S26.E05 Economics of Shame

[dttruman]

When a TV reporter becomes the victim of sextortion that could ruin her career, Benson helps her take back control while Velasco goes undercover as a potential rich target.

[MediaZone4K]

I remember someone mentioning the lack of variety in modern SVU episodes, that everything is now a rape case. It was great to have some variety tonight with a sextortion plot. Hopefully the plot variety continues.

[wknt3]

The Good:
The cold open. While I still think that we should drastically cut back on showing the crime and use the openings to feature some of the squad coming into the scene and leave some mystery about what happened, this was very well done as these things go and didn't rely on heavy music and editing to try to create a sense of something happening. It actually made me more interested in what was to come which after all is the job of the opening scene.

Fin & Bruno! Working together and showing us SVU detectives can be empathetic while also remaining professional. And being cool as hell and watchable too. Plus they even gave us some characterization and continuity with the watch!

They actually gave Velasco something to do! I'm surprised. Even if they probably should have done some more with the undercover op it was nice to see him do more than glare and take up space while occasionally delivering some exposition.

And Silva too! Although they still haven't bothered to much in developing characterization or letting her play a major role in solving the case - back in the day she probably would have been the one to go undercover and we would have gotten some background about her past and her POV. But at least she was more than a glorified extra this week.

The Bad:
JFC. Benson just casually dismisses a Deputy Chief and a trained ESU team???!!! And they actually go along with it????!!! Without bothering to see if she has rapport with the jumper? And then we immediately cut to the victim praising Benson as her lord and savior? Way to ruin a good setup.

Benson the victim whisperer heals everyone and figures out the perfect solution  that makes everything OK. While I appreciate that she isn't single handedly solving the case and was actually leading and letting the team work, this was still a particularly unsubtle ego stroke for Mariska.

With a full house this week and several cast members underserved, what was the point of having Curry there? I quite like the actress and I like the character (although I hate the ridiculous idea of TWO captains working in one squad) but I don't see what she brought that anyone else couldn't have provided if they cared to overcome the idea that only a woman over 35 can truly be wise and empathetic with victims.

Overall this was an significant improvement over last weeks sodden mess, but still shows how this current season is less than the sum of its parts and can't be bothered to execute the fundamentals. It was like Game 5 of the World Series all over again...

Edited November 2 by wknt3
ducking autocorrect

[Diana Berry]

What happened to the young man that had the encounter with the reporter at the beginning and took the pictures ?  

[Xeliou66]

An improvement over last week, and nice to see the whole squad plus Carisi all have something to do, but I found the case boring and not that compelling. Just couldn’t get invested in it, and it had way too much Benson worship and Benson saving the day along with usual whispering and cliched statements. And the case was rather complex and hard to follow in places. It was nice to see Bruno again, and nice that they gave Velasco something to do, but the case was just mediocre.

[Zaffy]

It was quite amusing listening the famous greek naughty word of... "mala**" on SVU, I believe that's a first. The actor could definitely speak Greek.
I can assure you though, that 85000$ are not a big deal to live here, even if our economy is screwed, you can't even buy a decent apartment with this money.
I agree that it was a refreshing case and I liked all the squad contributing and the happy ending.
Of course Olivia can also save "jumpers", but hey, nothing surprise us anymore, right? It actually made me laugh.

And I will never ever never understand how people keep exchanging explicit photos or even taking ones. They never learn...

Edited November 1 by Zaffy

[Wizardpatch]

I don't think anyone would actually believe that a reporter would have sex on tape with some random criminal just to go "undercover". They know she fell for him.

[Sake614]

The girl (don’t remember her name) is 19. She said her encounter took place last year or two years ago? So she was 17/18. And the guy brought wine on their date. Why didn’t Benson even blink at that or try to find the guy and charge him with plying a minor with alcohol? She was only interested in the girl to make the larger case stick. Where was the outrage from her? I don’t miss it but it was strange how she never even reacted to that statement.

[txhorns79]

On 10/31/2024 at 11:34 PM, Diana Berry said:

What happened to the young man that had the encounter with the reporter at the beginning and took the pictures ?  

They made an off hand comment that he had been arrested.  They said he was just hired to seduce Kelsey, so he wasn't a major player in the scheme. 

 

4 hours ago, Sake614 said:

And the guy brought wine on their date. Why didn’t Benson even blink at that or try to find the guy and charge him with plying a minor with alcohol?

I thought they said she was 18 when the seduction occurred. 

The ending didn't make a huge amount of sense to me.  I would have loved to have been there when Kelsey tried to claim to her bosses that she was doing an undercover story about sextortion.  I presume the perp sent out everything on her to her friends and colleagues, including a sex tape.  Was she trying to claim to them that she had sex with the guy and sent him legit naked pics for her story?  I was also curious if her credibility would be undermined if the case went to trial by lying on air about what happened.  I'm probably overthinking things.      

[Diana Berry]

1 hour ago, txhorns79 said:

They made an off hand comment that he had been arrested.  They said he was just hired to seduce Kelsey, so he wasn't a major player in the scheme. 

 

I thought they said she was 18 when the seduction occurred. 

The ending didn't make a huge amount of sense to me.  I would have loved to have been there when Kelsey tried to claim to her bosses that she was doing an undercover story about sextortion.  I presume the perp sent out everything on her to her friends and colleagues, including a sex tape.  Was she trying to claim to them that she had sex with the guy and sent him legit naked pics for her story?  I was also curious if her credibility would be undermined if the case went to trial by lying on air about what happened.  I'm probably overthinking things.      

No not overthinking.  I was wondering the same thing.   

[Sake614]

13 hours ago, txhorns79 said:

I thought they said she was 18 when the seduction occurred. 

Legal drinking age is 21 so he still served an underage drinker.

also agree with you about the ending. I thought she’d just go to them and explain that she was the victim of a crime, then maybe do an in-depth story about sextortion. They did make a point of having the guy say that Kelsey told him he was part of a protected class and was unjustly fired. She wouldn’t have to admit on air that she’d been a victim as well. Just interview others. That would’ve made much more sense.

Edited November 3 by Sake614

[Iguessnot]

When the guy picking up the ransom was not the who they thought, I would have thought they would trail him. Let him lead you to the next contact. In my mind, I would have expected a higher up to be watching the retrieval. 

Of course they nab the guy and Benson mentions the 48 hour deadline, but the interception of the ransom seemed to be a non issue. 

The writers need to stop making the victims a member of the team who receive up to the minute updates from Benson. It only emphasizes how unprofessional Benson is.

[Iguessnot]

On 10/31/2024 at 10:20 PM, wknt3 said:

 

The Bad:
JFC. Benson just casually dismisses a Deputy Chief and a trained ESU team???!!! And they actually go along with it????!!! Without bothering to see if she has rapport with the jumper? And then we immediately cut to the victim praising Benson as her lord and savior? Way to ruin a good setup.

 

All Benson did was introduce herself, and the jumper immediately took a knee. The trained team skedaddled out there like they had a hot date.

[tennisgurl]

I love how the second Olivia arrives at the scene, the guys who are actually trained in talking down jumpers immediately run away the second Olivia, mast hostage negotiator, arrives, and then the jumper gives herself to the Olivia Hug the second she arrives. Classic SVU.

The case was alright, I like that they went with sextorsion instead of a straight up sexual assault, and even got into the main victim wondering if she feels raped retroactively knowing the whole thing was a set up, it was a decently interesting case overall. My main issue, other than come classic Olivia worship, is that it felt like it could have used one more draft. I wanted to know what happened to the actual guy who seduced the reporter, sure he was arrested but he was set up as the main villain, I wanted to see him get his comeuppance, even if he was just a hired hot guy. I also thought that the ending with the reporter covering up what happened to her with "I totally went undercover to catch this sextorsion ring and this was all a part of a story where I was working with the LAPD, just ask this micromanaging police captain" was really weird. I thought that the obvious play was for her to come totally clean to her bosses and viewers about being a victim of this scam and using it to start a conversation about how anyone can be taken in and taking back her life, especially as being a reporter that her audience can trust is so important to her. If it comes out that she lied, wont that all be much worse than her falling for a scammer? How did she even pitch this to her boss?

It was nice to see more of the squad getting some time together, they had good chemistry and it felt like we had a full actual squad. 

[wknt3]

On 11/3/2024 at 6:01 PM, Iguessnot said:

All Benson did was introduce herself, and the jumper immediately took a knee. The trained team skedaddled out there like they had a hot date.

Hopefully not  one they set up online...