'Criminal Minds' Season 12B Spoilers: One of the BAU Members Takes the Spotlight in the Last Half of the Season
"Criminal Minds" season 12 is just about o the tail end of its hiatus but a huge tease, courtesy of show boss, Erica Messer will have people hoping that Wednesday comes faster as one of the BAU members takes the center stage for the last half of the installment.
In an exclusive conversation with Entertainment Weekly, Messer reveals that they are embarking on a brand-new form of storytelling when the police procedural comes back this week. She says that while this is something that they have never tried before, which obviously gives the creative team some jitters, she is excited about how it will shape the show moving forward.
"This is something our team has never had to deal with," Messer reveals. "After 12 years of telling stories about our heroes, we are entering into the unknown. We are not a serialized drama and yet the back nine of season 12 will be heavily serialized. I think the audience will be shocked that we went in this direction with one of our heroes. They won't see this coming," she added.
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Unfortunately, the TV exec will not name-drop, but with a small pool of longtime cast members — Joe Mantegna, A.J. Cook, Paget Brewster, Kirsten Vangsness and Matthew Gray Gubler — fans already have some sort of idea who Messer is referring to. Based on hints and news that came out in the past couple of months, Gubler's Dr. Spencer Reid is the most likely candidate, with the character's mother, Diana (Jamie Lynch), scheduled to reappear in the show.
Furthermore, a future episode titled "Spencer," scheduled on Feb. 15, does not really hide much in terms of what fans can expect from the police procedural. In fact, since the name of the installment has been confirmed, a lot of viewers initially thought that it could be another farewell story for the super-genius profiler. But with Messer coming out and revealing that the serialized story revolving on one main character will last until the end of the season, Reid followers can be relieved, at least at the moment.
"It's one of those things that will certainly open so many doors for us," Messer continued to explain on the new direction that "Criminal Minds" is heading to. "We will still have a bad guy of the week. It's not like this show will suddenly become a soap opera. But there will be a storyline running through every episode of the back nine that will be unlike anything we have ever done," she continued.
"Criminal Minds" airs every Wednesday, 9 p.m. ET on CBS.
