It's been a while since I've had a review for
Criminal Minds and I was hoping for a super episode to be able to review. However, I was once again let down a little. I found "
Mr. & Mrs. Anderson" to be somewhat boring and predictable - it doesn't help that we once again know who the UNSUB is from the beginning of the episode. I long for an episode from
Kim Harrison that is reminiscent of "
Into the Woods". An episode that I want to keep on my DVR forever, but that was also too disturbing to watch again and again!
In "
Mr. & Mrs. Anderson," a husband and wife team are killing young girls by luring them to their hotel room with the wife playing an almost mothering role and the husband then choking the girls. Both the husband and wife are sexually aroused by the killing. The couple has had it's ups and downs during the marriage and are in counseling. The counselor suggests that the husband needs to put his wife's needs first, at which point she recruits a young man who is killed. During the course of the investigation, the team finds cases with the same MO, and also rape/murders that they think are tied to the case, dating back to 1989. The team locates a victim who lived and when
JJ interviews her, she is able to give them a name and remembers a tow truck. From this information, the team is able to discern who the couple is and arrest the wife.
Judith Anderson defends her husband almost to the end - despite his infidelities, both in the marriage and in killing without her. It's not until the team locates
Alan Anderson and shows
Judith a picture of a locket that
Alan gave
Judith the previous night, and the victim wearing it, that
Judith finally decides to cooperate.
Likes: Having
Felix Alcala back as a director and the
Valentine's Day date night scene at the end of the show. The previews for next week's ep with the hopes of what we, at
CMRT, like to call a "Hotchalanche" (and I'm not even the
Hotch fan!).
Dislikes: The predictability of the story line. Knowing the UNSUB from the beginning of the show. The team seemingly not even working together. Even my son asked if
Hotch was gone due to his lack of screen time in this episode. I think the thing I found most disturbing about the entire episode was how much the marriage counselor looked like
Eva Longoria.
Here's hoping for a nail biting, sitting on the edge of your seat episode next week!
~~~~Guinevere
I totally agree with you about the episode "Into the Woods" I swear sometimes someone else must've wrote it and just stuck Kim's name on it. I really feel that the big difference between that episode and most of the stuff we get from Kim today is that Ed Bernero still had a hand in the show and Erica Messer had not yet officially become the show runner.
ReplyDeleteAnd as a huge Reid fan I really liked the way she wrote him in that episode.It may not have been perfect but it was far better than most of the stuff we get from Kim today. Nowadays she has Reid saying stupid things like he use to watch Mr.Belvedere reruns and she thinks it made him sound responsible.Of course Kim Harrison has admitted that she doesn't know how to write for Reid.
And I agree with you about this episode being predictable and boring. We saw the unsubs too earlier and too often. The dance scene between the two of them was boring and totally unnecessary. That time could've been better spent showing the team working the case.
Other things I didn't like was yet again the excessive amount of JJ and the lack of Reid and Hotch. Reid was pretty much reduced to spouting Wikipedia facts and plunging a toilet, because after all what else would they use a genius like Reid for.Naturally Miss Perfect had to be there telling him how to do it.If JJ thought she could do it so much better than Reid why the hell wasn't she the one plunging the toilet.
But at least it was Morgan and Reid who went to the aid of the therapist and saved her life, instead of Morgan and JJ.
I agree with Debra. It's all been said - dull, predictable episode, too much unsub and waaaay too much JJ. Oh that interminable cognitive interview! I thought it would never end. Let's hope for better things this week although I fear SuperAwesome JJ will rear her head again! At least we should get some decent Hotch time but I wish they would give us some classic Reid again.
ReplyDeleteMary, somebody timed that interview and found it to be a little over 4 minutes long.That was about the same amount of screen time that the team had gotten in the entire episode of "200"Add to the fact that wasn't JJ's only scene.All together she had about 11 minutes worth of screen time.Now you would think since JJ had been given such an excessive amount of screen time( a whopping 27 minutes) in the previous episode, she would have gotten less screen time this time around. So that other characters like Reid,Rossi and Hotch would have a chance at some decent screen time.
DeleteJJ is Erica Messer's favorite character so I can't see things changing much. Such a shame. I also hate all the so-called "family" moments bookending the episodes - they do them so badly - that Valentine double date made me want to curl up and die!
DeleteWell Mary I'm hoping that if CBS hears from enough fed up fans that it' will result in some reduction in JJ's screen time next season.Don't forget they have the final say in how much screen time a cast member gets.
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