Reviewing the Case:
Freckle-faced Melanie, pregnant at age twelve, tells detectives that the father is her “husband” Abraham. Turns out he’s a self-styled preacher—a.k.a. a con man named Eugene—with an obedient cult following, most of them women or young girls. When police raid one of his households, they find children shot to death in their beds and cribs. Melanie’s brainwashed mom must be convinced that Abraham/Eugene has a hidden and far more earthly agenda.
Notable Discoveries:
The shot of so many dead children precedes a long silence, a chillingly effective way to end the scene. “Charisma” as a whole is altogether chilling. The detectives are shaken and ordered to talk with Dr. Huang in a long stretch of soul-searching. Munch: “The human race is ever-evolving and we’ll always come up with elaborate, repulsive, and depraved ways to kill each other.”
Relevant Testimony:
“We lay the kids down, put fake blood all around and told them to go to sleep. But the image, even when you know it’s not real, is striking. I looked at pictures of the 700 dead people at the Jim Jones compound in Guyana. I kept that photo on my script book, in fact, and showed it to Mariska. That was a great motivator.”—Arthur Forney
Episode 124: Doubt
Original Air Date
:
November 23, 2004
Teleplay by Marjorie David, directed by Ted Kotcheff
Additional Cast:
Bill Campbell (Ron Polikoff), Shannyn Sossamon (Myra Dempsey), Viola Davis (Donna Emmett), Mariette Hartley (Lorna Scarry), Patricia Kalember (Judge K. Taten), Wynter Kullman (Jenny West), Jeffrey Carlson (Justin Wexler), Carolyn Miller (Sophie Polikoff)
Reviewing the Case:
A grad student claims to have been raped by a womanizing art professor. The evidence—bruises on her throat, deep scratches his back—seems conclusive and yet. . . . A sequence in which the duo take off their clothing for separate forensics exams is conveyed with split-screen parallel views, a very effective way to underscore the he said/she said nature of this case with an ambiguous conclusion.
Noteworthy Discoveries:
Stabler reveals that his wife has left him, a shock to Benson and the start of a long story arc.
Relevant Testimony:
“The actor, Bill Campbell, asked: ‘Did I rape her?’ I said, ‘Of course you didn’t, Billy.’ The actress, Shannyn Sossamon, asked: ‘Did he rape me?’ I told her, ‘Of course he raped you, darling.’ I wanted to give the sense of how difficult it is to make a decision sometimes about guilt.”—Ted Kotcheff
Episode 125: Weak
Original Air Date
:
November 30, 2004
Teleplay by Michele Fazekas and Tara Butters, directed by David Platt
Additional Cast:
Mary Stuart Masterson (Dr. Rebecca Hendrix), Amanda Plummer (Miranda Cole), Dallas Roberts (Thomas Mathers), Joselin Reyes (Martinez), Angela Pietropinto (Mrs. Mathers), Greg Vaccarello (Off. Galloway), Ward Horton (Alan Richter), Justine Boyriven (Samantha Trager), Adara Almonte (Gina Kownacki), Casey Spindler (Raymond Ettinger), Geneva Carr (Margo Sanders), Becki Newton (Colleen Heaton)
Reviewing the Case:
Predators come in all sizes, shapes, and sexual predilections. The guilty party in “Weak” is a true surprise. He favors the most helpless people, including a paranoid schizophrenic woman prone to wild hallucinations when she stops taking her meds. A psychiatrist at Bellevue, who happens to be a former cop, works on the case with Benson and Stabler. The ending is not happily-ever-after.
Noteworthy Discoveries:
Amanda Plummer’s Emmy-winning turn as a madwoman seems like a familiar one for the quirky actress. Benson seems wary of Stabler’s willingness to work with Dr. Hendrix, perhaps suspecting it has something to do with his marital woes.
Relevant Testimony:
“Amanda is actually the sweetest, meekest, most introspective kind of person. . . . Mary Stuart Masterson’s character got under the audience’s skin a little bit. People thought she was coming between Stabler and Benson.”—Jonathan Strauss, casting director
Episode 126: Haunted
Original Air Date
:
December 7, 2004
Teleplay by Amanda Green, directed by Juan J. Campanella
Additional Cast:
Nicholas Gonzalez (Det. Miguel Sandoval), Kent Cassella (ND Detective), Katie McGee (Reporter), Jeffrey V. Thompson (Fat Tony), Jeanetta Arnette (Sandra Knowles), Kevin Pinassi (Vance Dennis), Ernest Waddell (Ken Randall), Emma Myles (Lizzie Jones), John Schuck (Chief of Detectives), Gene Silvers (T.D. Beeman), Albert Insinnia (Lt. Pizzelli), Kevin Nagle (Joey Bosco), Tijuana Ricks (Dr. Marnie Aiken), Francis Jue (Dr. Fong), Jaime Rodriguez (Crazy Jim), Georgienne Millen (Paula Beeman)
Reviewing the Case:
Tutuola is wounded in the process of killing two robbers in a convenience store holdup. This is merely a prelude to another case, from the days when he was an undercover narc. A distraught woman sees his picture in the newspaper and demands to know why he dropped the ball on finding her daughter, who disappeared into the underworld of drugs. After reluctantly teaming up with a rookie, a young whippersnapper who proves to be quite savvy, Fin retraces his steps.
Noteworthy Discoveries:
Tutuola, whose
nom de guerre
in Narcotics was Terry Brown, sees his estranged son Ken after a separation of many years. Their meeting isn’t exactly warm and fuzzy. An especially poetic scene at Potter’s Field gives Warner a chance to talk about some New York history.
Episode 127: Contagious
Original Air Date
:
January 11, 2005
Teleplay by Jonathan Greene, directed by Aaron Lipstadt
Additional Cast:
Mary Stuart Masterson (Dr. Rebecca Hendrix), Jennette McCurdy (Holly Purcell), David Lansbury (Larry Purcell), David Lipman (Judge Arthur Cohen), Caitlin Muelder (Donna Pellegrino), Maggie Kiley (Terry Van Houten), Daniel Hugh Kelly (Mark Dobbins), Rebecca Lowman (Julie Dobbins), Pamela Holden Stewart (Sonya Purcell), Zach Gilford (Kevin Wilcox), Mariah Fresse (Nicole Van Houten), Courtney Taylor Burness (Danielle Pellegrino), Laura Kai Chen (Dr. Sanada), Angela Robinson (Mrs. Wheeler)
Reviewing the Case:
Doctors determine that a prepubescent girl named Holly, brought into the ER after a car accident, has been molested. She eventually pinpoints a friend of the family who coaches girls’ soccer at her school. When other students come forward with similar accusations, the hysteria begins to resemble that of Salem in the late 1600s. But the truth eventually emerges, leaving several casualties in its wake.
Episode 128: Identity
Original Air Date
:
January 18, 2005
Teleplay by Lisa Marie Petersen and Dawn DeNoon
,
directed by Rick Wallace
Additional Cast:
Charlayne Woodard (Sister Peg), Peter Firth (Dr. Preston Blair), Mary Stuart Masterson (Dr. Rebecca Hendrix), Donnetta Lavinia Grays (Off. Ramirez), Reiley McClendon (Logan Stanton/Lindsay Stanton), Regan Thompson (Katie), Hillary Bailey Smith (Amelia Stanton), John Bolger (Clark Stanton), Denise Ramirez (Claudia Hernandez), Michael Ray Escamilla (Hector Ramirez), Ron Scott (Jerry DelVecchio), Ana Maria Andricain (Housekeeper), William Paulson (Agent McClosky)
Reviewing the Case:
This episode travels a very long distance, from an apparent gang-related homicide to the bizarre psychology of identical twins. These prep-school adolescents are wannabe graffiti artists, so their involvement in the crime is derived from a desire to “tag” like the street kids. Lurking beneath the surface, however, is a social engineering experiment that makes Manhattan seem a bit like
Village of the Damned
(1960 and remake in 1995).
Relevant Testimony:
“The casting process was murder. We needed to see hundreds of kids—twins, bother-sister combos. Reiley McClendon came to audition for the boy’s role and still had that sort of androgynous quality of young guys. He said, ‘You know, I could do the girl’s part as well.’ When he came back for another audition, he’d glammed himself up a bit. As the boy, we put him in lifts to distinguish between the twins. That was (executive producer) Ted Kotcheff ’s idea.”—Jonathan Strauss, casting director
Episode 129: Quarry
Original Air Date
:
January 25, 2005
Teleplay by Jose Molina, directed by Constantine Makris
Additional Cast:
John Savage (Lucas Biggs), Michael Shannon (Avery Shaw), Terry Serpico (Deacon Brinn), Angelica Torn (Julia Brinn), Jill Marie Lawrence (Public Defender Conrad), Bill Buell (Terry Ronsen), Suzanne Grodner (Lynne Ronsen), Julie Lund (Kimber Faulk), Kathryn Rossetter (Vivian Tate), Corey Carthew (ESU Leader), Jack Pavlinec (Zeke Brinin)
Reviewing the Case:
Every now and then,
SVU
comes up with a predator so repulsive that even a devoted fan of the show might want to switch channels. That’s the reaction prompted by baseball player Lucas Biggs, who gleefully enumerates his extensive abuse of adolescent boys while awaiting execution. The repeated rape of one particular child has set off a chain of events that, twenty-five years later, sparks tragic repercussions for an entire community.
Episode 130: Game
Original Air Date
:
February 8, 2005
Teleplay by Patrick Harbinson, directed by David Platt
Additional Cast:
Barry Bostwick (Oliver Gates), Seth Gabel (Garrett Perle), Robert Montano (U.S. Attorney Raul Menendez), Matthew Faber (Stuart Davis), Geoffrey Arend (Game Creator)
Reviewing the Case:
A brutal attack on a prostitute seems to emulate a particularly nasty video game, so the detectives begin tracking down the denizens of virtual reality. After questioning a few pathetic nerds, they arrest a seventeen-year-old boy who’s a sociopath and proud of it, along with his I’ll-do-anything-for-him girlfriend. Dr. Huang surmises the young man’s “an adrenaline junkie and narcissist.” The defense? Blame it on the dopamine.
Noteworthy Discoveries:
There’s nothing like a case with demented teenagers to get Stabler worrying about his own children. Sweet little Dickie gives his dad reason to ponder.
Relevant Testimony:
“That look at the end between Dickie Stabler and (his father) is implied in the script but I might have taken it another step.”—David Platt, episode director
Episode 131: Hooked
Original Air Date:
February 15, 2005
Teleplay by Joshua Kotcheff, directed by Jean de Segonzac
Additional Cast:
Hayden Panettiere (Angela Agnelli), Janae Kram (Lisa Downey), Shuler Hensley (Tim Downey), Matt Malloy (Max Long), Alex Cranmer (Dr. Derek Tanner), Ivan Martin (Jerome), Jessica Dunphy (Allison Downey), Sharon Washington (Jenny Anderson), Aaron Staton (Andy Wall), Annie McGreevey (Mrs. Downey), Patrick Frederic (Troop Leader), Michael Drayer (Nicky Sims)
Reviewing the Case:
Lisa Downey, a fifteen-year-old last seen in her high school uniform, has been found dead wearing an $800 cocktail dress. She and her classmates sported “sex bracelets” to boast about their levels of promiscuity. But Lisa and her BFF Angela had gone way beyond teen hanky-panky. Adult predators, HIV, pornography, and prostitution all come into play as this complicated girls-gone-wild episode unfolds, with a few sly references to Monica Lewinsky along the way.
Episode 132: Ghost
Original Air Date: February 22, 2005
Teleplay by Amanda Green, directed by David Platt
Additional Cast:
Mitch Pileggi (DEA Agent Hammond), Brían F. O’Byrne (Liam Connors), Stephanie March (Alexandra Cabot), Nicholas Gonzalez (Det. Miguel Sandoval), Joselin Reyes (Paramedic Martinez), Audrie J. Neenan (Judge Lois Preston), Natascia A. Diaz (Mrs. Delgado), Robert Turano (DEA Agent Trayne), Millie Tirelli (Elvira Castilla), Maury Ginsberg (Assistant M.E. Fielding), Mickey Kelly (Doyle Shanahan), Lori Prince (Patty Kerner), Raymond Wittmann (Antonio Montoya), Ali Reza (Dr. Mehta)
Reviewing the Case:
The husband-and-wife owners of a private hedge fund are murdered. Ditto for an Hispanic couple, whose son Antonio is left for dead. These crimes are linked to an earlier case (“Loss,” season five), in which ADA Cabot was shot while investigating a notorious Colombian narco-baron. His elusive hit man—a former IRA operative—figures in the current situation. Full of surprises, this episode is a bit like the movie
Traffic
in addressing the futility of America’s war on drugs.
Noteworthy Discoveries:
Mitch Pileggi, who appeared as an FBI official on
The X-Files
, shows up here as a top DEA agent.