Law & Order: SVU season 19 premiere title speculation galore

There isn’t all that much out there just yet in terms of Law & Order: SVU season 19 news, and for good reason given that filming only just started in New York City. There’s only so much information that can be handed out, especially when you don’t want to spoil anything.

Nonetheless, we are glad to be bringing you something small today in the form of the official premiere title for the very first episode starting up this fall. According to executive producer Julie Martin (see the tweet HERE), the title here is “Gone Fishin’,” and it’s being written by none other than new showrunner Michael Chernuchin. He’s not wasting too much time at all before getting his feet wet with a big episode! It’s one that we’re already curious about just in terms of what this title means and what sort of story that we’re looking at.

Superficially, there are two very clear interpretations for “Gone Fishin'” as a phrase.

1. People have actually just gone fishing for a little while – Maybe this entire episode is just going to focus on Benson, Fin, Rollins, and Carisi out somewhere at a dock trying to catch the big one. After that, they bring it over to Barba who makes a mean fish-and-chips platter.

Somehow, we don’t think that this is actually going to be the story of the episode. Maybe actual fishing is somehow involved, but having a full episode of the SVU team chillin’ out doesn’t exactly seem like it’s in the series’ DNA.

2. It’s often an expression used for a vacation or an absence – If someone is “gone fishin’,” it often just means that they’re predisposed, or they’ve taken off for a good period of time. We remember on some old NBA – TNT broadcasts they would use this expression, coupled with some cheesy PhotoShops, of various teams and players at the end of a season suggesting that they were done with work for a while. There could be some symbolism here given that the team is coming back after a long hiatus for the premiere, and maybe there’s a time jump to reflect that.

It makes sense for Chernuchin to dive into the new season like he’s trying to catch some fish with his bare hands — the man is very familiar with the Law & Order brand and with Dick Wolf in general. Just this past season, he was the showrunner for Chicago Justice, and if he continues to deliver quality work here, hopefully, he will stick around for a while.

New episodes of SVU will begin airing in just a matter of months!

(Photo: NBC.)