‘Criminal Minds’ season 10, episode 19 review: Gary Sinise, Anna Gunn, Tyler James Williams get serious

Last time on “Criminal Minds” we didn’t have much going on when it comes to our main cast of characters, outside of Spencer asking out his surveillance partner on a coffee date, so we were hoping for more of that tonight, but this episode is really being used to introduce us to the new “Criminal Minds” spin off starring Gary Sinise, “Breaking Bad” star Anna Gunn and Tyler James Williams(The Walking Dead). Is this group strong enough to head their own “Criminal Minds” spin off? Feels like a good team… let’s take a look.

When a family gets kidnapped while on vacation in Barbados by a man acting out revenge fantasies towards his own family, Jack (Sinise), Lilly (Gunn), and Monty (Williams) are brought in to investigate since they are the team that deals with international cases. It was a case that we have seen before on other crime shows, but the location was nice and having the kidnapped family taken into the middle of the ocean on a boat made the case even more complicated to track. It was a good twist on an old kidnapping classic.

Sinise was the same hard ass he always seems to play in shows like these, but Gunn slipped into this new role with ease and it was nice to see her play something very different from her character on “Breaking Bad”. The real star of this spin off to us is going to be Williams: His character is incredibly smart, very calm in the worst situations, but he also has fantastic social skills when it comes to working with frantic families.

We have seen “a “Criminal Minds” spin off crash and burn before, but Gary Sinise and Anna Gunn have both been proven to hold their own as leads in other shows and from what we’ve seen so far, these two have great chemistry and the idea of this team working internationally makes this even more exciting. While we have high hopes for this spin off (great leads, lots of story potential) we worry that there might be too many procedural crime shows on the air right now that there is really no room for anymore… just look at what’s happening to “CSI: Cyber” which is a really great show, but failing in the ratings. Bad time slot seems to be killing this show, but we fear that over-saturation is also a problem. Episode grade: B+

What did you think about this episode of “Criminal Minds”? Are you exciting about this new spin off? Share some of your thoughts right now with a comment, and if you want to further preview what is coming up next, you can do so right now here. Also, sign up today to get some more updates on everything we cover right now via our CarterMatt Newsletter. (Photo via CBS.)