Law & Order: SVU season 19 episode 13 review: Is Barba gone?
What we know going into the episode is this: Tonight’s episode features Barba in peril after he makes a choice that puts his own future in jeopardy. We also know that at the center of tonight’s episode was a story about a man desperate to get his baby boy Drew, really to the point that he was willing to start a hostage crisis. Benson was able to go into his home and calm him down; following that, she was able to put him under arrest. He claimed that the mother didn’t want to care for the boy — he was blind, he was deaf, and according to the mother virtually brain-dead. At the center of this story was effectively a moral struggle between two parents with very differing opinions on how to handle their child.
The question Barba found himself running into was this: Should he or should he not prosecute? How do you take on a situation this complex, especially when you are talking about suffering on this scale?
Enter Peter Stone
Philip Winchester’s character from Chicago Justice turned up for the first time in a scene with Jack McCoy. He was in New York for his father’s funeral, and while there he received an offer to come and work at the D.A.’s office. He wasn’t interested in considering the offer at first.
Meanwhile, Barba’s moral dilemma continued with the case as he got more of a sense of the complications from the baby’s mother about the decisions that she made, and the struggles of having a son whose health was rapidly deteriorating and she did not know how to handle it.
What happened next: Barba on trial
This is where things get tragic — Barba did what he thought was right, and that was helping to end the baby’s life. Rafael found himself charged after that for what happened, and from there Peter Stone found himself appointed special counsel for the case.
Barba was on trial for the case, and soon after that it was clear that Stone was just as adept as a prosecutor in New York as he was in Chicago. He was all about enforcing the law by the book and that was something that Benson did not appreciate.
What is a “justifiable homicide”? That was what Barba proclaimed that he did with Drew — he killed, but he wasn’t a murderer. Or, was he? Where Peter seemed to hit Barba was in the question of guilt — whether or not he felt guilty over what he did, and also if he consulted with the baby’s father.
The jury’s verdict
Barba is … not guilty. Hooray! Yet, here is the twist: That didn’t necessarily mean that he was sticking around. Barba still chose to depart the D.A.’s office at the end of the episode — at least for now. We don’t exactly feel as though his journey is over.
CarterMatt Verdict
Another outstanding performance by Esparza, an actor who has given a number of fantastic performances on the show as of late. Why did Barba get so involved in this case in the first place, especially in such a hands-on matter? It’s a good question worth discussing, but so much of that must trace back to the character’s heart. He’s a fighter and he has always been a fighter.
Now, Barba goes on to fight in another way. The character is drifting off to another horizon — we don’t know what that horizon is for now, but with this show we’ve come to learn that goodbyes are not often forever.
Of course, we also welcome some of your thoughts on this story in the comments!
(Photo: NBC.)