TV.com

Criminal Minds

Compromising Positions

Season 6, Episode 4, Aired Oct 13, 2010

Next
Episode Previous
Episode

Episode Summary

EDIT

8.7

EPISODE RATING: Great

322 votes

Your Rating: 10

"Perfect"
Your Rating: 9.5

"Superb"
Your Rating: 9

"Superb"
Your Rating: 8.5

"Great"
Your Rating: 8

"Great"
Your Rating: 7.5

"Good"
Your Rating: 7

"Good"
Your Rating: 6.5

"Fair"
Your Rating: 6

"Fair"
Your Rating: 5.5

"Mediocre"
Your Rating: 5

"Mediocre"
Your Rating: 4.5

"Poor"
Your Rating: 4

"Poor"
Your Rating: 3.5

"Bad"
Your Rating: 3

"Bad"
Your Rating: 2.5

"Terrible"
Your Rating: 2

"Terrible"
Your Rating: 1.5

"Abysmal"
Your Rating: 1

"Abysmal"

Rate Now!

The BAU travels to Ohio to identify a serial killer who is murdering married couples in Akron. Meanwhile, Agent Hotchner looks within the team to fill a recent vacancy.

WRITE A REVIEW FAN RECAP

Cast & Crew

See All EDIT

GUEST STAR
Wayne Nickel

Deacon
GUEST STAR
Thomas Garner

Phil Andrews
GUEST STAR
Lisa Arturo

Debra Wilson

Paget Brewster

SSA Emily Prentiss
Matthew Gray Gubler

SSA Dr. Spencer Reid
Thomas Gibson

Unit Chief Aaron Hotchner
Kirsten Vangsness

Analyst Penelope Garcia
Shemar Moore

SSA Derek Morgan
Joe Mantegna

Senior SSA David Rossi

Watch Online

Fan Episode Reviews (3)

See All

It's Garcia, no, it's JJ, no it's Garcia again!

8.0

"Great"

By Finnegan77, Mar 12, 2011

I love the character of Penelope Garcia. I love that she's so outside the box of the FBI norm, that she's bright and colorful and endearing. I love that she's unique and quirky and so completely brilliant as a tech analyst and so completely unwilling to look too long at the evil that the team deals with every day. I love her interrelationships with each team member, from her "liege," "lord and master" Hotch, to Rossi who has come to respect her deeply, to fellow-quirk and boy-wonder Reid, to silly-smoldering with Morgan and rock-on-girl-power with Emily. I love her back-story and her boyfriend, Kevin.

Just getting that out there.

Garcia wants to help - that's completely within her character. She wants to fill in the gaps and hold the line just as JJ did; she wants to somehow hold on to that friendship and camaraderie by taking over JJ's responsibilities. And she's willing to compromise to do so. That much is solid and admiration worthy.

Hotch letting her? Oh, no. Nope. Not seeing it. Training aside, quirkiness aside, strengths and skills aside, the leader of this team should be helping each member attain the highest level of skill he or she can, and should be determined to slot them into place where they can do the team the most good. He should be able to overlook emotional issues and make decisions for the good of the team and to enhance their abilities to solve cases and help people. He should not give in to wishes and dreams and impossibilities that are right in his face, no matter how sincere his teammates might be. He needs to be a boss. A leader.

He needs to focus on the CASE, on his job, on profiling and catching the bad guys. And so does the show.

So, while watching Garcia become a mirror image of sleek, straight-haired, power-suited JJ was hilarious and charming, it was way too spoofy to be believable, and added a layer of "huh?" to an otherwise good episode. And the "poof!" transformation of Garcia back into her colorful, quirky super-computer-sleuth after mild mannered JJ-clone disappeared was silly. What, did she bring that outfit along with her? Did she change in a nearby phone booth and emerge with her brain on straight and all the answers at her fingertips? Groan.

I love Guy Norman Bee. I love his directing, his story-telling, and his ability to draw the viewer into the world of the unsub. He's got a strange and horrible vision and he's always delivered. The first scene of the unsub watching the couple have sex in the car? Tres nasty. And a total "gotcha!" moment when the unsub shoots the husband.

The unsub was scary in his intensity. I loved that we really didn't know what the heck was going on with him for most of the ep. I love it when the team scrambles and gets it wrong before it gets it right. And, even though the "aha!" moment was rushed - AGAIN - it was good rising action that brought us to the pregnant wife.

I did not love the scene with Prentiss in the club. The team did not do its research, or listen to its own profile here - they should have known that she was using the wrong terminology, and that he, the alpha-male, was the one who did the choosing - he was not swayed by a pretty face or friendly patter. It was clumsy and awkward and hurried - and maybe that was the point, but it could have been better.

So, weak climax aside, I thought this ep - the case side of it, anyway - may have put our BAU team back on the right footing. Here's the ongoing problem, though: the dramaqueen moments, the emotions, the focus on Ellie Spicer's call and Garcia's transformation and Hotch's inability to lead are taking up too much time. Get back to the case. Get back to the focus on catching the bad guys at the 11th hour. Get back to the pacing and tension of a fantastic story and drop the interpersonal drama. Before it's too late.moreless
DO YOU AGREE?
11 2

Flag
Share Hide
Thank you, Garcia, for being who and what you are and thank you to the writers for making the character so completely loveable and necessary. A far superior episode to last week's effort with an interesting case and unsub and some excellent team work.moreless

8.5

"Great"

By Lady_Lancaster, Nov 16, 2010

There is quite a bit to enjoy and praise about this episode, most particularly the excellent work done by Kirsten Vangsness as she (as Gracia) endeavoured to be all things to all people (something that I think we all try at some point in our lives.) The fact that Garcia, perhaps more than all the others, misses J.J. so terribly was very obvious here and I have to admit that I loved the way she explained to Hotch the 'how' and 'why' she could replace J.J. as the Media Liaison.

When she stepped onto the plane before the journey to Akron, I was delighted to see that even though she had made so many changes, she was still one hundred percent Garcia underneath it all. It would have been a huge shame if she had been any other way.

The plot was something different and very interesting, even if it did get a little convoluted in places. I was a little surprised when Prentiss had to ask the unsub's wife to clarify what she was talking about when they discussed her early days with the killer as I would have thought it was obvious. The unsub himself didn't scare me at all and I thought he was actually quite dull even though I liked the premise of what he was doing. I found it hard to have too much sympathy for the victims except for the first two couples because I was crossing my fingers and hoping that Garcia would perform brilliantly and, of course, after her talks with Hotch and Morgan,she did.

I loved the by-play between Hotch and Garcia and I was impressed with the fact that he took the time to give her confidence a boost as it must have been lagging badly considering she thought she had ruined everything. I REALLY hope that we DO see more of Kirsten as part of the team, most particularly when they travel as she is a character whom everyone seems to love and with the yawning gap left by A.J. Cook's departure, I think a stronger presence by everyone's favourite Technical Analyst/Part-time Liaison is just what the doctor ordered. I hope that Kirsten's role won't be greatly curtailed after she begins working on episodes of 'Suspect Behavior' as that would be a huge shame for all 'Criminal Minds' fans.

The only two things that I found a little irksome were the fact that, once again, we are hearing about Ellie Spicer and we already know that there is more to come. I hope it doesn't end up being a season-long arc because it really has nowhere to go. The other small issue I had was that, once again, Reid mentioned 'The Son of Sam', which he always does whenever anyone is shot in a car. Given that Reid has an eidetic memory, he would certainly know of several killers throughout history who have used the same MO so I'd like it if the writers mentioned some others instead of just 'The Son of Sam' in the scripts. They mention the BTK Killer constantly too when similar cases come up and that could be improved upon. This is not a criticism, just a minor annoyance.

All in all, in my opinion, a much better effort, largely due to Kirsten Vangsness, and Thomas Gibson, with some good work thrown in by Shemar Moore as well. I still miss J.J. a lot and I suppose myself and a lot of fans are going to continue to do so but this was an improvement on earlier episodes.

I'm looking forward to seeing what they have for us next week.moreless
DO YOU AGREE?
10 7

Flag
Share Hide
Comparitively uninteresting case. The tidbits about Garcia's carrer move was what made this episode interesting. Not the best episode.

9.0

"Superb"

By amazing_race, Nov 16, 2010

I thought this episode was a real let down. The case was different, which is scertainly something that I love to see, but it lacked any realy direction, and it seemed quite bland ot me.

The involvement of Garcia in this episode was really nice, and definitely my favorite mpart and aspect of this particular episode. It was certainly always going to be a tought positiion to fill, courtesy of the teremendous work AJ Cook pu t in over the last five seasons.

I think the case was poor. It was predictable, and lacked any suspense. Worthwhile watch, but if you want to, I'd recommend a lot of other episodes over this.moreless
DO YOU AGREE?
1 0

Flag
Share Hide

WRITE A REVIEW

Trivia, Notes, Quotes and Allusions

See All

FILTER BY TYPE

TRIVIA (1)
ADD TRIVIA
- Mike Smith, who portrayed Paul Wilson, is a professional stuntman. As such, he performed his own stunts in this episode.
  EDIT SHARE
QUOTES (4)
ADD QUOTES
- Hotchner: Garcia, when you applied for this job, you gave me your resume on homemade pink stationery. I realized then that you were unique. And I wouldn't want you to change that.
  EDIT SHARE
- Garcia: (to Hotchner about taking over JJ's duties) Sir, I'm willing to tone down my wardrobe choices. I am ready to make that sacrifice, if you just please give me a chance.
  EDIT SHARE
- Garcia: Abraham Lincoln said, "Whatever you are, be a good one."
  EDIT SHARE
- Prentiss: "We all wear masks, and the times comes when we cannot remove them without removing our own skin." Andre Berthiaume
  EDIT SHARE
NOTES (1)
ADD NOTES
- The songs heard in this episode were "You're My Everything" by Joe King, "Disappear" by Kitten Control, and "Guise" by Von Iva.
  EDIT SHARE
ALLUSIONS (0)
ADD ALLUSIONS
- ADD ALLUSIONS from this episode.