Criminal Minds - Review

Criminal Minds

Plot summary:

An elite group of profilers, along with a brilliant technical analyst, make up the FBI’s Behavioural Analysis Unit(BAU). They study and analyse the behavioural patterns and victimology of perpetrators, along with other aspects related to the cases in order to outwit, hunt down, and capture criminals.

Review:

This series enters and delves deep into minds of various types of criminals with differing centres of interests. And it’s all interesting and entertaining to watch, considering the different types of crimes and the different methodologies involved for a particular type of crime, both, in committing it and solving it. Plus the presentation and explanations of the methodologies of committing crimes and solving them are balanced well. The creativity involved in this series considering all these aspects is just brilliant. Each new episode brings a different type of villain, be it killers, arsonists, abductors, etc, all with varying and captivating scenarios. And the lengths this series goes into showing, both, the minds of criminals and how the profilers analyse the minds of criminals and determine their motives, stressers, and other important traits and triggers in order to determine their next move is enthralling. I personally find the serial killers and the stories revolving around them to be more interesting. And aside from each episode having a different unsub(Unknown Subject), Criminal Minds does occasionally give you some continuing episodes revolving around one formidable criminal or criminal alliance.

The BAU consists of Supervisory Special Agent(SSA) Aaron Hotchner(Thomas Gibson), who’s also the chief of the BAU, former Senior SSA Jason Gideon(Mandy Patinkin), SSAs Derek Morgan(Shemar Moore), Jennifer “JJ” Jareau(A.J. Cook), Elle Greenaway(Lola Glaudini) and Dr. Spencer Reid(Mathew Gray Gubler), and Agent Penelope Garcia(Kirsten Vagness). Hotchner is shown to be the serious, stout, and determined leader. Gideon appears to be quite focused, methodical, and to have a keen eye – observing and noticing things that others may tend to overlook. Morgan’s depicted as confident, charming, and at times, flirtatious with Garcia, as Garcia is with him. Aside from that, Morgan is also shown to be quite serious at times. Dr. Spencer Reid is no doubt shown to be brilliant with his IQ of 187 and his eidetic memory. And aside from being shown as a genius, Dr. Reid is also shown to be socially awkward, somewhat introverted, unaccustomed to technology, and to suffer from OCD and Mysophobia. Garcia appears to be exuberant, confident, and witty. Jareau and Greenaway are both shown to be strong-willed and resilient.

Everyone’s acting in this is series is quite strong and convincing. They all fit right into their respective roles. You get to see a lot of these characters go through emotional trauma or stress due to varying factors, be it work-related, family-related, past-related, or health-related. And the actors and actresses give brilliant performances in their struggles to handle their emotions or not let their emotions get in their way in their dangerous line of work. We see some main actors and actresses come and go. Especially the female brunette characters keep changing. I wonder what that’s all about. Paget Brewster(Emily Prentiss), Jennifer Love Hewitt(Kate Callahan), and Jeanne Tripplehorn(Alex Blake), have all appeared for a short while during this series. Of course Brewster is supposed to be coming back to series as I’ve recently come to know. And of course I must mention Joe Mantegna who plays SSA David Rossi since his debut in Season 3, who’s an invaluable character to the series. 

The plots and the dialogues are both fantastic. Dr. Reid’s lines where he tends to give quick-paced explanations and even go out of topic, not to mention his random fun facts confusion, and Garcia’s flirtatious and witty lines, especially when it causes awkward situations are especially interesting and amusing considering dialogues. And aside from the comic relief, this series never fails to pique the interest in the cases involved – the explanations are very interesting to watch. There’s some excellent suspense built up in certain episodes which makes this series more intense and thrilling. There’s some good music involved, and each episode gives a couple of interesting and important quotes to the audience. It’s quite an exceptional series.