Or is he becoming less petulant? I can see they're trying to make him 'mature', although I have my doubts that fully formed adults are capable of that. (A little too late, for my money) But with the change he seemed to have traded likeability for panache. Thoughts?

I see the whole 'growing up' arch, but being a parent already, however awful even a mediocre parent can be, and granted that there is a wide variety of them, parenting entails, by its very nature, a minimum of responsibility. Particularly a single, caring parent. So I'm not sure 'growing up' is the right term. It's more like he's understanding this other world, and therefore caring. But since the whole point of family life was to show a caring side, I would argue for a bit of an imbalance there. Maybe. However, I was talking about initiative as well. First season we'd had, in no particular order, besides ordering the cap machine, we'd had the looking up the rug thing, the dialing the prostitute, the tickets for the ball, with dress delivered to boot. Season 2, and correct me if I'm wrong, the man hardly sneezes without checking with the team. And I miss some of that tension, character development be darned. What has replaced all that seems more innocent, childish, making the impression he's mellowed. And however I would want that in real life, I found the former much funnier.

I guess trust may be one thing, but she could still make him jump through hoops to get them – even if just for fun, the way she thought she was going to have fun with him at target practice. And yes, they made the obvious call-back switch/nod to Season 1 on that. And there I grant you that she could be starting to pick up stuff he does, as that seemed the case. I don't know if I want a big messing up in his part, but just the bits of independence that would reasonably infuriate her but would make it difficult for her to discipline him – because he is- bite your lip, Beckett -right. 

And by the way, are we talking about ways to stretch the sexual tension for the good of the show? I think that would be a sure-fire way to do so. No woman, no matter how self-secured, wants to hang around a loose cannon. 

Finally, I'm looking forward for more 2 parters for a simpler reason – I want them to break this whole 'formula' of she calling him, coming to the crime scene, etcetera. It's getting way too predictable for my taste. I am, in fact, looking forward to a case where he can't be there, or that she finds he's out on a book tour, and the man has to do the whole follow-up long distance — hopefully in Europe, so that they can wake each other at very inconvenient hours of the night just to catch up on the details of the case. 

1892Rojas said:

Finally, I'm looking forward for more 2 parters for a simpler reason – I want them to break this whole 'formula' of she calling him, coming to the crime scene, etcetera. It's getting way too predictable for my taste. I am, in fact, looking forward to a case where he can't be there, or that she finds he's out on a book tour, and the man has to do the whole follow-up long distance — hopefully in Europe, so that they can wake each other at very inconvenient hours of the night just to catch up on the details of the case. 

1) Repetitions: It's more the dynamics of the scenes themselves. What Beckett should be saying is 'When will you have the prints?' or 'Make sure you also canvass this'. That is, to qualify her suggestions. The other stuff is like asking Esposito if he read the rights of someone he cuffed. I mean, it goes without saying they will be canvassing for prints, etc, etc. The dialogue strain to show her in command and the effect, on me, it's the opposite, it looks like she's got nothing to do and is trying to be relevant to what's happening, and that looks bad, in my eyes. 

2) Maturing: Again, it all boils down to, 'do people change'? Sure they do, but not after painfully making the same mistakes. Again and again. Caring more for her, and thus change his behavior, that I do get, and it's believable. But it's less fun. That's one aspect where I'm willing to suspend my disbelief more, as opposed to a NYC detective who is all day on high heels, all the time — do these women exist anymore?. 

3) Pro active: Of course Castle won't be as impish as when he first met Kate, and now it's impossible to go back to that, for practical, continuity reasons. And, by the same token, that rules out Castle getting into big trouble by himself, either. Because now, knowing them, knowing how they risk their lives, how he's considered 'part of the team', he knows he would be dragging them into trouble on purpose. He wouldn't do that now. 

But they should have that in mind in order to come up with a satisfactory alternative, something that rankles Beckett, and Beckett alone. I thought it was so funny when Lainie first met Castle, that she was all charmed by him, and how that created tension with Beckett. I guess the only way to go now is if Beckett mellows a little in deference to Castle, and fights against that impulse, like we saw in the S2 opener, in the first scene in the elevator, when she step back from him because she remembered she was mad at him. I don't know what else would work. 

Agent Shaw took her with her. Or didn't she?

Again, it's not so much the repetition of what they say but how it's done. Esposito and Ryan come in to the scene. Let's say they're rookies. They forget to canvass for bullet casket or prints. Then, sure, Beckett comes in, notices, and tells them, but even then, she would be more like reminding them, than ordering them. She would be saying 'do that' if something new comes up right then and there.

And, correct me if I'm wrong, but she is always brought in to cases that Ryan and Esposito find 'weird', to assist, so I feel her attitude should be more in terms of 'when are you going to have this?' 'when can I look at that?', rather than 'dust for prints'. Duh, like they would have forgotten to do that.

In fact, she is rarely even called on directly by uniforms to a scene or assigned by Montgomery. Let alone stumbling onto a crime scene herself, or have Castle stumble onto a crime, for that matter. I think the Late Shaft was one such exception. I wouldn't mind more of that. 

I think Castle isn't so much getting meeker as he is getting more human. He's realizing that he cares about Beckett and about his feelings and hers more than he thought.  I think it's quite a rude awakening for him to realize that maybe life isn't all easy and fun – it's also hard work and emotions and love and that's hard to deal with.