While watching the two-part Season 3 finale of fave show The Mentalist titled “Strawberries and Cream” a few weeks back, I just about died when I realized that the Burbank Town Center had stood in for the supposed Sacramento-area “Pinewood Shopping Mall” in the episode’s climatic final scene. While Burbank Town Center is not actually my local mall, I immediately recognized the place as the Grim Cheaper had taken me there on our very first date, just a little over a decade ago. We had first gone to see the movie Cast Away at a nearby theatre and then headed on over to the mall so that the GC could show me an antique carousel that used to be located there. Prior to our date, I had no idea of the carousel’s existence and thought it was so incredibly cool that the GC knew little tidbits about LA like that. I am pretty sure I fell in love with him right then! 
And while the carousel was sold a few years back (I hear it is now located in the San Diego area), because we had spent at least a half an hour looking down upon it from the Center’s second floor, when that area of the mall popped up on The Mentalist I recognized it immediately. So yesterday, after getting my hair cut in Burbank, I decided to cruise on over there to snap a few pics of the place.
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In the “Strawberries and Cream” episode of The Mentalist (and a BIG warning here that there are major spoilers ahead, so if you have yet to watch the Season 3 finale and plan on doing so, you should STOP reading this post now), Patrick Jane (aka Simon Baker) sets up a sting operation in the middle of the mall in order to both prove that DLE Director Gale Bertram (aka Michael Gaston) is the CBI’s mole and to also hopefully discover the true identity of Red John, the serial killer who murdered his wife and daughter.
While there he ends up finally meeting and then killing Red John, who was played with perfection by The West Wing’s Bradley Whitford.
In what turned out to be my very favorite part of the episode, after shooting Red John and causing mass pandemonium in the mall, Patrick sits down calmly, finishes drinking his tea, and then calls out to the waitress, “Check please!” before surrendering himself to the authorities. LOL As you can see in the above screen captures, the central area of the mall, where the antique carousel used to be located, was decorated to look like a café for the filming.
Oh, how I wish they did actually serve espresso in that area of the mall! In reality, though, after the carousel was removed, a small – and not-very-aesthetically-pleasing – children’s train ride was placed there. Note to Starbucks – the Burbank Town Center is in desperate need of a cute café, pronto! 
Photographs of the area which appeared on The Mentalist, taken from the mall’s second level, are pictured above.
And a view of that area from the mall’s bottom floor is pictured above.
The entrance to one of the Burbank Town Center’s garage areas was also used in the episode, but I completely forgot about that yesterday while I was stalking the place and failed to snap any pictures of it.
Until next time, Happy Stalking!
Stalk It: Burbank Town Center, from the “Strawberries and Cream” episode of The Mentalist, is located at 201 East Magnolia Boulevard in Burbank. You can visit the mall’s official website here. The area where Patrick Jane shot Red John is located in the very center of the mall, on the bottom level, in front of Old Navy and Shiekh Shoes. The parking garage entrance which appeared in the episode is located at 501 North Third Street.
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