‘Law & Order: SVU’ season 18 spoilers: On Benson, motherhood, and more

Through at least the first couple of weeks of “Law & Order: SVU” after the series returns to NBC with new episodes, one of the themes that we’re apparently going to see is the exploration of some significant parts of Olivia Benson’s personal life. When the show returns in early January, it will do so with an installment that features Mariska Hargitay’s character starting to get a sense of where things stand between her and Tucker as he looks towards retirement and the future.

Meanwhile, the second episode of the new year, entitled “Chasing Theo,” is going to look more at her as a mother. This will come in the midst of an investigation into the disappearance of a young child, who disappears while his mother is having a crazy party fueled in part by drugs. While there may not be a direct correlation between this child’s situation and what Benson has with Noah, anytime you think about a child in crisis you often are going to see parallels to your own family and who you are trying to raise. Are you doing the right things to ensure that they are safe, and is there something more that you can do?

We’ve obviously come to know Benson very well over the run of the show and realize that she is a great mother to Noah, so we hope whatever introspection she gets into during this episode will not cause any significant changes down the line.

One other thing that we can tell you right now is that the status of the Donald Trump-inspired episode “Unstoppable” remains firmly up in the air, and it is not on deck at the very least for the first two weeks of January. This episode was originally scheduled to air this past fall, and has since experienced many delays.

(Photo: NBC.)