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The Good: Fin and Bruno. I wish they were the leads from the jump, but their scenes were the best part of this episode. Carisi. He had some good bits, and was well written, especially for a Rollisi episode, and a "Carisi goes in the field" episode. They even actually had Carisi saying he couldn't prosecute the case because he was involved in the investigation! They remembered how to write Benson as the lead without making her Batman solving crime almost by herself with just a few sidekicks. Rollins. They actually wrote her fairly well and she managed to avoid the usual psychodrama pitfalls as an investigator. Still don't buy her as a profiler, but they managed to make her believable as an investigator. The COTW. Interesting motivation and MO. Nice flow and squad dynamics too. The Bad: It was cheesy 80's cop show ridiculous that Rollins could just work a case because she didn't have anything better to do. Did the history department at Fordham force Rollins out because she was tarnishing their image by presenting "Braveheart" as factual? It's kind of a minor thing really, but this show used to be pretty good about research - even if the story was monkey in a basketball OTT ridiculous the factoids and references were usually accurate. They couldn't go a whole episode without at least some of "Benson the all knowing guru" bit. I mean they couldn't at least go with the theme of the episode and have her telling the victim the perp would never take her freedom? Overall this was a solid episode. It could have gone off the rails easily, but they actually took a flawed premise and executed it well instead of botching a solid concept like most of the season so far. And I liked that the ending seemed to be seriously backing off the Rollins return tease. I mean even if KG took a significant paycut and went part-time it would still mean going backwards plus losing some of the more interesting new characters and having enough bodies for the weeks when co-leads are off to save money. Maybe this "new thing" will be some sort of role that gives her a reason to guest star without us needing to forget everything we know about her to believe she has the job?

How much you want to bet the perp is another powerful rich old white man?

I thought we pretty much always knew Mariska didn't really like it, but she wasn't willing to do what was needed to keep her - take a pay cut or do some sort of deal with NBCUniversal where she produced her own docuseries about abuse or her work with Joyful Heart so she made the same salary, but Dick Wolf didn't have to wait for the reruns to recoup his costs like every other producer in network television. And seeing as how Mariska has shown no inclination to put her money where her mouth is and there really is much they can do to earn more money from the network run short of some sort of truly horrendous product placement ("I think we found our suspect Captain. Her driver for the CarshareEats delivery we found outside her apartment was fired from Door Dash becuase their background check found he was on the registry. Another Carshare Eats perv? That's why I stick with HelloFresh. The foods a lot healthier and it's safer too!") or making streaming illegal on Thursdays, I don't see that changing. And it was actually the right move creatively - as bad as the show is today it would be worse if we had Rollins instead of Bruno etc. I mean I don't want to even think about what the Maddie arc would have been like...

I think that some/many of the cast just figured they would find a way to keep the gravy train rolling even if it meant "freezing" time despite the young actors obviously aging. I mean as much as I agree that this is a good creative and business move (you leave the audience wanting more and have two winners plus a new spin off that has good odds of being profitable while preserving the value of two hits) I'm not sure I would agree if it meant I stopped getting big checks while working with a great cast and some all time greats as guest stars and recurring. It must be especially hard emotionally given all of the disruption with COVID and the strikes. I probably would prefer to keep having fun and making lots of money and then criticize the bosses after they keep it going too long myself.

Yes that is the sort of angle that could make devoting the bulk of a season to a single case worthwhile. They could have done a Carisi-centric episode devoted to this facet of the case. In my perfect world where they actually had the cojones to let this case go unsolved, or at least wait until the end of the season they would have found the connection and it turns out to be a dead end, but they still prosecute the perv who found/shared the picture and the manufacturer. Just one of many wasted opportunities this season. There about a million ways they could have gone and all of them are more interesting. I mean do a simple two-parter or go all out and have the squad hit one dead end after another and go for an entire season before they solve it and/or Maddie turns up dead in the finale. Anything would be better than superhero Benson Taking!It!Personally! before ultimately saving the day as usual, but dragged out over several episodes.

Counterpoint: It could be a good thing if it means something more like this season with a fully planned out and coherent arc with some smaller COTW stories as well along the way. Also they are more likely to be able to get big names to guest as mob bosses at a price Dick Wolf will pay. Also it could lead to fewer unneeded SVU crossovers in the OC episodes. And perhaps this will lead to more of the franchise library at Peacock on a long term basis and perhaps resources going to the mothership or a revival of Hate Crimes. Counter-counterpoint: It could mean that Meloni is contactually obligated to spend more time telling Benson how she is the greatest most special cop and person ever and pandering to the shippers on SVU during sweeps.

I believe there are a few different things going on here. The first is that newer episodes are shorter. If you look at Peacock the early episodes of SVU are listed at 43/44 minutes while the last few seasons are 41/42 minutes. It doesn't seem like much, but it does have an impact. The second is that budget cuts mean that there are fewer characters and less fieldwork. What used to be done with interviews on location is now done showing surveillance camera footage in the squadroom. While this saves money - fewer speaking roles and location shoots, it also changes the feel of the episode and how much is happening, especially since combined with 2 minutes less story time we often have less of the initial stages of the investigation where the detectives are looking at multiple suspects and ruling them out. Finally there is something I have heard a few writers and showrunners talking about on various podcasts - network executive interference and the vogue for "second screen" storytelling. This is an assumption that viewers are also looking at their laptops, tablets, or smartphones while watching so shows need to repeat important story points and avoid important plot points being shown instead of told. So that means even if we had the 2 minutes back they wouldn't be as dense - because it is more expensive and because the suits feel like that kind of storytelling doesn't suit today's viewer. After all it's not like there is any evidence that the old style works perfectly well with modern viewers who are watching as background while doing other things as well as more attentive viewers. I mean to prove that you would need decades of leading viewership numbers on all sorts of networks and platforms and how could you ever get that?

I am not saying it can't be done. Just that it is harder. Especially on a set that is not used every week and where it is not a priority like with Lucy or "The Honeymooners" or Louis CK's show. For something like we are talking about where it is not a priority having room for crew and equipment to allow for various blocking the director might want makes it more practical and cost effective to be unrealistic.

I don't think they are really worried about being too depressing. It's not like they've shied away from dark moments. Just all about the practical issues of being able to fit the technical elements. It is actually much harder and more expensive to shoot on a stage set up like an actual NYC "affordable" apartment.

Yes she is all of that and more. Investigator, advocate, counselor, legal theorist, scientist, psychologist, sharpshooter, teacher, ethicist, psychic, wine connoisseur, mother of the year, and more. She is the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and end. She is 32 flavors and then some. She's a sinner, she's a saint, she does not feel ashamed. She's your Hell, she's your dream, she's nothing in between. You know you wouldn't want it any other way.. It wasn't about copyright it was about the OG Benson's look of disapproval. Because Google Image Search came up empty for "Robert Guillame flipping the bird"...

The Good: Carisi. He had some good moments this week and was about the only one who wasn't completely sucked into the Benson vortex. It wasn't a two-parter. The promo for next week at least has some potential. The Bad: Benson, Benson, Benson. Another episode where she is the expert in everything and everyone else is just there to handle the details. And she alone has the power to find both justice and understanding. And she has the gall to talk about the perp having a messiah complex? The heavy handed editing and musical cues. It's not like the writing didn't already make everything else abundantly clear so we don't need to be beaten over the head. All it did was undercut the great job the actors did making the material almost tolerable. Yet another Maddie episode that adds nothing new unless you consider elevating the rehashed material to a new level of unbelievablity new. After episodes with characters absent who would have added something to the story we have everyone here this week, with most of them not getting anything significant to do. We could have easily given Curry, Velasco, Bruno and/or Fin the week off since they contributed nothing of significance either plotwise or thematically. in an episode of overused, overdone cliches we have another hostage situation where Benson saves the day by completely disregarding procedure. And they make it worse by not actually taking a chance to go for either surprise or nuance - they could have either had mom kill the creep with Benson complicit, or actually ended the scene with Benson arresting the mom instead of merely mentioning it in dialogue and brought to the forefront that she was in the wrong. The ending. Benson whispers and makes it all better and the victim cries tears of gratitude while Mariska shows that she cannot do nonverbal acting well at all any more. Overall this was a steaming turd of an episode. Bad pretty much from start to finish. A bad idea executed poorly. And while I like being right, the writers really didn't need to prove that last week's episode was merely mediocre and that they were capable of producing a special and unique kind of bad and that the Benson worship dial went to 11.

And Amber Ruffin as the shopper! Talk about an all-star comedy sketch...

I am not going to go back and rewatch Season 18 to find specific examples as I don't hate myself that much, but I think even astute viewers such as yourself forget how terrible it was as only a few episodes such as "Imposter" were memorably bad. Something like 17 were the same plot and Benson was doing almost all of the investigative work, plus the scripts were even worse than this as far as plot mechanics were concerned - it wasn't even that they took short cuts to get from A to B while focusing on Benson, things just happened and you couldn't even figure out what might have been cut as too expensive or not focused on St. Liv. This week feels like pages were not shot or lost in the edit - repeatedly in my Season 18 posts I mention that it felt like the script was a rough draft where there wasn't even a blank to fill in and figure out what was missing. I guess my argument is that the Season 18 episodes were worse, both because of how repetitive they were (I see I went relatively easy on "Imposter" as after the last few episodes of Season 17 and the first couple episodes I was relieved to see an episode that was unquely bad ) and because they were probably even more Benson-centric with her lecturing the squad and the brass, doing more of the legwork herself, and not having anyone challenge her at all - the scene where Carsisi points out that she went too far for example would not have happened or she would told off Barba and they would have presented him as wrong. Perhaps in time I may agree that this is a standout bad episode, but right now it just seems like a mere D/D- episode that is more proof that they have lost control of Mariska again and that there are many equally bad or worse pieces of crap SVU has put out in the past 7 or 8 years.

I feel like this is slightly overstated. The Benson worship was just as bad and probably worse in Season 18 and there have been previous episodes that have been equally and more Mariska publicly gratifying herself in a much more horrific way than any of Munch's various subway weenie waggers that kept him in court for just about every episode Cragen was in for 3 seasons. "Something Happened" comes to mind as does the whole Mariska as a literal angel scene. And I would say most of Season 18's episodes were worse and there has been enough utter crap in the last decade that this probably doesn't crack the bottom 10. And this is probably slightly understated so I guess it all balances out.

A sense of humor is a big part of real world police work too. I think there is still some snark and one liners, but unfortunately this another problem that I suspect is caused by NBC/Dick Wolf mandates and not anything that could be fixed bringing in new writers or a new showrunner. TPTB want the new shows to be more like present day SVU than the original run and there is very little humor there these days since the lead does not have the chops to pull it off. Also they like to show us the crime in the opening scene instead of discovering the body during stereotypical NYC moments that were often little comedic gems. The other big opportunity for comedy was during witness interviews and those have been dramatically pared back because it saves money on hiring actors for those small speaking roles - which I strongly suspect is a big reason for almost entirely eliminating the cold openings where passers by find the dead body too. Where it is a matter of weak writing is on the legal side although part of that is also structural with less time for anything not essential to advancing the plot and a seeming reluctance to have the same number of recurring experts and distinctive arraignment judges which is where a lot of the courtroom humor came from.

Isn't it obvious which way they would go?

Yeah I don't know where she got the idea she could just keep repeating that and get acclaim and awards. Or maybe I do...

The Good: Carisi. He did a good job making Benson seem almost relatable and human and kept my eye rolls from reaching a full 360 degrees. Bruno and Velasco. I would have liked to have seen them given more material, but it is always nice to see SVU detectives acting like investigators instead of advocates or therapists. The guest cast. A good job all around in elevating the material and keeping things on track. It would have been really easy to veer into scenery chewing or simply phone it in, but everyone delivered. The Bad: The opening scene. As if clumsily done Benoah isn't bad enough we have it as a reason to drag up some of the worst of past Benson stories so Mariska can whisper and make constipated faces while talking like a third rate writer's idea of a second rate therapist. Along with a thematic link that is about as subtle as a slegehammer to the face and equally enjoyable. Mariska as director. Every time she directs she manages to amaze even a cynical jaded viewer like me that what we usually see is Mariska being dialed back by her collaborators. It would be like finding out that Lady Gaga's stylist has a whole book of outfit proposals they rejected as too far out there... I really do like a larger pool of potential team members to draw from, but this feels like another episode where they don't seem to be really making the best match of characters to story. Why not have the experienced profiler with a deep personal connection to kidnapped girls work this instead having the gratuitous second captain there to look concerned? Especially when the queen bee is so insecure that the other captain can't be wearing her badge at the crime scene like all the detectives and the extras because it would make Benson seem less special? Speaking of bad stories from the past as we were during the opening I don't think we ever need another hostage situation on SVU. At least nobody died and Benson never fired her weapon, so I guess that's a win? So after all of the various lectures Benson has given everyone she can torture a subject into confessing and it's OK because it's "for the victims"? And when we do acknowledge that there was an issue there she can just blow off everyone pointing it out and we're supposed to move on? The previews. Back to Maddie? Seriously??? Overall this is yet another good plot idea that never reached its' potential because it had to devote so much time to Mariska's creative autoeroticism. At least she didn't try to make herself into an actual avenging angel ascending to heaven this time so I guess we're making some progress?

What is the over/under for life expectancy of anyone closely associated with a politician taking the subway from or to Hudson University in the current run of Law & Order? 2 minutes? 3?

Does that really count as an SNL tie at this point? I mean I think fewer people have taken the NBC Rockefeller Center tour...

Wow. I guess we know that whatever other failings the writing may have, trading positive portrayals for sponsorship isn't one of them. I mean this is only slightly less surprising than finding out one of the local colleges is rebranding as Hudson University for a week...

Me too...

Moving this over from the episode thread as it's really more general discussion - Yes they do have market research. There is a certain percentage of the viewers that have stuck around to see how Benson's story turns out. I know it has been mentioned in past articles. We also know that it is out there because NBC execs have previously said publicly that they were waiting to sign a contract before renewing the series. And because Dick Wolf does not let any actor get so much money and become bigger than the show without some hard evidence that it is needed. As far as the extent of her power and influence it does have limits. NBC is only willing to spend so much on the show, even if it is the number 1 scripted drama on NBC and Peacock (yes, yes bar so low it's on the ground etc.) and they did realize after Season 18 that they needed to provide a variety of plots even if Mariska had a certain focus on particular types of sexual abuse and power dynamics that she wanted to portray almost exclusively. The biggest limit on her creative influence is the showrunner and the budgetary constraints. Chernuchin and especially Leight have strong track records and influence on their own and pushed back a bit. Without that we find that it's all Benson all the time. As far as budget is concerned - budgets are not really her concern and don't seem to interest her except in being the highest paid actress on network television. Which is why it is one of the few real limits to her influence - budgets get tighter and her salary keeps rising which meant for example KG had to go even if Mariska wanted her to stay. And that they can't do too much to make Benson into an action hero. Dick Wolf is not going to spend his own money to keep Mariska happy. And money is the reason that no matter what we will not see a significant decrease in her screen time. She simply gets paid too much to sit on the bench (insert Mets joke here) and they don't really have any alternative unless Meloni ends up free...

Just came across this again. Truly a reminder that when it comes to this show to be careful what you wish for...