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So, I've been meaning to talk about Reid and Prentiss' conversation about Gideon's letter in "Scared to Death". It's a short conversation, but it perfectly encapsulates their respective personalities and approaches to life. Reid is the analytic Hermione Granger in a tie, searching for answers in syntax and grammar and etymology; Prentiss is more concerned with the spaces between the words, the truth Gideon wanted told but couldn't say.
For all their collective intelligence, Prentiss and Reid still suffer from miscommunication. When Prentiss tells Reid to reread Gideon's letter, he mistakenly assumes she's questioning his ability to understand the literal meaning of the letter. He says, "I've read it over and over, and I've got an eidetic memory." He doesn't need to reread the letter because it's all in his head.
But Prentiss isn't concerned with the what of the letter so much as the why. Gideon abandoned the team as a whole, yet he left a letter only for Reid. Why? Prentiss might not know why, but she knows it's important, and she knows that Reid needs to answer that question before he can truly understand the letter. But Reid has his Nerd Genius goggles so firmly attached that he can't see that yet, and might never see.
But despite her formidable profiler fu, Prentiss isn't seeing the whole picture, either. Reid succinctly spells out the root of his problem when he independently raises the subject of his father's abandonment when he was ten. Anyone with a firing synapse can see that he's conflating that trauma and Gideon's unceremonious exit from his life. First the father, and now the surrogate father. Reid has Abandonment Issues, and as a profiler, Prentiss should know that intellectual understanding of a hurt seldom heals the wound from which it springs.
Reid can read that letter and have Eureka Moments all day long and twice on Masturbation Sunday, but they won't change the underlying truth that he feels abandoned by Gideon, who, if his weenie apologia is anything to go by, knew exactly how badly this second desertion would affect him, especially on the heels of his ordeal with Tobias. Try as you might, you can't logic your way past hurt, and Prentiss should've known that.
Tomorrow will be another dollop of pop culture meta, this one concerning Jack Malone and his selective morality. In the meantime, I'm going to futz around the Interwebs and maybe scritch a bunny.
For all their collective intelligence, Prentiss and Reid still suffer from miscommunication. When Prentiss tells Reid to reread Gideon's letter, he mistakenly assumes she's questioning his ability to understand the literal meaning of the letter. He says, "I've read it over and over, and I've got an eidetic memory." He doesn't need to reread the letter because it's all in his head.
But Prentiss isn't concerned with the what of the letter so much as the why. Gideon abandoned the team as a whole, yet he left a letter only for Reid. Why? Prentiss might not know why, but she knows it's important, and she knows that Reid needs to answer that question before he can truly understand the letter. But Reid has his Nerd Genius goggles so firmly attached that he can't see that yet, and might never see.
But despite her formidable profiler fu, Prentiss isn't seeing the whole picture, either. Reid succinctly spells out the root of his problem when he independently raises the subject of his father's abandonment when he was ten. Anyone with a firing synapse can see that he's conflating that trauma and Gideon's unceremonious exit from his life. First the father, and now the surrogate father. Reid has Abandonment Issues, and as a profiler, Prentiss should know that intellectual understanding of a hurt seldom heals the wound from which it springs.
Reid can read that letter and have Eureka Moments all day long and twice on Masturbation Sunday, but they won't change the underlying truth that he feels abandoned by Gideon, who, if his weenie apologia is anything to go by, knew exactly how badly this second desertion would affect him, especially on the heels of his ordeal with Tobias. Try as you might, you can't logic your way past hurt, and Prentiss should've known that.
Tomorrow will be another dollop of pop culture meta, this one concerning Jack Malone and his selective morality. In the meantime, I'm going to futz around the Interwebs and maybe scritch a bunny.
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