Reviewer Rating: 4/5.0
4
This can’t be the end of Carisi’s problems, can it?
Law & Order: SVU Season 26 Episode 9 portrayed his PTSD almost perfectly until the very end.
After a pep talk from Benson, Carisi seemed to recover, but that wasn’t realistic. Is another crash coming?
Carisi’s debacle has been a long time coming
I didn’t like the Carisi hostage situation in Law & Order: SVU Season 26 Episode 8 because it seemed completely unnecessary.
Carisi was already in trouble, and after years as a police officer in SVU and then as a prosecutor, his vicarious trauma left him panicking about keeping his daughters safe.
Without the lurid storyline surrounding his hostage situation, he might have suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder.
But if we must have such a story, at least the aftermath is nearly perfect.
In one of the most effective scenes in Law & Order: SVU Season 26 Episode 9, Carisi tried to overcome his fear by going to the deli where the incident took place, only to be so triggered that he didn’t buy any Things just left—and that was just the beginning.
He can’t focus in the squad room, doesn’t want to work on this new case, and is furious about the plea deal one of the robbers made, which is getting in his way.
I’m not sure what set him off in court, but it was clear he was triggered even before he was immersed in the memories of trying to save Ali’s life.
He ultimately decided to shelve the box and it looked like he might have thrown it away. If nothing else, the jury may decide the DA is out, which could be a big problem if Carisi doesn’t recover enough to force Harris into a plea deal.
Benson gives his usual supportive speech on Law & Order: SVU Season 26 Episode 9, but it’s not enough
I loved Benson’s pep talk for the survivors, but it wasn’t enough to break Carisi out of his PTSD-related fog.
Benson: All those years of night school… you were a detective and then a prosecutor… would you let a manipulator like Harris Vernon take everything away from you?
Carisi: Liv, what do you want from me?
Benson: I hope you wake up. return.
Law & Order: SVU is usually pretty good at realistically depicting mental health issues, but this time around it may have been so eager to keep Carisi motivated to do his job that it kind of lost the plot.
Benson means well, but telling someone with PTSD to “wake up” is probably the worst advice possible.
You can’t just turn off a trauma response, and Benson should know that better than anyone. After being kidnapped, she couldn’t even snap her fingers, so why could Carisi do it?
Considering his job is now on the line and his boss thinks he should drop out of the case, it makes sense for her to tell Carisi again that he needs therapy.
I thought that was what Benson was going for when he said Carisi’s anger was a feeling, but she went too far when she forced him to return to normal, something he couldn’t do without professional help a little.
(As an aside, I have a hard time imagining Law & Order’s Nicholas Baxter questioning whether Carisi should continue to follow the case. Although the exchange took place off-screen, I miss McCoy!)
Oddly enough, Benson’s delivery worked better than it should have. Carisi is back to being an aggressive DA willing to fight hard for justice. He managed to corner Tommy Gallagher and Harris Vernon so they could make a deal, settle the case, and hang out with Rollins.
He didn’t even seem worried about the girls playing with a claw machine on the other side of the pizza place at the end of Law & Order: SVU Season 26 Episode 9.
I call this bullshit.
Carisi may be able to do it in the short term, but if he does nothing with the flashbacks other than holding Rollins’ hand and telling her he’s sure everything will be okay, then after a while, anxiety will come to mind again.
Rollins’ guest appearance didn’t live up to the hype
Although Law & Order; SVU Season 26 Episode 9 was billed as a Rolling Stone episode, Rollins only had a small role.
Surprisingly, Carisi called her and wanted to know if Katherine had written the messages and not Benson contacting her because of Carisi’s struggles.
Rollins also didn’t have any personal conversations with Benson or anyone else this time. She shows up, promises to investigate, discovers the message from “Catherine” is fake, and has a brief scene of her and Carisi eating pizza together.
This cameo feels more like a cameo. Her investigative part wasn’t even completed on screen!
I’m always happy to get Rollins in any form, but this is silly.
She’s been a staple of SVU for years and I hate that her appearance now barely has any lines.
I feel doubly sad for the Rollisi fanatics because they were promised an episode centered on them and very little of Rollisi.
It’s a bizarre case with no real motive…but does Harris need one?
I’ve long thought Harris was a bad guy. This seems to be the only logical conclusion.
However, I was left distraught throughout Season 25 of Law & Order: SVU, trying to understand why he decided to trick people into raping his wife.
This doesn’t make sense. Rapists usually want to have some kind of power over their victims, but as far as I can tell, Harris’ only motivation was that he did this crap to his wife.
Maybe this motivation is enough. Sadly, there are enough mean men in this world who treat their wives’ bodies as their own property.
Still, it’s never really explained why he does what he does other than being a scoundrel, which I found unsatisfying. I want to know more about why he does this crap.
The men involved thought Katherine wanted it, but they should have known a drugged person couldn’t consent, especially if they didn’t get her permission before Harris drugged her.
Nonetheless, Carisi was right to believe that Harris was the mastermind, and therefore it was appropriate that he receive double the sentence that Tommy Gallagher received.
Random Thoughts on Law & Order: SVU Season 26 Episode 9
- Who would put a flash drive labeled “whore” from an anonymous source into their computer without checking for viruses?
- At first, I thought someone had created a deepfake of Katherine and Tommy. This could be an interesting direction!
- Despite being a different actor, Harris looks similar enough to Griffin Dunne from This Is Us to be distracting.
Over to you, SVU fanatics! What did you think of Law & Order: SVU Season 26 Episode 9?
Vote in our polls, rank the episodes, and voice your thoughts in the comments.
“Law & Order: SVU” airs Thursdays at 9/8c on NBC and Fridays on Peacock.
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