ABC’s Castle is a pretty solid cop/crime drama that’s currently in its second season. Starring Nathan Fillon and Stana Katic, it features a crime novelist (Fillon) assisting an NYPD dectective (Katic) as she and her team work to solve crimes around the city. Given Fillon’s involvement, it’s no surprise that there’s a decent amount of humor running through the proceedings. But this is a crime/mystery show at heart, so the chase of the criminal element is at the core.

Well actually, the core of the show is the relationship between Fillon’s Castle and Katic’s Dectective Beckett. She’s got the somewhat over-used “tough single girl” cop thing going on, and he’s the over-confident, famous crime fiction writer helping out (despite her frequent displays of independence). Elements of the set-up are a tad clichéd, but the show wins you over through the strength of its cast and storytelling.

In this particular episode (the first of a two-parter), the show reaches a new level of meta-narrative as Castle’s book, Heat Wave, is being developed into a film within the TV show universe. Did I mention that the book actually exists? Yep, it was published last September and actually made it onto the New York Times bestseller list. Crazy, eh?

At any rate, Castle’s been using his experiences helping out the NYPD as fodder for his books, including Beckett as the lead character, Nikki Heat. As “Tick, Tick, Tick” opens, Beckett gets a call from a fan who is willing to kill in order to get her attention. As more dead people start showing up, the FBI gets sent in to “help” (or take over) the case along. Given that this is a two-parter (and thus a cliffhanger), I don’t want to give away much more. The crime aspects here are solid and interesting, and as mentioned before, the acting is terrific. The cast works well together and makes the show worthwhile. Tune in next week to check it out (and the week after for the conclusion).