Xeliou66

Here is the thread for tonight’s season finale episode.

I have no idea how a crossover would work with OC on Peacock and SVU on NBC, given that not everyone has Peacock. The truth is, OC has run out of stories pretty much - I feel like OC was just created to bring Stabler back so he could inevitably hook up with St Olivia. To be honest I don’t care at all about the whole Stabler/Benson will they/won’t they drama that’s been dragged out for years, I don’t like either character and I’m at the point where I don’t care whether they end up together or not, I usually dislike having romances between main characters on crime procedurals but I just do not care about Stabler or Benson anymore. I won’t be watching OC, I’ve only watched it half the time anyway, and I’m honestly not sure if I’ll continue with SVU - some of the episodes this year were just painful to get through the St O worship was so heavy. I really only watch for Fin and Bruno, they really need to bump Bruno up to opening credits, makes no sense that’s he not in them given that he’s in as many episodes as everyone else and seems to be universally popular with the fans - from what I’ve seen online liking Bruno is one of the few things most SVU fans agree on. Fin is of course the anchor of the show and pretty much the only character who can connect with Benson as an equal now. I like Carisi as well of course but they don’t know how to use him at all most of the time - they rarely go into court, probably because it means less focus on St Olivia, and the legal stuff is frequently poorly written, and they seemed to slip back into the bad habit of writing Carisi as more cop than lawyer towards the end of the season. Velasco is fine but isn’t really used much it seems, and the revolving door of female investigators in the squad don’t make much of an impact for me, it’s nice to see a bigger squad again but it’s weird having an IAB captain and an FBI agent working there and sometimes the squad dynamics are screwy. So I’m not sure if I’ll watch SVU when it returns or not.

Here are some of my thoughts on this season The detective stuff was stellar for the most part - Shaw is very good and Riley was a strong addition - he fit in well from the start and has good chemistry with Shaw and I liked his friendship with Dixon - their prior connection helped make Riley’s intro smooth. I do wish they had given a satisfactory explanation for Cosgrove’s departure instead of one line that left me with more questions than answers - I had come to like Frank, after a very rocky start he became a lot more well rounded and likable in season 22, but I enjoy Riley even more - I like how both Riley and Shaw have mostly laid back, relaxed personalities but can bring the intensity when needed. Dixon was a good squad leader and I’ll miss her next season. The detective part of the show was mostly well done and had good investigations. The legal stuff was shakier - there were frequently illogical and very predictable rulings to suppress evidence/toss out testimony by the judge used as a plot device to create drama and set the DAs back. Also a new witness emerging at trial or new info being discovered in the middle of trial happened too often - those are my biggest complaints with the show, how they’ll throw in something for shock value on the legal side that not only isn’t shocking but doesn’t make logical sense. I hope they can work these issues out in future episodes. As for the characters, Maroun is my least favorite of the current L&O main characters also, she doesn’t add much, very bland and at times she’s whiny sort of like Serena was. It was notable how Maroun didn’t do much in the last 2 episodes and I enjoyed the legal stuff more in those episodes. I wish Maroun was leaving instead of Dixon. I have mixed feelings about Nolan Price, sometimes I like him, sometimes he comes off as soft/low energy. I thought Price had more passion in the last 2 episodes which was good to see. Jack was awesome, L&O’s most iconic character, but it was probably time for him to retire given his age and the reduced role he had in most episodes. Still I miss him and am adjusting to L&O without him in the new episodes. Baxter is interesting and has a commanding presence which is needed for a DA and adds some intrigue, and while I was nervous after his first 2 episodes that he would just cause a lot of conflict, he’s settled in since then and I like what he’s brought to the show and I’m interested to see how they use him next season and how his relationship with the others continues to evolve. Some brief thoughts on each episode Episode 1 - Total garbage. Ridiculous plot, clunky and preachy dialogue, cartoonish characters and controversial just for the sake of being controversial. Definitely my least favorite episode of the season. Episode 2 - Strong case with an interesting plot about the murder of the tech executive and the AI program. Good episode overall. Episode 3 - Average episode, felt like the case took a backseat to Riley’s backstory, I would’ve liked more exploration of the perp, not bad though. Episode 4 - Good case, interesting twists in the plot and it flowed well from start to finish. Good episode. Episode 5 - Awesome exit for Jack. Really great to see him go into court again and he went out in a very fitting manner, beating the odds to get justice one final time and outmaneuvering the mayor. My favorite episode of the season. Episode 6 - Interesting scenario but very predictable, the great performance by Mehcad Brooks elevated the episode and I liked the callback to when Shaw was profiled and detained last season. The search for the perp was intense and that helped the episode as well. Weird that there was no DA in the episode. Episode 7 - Baxter’s intro, I liked how they immediately distinguished him from McCoy and made him interesting but I was wary of the conflict he was causing. Decent case overall. Episode 8 - I was already annoyed at all of the tension Baxter was causing here, seemed like they were trying to put him at odds with everyone in every scene. The two things I liked about this one were the detectives visiting the ME and hearing both sides give closing arguments. Episode 9 - Strong case, good investigation, and Baxter settled in as DA in this one and his scenes were normal and not tension filled. Maroun was annoying me though. Episode 10 - Very interesting premise but the plot really stretched credulity - I couldn’t believe the DAs would go to trial with such flimsy evidence and the killer being mistaken for a man was kind of ridiculous. I liked Baxter’s role again and the scene between him and Price near the end was good. Episode 11 - Nice to see Dixon get a large role and to meet her son. Average case other than that, not a lot to say about it. Episode 12 - Solid episode, I liked seeing Baxter in court, the legal side had more life to it, and Price was more passionate, I think this kind of marked a turning point in the Baxter/Price relationship. Episode 13 - Pretty good season finale - good investigation and I liked getting more insight into Baxter, interesting way to end the season with everyone at campaign headquarters. The only episode I flat out disliked was the season premiere. My favorite episode was Jack’s exit in episode 5, such a great send off for a legend. I liked most of the episodes but some were better than others. I seem to enjoy the revival more than most, it’s not as good as the original 20 years but it’s still good. I hope they work out the flaws on the legal side and that it flows better next year, and I hope they do a good job with Dixon’s replacement. I do wish they would add in more recurring characters such as MEs/forensics people and especially a new psych expert. The foot chases are annoying and I wish they would go back to the classic openings instead of the openings used in later seasons. It’s a good show overall, I look forward to season 24 in the fall.

Season 4 is on rotation on Charge tonight Collective is a really strange episode, but Goren playing with the “7 weapons in one” toy gun in the Philly vintage toy shop makes the episode worth watching - one of the very best Goren scenes, downright hilarious. Other than that it was a weird episode that was kind of hard to get into - the first half about the search for the woman who set up the toy collector to be killed was interesting, but once they found her dead the episode fizzled and the whole vampire group plot just wasn’t that interesting to me. Stress Position is a strong episode, with the return of Logan, it was interesting to see him work with Goren/Eames and the case about the secret prisoners was unique and pretty chilling. Loved Logan’s line about reading the Patriot Act under its original title - 1984. I liked that Deakins spoke with Van Buren on the phone and mentioned that Van Buren had been trying to get Logan back to her squad - it corrected the crap from the awful movie where it seemed like Van Buren disliked Logan. It was odd though that they didn’t state who exactly killed the victim at the start, we know that the lead guard had him killed but did he get a criminal affiliate to do it or did he do it himself? That was unclear and very weird how it wasn’t stated.

Yeah I guess the victim of the accident could’ve sued Baxter’s daughter - who knows, they might have - I figure the Baxter family probably reached a settlement with the injured party.

I don’t follow your post. There was no manslaughter - no one died in the drunk driving crash caused by Baxter’s daughter - a pedestrian was injured but survived. I had mixed feelings about the situation with Baxter’s daughter - it’s hard to fault Baxter for doing everything he could to help his daughter, any parent would, but it is a valid point that if the daughter hadn’t come from privilege she might’ve faced a more severe punishment. Regardless the daughter did the right thing by testifying and Baxter did the right thing by encouraging her to take the stand, and it showed that Baxter cared more about his duties as DA than about his image as an incident like that would hurt his campaign. The most interesting thing about the situation was Price’s reaction IMO - I was surprised when Price told Baxter he could keep her off the stand and tried convincing him he could win without her, I expected Price to get pissed at Baxter for not telling him sooner and have a heated confrontation with him, so it was interesting that Price went the opposite way - I guess Price has come to respect Baxter more than he did at the start. I look forward to seeing how Baxter’s relationship with everyone else continues to evolve, but Price, Maroun, Shaw and Riley all being at his campaign headquarters on election night showed that they’ve come to respect him.

Pretty terrible episode all around to be honest - while I thought we were going to have an interesting serial rapist case, it instead was solved pretty easily and took a backseat to a bunch of cliches, characters acting stupid and St Olivia worship. SVU is garbage now and everyone aside from Mariska and her diehard fans can see that it’s garbage. While normally I would enjoy seeing Fin get focus, he was acting way more like Benson than himself here - I just didn’t buy that Fin would cover for a kid who shot him and wouldn’t do anything about it. That felt ridiculous and way OOC. The case was solved pretty easily and it seemed like they could’ve figured out the explanation of why the original suspect’s fingerprint was at the scene. The whole thing just felt sloppy and cliched from start to finish. The worst cliche was the portrayal of the DAs office returning to how it was portrayed before the Mothership returned, with Carisi as the only ethical one and being caught between the SVU squad and a one note political hack boss. I hope we never see this boss again. And it feels like the Mothership and SVU are taking places in different universes once again - the Mothership finale had Baxter’s election coming up and ended on election night, it wouldn’t have taken much for SVU to mention Baxter by name and say he was keeping a close eye on the case or something instead of bringing in a cartoonish boss to piss everyone off and crap on the office. And if the rest of the episode wasn’t lousy enough, we have to get one more scene of fucking Maddie and her annoying family, with the sole purpose of them kissing Olivia’s ass and telling her she’s the greatest thing since sliced bread. Seriously, Mariska’s ego must be gigantic for them to continue to put these scenes in of characters falling all over themselves worshipping St Olivia. And then they couldn’t even get Meloni/Stabler to pop in in person for a chat - that was just pandering to the shippers and felt very shoddy and forced. Really the only thing I liked about this episode was Bruno, he’s awesome, and him and Fin’s scene at the hardware store was by far the highlight of the episode. Velasco and Fin had a nice scene as well. Other than that it was crap. I am very tempted to quit SVU now - the Benson worship reached an all time high this season and is just nauseating. It’s mainly just a hate watch for me now. It’s clear the show doesn’t care about having interesting cases or doing anything other than giving Mariska an ego boost. It’s downright comical what they’ve turned Benson into to be honest. I’ll see how I feel when season 26 rolls around, but SVU is pretty much crap now.

That was a different gun than the murder weapon - they recovered the murder weapon and sent it to the forensics lab and that’s what led Shaw/Riley to the shooter. The shooter had gotten another gun when he went to the piers, so the gun that he threw in the river wasn’t the one used in the murder.

Pretty good episode - compelling story, albeit a bit different from the norm, but it worked well for the most part. Baxter got a lot of focus these last two episodes, and it’s made the legal side better actually - he has a strong presence that works well and lifts up the sometimes shaky legal writing. We’ve gotten a good feel for Baxter over the last couple of episodes and I like how he’s settled in as DA - it’s clear Price/Maroun have warmed up to him now - it was interesting that Price seemed willing to keep Baxter’s daughter off the stand so as not to drag them through the mud, given that up until tonight Baxter and Price have had several disagreements - I guess Price has come to respect Baxter more, maybe after seeing him in action in court last episode. It’s interesting that the episode ended on sort of a cliffhanger with the election results, but I’m sure Goldwyn/Baxter will be back next season, I haven’t heard anything about him leaving and I doubt they would bring him on and give him such focus if he wasn’t staying for a while, so I’m confident Baxter will prevail in the election. The detective stuff was great as usual, Shaw/Riley are awesome and I loved seeing them go to the forensics lab and get a lead on the murder weapon that led them to the shooter, that was classic L&O detective work and it was nice to see the lab and a forensics person again. I’ll really miss Dixon and I guess they didn’t know she was leaving when they did the episode because nothing was said about it. I really liked seeing Dixon/Riley/Shaw interact with Baxter, the more interactions between prosecutors/detectives the better, and it was interesting that Shaw/Riley were at campaign headquarters at the end along with Price/Maroun. The flaws in the episode were some of the legal writing, particularly with the witness getting killed, why wasn’t the witness being watched by patrol at least even if he rejected protective custody? It was hard to believe someone could kill him and leave no trace, it would’ve been more realistic if they had caught the killer of the witness immediately but he refused to turn on the gang. And yeah the judge’s rulings were questionable as well about not admitting the testimony about the gang stuff, I did buy that the defense would question Baxter’s daughter about her past to impeach her and her dad’s credibility. I think Baxter’s marriage may be over, it appeared there was some trouble there even before this case happened. It was interesting that the prick of a mayor that Jack clashed with in his last episode showed up for a cameo at the start, and I was fully expecting him to show up later and cause problems again. I also found it interesting that he endorsed Baxter, given that he wanted a puppet he could use as DA and Baxter is certainly not his puppet, I guess the mayor gave up on trying to control the DA’s office after Jack outmaneuvered him. Maroun was barely in the episode once again and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that I’ve enjoyed the legal parts of the last 2 episodes more than I usually do and she hasn’t been in the last 2 episodes much - she just doesn’t add anything - I wish it was her leaving instead of Dixon. The ending definitely reminded me of the season 19 finally when Jack was up for election and it was unclear what the results of the election would be when the episode ended. But like I said I’m pretty sure Baxter isn’t going anywhere. Enjoyable season finale overall and I look forward to season 24 coming in September.

Here’s the thread for tonight’s episode, the season finale.

Another stellar episode - really good case about the woman killing for the mob in exchange for information allowing her to get to the scummy casino owner who killed her dad - a lot of players in the case but it flowed well from start to finish. Good work from each agent, and good twists and turns in the case. This show has the best cases of the 3 FBI shows. I figured the guy Hana met on the plane would pop back up, but I’m not sure where they’re going with him.

Good episode tonight and I like the new guy who’s probably going to take Scott’s place - he has a good personality and fit in smoothly with everyone - I think Scott is dead unfortunately - I don’t see any other way they could write him out. It will be interesting to see how they end the season and if it ends on a cliffhanger or not. The case was interesting and I liked the investigation and how it was solved.

I’ve always liked Jeremy Sisto, he was awesome on original L&O as Detective Lupo and he’s great as Jubal also IMO. Jubal centric episodes are some of my favorites as he always delivers compelling stuff, although I like the entire FBI team.

Good episode, I am a big fan of Jubal so I liked seeing him take center stage, the show usually delivers solid cases when he’s front and center. This was a good case. Joe was an idiot though, him charging in nearly got his son killed and then he had some nerve blaming Jubal for the whole fiasco when it was his dumbass son who got into the mess and then it was him being reckless who caused the situation to explode. Joe must not have known Jubal at all if he thought Jubal would destroy evidence for him, and Jubal went out of his way to try to help the son out. The son was a terrible informant, he couldn’t fake it at all, but that wasn’t Jubal’s fault - Joe really pissed me off, Jubal was just a nice scapegoat for him to blame the situation on. Didn’t even really feel like Maggie was absent, I guess due to the larger role for Jubal, the team works well together regardless of who’s paired with who, I liked seeing OA and Tiffany work together some - all of the characters gel well together. Good case and pretty good season overall - I guess in the finale next week they’ll wrap up the story about the terrorist who killed Hobbs.

Just a Girl In the World is a terrible episode IMO, it was so out of character and ridiculous that Lupo would go to bed with someone involved in a case who turned out to be the perp. Lupo was never one to use bad judgment like that, it was highly OOC. Plus the lab guy planting evidence to help build a case was a weird plot point that was glossed over - it would’ve caused a huge scandal, and people that were close with the victim wouldn’t be working on her murder case in the first place. Really glad that episode was never mentioned again and everything went back to normal with Lupo next episode, because this one was really stupid and soap opera-ish.

Here’s the thread for tonight’s episode

Yeah it was a great case. It was a good twist that the perp was a teacher, and while the perp was a psycho, I can see why he snapped - I didn’t feel sympathy for him, but the episode did a good job of showing all of the stress teachers are under, the guy Jack confronted made valid points about the issues teachers face, but he was wrong to try to stifle their investigation given how dangerous the perp was and it was satisfying to see Jack tell him to get out of the way. Exits have always been a mixed bag on L&O, so it was great that Anita got such a strong one, she was awesome. It was fitting that Lupo wanted to help her out, they always had a strong relationship, and it was a really nice finish seeing all of the characters come together at the end to support Anita. It was a really great way to end the show’s original run and a great way to conclude Anita’s story. The show shouldn’t have been cancelled, but it was an awesome conclusion to the Mothership’s original run. Season 20 was a really good season overall - there were 2 really lousy episodes in Just a Girl In The World and Dignity, but overall there were a lot of really strong cases.

The end of season 20 is on WE today - Love Eternal is a weird but entertaining episode, the victim’s wife was a loon but it was a good twist that she didn’t do the murder, and the fact that the second husband poisoned the first husband was a good twist. It was an interesting plot of how the husbands were conspiring to hide assets from their wives and how the victim backed out and so one of the others killed him. Cutter’s cross of the murderer was very strong, as I’ve said before I have issues with Cutter but he improved quite a bit in season 20 IMO. Rubber Room is an awesome finale as I’ve said before - a different type of episode but it worked really well - very intense race against the clock episode. Jack’s confrontation with the bureaucrat was epic, and I love seeing Skoda help out. Lupo organizing the fundraising party for Van Buren was a nice touch, Lupo and Anita always had a strong relationship and it was nice to see all of the main characters come together to help out Anita, and it was an awesome conclusion to her story since she was leaving the show. She was a great squad leader and I liked her she got used more in season 20. Rubber Room is a great episode to close the original run of the Mothership, although it never should’ve been cancelled in favor of the much weaker LA show, it was an excellent way to close L&O’s original run.

This sucks. I’ll miss Lt Dixon, she was a good squad leader even if we didn’t get enough of her. I have a feeling this was another cost cutting move by the show if I had to guess, if it was done for creative reasons then it’s fucking stupid because anyone can see it’s the legal side that needs a shake up more than the detective side. Really wish that if someone was leaving it was Maroun or Price. Oh well, L&O has always had lots of cast turnover, hopefully they’ll find someone good to be the new squad leader - they’ve done good with the detective side - Shaw and Riley are awesome and have been excellent additions to the show, so hopefully the new Lieutenant will fit right in. But I’ll miss Dixon, and if anyone needs to go, it’s Maroun or Price. Maroun is my least favorite, she was barely on last night and it made the second half better.

This episode felt kind of boring to me - maybe because the cases were cold and so it kind of lacked intensity, and it was solved rather easily, I didn’t get why the cases went cold for so long - maybe they were never linked but Benson and company linked them easily. The opening added nothing to the show and failed to get me interested, and it was just a rather boring episode IMO - while I liked seeing the whole squad working a case, I didn’t get why St Olivia didn’t let everyone in on what was going on, it seemed like she has no trust in her squad besides Fin, she really annoys me. Fin had some good scenes, and Bruno was good as always. Overall I really don’t have much to say about this one, it wasn’t nearly as bad as a couple of other episodes, but it wasn’t that great either.

Pretty good episode, it was very interesting to see Baxter take the lead in prosecuting, I liked it, maybe because it was nice to see Baxter’s lawyering skills in the courtroom and to get more of a feel for the character, and maybe because Price is so low key that it was nice to see someone with a more commanding presence take over. Everyone seemed cranky tonight, Baxter and Price had a heated discussion, Riley seemed salty with Price, and Shaw lost his cool in the interrogation room and Riley had to hold him back which wasn’t like Shaw. I did like seeing some more fire from Price actually, usually he’s so low key that he doesn’t bring the intensity, so we saw something different there. I think Baxter and Price needed to clear the air, and I think Baxter had a point about how Price viewed him, I think Price was comparing Baxter to McCoy some of the time and did have suspicions that Baxter was a “carnival barker” and more politician than lawyer, and I liked that even Maroun called out Price for his views on Baxter. Speaking of Maroun she was barely in the episode, and I didn’t miss her, she is bland and doesn’t add much. I could’ve done without the ending twist of the rape victim attempting suicide, that felt tacked off for shock value and cheapened the episode. Baxter was 100% right to not make offer any deal, the piece of shit killer did not deserve a chance at ever seeing the light of day again, they made a deal with him last time and he killed as soon as he got out, he needed to go away for life. He was pure evil. It was so predictable that the DAs would lose the necklace the killer took, it’s tiresome how they lose evidence on a motion to suppress in every episode, but at least this time they did something with it and explained that this judge was biased towards the defense and was more concerned with his image and not getting rulings overturned than with the law, and I liked seeing Baxter confront him towards the end and say he would appeal the ruling and delay the trial, I thought Baxter would get held in contempt but it was satisfying to see. The investigation was shorter than normal and they zeroed in on the killer quickly, but some investigations are like that. Still the detective part of the show flows much better than the legal side. This was pretty compelling and there was a lot to unpack here, I liked seeing Baxter get in the courtroom, I’m liking him as the DA and it’s interesting to see how his relationship with Price/Maroun is evolving, and like I said I think Baxter made valid points about how Price viewed him. It will be interesting to see if things are smoother now between them. Looks like Baxter will be front and center again in the season finale, they are definitely giving him a large role.

Yes Rey was a sanctimonious jackass and a hypocrite. It’s funny because the cases were arguably at their best during his time on the show, I mean I think season 7 is L&O’s best season case wise, it’s just one excellent, classic case after another, but Rey is my second least favorite detective on L&O behind only Beauty Queen in season 17. He just makes me want to punch the tv sometimes. At times I wonder if the showrunners intended for Rey to be unlikable or at least controversial - Lennie was such an awesome, likable detective that I wonder if the heads of the show wanted someone who would cause some conflict and get viewers riled up so they brought in Rey. Anyway it was always nice when Rey got knocked down a peg and that’s one of the things I like the most about Stalker is seeing Jack expose Rey as a giant hypocrite on the witness stand.

Here is the discussion thread for tonight’s episode.

Yeah I didn’t get why Rey said that by her behavior she acknowledged she lied - she never said she lied, she was crying because she was terrified of the psycho stalker and the detectives didn’t believe she was in danger. I liked how the episode pretty much left it open ended as to whether the first attack was real or not - one thing that I thought of was that Briscoe said she had deep scratches on her neck, but if she had done it herself wouldn’t they have found her own skin under her fingernails? That makes me think the attack was real. There was the inconsistency about the garbage but there could be a reason for that. It could’ve been real or fake, but I lean towards believing it was real. I thought it was absurd that Rey said she acknowledged she made it up by her behavior. Glad I’m not the only one who thought Anita was a bit out of character - that scene just seemed off, Lennie and Anita had known each other long enough for them to have a conversation about the case without getting so pissed. And Rey was a hypocrite for how he judged Lennie for his actions when Rey had lied to help the victim in the past. But Rey being a hypocritical jackass was nothing new.

I love the colorful minor characters on L&O that the detectives run into.