We open in Evanston, Wyoming. We’re listening to dramatic music. We’re in a teenagers room. We’re looking at trophies and vision boards. We’re realize that we’re in two different teenagers’ rooms. We see one boy take off his headphones and stop playing video games. The music swells. We see a girl get up and lock her door. We see that she has a parakeet who watches son in horror as both the boy and the girl kill themselves.

Cut to BAU headquarters in Quantico, VA. We see JJ get a call and she says dramatically: “Okay, I’ll see what I can do.” Then she pulls a red jewelry box from out of her desk, and opens it up. Inside is a golden locket, which she puts around her neck. JJ then goes to Hotch and tells him that a Sherriff Samuel has reached out to her from Wyoming. This Sherriff Samuel is in charge of the two teenagers who died from suicide. We learn that the teenagers were Trish Leake and Ryan Krouse. JJ tells Hotch that the Friday before Trish and Ryan’s deaths, two other teenagers died by suicide in the neighboring town. All four of the kids attended the same school district. JJ states that none of the teens had drug or alcohol abuse history or prior arrests. She states: “These are just plain good kids who decided to hang themselves at approximately the same time on a Friday night.”

We cut to the unsub, making CDs of the footage from Trish Leake and Ryan Krouse’s deaths. Unsubs be mixing!

Cut to the BAU private jet. Garcia is on the jet! Hotch is allowing the team to work the case under the banner of an “unequivocal death investigation”. Which is basically a personality assessment of those who have died under unusual circumstances. He tells Garcia that she is here to “mine” the data of all the teenagers because they’re of “the internet generation”. Okay, Boomer. Reid then says: “The first few days leading up to a teenager’s suicide are usually very telling. Their behavior is transparent- there’s a multitude of indicators.” And JJ goes: “The most common don’t exist here.” JJ then list the common behaviors, the last of which is “spontaneous proclamation of love”.

In Wyoming the BAU meets with Sherriff Samuels. She advises the BAU that there’s been a reporter hounding her for information. The BAU tells her to hold off responding to the reporter and advises her to be careful about releasing any information regarding this case. Morgan says: “Sensationalizing these deaths my cause a domino effect with other kids.” And Reid says: “The term is suicide contagion, the spread of suicidal thoughts among a group of people that sometimes result in copycat acts. It’s especially prevalent among teen cases.”

The BAU splits up to talk to the families of the most recent deaths. JJ, Hotch and Prentis speak to Trish’s parents who tell them that Trish was so excited to graduate and even take her SATs. Prentis asks if Trish had a boyfriend and her father is like “no” and her mother is like “yes”. And it turns out Trish ran up over $100 of phone charges from texting the boyfriend last month, and her father grounded her, and he’s blaming himself. JJ then goes “If your daughter committed suicide, it wouldn’t have been because of a punishment.” And Trish’s mother is like IF!! WHAT DO YOU MEAN IFF?

Morgan and Reid meet with Ryan’s parents. They don’t believe that their son committed suicide. Reid then tries to explain an “unequivocal death investigation”. to his parents, who are grieving and obviously don’t understand.

Garcia delves into Trish Leak’s laptop and notes that the computer is blank, as if her someone has wiped her hard drive. Garcia finds that Trisha was on a “choking game site” the night she died. And suddenly we’re all talking about choking games like we’re aware of them. Garcia says: “It’s a game kids play where they choke themselves to get a buzz, to get high.” And Reid is like “They call it the good kid’s high, you get light headed and a sense of euphoria even though no actual drugs are involved.” What????? Even though Ryan didn’t have a computer in his room, apparently he used his gaming system to go on the choking game website.

Garcia finds a creepy text to voice thing on the website that says: “Come on, try it. We all do it. I dare you.” And Prentis is like- someone is orchestrating this! Encouraging kids to choke themselves to death!!

Cut to- some really bad Matrix CGI of going inside a computer and hacking into the choking game database. We see a bunch of teenagers at their computer participating in the game. We hear that same creepy text to voice thing saying; “Make sure you close the door. Tomorrow’s the big night. We’re all gonna play the game.”

And Garcia is like talking about how there is this whole teen subculture around the choking game. The kids make up names for it and do it at parties and I’m like… have… have the writers of this show ever met a teenager? And apparently there’s a contest where the three local schools are competing against each other. Apparently the school that logs the most “high time” wins. And there are rules! The kids must do it alone, video themselves, and upload the videos to the website to count.

Unsubs be streaming!!

Hotch is like SHUT IT DOWN! And Garcia is like, this site is the only way for us to track the unsub. And if we shut it down, he’ll just change the code and bring the site back up.

And now we get, the profile…

We believe the unsub responsible for these deaths may be a teenager
- He’s a loner, he doesn’t participate in team sports or group activities. He’s withdrawn, very low self-esteem.
- His only form of pure interaction is online. He engages in activity that draws attention to himself, yet isolates himself from his peers.
- Parents and teachers should watch out for the warning signs-
- Kids with bloodshot eyes
- Marks on their necks
- Severe Headache
- Disorientation
In real life he considers himself a “loser”
In cyberspace, he can pull strings. It makes him feel powerful.
He’s choking himself and daring others to do it. So we’re most likely looking at reckless homicides here.

Reid then travels to a local area school to teach the children with manual strangulation is bad. He talks about strangulation and hyperventilation creating the same effect of oxygen deprivation in the brain. Morgan is also there as back up, and sees a kid texting and the kid was texting being like “what planet is this dude from? He doesn’t want us to win the contest.” Then Reid starts describing, in detail, how Ryan Krouse died. It is… pretty brutal. And then Reid calls the strangulation game “lame”.

Then there’s this goth kid in the back of the class who is like “You all believe this crap?” The kid is wearing a choker around his neck and has a mohawk. And Then he like, runs out of the class? So Morgan runs after him. Now that Morgan is no longer in charge, he’s allowed to tackle people, so he’s about to tackle the kid, but the kid trips over a cart. Also the kid has marks all over his neck, so he has been participating in the choking game. However, he has so many scars on his neck, and many are different colors, indicating different stages of healing, meaning that he has been choking himself for a long time. So the BAU thinks the kid, Christopher Summers, is the unsub.

At the hospital, Christopher’s father shows up, and Reid and Sherriff Samuels have to explain to his father about the choking game. Reid then asks Christopher’s father “How long has Christopher been dressing in the Gothic Fashion”? Christopher’s father tells Reid that Christopher’s mother died a few years ago, and Christopher has been having a hard time.

Reid is interrogating Christopher, but is not getting very far.

Also like… the vibe is kind of sexual with Sherriff Samuels and Christopher’s father Wilson Summers is that they’ve like… had sex… and now it’s awkward. Christopher’s father turns Christopher’s computer is turned over to the BAU. Sherriff Samuels comes to the Summers house to collect the laptop and she tries to be supportive and tells him not to worry. As we cut away, we see a bunch of CDs stacked by Christopher’s computer meaning… perhaps he is the unsub!

Back at BAU headquarters, Garcia is given Christopher’s computer and starts getting into the hard drive. However, she has a hard time cracking into Christopher’s security system, and as Christopher’s in the precinct, a new video is uploaded. Hotch then tells Garcia that she’s funky and pastel goth, she should go talk to Christopher. At first she’s like… I don’t know I’ve never done this before. And then very quickly is like… okay I’ll do it.

Actually Garcia doe build a rapport with Christopher. She talks to him about how she lost her parents at his age, And then tells him: “I felt totally alone, until I found the netizens”. He then goes “btdt”, which I had to look up. Been there, done that. Then she starts flattering him and tells him she likes his earring and he’s like “It’s from that Johnny D pirate movie” EXCUSE ME WHAT? IS THIS KID JUST TELLING US THA THE BOUGHT THE EARRING JOHNNY DEPP WORE ON PIRATE OF THE CARIBEAN???

Garcia then goes over this tech mumbo jumbo with Christopher, and he seems kind of lost. Just then Daddy Christopher shows up and is like “we’re getting Christopher a lawyer”. And as he leaves, Christopher gives Garcia his Johnny D Pirate earring?? And then tells her that he still misses his mother from time to time. Garcia realizes that Christopher was giving her the password to his computer (which his mother’s name- Cynthia Summers). Meanwhile, the rest of the team researches the Summers family. They look the death of Christopher’s mother Cynthia, who went to the ER repeatedly leading up to her death. She would recover in the ICU, only to go home, and get sick again. They also get Christopher’s medical records, and discover that he has been choked and revived again and again. Girls- it’s Munchhausen!!

After gaining access to the computer system, the BAU recognize that there are two distinct writing styles utilizing the same screen name. One is clearly a teen ager, and the other one is more sophisticated. And they’re like- so Christopher is being manipulated by his father. And guess what- his father is an EMT who works Friday nights! So he goes to revive the children after they accidentally strangle themselves to death. And they’re like- he’s keeping the video tapes of the children as trophies!

Sherriff Samuels is like- I was in the house and I didn’t see anything! Yeah girl! You fucked up! So then the BAU think Christopher is going to try to kill himself. And JJ is like Garcia, did he give you anything? And Garcia is like yeah, the Johnny D earring. And this is when the wheels really fall off. The BAU is like, Wilson is going to need to download the videos from the website where the kids are choking themselves? Really? You guys really think this is his number one priority? And through leaps and bounds they think that Wilson has taken Christopher to the cemetery where his mother is buried. And I’m like- this can’t be right. And the BAU is like, yeah he’s going to take Christopher there to choke him, and Christopher is going to let his father kill him. And I’m like… no way. That’s too crazy!

Cut to- the cemetery where Cynthia Summers is buried. Inside a chapel Wilson Summers is getting ready to stream and download some child choke videos. He then sets up a noose for Christopher and is like “You know the drill. This won’t take long.” And I’m like????????????????????????????????

I guess the BAU nailed it. That is exactly what happened. How did they know? HOW DID THEY DO IT??

Cut back to inside the chapel and Wilson Summers is not able to download the videos, so he starts choking his son. But the BAU shows up just in time to save the day. Christopher is fine. So glad that they literally knew exactly what was going to happen!

Cut to the BAU private jet. Hotch talks to JJ and thanks her for pushing for the team to take the case. JJ then reveals to Hotch that the necklace she put on during the beginning of the episode was something her sister gave to her when she was eleven. She told JJ that no matter what happened, she loved JJ. It was her sister’s favorite necklace. Her sister died from death by suicide later that day. Which was some very sad but very touching character development for JJ.

Rating Criteria:

Criminal/Serial Killer: 12/20

Character development/ character arcs: 20/20
Forensics/Context: 20/20
Script writing: 5/20
Background characters: 20/20

Overall: 77/100

S5E13 - “Risky Business”

S5E14 - “Parasite”

S5E12 - “The Uncanny Valley”