Criminal Minds' Final Season: A Very Big Bad, a 'Must-See' Finale and Time Jump Will Set Stage for Farewell Run
How will CBS’ Criminal Minds set the stage for its 15th and final season, which was announced on Thursday night? By giving us some good, and then a heap of evil.
The Season 14 finale, airing Wednesday, Feb. 6, is “a great big one,” showrunner Erica Messer shares with TVLine. “Obviously we have our bad guy of the week, but there’s also the good stuff in life — like Rossi getting married, and… all kinds of things in between.”
Can Messer elaborate on any of those happy “things in between”? “I don’t want to give much away, because I want this to be a ride for everybody,” she hedges. “But it’s going to be a must-see episode, for sure. It airs February 6, and then people won’t see us for a while, so you will not want to miss Rossi’s wedding… and everything that leads up to it.”
What about season-ending twists that cast doubt on any characters’ fates, as Criminal Minds is famous to uncork? “There are discussions that haven’t been said aloud before,” the EP hints, “so that’s an interesting emotional cliffhanger, versus SUVs exploding.”
“It’s a really full episode,” she adds, “and then we jump ahead in time, to kick off the final 10.”
Criminal Minds‘ last blast of episodes will feature “a little more serialized storytelling,” Messer says, including “a bad guy that we meet toward the end of Season 14, who will be our main focus” in Season 15. Though Messer is mum on casting, she believes this character will prove “a worthy adversary” for the BAU during this farewell run.
“As Rossi says, ‘He’s younger, faster and stronger'” than the team’s Supervisory Special Agent. “He’s a bit his Joker,” to use a Batman reference. “But as [fiancee] Krystall reminds him, the one thing that UnSub isn’t is smarter than David Rossi. He’s a worthy adversary because he does have a lot of things on his side, including being a truly twisted individual.”
Also on tap for the final season are “a couple of personal stories that might be surprising to people,” Messer shares. “Certainly things that I feel the fans will be completely invested in.”
Want more scoop on Criminal Minds, or for any other show? Email [email protected] and your question may be answered via Matt’s Inside Line.
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