Derailed

Season 1, Episode 8, Aired
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Episode Summary

Elle, along with many others, is held hostage on a train in Texas by a paranoid schizophrenic who is convinced that the U.S. government is monitoring him. Hotchner and Gideon are forced to play into the man's fantasy to save the people he has taken hostage.

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Fan Episode Reviews (17)

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  • “Could at least one of you look like you're going to see me again?" - REID

    9.6
    "Superb"
    By bleach7, Oct 11, 2011 Report Abuse
    I will really add Reid as one of my personal favorite TV characters. He is becoming more and more attractive. I like how he acts very encyclopedic person. From a very eccentric boy genius to a man who wants to see the world and let the world know that being a genius is not something special but just a norm. His team babied him (asking never to remove his bullet proof jacket, Morgan trying to go with him as his enters the danger zone, etc) but in this episode he really showed that he is worth his position.moreless

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    7 0

  • Highly enjoyable and suspenseful episode!

    10
    "Perfect"
    By amazing_race, Oct 11, 2011 Report Abuse
    This episode was a higly captivating one, and I really enjoyed it. The case was very cool, as it involved a hostage situation, and one of the hostages was indeed a team member.

    My favorite part of the episode was the 'magic trick' that Reid had to perform when he went into the train. It was really well done, and it created a lot of interesting moments as the episode carried through.

    I liked the idea of everyone being government agents, and Rreid did really well in the train to help eventually save them all!

    This was a really great episode, especially when considering how early it still is in the show's history and lifespan. Keep it up, Criminal Minds, and I would highly recommend this episode!moreless

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    2 0

  • Review

    8.0
    "Great"
    By cavanagh15, May 22, 2011 Report Abuse
    I actually think that this is a very overrated episode. There was no mystery - there was simply a profile that needed to be explored as carefully as possible so that no one on the train got hurt. I like the Criminal Minds epioosdes with a sense of mystery to them - a sense of not knowing who the bad guy is until the last ten minutes of the episode. In this episode it starts off with the little flashbacks of why everyone is on the train and then just like that the killer among everyone on the train is exposed. I thought this episode itself was written okay, it just wasnt one of my favorite storylines because of the general non-mystery factor that I have grown so used to seeing.moreless

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    0 2

  • Little too slow

    7.5
    "Good"
    By Parricida, May 22, 2011 Report Abuse
    Oh.. this time Greenaway ends up in being a hostage in a train what makes emergency stop as someone was hit by the train but that is not their biggest problem - there is lunatic who thinks he has something on him and wants it off, suspects everyone is against him.. and has two guns.

    So, the episode is about trying to get everyone out safely. Maybe it was that they did not had to figure out who was behind it that made it slower, or just as there was nothing they could do and we knew they won't solve it before the end.. so I think little too much time wasting.moreless

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    1 2

  • When Elle Greenaway is one of several passengers held hostage by a paranoid schizophrenic on a train, Gideon must play the man's game and try to rescue the hostages without bloodshed and Spencer Reid turns out to be of invaluable assistance.moreless

    7.5
    "Good"
    By Lady_Lancaster, May 22, 2011 Report Abuse
    Agent Elle Greenaway is on a train in Texas when a paranoid schizophrenic, former psychiatrist Teddy Bryar, hearing voices in his head which give him instructions, decides to take everyone hostage. The man is convinced that the government is monitoring him via a microchip implanted under his skin and he is determined to get it out.

    Gideon knows how dangerous the sick man is and he also knows that in order to free the hostages, it will be necessary to play along with his delusions as much as possible. Refusing to speak to anyone except the person in who is the Highest Authority, Gideon assures him that he IS speaking to the highest authority and that they will help him have the microchip removed at once. It is here that Reid comes into his own when he volunteers to use a magic trick requiring a skilled manouver in order to make Bryars believe that he has removed the offending 'tracking device'.

    Knowing that himself, Elle and the others on the train are in great danger, Reid nervously but successfully removes the chip, but will that satisfy Teddy Bryars when Leo, the persistant voice in his head, tells him that he has been tricked?

    Watch this one and enjoy the ending. The episode, overall is a little slow and somewhat predictable but Matthew Grey Gubler does a fantastic job and it's worth watching for that alone.moreless

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    2 2
 

Trivia, Notes, Quotes and Allusions

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  • Trivia

    ADD TRIVIA
    • When Reid is going to the train to fake the surgery, he walks past a cop and a SWAT operator taking cover behind a car. The cop has a red safety plug in the barrel of his pistol that wasn't edited out in post-production. Edit
    • When the team is riding in the SUV early in the episode, the camera shows the vehicle from the outside and there is no one in the back seat. Edit
    • Elle was traveling to Dallas, yet she flew into an airport 637 miles away, in El Paso, and then took a train back (north and east) to Dallas. Dallas/Fort Worth has an international airport. The Amtrak trip from El Paso to Dallas takes 29 hours 30 minutes. Edit

  • Notes

    ADD NOTES
    • The song heard in this episode was "Wrecking Ball" by Gillian Welch. Edit

  • Quotes

    ADD QUOTES
    • Reid: (to Dr. Bryer) The voices, they helped you right? While the other kids were outside in the playground you were inside studying, reading, learning. The voices wouldn't stop. They helped you understand things that other people couldn't realize. Then as you grew older it became almost a responsibility, right? A responsibility to use that ability, to use your knowledge. Edit

    • Reid: The voices, they won't stop. They've been talking to you since you were a child.
      Leo: He's telling you I'm not real. He is lying to you.
      Dr. Bryar: You're lying to me.
      Reid: That's Leo speaking; that's not even Dr. Bryar. Why won't you let him think for himself, Leo?
      Dr. Bryar: You...can you see him?
      Reid: Yeah, he's right there.

      Edit

    • Reid: I know what it's like.
      Dr. Bryar: Make it stop!
      Reid: I know what the voices are like.

      Edit

  • Allusions

    ADD ALLUSIONS
    • Reid mentions Ralph Tortorici taking a classroom full of students hostage because he thought microchips had been implanted in his body. This happened in 1994 at SUNY Albany. All of the hostages survived but one man was injured during a struggle for Tortorici's gun. Tortorici committed suicide in a correctional facility in 1999. Edit
    • Reid mentions mathematician John Nash as an example of someone who suffered from delusions, and Morgan says that he saw the movie. The movie about Nash is 2001's A Beautiful Mind, directed by Ron Howard and starring Russell Crowe. Edit

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