Because Castle starts to believe that this man could actually be from the future, he probes him on questions about his relationship with Beckett.
Doyle shares that Castle and Beckett are indeed married in the future with three kids. He states that Castle's still a writer, although he's dipped his toes into non-fiction writing over his traditional fictional tales. However, one big nugget of information that Doyle lets slip is that Beckett is a senator. This is particularly interesting because at the end of Season 7, Beckett is offered a chance to run for state senator. However, she also discovers that she's passed her captain's exam, so she must decide between two possible career choices.
In the end, Beckett decides to stick with being a cop, as Season 8 sees her as the new captain for her division. However, the seven-year time jump that's slapped on at the series finale shows that Doyle's prediction of three kids comes to pass. So, does this mean that he really was from the future? And if so, has Beckett moved on from captain to senator?
How do Nathan Fillion and Stana Katic really feel about each other?
Sometimes when actors work on a series together for as long as "Castle," they become lifelong friends. Other times, they do not. Unfortunately for those who ship the "Caskett" romance, actors Stana Katic and Nathan Fillion are apparently very much part of the latter group. You can't tell from watching their characters, but they did not get along at all.
According to US Weekly, a source on set revealed that there was some serious friction between the two leads. Aside from when the two filmed scenes, Fillion and Katic would not interact with each other. The dynamic between the two was so bad that they were sent to couple's counselling to work out their issues. Sources even claimed that Fillion made Katic's experience a nightmare, as it was reported that she would often be found crying in her dressing room due to his behavior.
When it was revealed that the "Castle" team chose to terminate Katic's contract, the actress remained pretty humble. However, with time, she's chosen to share that she was ultimately hurt by the decision to remove her character from the series (via TV Commentary). And while neither Fillion nor Katic have ever publicly discussed their reported feud, they've also never denied it either. That alone is very telling.
Perhaps this is something that will be addressed in the future, but until then, it remains an unsolved mystery for fans.
What happened to Alexis' interest in medical examination?
Molly C. Quinn portrays Castle's teenage daughter Alexis. Initially, she's a mature girl who often finds herself at odds with wanting to enjoy her youth while simultaneously keeping her parents and grandmother in check. As the series develops, Alexis matures into an adult who's often seen helping her father in any way she can. By the end of Season 7 and into Season 8, Alexis works with her father at his P.I. office and she's seemingly taken an interest in crime solving.
However, while it's nice to see more of Castle's relationship with Alexis progress into her adulthood, her interest in private investigation as a career choice seems random. Especially when one considers the internship that Alexis had with the precinct's medical examiner Lanie (Tamala Jones).
In "Pandora" (Season 4, Episode 15), Castle discovers that Alexis is interning with Lanie in the morgue. And while he's cautiously concerned at first, Alexis informs him that this is her decision and that she's taken an interest in this profession. Throughout her internship, Alexis is faced with some serious and somewhat scary moments regarding death, however she overcomes her fear and prospers.
Eventually, her internship must have ended because Alexis is no longer seen hanging around the precinct with Lanie. The show never really discusses it, but we can only assume that Alexis decided to switch career trajectory and move on to detective work with her dad.
Does Javi end up with Sonia?
Throughout most of the series, "Castle" focuses on the romantic relationships of both Beckett and Castle, whether with each other or other characters. However, another prominent relationship that "Castle" features is between Javi and Lanie. The two began a romantic flirtation that grows into a full-blown relationship. While they break up and get back together a few times, in the end, the two ultimately decide that they aren't right for each other. They part ways with no hard feelings.
In "Heartbreaker" (Season 8, Episode 16) audiences meet a blast from Javi's past, Sonia (Angélica Celaya). Years prior to the show, Javi and Sonia were engaged to be married, but once he found out about her criminal activity, Javi sent Sonia to jail. Now, nine years later Sonia agrees to help Beckett in exchange for her temporary release from prison. She reconnects with Javi, and just when he starts to trust her again, she attempts to make a run for it.
The end of the episode sees her choose to do the right thing, accepting that this will result in her returning to prison to complete her sentence. However, this time Javi promises that he'll visit her. It seems as though "Castle" is setting up a potential romance between the two. It's sad that audiences will never get to see Javi have his happy ending.
What happened to Captain Gates?
Penny Johnson Jerald joined "Castle" in the fourth season as the new captain of the precinct. She's introduced as being a tough-as-nails character who doesn't have much interest in Castle. However, as the series continues, Captain Gates warms up and becomes a great captain for the team.
In 2015, Jerald posted a goodbye to her fans on Twitter, stating that she recently learned that her character would not be returning for Season 8. With this knowledge, audiences likely expected some sort of goodbye for her character on "Castle," which never really happens. Beckett passes her captain's exam and chooses to follow the path of becoming a captain rather than a Senator. Season 8 begins with Beckett as the new captain for her precinct with Gates a distant memory that's barely even acknowledged.
Jerald's departure was not the only cut the "Castle" team had in mind, as Season 8 was meant to be the end of Stana Katic's Beckett and Tamala Jones' Lanie. And while Beckett's absence is already set in motion, we can't help but wonder if Lanie would have been given a proper send off, or if she was just going to disappear like Gates did in Season 7.