‘Criminal Minds’ season 12, episode 6 review: Farewell Hotch; Prentiss takes charge

Last time on “Criminal Minds” we saw Luke and Garcia finally finding some common ground with one another and it’s all thanks to Roxy and their love of animals. We all know that Luke can’t replace Morgan (no one can replace Shemar Moore even if they tried), but there’s no reason to shut out Luke before we get to know him and Garcia has moved into this way of thinking as well.

With these two now on slightly better terms, let’s now move onto Wednesday night’s new episode “Elliott’s Pond,” one that proved to be emotional almost from the get-go thanks to the news that Hotch was in the witness protection program with Jack, and wasn’t going to be coming back. We talked about the circumstances already,  so within the context of the story, showrunner Erica Messer (who penned this episode) tried to make the departure work by including various reactions throughout the hour. Garcia, for example, was struggling with the thought of losing a good friend and confidante, but Rossi helped her to get through it.

Also, congratulations to Emily Prentiss on her promotion to Unit Chief! She admitted that this was bittersweet news. It’s a welcome promotion, but at the same time you obviously don’t want it to come under these circumstances — and one that she had to think about, given that she had a life overseas and also a boyfriend. She was only supposed to stick around temporarily. Ultimately, she made the unsurprising decision to stay, and her boyfriend is going to come overseas soon for a visit.

Case of the Week – We’re talking here about the disappearance of three children in a small town, which just so happens to be the same time that a similar crime occurred a solid three decades beforehand. The police claimed that most of the suspects from the original case were gone, but we met one particularly creepy guy in particular who remembered the original case vividly. He claimed that he had nothing to do with what ultimately happened, but at the same time he blamed himself for it and became a little bit of a hermit. The team scrambled for more evidence, including the idea of a captor who, one year removed from getting out of prison, may have kidnapped the children and brought them to a mystery location where they could live out the rest of their days.

Think of this case as one part “Stranger Things” (we actually saw a good bit of the newly-kidnapped kids, at least in comparison to prior episodes of “Criminal Minds”) and one part “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt,” as it turned out that the theory about the original kids still being alive turned out to be true.

We don’t want to say “of course the group was rescued” largely because this is not a show where these sort of things are given. We’ve seen so many of them turn sideways that it’s best to not assume anything. At least this story did have a message: Cherish your time with your family, and be grateful for the love that you have.

Overall – This was a tough episode for Messer and the writers to take on, largely because of the fact that there was no easy way to write off Hotch, or frame an entire episode around him at this point since they didn’t kill the character off. Basically, you had to come up with a way where it made sense for him to leave the BAU while also not coming across as a jerk. We do still wish that the show had more time to spend on it given that he was a part of the show for twelve years. That’s just not the format of this show. We got a little bit of a proper farewell in the B-story, and that’ll have to be enough.

As for the case of the week, we’d consider it one of the better ones of the season. It was emotional, and we prefer that to some of the stories that are chock full of scares and creepy characters. Episode grade: B.

What did you think of this week’s episode of “Criminal Minds”? Leave us a comment in the box below. If you want more news on “Criminal Minds” and what’s coming up then head on over to the link here. (Photo: CBS)