Up till this episode everything in Season 9 of "Criminal Minds" has been pretty routine and mediocre with the team nearing complete supernatural heights of deduction skills with a series of incredibly gruesome killers and very elaborate schemes. Not that that's boring but with what seasoned viewers of the show have become accustomed to; it's pretty forgettable. This episode, however, reminds me just why I stick with the show.
Bones are discovered in the backyard of a middle class African American family and the mother, father and son are rushed to headquarters for interrogation. At first the son is suspected but soon it seems more likely the father is the guilty person. Meanwhile more bodies are being unearthed as Rossi gets in a heated situation with the household father.
We have here a bona fide victim of hatred who's killed because of what was done to him and viewers understand him, if not sympathize to a large extent. The episode also unfolds in a very different fashion in that it mostly takes place in an interrogation room with primary focus on Rossi and the guilty party. In order to try and dig deeper; Rossi admits to a heinous act in his past hoping that it will get the suspect to open up to him (and all indications point to that Rossi was telling the truth). When confession time finally comes most viewers will probably be quite shocked at what the man had to endure and fully understand his rage. This becomes at the end a bitter sweet justice at best.
This episode doesn't stray from the usual hard-to-believe fast nature of the unfolding; with DNA results getting the rushed treatment and delivering concrete data in a matter of hours being one of the more irritable "unbelievables" in the show but no matter; this is still a top tier "Criminal Minds" episode. Rossi has always (at least from Season 3 onward) been the richest of these characters and here we get another glimpse of his past and Mantegna is in top form here. Glynn Turman, as the suspect, gives Mantegna a run for his money as their scenes play out in a tense manner and could easily have gone on longer had running time permitted.
In the end; the crimes included innocent individuals so retribution is necessary. "Strange Fruit" will go down in my books as one of the more interesting episode in this long running series.
Bones are discovered in the backyard of a middle class African American family and the mother, father and son are rushed to headquarters for interrogation. At first the son is suspected but soon it seems more likely the father is the guilty person. Meanwhile more bodies are being unearthed as Rossi gets in a heated situation with the household father.
We have here a bona fide victim of hatred who's killed because of what was done to him and viewers understand him, if not sympathize to a large extent. The episode also unfolds in a very different fashion in that it mostly takes place in an interrogation room with primary focus on Rossi and the guilty party. In order to try and dig deeper; Rossi admits to a heinous act in his past hoping that it will get the suspect to open up to him (and all indications point to that Rossi was telling the truth). When confession time finally comes most viewers will probably be quite shocked at what the man had to endure and fully understand his rage. This becomes at the end a bitter sweet justice at best.
This episode doesn't stray from the usual hard-to-believe fast nature of the unfolding; with DNA results getting the rushed treatment and delivering concrete data in a matter of hours being one of the more irritable "unbelievables" in the show but no matter; this is still a top tier "Criminal Minds" episode. Rossi has always (at least from Season 3 onward) been the richest of these characters and here we get another glimpse of his past and Mantegna is in top form here. Glynn Turman, as the suspect, gives Mantegna a run for his money as their scenes play out in a tense manner and could easily have gone on longer had running time permitted.
In the end; the crimes included innocent individuals so retribution is necessary. "Strange Fruit" will go down in my books as one of the more interesting episode in this long running series.
