S1E10 - “The Popular Kids”
We open on Massanutten Mountain in McAllister VA where Cherish Hanson and her boyfriend Adam Lloyd are out for a morning jog. They split up so Cherish can rest because ya know women be weak. Cherish hears branches breaking and grows freaked out, she rushes to catch u with Adam. Whole bunch of animal sounds? Birds? Wolves? She finds Adam unconscious on the ground, his head smashed in by a rock. We see the shoes of a unsub looming over her and she cries “nooooooo”.
Cut to the BAU Headquarters in Quantico Virginia where Reid is adding a lot of “sugar” but it looks like dairy free creamer to me. Reid confides to Morgan that he’s been having nightmares about what they do. Morgan advises him to speak to Gideon.
JJ introduces the BAU team to case, we discover that another body has been found at the Lloyd crime scene, with almost identical wounds. However, this body has decayed and is much older. The BAU has been called in because a tree at the scene has a satanic star and the inscription “Satan Lives LOD”. Possible satanic cult. On their private jet (but don’t worry, the location is only a half hour away not that much tax payer money needs to be wasted) the team discusses satanic cults. The FBI has apparently looked into Satanic Cults extensively and not found there to be any evidence of murderous satanic cults. Gideon says that most of the “Satanism” they see is juveniles damaging property, desecrating churches and cemeteries. To Gideon’s knowledge, there has never been a proven case of satanic ritual killing in the united states.
Cut to the crime scene on Massanutten Mountain. The whole team is there including JJ, why?? Why are they making her ruin her nice boots? Reid determines that the older body was a male victim, they also notice candle wax burned into the bones of the older victim. Cherish’s mother has heard about Adam’s murder and comes running to the crime scene to tell the police that her daughter was out running with Adam this morning. Sherriff Bridges sets up a search party for Cherish, and Gideon asks him to use locals, knowing that the unsub will likely show up. JJ talks to Sherriff Bridges and confides that she grew up in a small town.
JJ, Reid and Sherriff Bridges head back to town. We meet Cory Bridges, Sherriff Bridge’s son. Who is… an intellectual? Who hates football? Then quit. The whole town shows up to help search for Cherish. Garcia runs backgrounds on everyone who has turned up to help, Garcia notes that most people in McAllister live above the medium income of the country. We learn that Reverend Paul was arrested for tax fraud. A man named Henry Dent was arrested for assault with a deadly weapon. Of course he’s with Elle because this show is sexist. Cut to Dent staring at Elle’s ass. Elle finds a bloodied note: “Satan commands the virgin be sacrificed at the next full moon.”
Back at the BAU’s base at the McAllister field office, Hotch tells Reid that everybody has nightmares sometimes (Morgan is a snitch.) Hotch is ready to give the profile.
PROFILE: KILLER CULTS
· Headed by a charismatic megalomaniac
o People who are not in his group will see him as strange, weird, and scary.
o Leader will be older
· Possibly teenagers
· Heavy metal music (look/culture)
· Can’t resist injecting himself into the investigation
· Must be a local
Cory Bridges names Micheal Zizzo as a suspect. He and his followers call themselves the “lords of destruction” (LOD). Zizzo apparently talks about Satan all the time and hangs out and gets high in abandoned houses. The team goes to raid Zizzo’s hangout. Cut to Jesse Pinkerman holding court. BAU arrests Pinkerman I MEAN ZIZZO why does it feel like I’m watching the interrogation of Damien Echols from West Memphis Three?? However, Zizzo sees the tree with the “LOD” spray painted on it, and he says he’s never seen the “LOD” insignia before. He says they get draw stars upside down, get drunk, and listen to heavy metal and don’t kill people.
Reid is mad at Morgan for telling everybody about his dreams. Morgan confides in Morgan that he had nightmares six months after he started the BAU. Morgan confides that he was haunted by images of a victim’s eyes that he feels responsible for. Morgan says he still has the nightmares, and that Gideon has helped. Cory Bridges shows up and is panicking because they haven’t found Cherish. He asks Morgan and Reid if they’ve search the out building, and they haven’t, so he offers to take them there. There’s a LOD insignia on the building.
Gideon stops because he notices that one of Cherish’s friends, Brandi Dreifort has come to talk to the BAU. Brandi confides to Gideon that the older skeleton found under three died a year ago. A tourist who was hiking and fell off the trail and died accidentally. All the McAllister town kids knew about it and would come check up on the decomposing body instead of reporting it to the police. Brandi tells Gideon that the pentagram and candles were just put at the crime scene, they weren’t there all along. The only kids who didn’t know about the corpse was Zizzo and the LOD.
Morgan fines Cherish dead inside the out building and Cory is freaking. Morgan sends Reid back to the house to get help because they have no cell service. Morgan and Cory stay with the body. Cory confides to Morgan that he was hoping to be a profiler one day. Morgan profiles Cory. It’s a basic “Organized Killer” MO. Injects himself into the crime scene, smart, organized, etc. Cory takes Reid hostage. Cory confides that he was just intending to kill Adam, because it was his run every day. But Cherish was there so Cory had to kill him to. Morgan tackles both Reid and Cory and puts Cory into police custody.
Back on the private jet, Gideon shares with Reid that he keeps a picture of a girl he saved from a kidnapper in his wallet so that he can remember all the successes. Gideon says that he looks at Deborah every night. “We don’t always beat the monsters to the babies, but we do enough to make the job worth it. To keep the nightmares bearable.”
Rating Criteria
Criminal/Serial Killer: 15/20
Character development/ character arcs: 15/20
Forensics/Context: 15/20
Script writing: 18/20
Background characters: 15/20
Overall: 78/100