JJ's Promotion

Criminal Minds S06E02 JJ

This is the saddest episode of Criminal Minds I have ever watched, mainly because I adored AJ's role in the show. With an official job title of Media Liaison, she was the face of the BAU to the world, and thus had to be more sympathetic and emotional than the rest of the team. After the birth of her baby, she was allowed even more freedom, this time to show the parent's struggle to the rest of the team, if they ever lost the plot.

While I can understand why the producers needed her to be written out (budget crisis means cuts of non-essential personnel), not having her will be a struggle that the writers need to work around without making the rest of the team lose its effectiveness. I liked that the writers chose to portray her reluctance to leave the team, paralleling the reality of AJ not wanting to leave the show, and yet not having her contract renewed - a decision made above her head.

The way this episode was written and acted was very deceiving. Usually in these shows, I can suss out who the unsub was simply by certain items/acts the director(s) portray to complete the picture. In this episode, I constantly kept changing my mind because the good-looking guy was so indifferent, the follower guy was so quiet, and the father was so reluctant to leave, that it came off as though he knew something and wasn't telling anyone. Overall, superb acting.

Some nice ideas were used to smooth the edit cuts. Using the closing of the elevator doors to allow for the intro to the title credits was a great idea because the title credits have an effect that looks like they're opening up from the middle so the audience gets a sense of the doors closing and the titles opening. Another good cut was the use of yelling to switch scenes. The prisoner reacted to the sound of the yelling and took the audience along with him.

One great thing about this episode was seeing the contrast between the staid clothing of the BAU unit and the colorful splash of Penelope Garcia. Props to the wardrobe department!