*Thomas Fuller said, 'A fool's paradise is a wise man's hell...'*

[marguerite_krux]

 Criminal Minds 4 x 04

Paradise Part 1

Warning: I am a fully-fledged Emily/Hotch shipper now. Proceed with caution. XP

Ok, not too too much, since the ep offered mere scraps to feed my starving shipper soul, but I maybe if I make it an official warning, the show will provide me with something to squee over? Anyway, I try to edit myself so as not to piss off non-shippers, but…it’s so hard. *woes* :[

First off, this episode won some points for stylish opening. I thought my d/l had crapped up because I could hear music but there was no picture…then on the beat, the delightfully abstract image of raindrops hitting asphalt appeared, all mysterious and portentous like. Niiiice. As a fanvidder, I like when they match picture to the music. Speaking of which…are there fanvids for Emily/Hotch out there?

 

Scene of post-mortem accident.
Hey, wait, I don’t get it. Were these people dead before he spectacularly smashed up their car? [In a move worthy of Sarah Connor defending her son] At first I thought they were fake people, like mannequins, and kept waiting for the UNSUB to bash this truck driver over the head and yoink him off to perform sick twisted deeds upon him, but nothing happened. [My mind is too devious for its own good, lol]

So I guess the truck driver’s off the hook, both as potential victim and as murderer of innocents, if someone else got to them before his truck did. Isn’t it fortunate how this all works out?

 

Office of unfulfilled dreams.

Reid: Hey, if you guys are interested, I know a pretty good restaurant that’s open all night.

[Aww, isn’t it cute? The awkward genius is so socially forward these days! Organizing group playdates and everything!]

Emily: No, I can’t. I have a date.

Me: OMGWTFNONONOOO! THINK OF HOTCH! DON’T DO THIS TO MEEE. *sobs*

Morgan: You have a date? *unflattering disbelief* With who?

Emily [evil-eyes him]: With my hot tub.

Morgan [flirtatiously]: Now that sounds like a party.

Emily: You’re so not invited.

ME: OMG HOW CUTE IS SHE? FALL TO YOUR KNEES AND WORSHIP AT HER ALTAR OF UNMITIGATED AWESOME. *FLAILS*
Flirty!Emily makes me despair because her love for Hotch is meant-to-be, but playful!Emily kills me ded with squee. *bounces*


Morgan: OUCHIES. *criz*

Me: HEE! Take that, Emily/Morgan shippers! *cackles*

My world was shattered and reformed within seconds, lol. I just thought- no, the writers can’t possibly destroy my OTP just a fortnight after I’ve realized how much it means to me. I can’t have luck that bad, can I? Thank you, TPTB. This was an evil trick to play on me, but I forgive you. Delicious team bonding barely a minute into the ep? The gods smile upon me. :D

Oh, and hey, look everyone! Notice how Emily’s all pretty and non-battered again! No scars to wear as a badge of honor? Remind me to thank Cyrus for not damaging her face.

 

Pregnant JJ is stylishly pregnant. How is she the size of a whale and stunning anyway? It puts paid to the whole ‘sexy is skinny’ myth. Not that I’d put on ten kilos to match her weight on the off chance it increases my hotness quotient, but still.

 

Aaand Emily mourns the pre-empting of her date. How harsh is this show? Can’t even let a girl soak in her tub, damn it. *pouts* Ok, come on, Scully had at least two tub scenes that I recall atm- Chinga and Hollywood AD. Surely we’re due one of Emily any day now? ALONE, kthxbai.

Conference room.
Wow, my first glimpse of Hotch this ep and he has on his brooding!Hotch face already! The man works fast. Then again, his MO for this season is ‘married to his work’, so it makes sense. With Haley out of the way, he doesn’t have to worry about putting on a long-suffering husband expression, angsty ‘torn between work and home’ expression or trying for the ‘I’m much more fulfilled being at home nagged by you than saving innocent lives’ expression. It’s so liberating.

 



Pretty Emily from dfferent angles. Um...am I meant to have intelligent commentary here? I just...come on, LOOK AT HER. *squishes* Let me fangirl without guilt, kthxbai.



Not to sound all creepy and obsessive, but there's something really compelling about her hands. And wrists. Delicate wrists are love. :P

Reid looks so girly. It’s the haircut plus this head-on-hand thing. It shrieks teenage girl, for some reason. Don’t ask me to justify my response.



This pic advances the post in no way other than to admire his hotness. I'm serious, does this guy have a bad look? They're all uber-attractive on him!




And...we have contact! What the Sparkies refer to as 'eye!sex'. [Because Sparky has a monopoly on that expression, omfg yes]

Roads of truck-driven doom

Female complains of tiredness. Male points out she’s been napping for ages rather than keeping him company, in dereliction of duty. It’s pretty much a rule that you entertain the driver when you’re on long drives. How selfish is this woman? She deserves to get targeted by a serial killer.

 

The sleepy couple is almost wiped out by a truck, complete with blaring horns and fake hysterical shrieks. Of course, it wouldn’t be much fun for the victims to lose their lives before the killer has his way with them, so they survive unscathed.

This dude looks familiar…William Mapother…isn’t he from Threshold? Ethan from Lost? He’s always playing the creepy guys. How odd to see him against type as the sympathetic victim we’re supposed to root for. Huh.  

Bates motel.
Dude: You’d better lock the door.

Woman: I’m not afraid of the dark.

Nooo, this isn’t reminiscent of a scene from a horror movie, not at all. *rolls eyes*

Well, I guess the idiot woman makes sense- if someone’s determined to get to you, locking a door isn’t going to help [unless you have bullet proof glass and can afford to sit there for hours til help arrives]. This was how my friend Katherine justified leaving her car unlocked after I expressed my outrage at having left my bag there for safe-keeping, expecting that locked doors would provide some measure of security. My poor Kyle XY dvds could’ve been stolen because of her aversion to safety precautions. How would I have lived not knowing how the show ends? [Btw, does it end end, like, series finale, or is there a third season? *nibbles nails anxiously*]

 

ARGH! Damn that guy and his stupid adorable antics. Scaring me like that is NOT FUNNY. I know half the audience is yawning at how lame and anti-climactic that moment was, but I’m very susceptible to music, ‘k? It manipulates my moods very effectively, and the cues it was giving off then were ‘heinous serial killer lurking about, omgscarryyy, run for your life’. It was practically my duty to jump in fright. See how loyal I am to this show? I obey its cues and everything.

 

Not!Ethan tells his wife there’s no one around and they can vacation in paradise free of charge. Of course, nothing in life is ever free, he might’ve learnt one always pays the price eventually, but they’re a loving couple on a romantic adventure and expect that the stars, the sun and the moon and all the planets in our solar system would align in such a way as to form a heavenly convergence of positive energy and karmic good fortune to bless their getaway with just this sort of serendipity.

Woman: I’m so glad we took this trip.

Well, sweetie, this being Criminal Minds and not your honeymoon video, I’m banking on you regretting this heartily sooner rather than later. Sorry.

 


Creepy moment of 'zomg, they're NOT ALONE'. Who didn't see this coming? Punch yourself in the face once, please. Maybe twice for good measure. I may get freaked out over scary moments that are telegraphed like, ten minutes in advanced but at least I realize what is going to come and choose to go with the moment. *nods firmly*

Credits of Fangirly Squee.

OMGOMGOMG! In my last first CM picspam, I specifically asked for new opening credits and LOOK! Pretty Paget has been updated! It’s like the universe heard and obeyed my wishes!




We see Professional!Prentiss in Lo-Fi, hunting down the unsub that shot the dude she was partnered with...




...then flirty!Emily in the season opener visiting injured cop in hospital and making him wish he weren’t married.

I wouldn’t swear to this because my attention is very selective- tuned specifically to the Emily frequency- but I don’t think anyone else’s credits were altered. Interesting. Sadly, the three guys are still front and center. *whimpers* I like Rossi most of the time but damn him for bumping Emily off the center of the cast pic. Gah.

EDIT: I’ve just gone back and rechecked- Emily’s definitely the only one they altered. I guess it may be due to Emily’s major hairstyle redo, like, they didn’t want to confuse the audience?

I would like to say that the opening quote is one of their LEAST profound quotes ever. Standards slipping this week, I’m very disappointed, writers.

BAU jet of superheroes

JJ plays Beethoven to her unborn child. Weird. Otoh, maybe if my mother had done that, I’d be way more intellectual and productively inclined. *shrugs*

 

Ok, this ship is new to me but already it enhances my enjoyment of the show. Usually, I’d watch a team scene and only have their conversation- whether it be friendly banter or case based chatter- to occupy my mind. Now I get to watch this scene and shriek, EMILY/HOTCH PROXIMITY ALERT. It’s so rare to see them captured in the same shot. And my, aren’t they a pretty couple?

 

Credits show…Wil Wheaton. *grimaces* I have an ingrained predisposition to dislike him, purely based on his TNG days as a Gary Stu know-it-all who frequently outshined the crew and saved their lives on a regular basis. Ack.

 

Thankfully, I have Hotch to distract me from the upcoming awfulness.

Emily: One thing going for us; the killer doesn’t know we know.
Hotch: That helps us.

There's something a little off with Hotch this week. Emily's said that this is a point in their favor, an advantage they have over the unsub...and Hotch echoes her sentiment. He's not usually the kind of guy that wastes time repeating what people say. It's odd. Who wrote this ep anyway? There are little things that don't quite jive with the characters- not major problems or anything, just tiny details that a nitpicker like me pays attention to, lol.

My ears perk up at the words, ‘If the unsub finds out we’re here, all bets are off’. Foreshadowing, much? Except NOT. It sounded like one of those lines that means it will come to pass, with the worst possible outcome, but…he does find out and nothing bad happens. I mean, nothing like him devolving and killing a whole bunch of other people.

Heartbreak Hotel.
The happy couple have spent a blissful night in their own private paradise. Nagging woman whose name I have not yet bothered to take note of begs her poor beleaguered husband to get her pancakes with butter and blueberry syrup. From where, pray tell? The motel is apparently ABANDONED.

 

Except for that lone girly looking eye peeping in. This is what I remember of Wil- he had girly eyes and lashes.  

The woman complains her husband is not a morning person due to his disappointing failure to whip her up breakfast in bed from non-existent supplies provided by absent people they have not paid for the use of the facilities. How hard is her life?

I find it irrelevantly amusing as I was just watching Blood Ties with this delightful exchange:

Henry: Where are you going?

Vicki: Husband hunting.

Henry [points at self]: Husband material.

Vicki: You’re sweet, but you’re not exactly a morning person.

Heh. The flashback makes me more tolerably disposed towards this woman. You may be allowed to live, female victim, provided you amuse me further.

Sheriff's office of few resources and ordinary minds.
Rossi: Do you have any aerial photos of the crash sites?

Sheriff: Didn’t think to get any.

Rossi: Not a problem. I’ll have our technical analyst get some from the NSA.

For some reason, that makes me shiver a little in apprehension. So casually, he can retrieve images of days and weeks past, in any given area of the country. It’s Eagle Eye, goddamn it. Or…Google Streetview. Which reminds me, I must find my house online and see if anything incriminating was captured…

Hotch's interviews.
Ohhh, the poor truck driver! He gets to go around with a reputation as a killer just so the investigation goes uncompromised! I mean, I get it, and I’m not all tender-hearted over it; I understand the necessity of sacrificing his comfort in order to catch an unsub but- why can’t they put it about that it was an accident and not his fault at all? They’re letting people believe he KILLED that couple; couldn’t they slant it so that it’s less his fault and more a freak accident, weather conditions, diminished culpability due to mitigating factors of some sort…a deer or something, anything? Hope no one comes to bash up this guy for revenge.

Oookayyy. Well, on the one hand, it’s nice Hotch isn’t letting the truck driver get sued for something he didn’t do- otoh, is it wise to spill secret investigative details to a grieving father who might do something rash, like tell the community there’s a serial killer at large and rustle up a lynch mob to take out some poor unsuspecting scapegoat? I guess it’d be hard to question the father without explaining why questions were necessary, but still.

 Diner.
Donuts make me queasy. I can devour an entire family block of chocolate with no problem but show me a cinnamon donut and...*swallows convulsively* ohh, the mental images. *shudders*

Ten dollar tips two days in a row? Awww. People that tip well shouldn’t be killed. Why doesn’t the universe observe Lecter Hannibal’s code of conduct- kill those that deserve it?

 BAU corner of brilliance.
Garcia: Anything else I can do you for?

Hotch: Not for now.

Reid: Thank you, Garcia.

Garcia: You- my fine, furry friends- are welcome.

Hotch: Remind me to have her drug tested.

And Emily thought he lacked a sense of humor! Where is she when he’s demonstrating his sharp grasp of wit? *angsts*

It’s funny he makes that crack about getting her drug tested NOW because this is the most un-Garcia-like she’s ever been. I was waiting for her standard, ‘You’ve reached the office of unadulterated awesomeness’ or ‘speak, mere mortal, and let the goddess of infinite wisdom guide your path’ or- something. Instead, she just cutes an ‘I thought you forgot about me. It hurt’. It’s fine but…it’s also weird. She’s all muted in this ep.  Where is her hyperness? *pouts*

Hotch’s plan to go door-knocking at random…is less spectacular than I have come to expect from the most intelligent and keenly honed minds in the country. However, this could do wonders for people’s perception of the FBI. Wouldn’t you love to have Aaron Hotchner knock on your door? Well, any of this team, really, but….Hotch. *daydreams*

 Office of fast food consumption.
My team eats super healthy! I just had Chinese for dinner tonight, too!

 

JJ [grimaces over leftover cartons]: That’s disgusting.

Sheriff snorts.

JJ: What?

Sheriff: Smell of Chinese food makes you sick, but you don’t even flinch when you look at those pictures.

Me: You frakking loser. She's PREGNANT, DUMBASS. We all know nausea goes with the territory and the smell of leftovers would be more likely to trigger a physical response than pictures, don't you think? God.


JJ pulls a face of disdain.

Reid: She’s pretty tough.

Aww! He comes to her defense against chauvinistic cops. Baby brother stands up for his sister. Sweet little Reid! Next week he'll be stripping off his shirt to take on the criminal element mano a mano. :D

 

ACK! Stabbing not!Ethan through the peephole. That’s DISGUSTING. This show is trespassing into part of the Saw series. *iz jittery* Even watching it out of the corner of my eye still freaks me out.

Profile distribution.

May I just point out the way that Hotch took the time to walk all the way from the crime board over to Emily's side? Just sayin'. :P



I can see why the cops are skeptical. It’s great the BAU can make predictions as to the unsub’s mental characteristics, what type of rapist he is [‘violent anger-excitation rapist’], what breed of offender they’re dealing with [‘malignant misogynist’] and all that, but the briefing’s of little practical value. Come on, he’s likely in his thirties- but don’t get hung up on it because it’s so tough to predict…he tortures them psychologically, making one watch his attack on the other…suffered childhood abuse which makes him loathe women but is able to hide his aversion to women until behind closed doors…except we shouldn’t rule out people who may have been charged with assaulting them. Helpful…NOT. The only practicable suggestion was that they search remote motels, which was the local cop’s idea anyway, so it wasn’t like it never would’ve occurred to them without the BAU’s intercession. I’m not saying the BAU is useless, because of course, they crack the case- but it’s less through profiling and more through having better informed and highly detailed databases at their disposal. It comes down to resources rather than training. *shrugs*

Emily: Only a woman could make him hate women as much.

Heh, interesting theory, that. Maybe my instinctively antagonistic attitude towards men is due to my hostile and negatively charged relationship with my father. The only guys I get along with are the ‘safe’ ones; relatives, my cousins’ boyfriends, my friends’ brothers and authority figures or guys much older than me. I don’t know what old guys find charming about me, but I win them over everywhere. :P