Castle - Season Three

Castle's Third Season finds Detective Kate Beckett (Stana Katic) and her plucky sidekick mystery writer Richard Castle (Nathan Fillion) solving murders, refusing to admit their true feelings for each other, and delving back into the unsolved mystery of Beckett's mother. Sounds good to me.

This year's cases involve counterfeiters, secret underground clubs, a dead psychic (Patricia Tallman) who predicted her own murder, a treasure map, a serial killer, a dead juror, a child kidnapping, aliens (okay, not really) and a shadowy government agency (yes, really!), a secret stash of Prohibition whiskey worth killing for, a dead matchmaker, a magician (Jeff Hephner) hired to plan the perfect murder, a dead lottery winner, the search for a dirty bomb hidden somewhere in the five burroughs, a death on the set of a soap opera, a murderous feud between rival pizza owners, a trip to Los Angeles, a murdered swimmer, and a death at a beauty pageant.

Also this season: Beckett reconnects with her old partner (Jason Beghe), the actress playing Nikki Heat (Laura Prepon) in the movie adaptation of Castle's novel shows up at the station for character research, Ryan (Seamus Dever) gets engaged (to real-life wife Juliana Dever), Esposito (Jon Huertas) and Lanie (Tamala Jones) start steaming up the morgue, one member of the team says their goodbye, and Castle and Beckett share their first kiss and spend their first night together (freezing to death locked in a frozen storage locker). And, don't forget, there's the season cliffhanger that had everyone talking all summer.

The extras on the five-disc set include a round table discussion with creator Andrew Marlowe, executive producer Rob Bowman, mystery writer Michael Connelly, comic writer Brian Michael Bendis, and Nathan Fillion, bloopers, a music video for "Get On The Floor," a look at the show's murder boards with assistant property master Kurt DeFilipps, a featurette on the show's Los Angeles episode, deleted scenes, and commentary for select episodes by Marlowe, Bowman, director Bill Roe, writer David Amann, Fillion, Dever, and Huertas.

Season Three continues to provide good mysteries and great moments week after week. It's a no-brainer for fans of the show to pick this season up and and throw it next to Season One and Season Two DVD's on their shelf. And, if that's still not enough to convince you, this season also gives us the pool scene.