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Criminal Minds last night was a clinic on how to balance procedural necessity and personal drama, and CSI:NY writers should take note. The case was all about Reed and the horrors he was facing; it was about him; his danger wasn't just a prop to highlight another character's long-buried woe.
That doesn't mean the other team members were irrelevant, however. In fact, the writers did a stupendous job of showing us how much the others cared for Reed without smothering us with ridiculously angsty schmoop or projecting other characters' hangups onto the situation and minimizing the horror for Reed.
The best example of this was the scene of Gideon pacing the bathroom and gabbling that he'd made the right decision, looking for all the world like his sanity was in doubt. He didn't rant, scream, or blubber. He just chanted over and over again that he'd made the right decision, and it was heartbreaking to watch his agony at the thought that his protege was dead.
The best part? The entire scene was fifteen seconds, and those fifteen seconds packed more emotional wallop than the entire episode of "Charge of This Post". In COTP, I wanted to crawl through the TV and beat Mac about the head and face with a brick. By contrast, in "Revelations", I wanted to crawl through the TV, pick up Gideon's broken pieces, and put them together again. I wanted to put all of them together again, because they were all so clearly broken.
One of the best traits of this series is its willingness to let its characters be human and react accordingly. When J.J. putters aimlessly around the kitchen and begs Morgan to tell her that it wasn't her fault for leaving Reed, he doesn't give it to her. He's actually very hard, almost cruel when he tells her that she has to work that out for herself, that it's not something he can give her. It's not pretty or neat or kind, but it's true and beautifully human. Whether we like it or not, blame gets assigned when bad things happen, and Morgan didn't give a shit about what J.J. needed at that moment. He cared about the more immediate problem of Reed, and frankly, dammit, that was how it should have been. Once Reed was safe and had granted J.J. his absolution, Morgan could and did soften.
What can I say about Reed and his ordeal? CM is a show that is absolutely unafraid to put its characters through hell and have them suffer long-ranging consequences. Do you hear that, CSI:NY writers? Ordeals have consequences. Unlike Flack, who has apparently been Obliviated by wizards from the HPverse and forgotten that he was blown up, Reed is obviously going to be fucked for the rest of the season, at least, and I wouldn't be surprised to see the repercussions bleed into next season as well.
There has been rampant speculation as to why Reed filched the LSD-laced Dilaudid from Tobias' body. Some are fervently hoping that he did it for Tobias as a last act of kindness for the personality that was trying to save him in its own twisted way, but let's get real. Reed took it because he's hooked. It was, after all, pharmaceutical smack. CM is going to do a drug angle.
Historically, drug angles on procedurals are disasters. See the farce of Martin Fitzgerald's painkiller "addiction" on Without a Trace. One episode, he's cribbing opiates from a victim's medicine cabinet, and the next episode, he's fine, hey presto, after a single NA meeting. My ass, and it's lazy, unrealistic pap like that that drove me from the show.
I have faith that CM will get it right, though, because the writers have a proven track record of following up. Elle got shot at the end of S1, and she was not okay. She was so not okay that she betrayed her badge and her dead father's memory by shooting a serial rapist to death in a parking lot because she could.
Morgan was molested as a child by a mentor, and he is not okay. He had buried that truth as deeply as he could until Hotch dug it up during the course of an investigation. He is still not okay with Hotch's handling of the situation, as evidenced by his eagerness to label Hotch a bully when he ordered the rest of the team to describe his worst trait.
Garcia is not okay. She is a computer tech, not a trained profiler, and she is unequipped to deal with the horrors to which she is being exposed.
No one is okay, and are you ready for some irony? The very fact that these people are not okay is what gives the show its incredible power and sets it apart from the procedural pack. Whitewashed people are boring, and while treating characters with delicacy and having everything be all right in the end appeals to the Strawberry Shortcake-pantied child lurking inside each of us, it's a disservice to the viewers and a death knell for the show.
My only regret is that CM writers don't work for CSI:NY.
That doesn't mean the other team members were irrelevant, however. In fact, the writers did a stupendous job of showing us how much the others cared for Reed without smothering us with ridiculously angsty schmoop or projecting other characters' hangups onto the situation and minimizing the horror for Reed.
The best example of this was the scene of Gideon pacing the bathroom and gabbling that he'd made the right decision, looking for all the world like his sanity was in doubt. He didn't rant, scream, or blubber. He just chanted over and over again that he'd made the right decision, and it was heartbreaking to watch his agony at the thought that his protege was dead.
The best part? The entire scene was fifteen seconds, and those fifteen seconds packed more emotional wallop than the entire episode of "Charge of This Post". In COTP, I wanted to crawl through the TV and beat Mac about the head and face with a brick. By contrast, in "Revelations", I wanted to crawl through the TV, pick up Gideon's broken pieces, and put them together again. I wanted to put all of them together again, because they were all so clearly broken.
One of the best traits of this series is its willingness to let its characters be human and react accordingly. When J.J. putters aimlessly around the kitchen and begs Morgan to tell her that it wasn't her fault for leaving Reed, he doesn't give it to her. He's actually very hard, almost cruel when he tells her that she has to work that out for herself, that it's not something he can give her. It's not pretty or neat or kind, but it's true and beautifully human. Whether we like it or not, blame gets assigned when bad things happen, and Morgan didn't give a shit about what J.J. needed at that moment. He cared about the more immediate problem of Reed, and frankly, dammit, that was how it should have been. Once Reed was safe and had granted J.J. his absolution, Morgan could and did soften.
What can I say about Reed and his ordeal? CM is a show that is absolutely unafraid to put its characters through hell and have them suffer long-ranging consequences. Do you hear that, CSI:NY writers? Ordeals have consequences. Unlike Flack, who has apparently been Obliviated by wizards from the HPverse and forgotten that he was blown up, Reed is obviously going to be fucked for the rest of the season, at least, and I wouldn't be surprised to see the repercussions bleed into next season as well.
There has been rampant speculation as to why Reed filched the LSD-laced Dilaudid from Tobias' body. Some are fervently hoping that he did it for Tobias as a last act of kindness for the personality that was trying to save him in its own twisted way, but let's get real. Reed took it because he's hooked. It was, after all, pharmaceutical smack. CM is going to do a drug angle.
Historically, drug angles on procedurals are disasters. See the farce of Martin Fitzgerald's painkiller "addiction" on Without a Trace. One episode, he's cribbing opiates from a victim's medicine cabinet, and the next episode, he's fine, hey presto, after a single NA meeting. My ass, and it's lazy, unrealistic pap like that that drove me from the show.
I have faith that CM will get it right, though, because the writers have a proven track record of following up. Elle got shot at the end of S1, and she was not okay. She was so not okay that she betrayed her badge and her dead father's memory by shooting a serial rapist to death in a parking lot because she could.
Morgan was molested as a child by a mentor, and he is not okay. He had buried that truth as deeply as he could until Hotch dug it up during the course of an investigation. He is still not okay with Hotch's handling of the situation, as evidenced by his eagerness to label Hotch a bully when he ordered the rest of the team to describe his worst trait.
Garcia is not okay. She is a computer tech, not a trained profiler, and she is unequipped to deal with the horrors to which she is being exposed.
No one is okay, and are you ready for some irony? The very fact that these people are not okay is what gives the show its incredible power and sets it apart from the procedural pack. Whitewashed people are boring, and while treating characters with delicacy and having everything be all right in the end appeals to the Strawberry Shortcake-pantied child lurking inside each of us, it's a disservice to the viewers and a death knell for the show.
My only regret is that CM writers don't work for CSI:NY.
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