The list troubles me. Red John troubles me. I'm not sure I understand why they have the list and why they are having the characters that could play Red John really well and leave us like "wow that's a good red john", DIE.  Which one is the most important,  the fact we couldn't guess who RJ was or the fact that we love the Red John that they create? I mean right now we still don't know for certain who he is. I mean none of us, we all have equally valid choices. So leaving Partridge in wasn't going to change anything with us. I would have been equally satisfied and would have guessed that he wasn't red John. I hope the actor they have chosen,  can transform into Red John at the drop of a hat and is really good at playing him because any thing short of a good performance is going to sink the show for me anyway.  Stiles is the only one that could do a show stopping performance? The rest I'm not sure? I could be wrong, they might be brilliant but they really need to be.

Also the descriptions, he has to match the descriptions otherwise what was the point of following the clues for the show at all? They would mean nothing at all. 

This brings me back to the whole lot of them being Red John. Its more likely to explain everything that has happened without using up too much air time. The group thing explains everything without having to explain anything and it also means that P.J will be hunting down the escapees from the explosion for the remainder of the season explains why the season doesn't finish with the killing of Red John.