‘Beauty and the Beast’ season 3, episode 4 review: Vincent, Cat take on couples counseling

Through the first three episodes, “Beauty and the Beast” did a lot to show us that this may be the strongest season that it has had to date; tonight’s episode “Heart of the Matter” may be some of the last bit of proof that we really needed.

What makes this episode particularly notable, at least to us, is the interesting and fresh way that it takes on the concept of couples counseling. Rather than making it feel like Cat and Vincent are on the brink of splitting up, this was more of an interesting device to identify the one biggest problem that these two need to work on: Co-dependency, and making sure they don’t lose themselves in the midst of their relationship and spending so much time together.

The counseling as a framing device was also effective, since it flashed us back to see how these two faced massive disagreement over how to handle a man who was considered a person of interest in the current secret experiments taking place. A wealthy magnate was set to receive a super-powered heart, and while Cat was focused mostly on justice, Vincent wanted to save his life more than anything else. They both did eventually come together to do both, learning in the way that there was a way to remove the powers from the heart he was set to receive, while at the same time exposing his wife as the real suspect in the plot to murder him.

Unfortunately, JT also learned at the end of the episode that since he has had his powers now a little too long, the antidote will not be so effective on him. While Tess has been focused on her new captaincy, she did take a moment or two at the end to be there for the man she loves, who is clearly struggling with fear of the unknown.

We really enjoyed this episode, mostly because it allowed us to see conflict in a fairly realistic way, and also got us away from some of the melodrama that the show sometimes focuses on a little too much. Was the counselor character perhaps a little stereotypical? Sure, but you can’t ask for everything. Grade: B+.

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