Criminal Minds Season 13: Showrunner Discusses the Season Finale Cliffhanger, 300th Episode and More
04/18/2018 | By Mace Parker
*WARNING* THIS ARTICLE MAY CONTAIN TRACES OF SPOILERS. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK.
They did it again. Criminal Minds ended the season with an unforgettable cliffhanger that will keep fans busy thinking about all summer long until the show returns in the fall. If you remember, last season, Criminal Minds ended with a cliffhanger involving everyone except Reid and Garcia. Well, this season, Reid and Garcia finally got their turn. The season ended with Reid (Matthew Gray Gubler) figuring out who the mole inside the FBI from a serial killer cult was and holding her at gun point. Unfortunately, he couldn't take her out because at the last second she revealed that the group had Garcia (Kirsten Vangsness) held hostage. She offered Reid an ultimatum to come with her and join the cult, or Garcia would be next on their victim list. Showrunner Erica Messer sat down with Entertainment Weekly, TV Guide and TV Line to discuss last night's potentially deadly cliffhanger, season 14 renewal, the 300th episode and more. ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY INTERVIEW: ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: A cult with serial killers! Where did you get this idea? ERICA MESSER: I know! It’s crazy-town. We knew we wanted to take it to an unexpected place. The idea of a cult is something that’s been done before, but the idea of a specific cult of people who are not only willing to kill but might actually have joy in doing it felt very unique to Criminal Minds, especially in terms of a 300th episode, which we are heading into. We got excited and decided that would be a tease at the end of episode 299, so in 300 we could really run with the why now of it all. 300 episodes! It seems wrong not to renew Criminal Minds when it’s about to celebrate such a huge milestone. Exactly! That’s how I feel. You must have felt confident enough about a renewal because you ended with a cliffhanger. I feel that we have been such a good show for CBS for so long, and we have such a loyal fan base who has been with us through ups and downs. It would almost be a crime to not allow us to finish out our show. That’s how strongly I feel, they wouldn’t let us just go off and into the sunset like that. I’m profiling CBS to say I don’t think they would be that cruel. [Laughs] Well, Criminal Minds hasn’t received an early pickup for years now. It’s been years and years of that, actually. [Earlier Wednesday, CBS announced the renewal of 11 series]. The last time we got the early order was going into season 8. It’s been for different reasons over the years. Sometimes there are a lot of actors who are up for renegotiation. Sometimes there are issues between ABC and CBS studios as partners in the production of the show. This time we have our actors ready to go and our producers and writers are all lined up. I’m sure CBS has many reasons why they are holding back on a pickup. It’s business. So you haven’t received any indication of a 14th season? Zero. It’s so funny. After 13 years of being on one show, people assume I have a stress-free May. And I say, oh no. We wrapped March 28. I won’t know until they are in New York. That’s when I get the call. At this point, would you consider adding anyone for a new season if the show were renewed for a 14th season? No, I think we’re doing great. We added Daniel Henney last year. We are at a really good place right now. A nice, diverse cast. Half women, half men. This is a really great group. I would love to see it stay as is. If you have a 300th episode, will it be a one-hour or something longer? I was planning on a one-hour to kick off the year unless they told me otherwise. I really want it to be a big reward for all of us who have been loving this show for 300 episodes. I feel hopeful. The thing is, it’s not like I’m sitting here saying, “We’ve run out of stories! We’re plum out, got nothing else to tell.” It’s not true! We can keep on going. TV GUIDE INTERVIEW:
How worried should we be, Erica? Two of our agents are in very serious danger at the end of these two episodes. Erica Messer: I know, I know. It's crazy. We are certainly in love with both Garcia and Dr. Reid. They feel like two incredibly important pieces to our team, who won't be available if they're held captive. They won't be available to help us solve the case, which is crazy. The challenges we're coming up with now are, "Gosh, if we have two of our MVPs sitting on the sidelines here, what can we do? What clues do they possibly leave behind for us to help find where they're being held or how we help to solve this case without them?" It's one of the first times, I think, we've ever been without, truly, truly without the help of both of them. We do these things just to challenge ourselves, to surprise the audience, to challenge the actors who are, I think, really excited that that's how the season ended, and to keep us all waiting all summer to figure out what happens. It's hopefully filling the definition of what a cliffhanger should be. Reid came off of his required sabbatical to solve this crime. What sort of long-term effects will he feel after being pulled into something this stressful? How will his own teammate being in danger affect him when he was supposed to be resting for these exact reasons? Messer: Exactly, I know. Well, that's one of the amazing things with Reid is he had this season last year where he had to come up with new survival skills because he was in an environment he never should have been in and that has changed him over the season and moving forward. I feel like we have a much more sure Dr. Reid at the beginning of that episode, having been lured to that storage unit. And then, by the end, having a very tricky predicament there at the end of the episode. I feel like there will be some effect to that stress, but he also is such a strong character, who tends to compartmentalize and to allow him to keep helping the team and figure things out. Ideally, he does not collapse or anything like that, that he can still be our Dr. Reid that we lean on. Garcia is yelling for him to just shoot at the end of the episode. Is that something he's actually considering, or would he never do that, considering where Garcia is at that particular moment? Messer: I think it's something he would really consider because we've seen him do what he has to do to survive when he was on his own in prison. I feel like that is a very real threat. Is he going to kill this woman? If he does that, does that put a bullet in Garcia's head, which would be ... Obviously, he's weighing all of that out in that moment because he would never do anything to jeopardize Garcia. He will only make the move that he knows would be the safest thing for her. This is the second season you wrote that you guys have decided to end the season with a huge cliffhanger like this. What is the exciting part of leaving fans wanting more, rather than perhaps tying things up in a neat bow just in case you guys don't come back next season?Messer: I feel very hopeful, and that's all I can say is hopeful, that we would have the opportunity to tie this up, if not given a full season, which is what we're all hoping for because of the fact that it is our 300th episode. But I would say there were a few years where I really was opposed to this kind of cliffhanger, where I enjoyed wrapping up a season and letting the team just be happy and smiling. I certainly did at the end of Season 7, when J.J. and Will got married, and Prentiss announced to the team, sort of individually, that she wasn't gonna come back, and everybody had a final dance with her. It was just really lovely. I was happy to end the season that way because the team had been through so much that year, that it just felt like they deserved to have a night off. This year just felt like we hit the ground running, post-car accident, catching Mr. Scratch, Prentiss being held captive. We just didn't come up for air. We're doing it all the way up until the very end. I felt like that almost made sense given this season, that oh my gosh, we've been up against it this year, and there's no signs of it stopping. There was something that felt sort of organic about that storytelling. Is there a contingency plan, if you don't get picked up for a full season, how you would wrap this up? Maybe like a special Criminal Minds movie event or anything. Messer: There's been no discussion about that. Again, I'm just incredibly hopeful that we get a chance to have a season to explore all of it. The introduction of the cult is actually a very interesting premise. Do you want to wrap it all up in one episode? Or could we see this cult be a continued threat for the BAU? Messer: There's two trains of thought on that right now, as far as the writers go. But there is something sort of natural in that could be an opportunity that you shut down one part of the cult, but there's another part that's still going. There's another part, and holy cow, this is bigger than we thought it was. We're gonna be in the room deciding that really soon hopefully. I think there's something pretty cool about the idea of this launches into a season 14. It gives us a drive for the first part of the season, at the very least. TV LINE INTERVIEW:
By design, Criminal Minds showrunner Erica Messer said of this year’s finale, “What we did was the people who were not in the cliffhanger last year are in the cliffhanger this year. Last year, [Reid and Garcia] were safe, this year they’re in danger.” In the event of a Season 14 renewal (which at press time had not been officially ordered), viewers will learn who all makes it out of this predicament alive, and how. “I felt [this cliffhanger] would launch us into a great conclusion in the 300th episode” aka the Season 14 premiere, Messer says. “I can’t think of a time when the stakes were bigger than Garcia being held captive and Reid compromised in a big way.” Even if Reid and or Garcia get emerge from this crisis unscathed, could The Messiah’s cult be an ongoing threat in Season 14? “Yeah, it could be,” Messer answered. “I am working on [the premiere script] as we speak, actually.” Criminal Minds (possibly) returns this fall with it's 300th episode. |
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