He was everywhere and nowhere. For six seasons of The Mentalist, the name Red John wasn't just a label for a serial killer; it was a shadow that darkened every sunny California frame of the show. You remember the smiley face drawn in blood. That's the image that stuck. It was crude, mocking, and oddly cheerful in the most twisted way possible. Simon Baker’s character, Patrick Jane, lived and breathed for the moment he could finally look into the eyes of the man who slaughtered his wife and daughter. But when we finally got there, the reaction was… mixed.
Honestly, the hunt for Red John is one of the most fascinating case studies in modern television history. It represents the peak of the "cat-and-mouse" procedural, but it also shows the immense pressure writers face when they build a mystery so big that the resolution almost has to feel small by comparison. We’re talking about a guy who somehow had high-ranking members of the FBI, CBI, and local police departments acting as his personal foot soldiers. That’s not just a killer. That’s a cult leader with a badge.
The Mythology of the Smiley Face
The first time we hear about Red John, he's already a legend. He didn't just kill; he performed. The signature was always the same: a clockwise circle drawn with the blood of the victim, using the pads of three fingers of the right hand. He wanted people to see it. He wanted the first thing the police—and eventually Patrick Jane—saw to be that mocking face. It wasn't just about murder. It was about dominance.
The show, created by Bruno Heller, did something brilliant early on. It made Red John feel omniscient. He wasn't just some guy hiding in a basement. He was someone who could break into Jane’s high-security life at will. Remember the season two finale? Jane is tied to a chair, and a masked figure recites William Blake’s "The Tyger" to him. "Tyger, tyger, burning bright." It’s chilling. It suggested a level of education and sophistication that separated him from the "monster of the week" tropes we usually see in police procedurals.
But here’s the thing that really gets people: the scope of his influence. The Blake Association. This was the secret society within California law enforcement that protected him. It turned the show from a simple revenge story into a full-blown conspiracy thriller. It made you realize that Jane wasn't just fighting one man; he was fighting a system that had been corrupted from the inside out.
Who Was He Really?
When the mask finally came off, we met Sheriff Thomas McAllister. Played by Xander Berkeley, McAllister was a character we’d actually met way back in the second episode of the entire series. Talk about a long game. Some fans loved it because it was a "hidden in plain sight" reveal. Others? Not so much. They wanted someone more imposing, maybe someone like Gale Bertram or the creepy visualization of Reed Smith.
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McAllister was... ordinary. And maybe that was the point.
Think about it. A man who can command dozens of people to kill and die for him doesn't necessarily need to look like a Bond villain. He needs to be the guy you don't notice. A rural sheriff with a penchant for hunting and a terrifyingly high IQ. He used his "ordinariness" as a shield. While Jane was looking for a grand mastermind, Red John was just a guy in a beige jacket running a small-town department.
There’s a lot of debate about whether the writers knew it was McAllister from the start. Truthfully? They probably didn’t. Most long-running mysteries like this involve a bit of "wait and see." Bruno Heller has hinted in interviews that several characters were candidates for the role throughout the seasons. This led to some inconsistencies that eagle-eyed fans still pick over on Reddit today. How did a local sheriff have the resources of a tech mogul? How did he always stay one step ahead of a world-class mentalist?
Why the Reveal Divided the Fandom
The problem with a six-year build-up is that the payoff has to be god-like. By the time we reached season six, Red John had become a supernatural entity in the minds of the viewers. He was a ghost. When Jane finally caught him in that chapel, and it ended not with a grand speech but with a desperate, pathetic crawl across a park and a hand around a throat, it felt real. It felt raw.
But it didn't feel "epic."
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That’s where the disconnect happens. We wanted a battle of wits that lasted an entire episode. Instead, we got a hunt, a realization, and a cold, quiet execution. Jane didn't want justice. He wanted to feel the life leave the man who ruined him. In that moment, McAllister wasn't a mastermind anymore. He was just a scared man who realized his luck had run out.
Some people felt cheated. They felt the "how" of Red John's powers—the psychic-like ability to predict Jane's moves—was never fully explained. How did he get the names of the list of suspects? Was it really just "he's a better mentalist than Jane"? That’s a bit of a pill to swallow for a show grounded in the idea that there's no such thing as real psychics.
Lessons from the Red John Saga
If you’re a writer or just a fan of mystery, there’s a massive lesson here. You can’t make a villain too powerful without eventually breaking the logic of your world. Red John could do everything. He could influence the highest levels of government. He could kill in locked rooms. He could predict the future.
When you give a character that much power, the only way they can lose is if they suddenly become "stupid" for the plot's sake, or if the hero gets incredibly lucky.
What You Should Take Away From the Story
- The Power of the Signature: Red John taught us that a visual hook is more important than a name. The smiley face is an icon of 2000s TV.
- The "Tyger Tyger" Hook: Using classical literature to ground a villain gives them immediate weight and history.
- The Danger of the Long Game: If you're going to keep a mystery going for 100+ episodes, you have to accept that no answer will satisfy everyone.
- Humanizing the Monster: The choice to make him a "nobody" sheriff was a bold move that prioritized realism over spectacle, even if it frustrated the "super-sleuth" fans.
What Actually Happened in the End
Jane killed him. He didn't turn him in. He didn't call Lisbon for backup. He chased McAllister through a cemetery and into a park, where he finished it. It was the only way the story could end for Patrick Jane. If he had arrested him, the Blake Association probably would have had him out of jail in twenty-four hours. Jane knew the system was rigged because Red John built the rig.
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The aftermath of Red John’s death is actually one of the better parts of the show. It didn't just end. Jane had to go on the run. He had to disappear to an island. He had to find a version of himself that wasn't defined by a dead man. It’s a rare look at what happens to the "avenger" after the revenge is over. Usually, the credits roll. Here, we saw the emptiness that follows.
For those looking to dive back into the series, pay close attention to the episodes "Red Hair and Silver Tape" (S1E2) and "The Crimson Ticket" (S5E1). The clues are there, even if they're messy. You can see the threads of the Blake Association being woven long before the term is ever used.
Red John remains a benchmark for TV villains because he represented our fear of the unknown. He was the person in the crowd you didn't notice, the one who knew your secrets before you did. Whether you loved or hated the McAllister reveal, you can't deny that for a few years, that bloody smiley face was the scariest thing on television.
To truly understand the impact, you have to look at the "Mentalist" community today. There are still deep-dive theories about whether the real Red John was actually Robert Kirkland or even Partridge. The fact that people are still arguing about it over a decade later is the ultimate testament to the character's design. He wasn't just a character; he was a puzzle that, for some, remains unsolved.
Practical Steps for Fans and Writers
If you’re revisiting the series or studying it for your own creative work, do these three things:
- Watch the "Red" Episodes Only: If you skip the procedural filler and only watch the episodes with "Red" in the title, the narrative arc becomes a tight, intense psychological thriller that feels like a different show entirely.
- Analyze the "Cold Reading" Scenes: Pay attention to how the show explains Red John’s "powers." It’s almost always through the same psychological tricks Jane uses—suggestion, observation, and exploiting the "Blake Association" network for information.
- Study the Season 3 Finale: The scene in the mall with Timothy Carter is widely considered one of the best "false endings" in TV history. It captures the essence of the Jane/Red John dynamic perfectly, regardless of who was actually under the mask later on.
The legacy of Red John isn't just in the reveal; it's in the hunt. It's in the way a man with a cup of tea and a sharp mind tried to outrun a monster that lived in the shadows of his own making. In the end, Jane had to become a bit of a monster himself to win. That’s the real story.