‘Law & Order: SVU’ season 16, episode 3 video: See Mariska Hargitay’s complicated new case

On this past episode of “Law & Order: SVU,” we saw a case that was basically a hodgepodge of true-life events that were twisted slightly for the show. There was an element of the Jay-Z / Solange Knowles elevator fight, a little bit of the Ray Rice drama, and also a character with many similarities to Donald Sterling.

For Wednesday’s episode, the show seems to be combining a young, troubled Hollywood starlet (we’ve seen some of these stories for years) with some of the sexual-abuse allegations that were made against many producers in Hollywood earlier this year. They even took the element where many of these alleged rape situations took place while at pool parties in mansions.

The young lady Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay) is questioning in the video below is Tensley, who is still just a teenager, but who has a long history already of being in these sexual situations. For the time being, though, she does not seem to consider it rape so much as just doing what she needs to do to get ahead. These incidents inform who she is, and also some more of why the SVU may be speaking with her in the first place.

When it comes to creating captivating television, one of the biggest hurdles this episode has is momentum. We thought that “American Disgrace” was one of the best traditional SVU cases we’ve seen on the show in some time, and it will be hard to top the level of crazy twists and turns that we witnessed there.

Photo: NBC