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This article contains spoilers for Criminal Minds: Evolution (2022).
Despite being renewed for another season, Criminal Minds: Evolution (2022-Present) may be the most lackluster “reboot” of a franchise in recent memory. Since key members of the cast were missing, the show needed to deliver plot-focused aspects in order to draw in new and returning fans.
The decision to implement an overarching, season-long plot line should have provided numerous opportunities to showcase individual character development, team dynamics, and — of course — good triumphing over evil. Instead, each episode had awkward pacing and felt like nothing more than a means to an unsatisfying end. The real mystery of this season was who, exactly, the show was meant to appeal to.
The Evolution Of Criminal Minds
Criminal Minds: Evolution began with an ending. After 15 seasons and 300 episodes, the long-running CBS crime drama Criminal Minds was discontinued in 2020. Creative shifts and budget reprioritizations at the broadcasting company meant the series had to be slashed in order to make room for new blood; the show’s fanbase, surprisingly still strong after fifteen years, was just not enough to keep it alive.
Less than a year after the show’s “final” season, a reboot was announced. Criminal Minds: Evolution would make its debut in 2022 on Paramount+ (CBS’ streaming service) and, despite the name change, would essentially be Season 16 of the series. Erica Messer returned as showrunner, and six members of the main cast reprised their roles. Fans were, by and large, excited for the show’s rebirth, only lamenting the news that popular characters, Spencer Reid and Matt Simmons, wouldn’t be returning.
It’s not unusual to hear that those working on a reboot are under a lot of pressure to get everything just right. Surprisingly, during an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Messer and some members of the main cast revealed that this actually wasn’t the case with Season 16. In fact, they describe the evolution as entirely natural.
“We started having these conversations of maybe we should bring Criminal Minds back, and not in a CBS way, but in a new way, where we can tell the same stories everybody knows and loves. We take you into the dark, we scare you, and then we save you, but adjust to the streaming market.”
Erica Messer (( Wang, Jessica. “Case solved: ‘Criminal Minds’ cast shares how the revival differs from the original series.” September 13, 2022. Entertainment Weekly. ))
Adam Rodriguez (Luke Alvez) insisted that the material was great, but that it wouldn’t matter if the new season was “the worst thing ever made” so long as he was able to work with the same group of people.
Kristen Vangsness (Penelope Garcia) agreed, pointing out that the real connection between cast members was why the show continues to be so popular with fans. “We are genuinely friends. Every time [I] do an interview and someone goes, ‘What do you think? Why do you think people love watching Criminal Minds?’ I think they love this constant unswore of: We genuinely dig each other.” (Jessica Wang)
Vangsness’ point about the cast’s chemistry keeping the show alive rings true. Following six characters as they attempt to solve complex criminal cases risks losing the plot. These individuals need to have deep ties to one another so that even when their personal lives are depicted, events almost always connect back to the entire group. The fact that the actors behind these characters share similarly close bonds goes a long way to reinforce authenticity for viewers.
Despite reassurances that the show would continue telling “the same stories everybody knows and loves,” with characters who “genuinely dig each other,” Criminal Minds: Evolution tosses both aspects aside in favor of a more elaborate, season-long plot line. The decision results in ten episodes of poor pacing, shallow connections, and questionable intentions.
The Opposite Of Fan Service
Any franchise with a devoted fanbase understands the struggle of succumbing to fan service. Creators want to make content that fans will enjoy, but many believe there should be a point where they have to remain independent from fan influence. Leading up to the premiere of Criminal Minds: Evolution, the cast used this to their advantage.
A few weeks before the show premiered, Twitter user @blackgirlmarvel tweeted, “@criminalminds Sooo are Garcia and Alvez not together in this cause… @Vangsness Answers are needed! #garvez” (( @blackgirlmarvel. November 5, 2022. Twitter. )) referencing the cliffhanger will-they-won’t-they between characters Penelope Garcia and Luke Alvez at the end of Season 15. Vangsness replied to the tweet, saying, “Just. You. Wait,” finishing off the teasing response with a winking emoji (( @Vangsness. November 6, 2022. Twitter. )).
This Twitter exchange is an excellent example of the issues embedded in the reboot. Fans are presented with the potential for deepening character connections only to have that plot line shut down, opening up Vangsness’ character for use as an arbitrary romantic plot device.
Those who have finished Season 16 already know that Penelope’s love life is intertwined in a pretty significant piece of the overarching plot. At least, it should be in theory. At first glance, Vangsness’ Twitter exchange seems to suggest that viewers can expect her character’s romance with Alvez to progress. In actuality, Penelope and Luke decide to remain friends and everyone’s favorite tech genius becomes romantically entangled with a key witness in the BAU’s investigation.
The issue is not that two characters shipped by fans don’t ultimately get together. Instead, the issue lies in one character’s entire story being devolved into a plot line that leads nowhere. Penelope and her Season 16 love interest have the excitement of forbidden lovers for barely more than a single episode before Penelope ends things.
Viewers are left asking: Why? What was the point? These questions are just as pertinent to the show as a whole.
Self-Contained Episodes Are A Tried And True Formula
Just as Penelope’s love life is used as a pointless plot device, each of the ten episodes in Season 16 feel meaningless in the grand scheme of things. A large part of the appeal of procedural crime dramas like Criminal Minds is their ability to serve viewers what veteran producer David E. Kelley refers to as “a whole meal.”
“It only makes sense that a viewer is going to say: ‘I want to watch something. I don’t have time to watch 100 hours of it, or even 10 hours, but I want to commit to three, four hours [of] it. I want to feel like I had a whole meal. You feel you’ve had the whole totality…of the storytelling experience in three or four episodes, and then you can choose to go back to that restaurant or not for another meal.”
David E. Kelley (( Koblin, John. “Case Closed! Old-School Police and Court Shows Are Big Streaming Hits.” January 8, 2023. New York Times. ))
This formula led to Criminal Minds dominating the streaming charts in 2021 (( Koblin, John )), earning it the title of the most-watched show against stiff competition. Squid Game (2021), The Great British Baking Show (2010-Present), and Bridgerton (2020-Present) were all viewed less than Criminal Minds, which joined Netflix in 2014 and brought a larger backlog of episodes than it would ever release. While nothing in entertainment is ever guaranteed, it would seem the crime drama formula is tried and true.
Criminal Minds is not an outlier. Similar shows like NCIS (2003-Present), The Blacklist (2013-2023), and Bones (2005-2017) were all among the most streamed shows since 2020, according to Nielsen’s streaming ranker (( Koblin, John )). Like Criminal Minds, all these series arrived on streaming services with a backlog of content. While Bones ended in 2017, The Blacklist announced it would be ending in 2023, and NCIS is still going strong. Each of them managed to successfully apply the crime drama formula to a streaming format.
Fairly predictable success over decades is hard to come by, so why did Criminal Minds: Evolution mess with the formula?
An Overarching Plot Leaves Much To Lose And Little To Gain
With its focus solely on a single criminal, Season 16 pulls from a few reoccurring villains in the show’s past. Familiar faces like Mr. Scratch, The Replicator, Billy Flynn, Tobias Hankel, The Reaper, Cat Adams, and Frank Breitkopf haunt the BAU over at least two episodes each. Some, like Cat Adams, even span seasons (albeit making inconsistent appearances). Much like the show’s name, the new criminal standing at center stage is evolved.
Elias Voit, aka Sicarius, helps budding serial killers all across America by placing “kill kits” for them to use and enforcing strict rules about who and where they can kill. Each episode of Evolution has the BAU dealing with one of the killers in Voit’s network. In theory, this should mold itself well to the formula.
Instead, each episode tries to pack in an instigating event (someone is murdered), an investigation (the BAU takes on the case), and a resolution (the victim is recovered and the killer is caught). On top of this, the episode needs to weave in bits of Voit’s storyline, feeding viewers small bites of information about how and why he is running this ring of killers. What’s more, viewers need to see the BAU receiving and processing these bites of information. It is an almost impossible task for an hour-long timeframe.
As a result, each episode rushes through the crimes being carried out by Voit’s circle. While the names of these unsubs (unknown subjects) are revealed, only a surface-level understanding is gathered about their lives and motivations. What drove them to join Voit’s network in the first place? The BAU simply concludes that the reason must be because they needed to get creative during the “lockdowns” resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Even ignoring the fact that this reasoning is shallow, it also makes absolutely no sense. America didn’t even require “lockdowns,” leaving the most vulnerable individuals (healthcare workers, grocery store clerks, delivery people) to continue operating as if everything was normal. Voit’s network of killers certainly may have been spending more time online, resulting in their connection, but to suggest that they needed a leader to provide them with the means and reason to kill is unserious at best.
As the final episode draws near, viewers have gotten a pretty good picture of Voit’s life, but it comes at the expense of any character depth for every other unsub the BAU spends 30-45 minutes per episode tracking down along the way. Voit’s wife and daughters exist to serve as potential collateral damage, but the viewers are prevented from focusing on their well-being because the life of team patriarch David Rossi is suddenly at stake. It’s all too much, too fast — the pacing prevents viewers from becoming attached to the very characters the show decided to spend ten episodes on.
Who Is The Audience & Does It Matter?
It is obvious what Season 16 was attempting to do. By all measures it succeeded, with the announcement for another season coming just months after the first’s premiere. The premise of a serial killer recruiting and assisting an entire network of people like him is certainly fascinating, and it has certainly appealed to fans of the show.
With the popularity of true crime content continually on the rise, the showrunners were clever to draw inspiration from well-known criminals in the real world. Voit’s “kill kits” in particular bear a striking resemblance to those planted by serial killer Israel Keyes all across the United States (( Murray, Russell. “Criminal Minds: Evolution’s Big Bad Sure Seems Inspired By This Terrifying Real-Life Killer.” November 25, 2022. Looper. )). Playing up references like this only increase the show’s relatability and virality.
Of course, entertainment doesn’t have to be “done well” to be enjoyed. So many beloved movies and shows continue to capture hearts because of their quirks and flaws. Criminal Minds: Evolution certainly isn’t “bad” because of a single season’s plot, but who did the minds behind Minds have in mind when they considered their audience?
There is obviously no intention to play into fan service, but long-time fans of the show were certainly predicted to be a large portion of the viewer base. The show was stalled for over a year in order to ensure the main cast would return, ensuring fans would tune in to see what would become of their favorite agents. As for bringing in new viewers, it’s unclear what the show’s intentions were.
Mixed messages are probably enough to drive away anyone who hasn’t heard of the series before. New viewers aren’t going to be interested in watching the continuation-branded reboot of a show they’ve never seen. Is it Season 16 of Criminal Minds, or is it Season 1 of Criminal Minds: Evolution? Is it both? These are questions someone who isn’t already invested in some aspect of the show isn’t going to bother asking.
Knowing its niche is something the Criminal Minds franchise continues to excel at. Even if they got it wrong this time, it doesn’t make the entire body of work less enjoyable. With an 85% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, it’s safe to say that it doesn’t even make this season less enjoyable.
Perhaps Criminal Minds flew too close to the sun not because it attempted something new, but because it attempted to maintain the self-contained formula for its episodes while doing so. Only so much can be done in the span of an hour, and with only ten episodes in the season, Criminal Minds: Evolution bit off more than it could chew.