He played a Boston unsub that savagely killed couples and faked an attack on himself. He went quiet years ago because he made a deal with the officer in charge that if he stopped searching for him, he'd stop killing. He started up again when the officer died, and tried to make the same deal with Hotch (while working with them pretending to be a victim). Hotch said no, and he killed again, including attacking Morgan, knocking him unconscious and stealing his FBI ID. They caught him, but he escaped from holding.

Played by C Thomas Howell, who they actually got back for that brief masked performance.

Damn, Criminal Minds. That was creepy, if not the kind of thing that actually scares me (single woman in the city, obv.).

I haven't read anything, but I wonder if WaT was victim to the whatever-year contract renegotiation thing? Not worth keeping if the cast was going to be more expensive?

Apparently it and The Unit, also cancelled, are very expensive to shoot.

I'm pretty sure if I were pitching a new show right now, it would have two characters sitting in an office 90% of the time.

A reality tv show about life in the Writer's Room!

One trend I've been finding annoying with procedural-type dramas is when they start off as a procedural and I find myself intrigued/interested by the process. Then, a season or two in, they start focusing on the main characters' personal lives ... by which I mean their love/sex lives and the resulting angst. I used to find CSI:Miami tolerable ... until they started in on the women in Horation Caine's life. I liked WaT ... until they started in on the tribulations of Jack Malone's love life. bleah

Toddson,

I totally agree with you. Don't forget the very special episode where one of the team is accused of murder - such special episode may feature:

a) the accused waking up with a dead body and having no recollection of what occurred the previous night(s);

b) someone from the accused past arguing with the accused on a Tuesday, winding up dead by Thursday;

c) the killer from a previous case 10 years ago, escaping from prison and seeking revenge on the CSI/cop/DA

etc.

I don't like the episodes where one of the team has to be cleared of a murder (that OF COURSE they didn't commit), but that'll be one episode per season. It's these interminable arcs with a relationship that is DOOMED (and not in the good way) and they go on and on and on.

I never managed to take CSI: Miami seriously, although I have watched a ton of it--someone at WX suggested watching it like a comedy and that was very entertaining. It always seemed to be too much about Horatio Caine's sheer marvellousness,

I just wanted to put in a note of how GREAT Garrett Dillahunt was in Criminal Minds. He played every phase of the unsub with great delicacy.

I want a procedural where the accused spouse really did not have an affair, where the other spouse really is just an obsessive nutball and the sympathetic other person really is just sympathetic. Every time our investigative heros get into the interrogation room and start screaming at the suspect, I'm rooting for the suspect to be proven innocent and then to sue the investigators for abuse.

NCIS and Bones will occasionally have someone innocent in the interrogation room. And on at least one Bones, the guilty party didn't confess and there wasn't enough evidence for a good case. It was very refreshing.