S16.E07: What Doesn't Kill Us

[Danielg342]

Quote

As the BAU wait to hear news regarding the Sicarius case, they turn their attention to an Unsub enacting his own brand of vengeance.

 

[Danielg342]

I'll give this episode this much- Nicholas D'Agosto brought out some warmth and tenderness I never thought I'd see out of Deputy Director Doug Bailey. He actually had some chemistry with Paget Brewster and was quite likeable as the dopey, "what have I gotten myself into?" stressed-out agent.

If I saw more of than instead of a run-of-the-mill obstructive bureaucrat at the beginning, I might have liked Bailey as a character.

Oh, and Brewster shined on her own, like with her migraine, as she's always done in that kind of role.

I also found the Tyler Green-Penelope Garcia end of credits scene to be weirdly amusing, even if the thought of said scene made my eyes roll and my head shake like it never did before.

That's about it, though.

First, I want to know who's decision it was that said, "this reboot needs a run-of-the-mill, good old fashioned Criminal Minds episode". Does anything say "filler" more than that?

Oh, and good that this case took place in West Virginia. Wouldn't want the FBI to have to worry about needing that jet they lost access to.

Secondly, I'll never understand CM's brand of anti-misogyny. Kill the dude, have him be the only one who dies in this episode, reinforcing an old trope (although at least the show brought in his parents and expressed their anger, instead of just using that dead body for clues like they usually do).

After they do that, though, CM turns around and has Elias Voit not once but twice hallucinate the gruesome death of his family, displayed in all of its gory glory (and perhaps doing a bit of foreshadowing). As well as showing Grace get whipped in full view with us hearing her agonizing (but muffled) screams as she gets whipped.

OK then.

It doesn't help that the case was rather rudimentary and, aside from it being odd, I don't know why the BAU's expertise was needed on this. Usually the show implies the local investigators' incompetence, but this time we actually saw it. What medical examiner would not know what a cat o' nine tails is?

The connection was rather simple too. The janitor (hey guys, CM's telling us "the butler did it!") bought drugs from the dead guy. Even though no one was charged there would still be a record of that somewhere, because the police were told to drop the matter.

You'd think that after the guy turns up dead bringing up that case might be the first thing the police do...but then it means the police would actually have to do work and not have time for the coffee and doughnuts.

I then have to throw some shade at all the telegraphing that is going on in the Voit story. Here's this for profiling- Erica Messer loves family drama too much, so, guaranteed, if Voit's family isn't dead by the finale, Voit's final act will be to take them hostage and try to die in a blaze of glory at the hands of the FBI.

I'm also betting that Tawny gets it. Because, even though it's very sloppy of Voit to leave her alive, he's also aware of his mistake and he'll correct it. He always does.

Oh, and the false drama of the Attorney General (what happened to the actual FBI Director?) closing the Sicarius case? We know the BAU will resolve it, and they may even go rogue to do so, because when has procedures and protocol ever stopped them before?

I bet Tawny is a victim and is only a victim because the BAU is forbidden to investigate her murder for some reason, with the BAU arguing "Tawny would be alive if we were only allowed to take her case". Which causes them to go rogue and confirm everything the father of the dead man in this episode believed about the FBI.

Hey, at least one person was on the ball in this episode.

[millennium]

This episode brutally reminded me why I gave up on the original series years ago -- the torture porn and apparent fetish for violence.  Bad enough we're made to stand by and watch a man graphically mutilate a young woman, but we were also treated to a fantasy of shooting a woman and young girls in the head.

I know it's a big paycheck but I don't know how the cast make peace with their conscience about this abhorrent aspect of the show.

 

Edited January 20, 2023 by millennium

[Danielg342]

2 hours ago, millennium said:

This episode brutally reminded me why I gave up on the original series years ago -- the torture porn and apparent fetish for violence.  Bad enough we're made to stand by and watch a man graphically mutilate a young woman, but we were also treated to a fantasy of shooting a woman and young girls in the head.

I know it's a big paycheck but I don't know how the cast make peace with their conscience about this abhorrent aspect of the show.

 

Mandy Patinkin couldn't make peace with the violence on the show which is why he left. I wonder if, secretly, the other actors who left and never came back- like Shemar Moore, Lola Glaudini and Matthew Gray Gubler, among others- also couldn't rectify the show's violent nature. Moore's new series may deal with guns and have some blood but I've never seen any gore on S.W.A.T.

I figure it was inevitable that the show was going to get more violent now that it's on a streaming platform. Without having to worry about the standards of broadcast television- which CM's writers and producers have complained about- upping the gore factor and having the characters swear was a given.

Of course, I also figured there might actually be nudity too. You'd think that, in real life, the woman getting whipped would be stripped completely naked, because criminals tend to do that (the criminal would probably also rape the woman, because most serial killers are rapists too, but showing that might have been extreme for the scene).

The bigger quibble is that CM seems to be using the violence in this episode- and many others- "just because they can". Which is the wrong approach. In the earlier years, the show would restrain the violent moments to the beginning, and only show what is needed to tell the story. It's there- once you get past feeling icky- to make you ask, "what is going on here?", since the killer's torture or kill methods would be integral to the profile.

Yes, seeing Grace getting whipped and being Angela forced to watch fit the profile, but we already knew that part of the profile by the time it was brought up. There was really no need to show it. If nothing else, the scene with Grace and Angela should have led off the episode because then we don't know "the puzzle" yet. Perhaps the first scene should have been Grace having to watch the man get killed.

Then again, I don't know if we needed to see a whipping at all. Describing the man's injuries was enough.

At the end of the day, the CM writers need to learn restraint. Just because you can doesn't mean you should- even if you are now allowed to.

[millennium]

7 hours ago, Danielg342 said:

Just because you can doesn't mean you should- even if you are now allowed to.

The whipping scene was unequivocally gratuitous.   There was nothing in it that elevated the story or advanced the plot.   The horror of Ashley being told she has to watch Grace be whipped was horrific enough.  We didn't need to see the bloodied blades tearing through Grace's flesh. 

It's my opinion that someone who actually enjoys watching depictions of this sort must be mentally ill.   So I wonder, why is the show going out of its way to pander to that audience?   Sometimes CM feels like two separate shows -- the BAU show, and the killer show, and there's rarely any crossover in the sense that the BAU actors aren't usually on camera when the sickest scenes are being filmed.    Maybe that's what allows the regular cast to imagine they are somehow apart from the misogyny and torture porn -- they only come in briefly at the end, make the arrest and find a fitting quote.

Edited January 20, 2023 by millennium

[Retired at last]

OK, thanks, guys. I got enough from reading your comments to know that I will skip this one. I miss Morgan, Reid, and even Hotchner.  I am not enjoying this round. I had a marathon today and enjoyed watching that. I have been pretty lucky to find one almost every day. Not tomorrow, but Sunday there is one that starts around 9 a.m.

[millennium]

It's ironic this episode should be titled after a Nietzsche quote.   Nietzsche has another famous quote that might be applied to the makers of this sadistic, misogynistic show:  "“He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster.”  

 

[Danielg342]

6 hours ago, millennium said:

It's ironic this episode should be titled after a Nietzsche quote.   Nietzsche has another famous quote that might be applied to the makers of this sadistic, misogynistic show:  "“He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster.”  

 

Funny enough, that quote was used as part of one of the bookend quotes in Episode 100. The other part of that quote has been used two other times- in S1 and S9.

[StarBrand]

I really don't get the complaints about the violence or torture. We're watching a show about serial killers. It seems to me there would be more than a few unpleasant scenes to sit though. Mandy had an issue with it, which is why he abandoned the show (and that's exactly what he did, just deciding not to show up again for work), so it would seem it's been a part of the show's DNA since the beginning, not something that started happening a few years ago.

If they had shown graphic close ups in the whipping scene, for example, I would say they'd gone a tad too far, and being on a streaming service, they certainly could have leaned into it. But they didn't.

Nice to see the boss guy actually make himself useful. Sorry to see that despite proving their worth, the Sicarius case is now closed. Of course, he's about to do something that puts himself back on the radar. The show really wants me to feel sympathy for him, and sometimes I almost do, but this guy has been too far gone for too long, and he's not coming back from that.  Not after entertaining thoughts about killing his own family.

The mid-credits scene was golden. Poor guy was rendered incapable of completing sentences.

[millennium]

3 hours ago, StarBrand said:

We're watching a show about serial killers.

I have watched plenty of shows about serial killers.   Documentaries, dramas, true crime re-creations, etc.   Many manage to be chilling without seeming to delight in graphic, gory depictions of the torment and murder of women.  Mindhunter, for example.

[Annber03]

Yeah, while I agree that some of the violence and graphic content will come with the territory, I was still really uncomfortable watching that scene with Grace being tortured, too. Sometimes less really is more. 

On 1/20/2023 at 3:57 AM, Danielg342 said:

I'll give this episode this much- Nicholas D'Agosto brought out some warmth and tenderness I never thought I'd see out of Deputy Director Doug Bailey. He actually had some chemistry with Paget Brewster and was quite likeable as the dopey, "what have I gotten myself into?" stressed-out agent.

If I saw more of than instead of a run-of-the-mill obstructive bureaucrat at the beginning, I might have liked Bailey as a character.

Oh, and Brewster shined on her own, like with her migraine, as she's always done in that kind of role.

I also found the Tyler Green-Penelope Garcia end of credits scene to be weirdly amusing, even if the thought of said scene made my eyes roll and my head shake like it never did before.

I really loved Bailey in this episode. I'd liked him from the get-go (again, helps that I like the actor, but still :D), and was looking forward to seeing another side to him over time, so it was really good to get more of that here. His interaction with the parents was well done, and the way he comforted Grace was touching and sweet. 

And I agree that his scenes with Emily are great. I got a good laugh out of Emily's response when Bailey was all, "How are you not nervous?" before their meeting with the AG. Emily just rattling off the fact that she'd been assaulted, beaten, and killed in the line of duty, and so nonchalantly at that, was a great comeback. I like when the show can poke fun at itself like that, and acknowledge all the crazy stuff the team's been through over the years. 

Also liked the scene with Rossi telling Tara to take some time for herself. I'd always liked their friendship on the original series, so it was nice to see a nod to it here, too, even if I want to tell Tara she needn't blame herself for how things with Rebecca ended. I get and sympathize with her sadness about the end of their relationship, but yeah, none of that's on her. She did what she had to do. 

When it showed Garcia in her kitchen in that end credits scene, and Tyler's feet on the counter, not moving, I genuinely wondered for the briefest of moments if we were going to take a really weird twist in this story with him being incapacitated or something :p. But no. I did brace for the possibility of things taking a dark turn when he showed up at her apartment towards the end, though, and I still feel like this relationship is going to blow up on Garcia, and possibly the team in general, in a spectacular way. I appreciated Emily pointing out the conflict of interest issues involved in Garcia and Tyler getting together. I can only imagine what she'll say when she finds out they slept together. 

[Danielg342]

20 hours ago, StarBrand said:

I really don't get the complaints about the violence or torture. We're watching a show about serial killers. It seems to me there would be more than a few unpleasant scenes to sit though.

Well, murder mystery has been a thing ever since television was in its early days, and, despite not being able to show any violence, they still made some riveting work. So I don't necessarily agree that gore has to "come with the territory" on shows about serial killers.

Ultimately, though, for me it's more about the maxim of "only include it if you need it". This would go for any kind of choice within the story, not just the choice to depict violence. However, when it comes to something that could, potentially, unsettle the audience- things like using gore, sex and vulgar language or doing anything taboo- it's really important for creators to lean into the "only include it if you need it" rule.

First, guaranteed, including an unsettling scene will turn off segments of the audience. There's no way around that. A great way to mitigate the inevitable backlash is to be able to say, as a creator, "we filmed it that way because otherwise the scene would not have worked".

Second, nothing will turn off an audience more than being forced to sit through an unsettling scene for no reason. You'll get complaints that the creator is "being exploitative" or "seeking attention" or what have you.

What upsets me more about the latter is that it's simply lazy writing. Overusing shock value tactics does not make up for a lack of a story. This, ultimately, the biggest mistake Gotham made during its run- it's no fun if you're "shocking" for the sake of it.

This is also a mistake that CM makes time and time again, especially in Erica Messer's years. Most of it is gratuitous violence, but they're not above pulling off cheap, emotional stunts like whatever it was with the Maeve storyline. In CM's case, gratuitous violence is more the symptom of a greater malaise- writers who cut way too many corners.

When it comes to this episode's usage of the whipping scene, it would have made far better sense to have it at the beginning. The idea of forcing the woman to watch the beating so she can be told, "you did this to her" was an important part of the profile. The UnSub felt wronged, and he needed to make the people who wronged him understand that.

More to the point, the UnSub ominously saying at the beginning "you did this to her" would make the viewers wonder, "what did she do to him?" From that vantage point, you can then start to construct the case that eventually answers that question.

The show didn't go that route. We instead had an opening scene of the young woman crawling through a maze of ducts, which added nothing to the profile other than explaining why the dead man had bruising on the palm of his hands and knees. Which was not a huge, Earth-shattering, revelation. The revelation that was Earth-shattering, though, was the revelation that the UnSub was a moral enforcer bent on teaching those who wronged him a lesson. Yet the scene that would have shown that- the whipping scene- came after that revelation was made (via exposition), so it lost whatever impact it could have had.

11 hours ago, Annber03 said:

I got a good laugh out of Emily's response when Bailey was all, "How are you not nervous?" before their meeting with the AG. Emily just rattling off the fact that she'd been assaulted, beaten, and killed in the line of duty, and so nonchalantly at that, was a great comeback. I like when the show can poke fun at itself like that, and acknowledge all the crazy stuff the team's been through over the years. 

That was a great scene. I had a chuckle too. Yeah, the Attorney General is a piece of cake after you've dealt with Ian Doyle.

Maybe Emily Prentiss ought to run for politics. She has the nerves of steel to pull it off.

11 hours ago, Annber03 said:

I did brace for the possibility of things taking a dark turn when he showed up at her apartment towards the end, though, and I still feel like this relationship is going to blow up on Garcia, and possibly the team in general, in a spectacular way.

You could be right, but there's a big part of me that wouldn't want to go there. We've already told the story of "hot guy starts dating Garcia to strike back at her" all the way back in S3, and doing it again, even if it is literally 16 years later, feels like Garcia is backsliding in that she didn't learn from that experience. Yeah, perhaps Garcia would be the type that is so naïve that she'd overrule any instincts that she might have that the relationship is a bad idea but I think there would be limits. It's not like we're talking about Garcia having a bad streak of dating people who cheat on her and are emotionally manipulative- we're talking about Garcia ignoring the possibility she could be dating- again- someone who might kill her.

That's a bridge too far for me. The first time it happened I could understand it because she might not recognize those signs. The second time? She would be ignoring her own trauma and that's unrealistic.

The other part is, while I'm sure there are many who don't want Garcia on their screens anymore (I know I have not liked Garcia since Messer took over), I think killing her off or putting her in peril would be the wrong way for her to go.

Listen...Garcia is like Reid. Vulnerable. Child-like. Full of insecurities...and she's the victim of several serious traumas that have wounded her emotionally and mentally far more than maybe even she realizes. The show has already established that Garcia likes filling her space with cutesy things because it helps remind her that there is still a lot of good in this world, despite its darkness.

In short, hurting Garcia- again- would be just like the thought of hurting Reid again. The show would merely be taking a character who's already down and kicking them again.

It would just feel...cheap...and disappointing.

Perhaps a fun twist could be Tyler- who is, supposedly, military-trained in psychological operations and thus might even be smarter than the BAU- uses Garcia to lull the team into some kind of trap. Tyler here plays the long game in making the BAU believe he is on their side, only to lure them into a trap that he and Elias Voit have set up. Tyler believes he's also set up the trap so well that not even Garcia can stop it, but here we see the smarts Garcia displayed in "Saturday" to show Tyler that, while he thinks he's the smartest in the room, he really isn't, and Garcia's tricks get the team saved- and Voit and Tyler Green arrested.

[Lebanna]

Yeah, I don’t get the García hate, honestly. She is somewhat the female version of Reid, she’s damaged and guilty for her mother and step-father’s  demise just as Reid lived with his having put his mother in an institution, years after his father left, so he could go away and live his life, without becoming her carer, as perhaps society thought he should. This is borne out later when it becomes clear that his mother, through no fault of her own, was physically abusing him, later thinking that he was a ‘clumsy kid’ because she didn’t remember hurting him. 
 

In García’s case, she becomes a hacker and grief councillor, trying to make up for what she once got wrong in ‘causing’ her parents’ deaths.
 

They’re both meant to be slightly emotionally stunted from the guilt they carry and therefore stuck in an emotionally somewhat set-back state which they illustrate through their deep innocence and in overly caring about those around them. In Reid, for example, that comes out as researching childbirth in case JJ went into labor in the field. In García, that’s her constant fear of any one of them coming to harm. 

I’ve always hoped both of them would end up happy in this show and Tyler plays into that in the sense that he is also guilt-ridden and stunted. Kind of hope he and García make it work, but it seems obvious there’s going to be a twist as the relationship has developed way too quickly. I know it’s uncool, but I just can’t hate her. She’s a little pool of light on this show and makes me smile.

[hypnotoad]

Quote

Yeah, I don’t get the García hate

I don't hate the character but I used to like her a lot more than I do currently. I loved her at the start of the show - I suppose she was on in more small doses. However, that changed as the show began to rely less on actual profiling and detective work and turned to Garcia's magical computer. And the cutesy thing wore off too (for me). All that ridiculous nicknames and so on with Morgan also annoyed me as it went on and on - though thankfully he isn't around anymore. At this point, the less I see Garcia the happier I am.

I'm watching this as long as Prentiss is a part of it. She's my favorite and always has been.

Quote

Emily just rattling off the fact that she'd been assaulted, beaten, and killed in the line of duty, and so nonchalantly at that, was a great comeback. I like when the show can poke fun at itself like that, and acknowledge all the crazy stuff the team's been through over the years. 

That made me laugh!

[StarBrand]

44 minutes ago, hypnotoad said:

Emily just rattling off the fact that she'd been assaulted, beaten, and killed in the line of duty, and so nonchalantly at that, was a great comeback. I like when the show can poke fun at itself like that, and acknowledge all the crazy stuff the team's been through over the years. 

And, yet, the thing that gave her a headache (literal or not), was Garcia kissing a material witness. Her head's gonna expode now.

[Danielg342]

I'm with @hypnotoad here in that I don't necessarily hate Garcia, I just have liked her far less in recent years. Most of that I chalk up to the writers whiffing and making several bad choices, like they do with the other characters, than any wider fault with the Garcia character.

It's gotten so bad that whenever Garcia pops up on screen I cringe at what will happen, and more often than not, she irritates me. That said, there are times- like when she told Tyler that "nerds do it better"- when I see the old Garcia magic and wish the show would milk more of that instead of the petulant, overgrown woman-child they have moulded for her.

All of my favourites- Morgan, Reid, Simmons, Gideon, Zoe Hawkes (I don't care if she was a one-episode wonder, she's still one of my favourite characters this show has produced)- are gone at this stage, so I'm pretty much watching out of pure loyalty. The main team I find to be rather bland but otherwise inoffensive. They don't set the world on fire but they won't make me stop watching. Garcia, on the other hand, is someone who I now look at as a character I just don't ever want to see again- she has "go away heat", for us wrestling fans.

Yet the thought of Tyler trying to kill her or just simply torturing her just doesn't sit right with me. I hated the prison arc because it felt like it was the show's excuse to beat Reid up, and Garcia is (practically) the female version of Reid. Torturing and exploiting the pain of characters who are- let's face it, weak- is worse to me than seeing the show torture some "victim of the week". The victim is a blank canvas that I don't have a lot of feelings for. Garcia and Reid are two characters I actually do care about.

I do believe that Garcia's relationship with Tyler will likely blow up in her face in some way. It could be a way to write her out of the series for good, as Prentiss fires her from the FBI for not terminating the relationship like she was supposed to. I still hope the ultimate denouement with Tyler ends up with her taking him and Sicarius down using her own brand of smarts.

For all her cutesiness and her magical computer hacks, we hardly ever see Garcia truly use her skills. They have an opportunity to change that so I hope the show takes it.

[Retired at last]

I agree that Garcia in small doses is fine. The problem is that there have not been small doses in many years. Plus, they have her writing/directing some of the shows that she is featured in. For example, the final show which was supposed to be about Rossi retiring turned into a celebration of all things Penelope, including Luke hitting on her. ENOUGH. Let her just do her computer magic without the attitude of superiority and specialness. 

On 1/22/2023 at 7:00 AM, Danielg342 said:

Perhaps a fun twist could be Tyler- who is, supposedly, military-trained in psychological operations and thus might even be smarter than the BAU- uses Garcia to lull the team into some kind of trap. Tyler here plays the long game in making the BAU believe he is on their side, only to lure them into a trap that he and Elias Voit have set up. Tyler believes he's also set up the trap so well that not even Garcia can stop it, but here we see the smarts Garcia displayed in "Saturday" to show Tyler that, while he thinks he's the smartest in the room, he really isn't, and Garcia's tricks get the team saved- and Voit and Tyler Green arrested.

I LOVE this idea, except for the last sentence - I would prefer it if Emily saved the team. Or Rossi - but not Garcia. Maybe let her work with one of the others, but not herself and it would be great.

[roamyn]

I found this episode so much better than the last.  Mostly because of the Bailey/Prentiss interaction.  I was also surprised that Elias didn’t kill Tawney.  Then again, he doesn’t like to get his hands dirty, directly.

I did find the wife’s attitude switch confusing.  They’ve been shown all loving, thus far.  Yes, he lied abt losing his job, and his stressed attitude can be attributed to that.  She came across as a bitch, not allowing her husband to snap one time, when the girls are arguing.  Tell me one parent who doesn’t.  He seems weak and dominated by her, and others, do his being the lead in this network appears to be him needing some control.

Penelope, you’re lying to your boss, disobeying procedure and orders, and putting “the most important case the BAU has ever investigated”, in jeopardy.

[idiotwaltz]

This might be my favourite of all the episodes I’ve seen so far, mainly because I loved Emily in it. I enjoyed her interaction with Bailey and the migraine scene with Garcia.

I didn’t mind that this was a run-of-the-mill serial killer case. I’m utterly bored with the Sicarius storyline and can’t care less about Volt’s family life. 

It was the little moments that made this episode for me - Bailey comforting Grace, Grace telling Ashley not to blame herself because she made the same choice with Terry, Tawny and Lewis (poor Moose!), Emily in almost every scene. 

Can’t stand the whole Garcia/Tyler bit. Garcia’s lack of professionalism is deeply grating. 

[mythoughtis]

I do not think Tyler has bad intentions toward Garcia.  I also think that the time period between when they met and their relationship  is longer than some of you are thinking.  I believe they met prior to when Moose the dog had been taken.  Her owner mentioned  that had happened quite some  time ago and didn’t remember who she had spoken to that night.   I also think Garcia knows everything about him that is available to find  

Now is the relationship appropriate right now?  Probably not, but Garcia has never been professional.   

I also thought the 180 degree shift in the relationship between  Elias and his wife was odd.  Not on her part because she found out he got fired and was still leaving and going who knows where.  He went from acting like a loving parent and husband to imagining killing them all. 

Edited March 14, 2023 by mythoughtis

[JMO]

Re: Elias--it looked to me as though his anger had a tendency to turn quickly to rage, and he used his killings and killings-by-proxy as sublimation for any anger he had toward those close to him (his family, his neighbor). 

As to Tyler and Garcia---For me, it wasn't the length of time they'd known each other.  Instead, I was distracted by the obvious fact that she is old enough to be his mother, and given her outfits and behavior, I wondered if she realized that.