Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (TV Series) Solving for the Unknowns (2020) User Reviews

Excellent writing and acting

[lor_ · 8 July 2023]

Investigating a case of a creep using a date-rape drug to manipulate women leads via a credible plot twist in a different direction in this segment with solid impact.

We see how dogged investigation and not giving up on a case that is difficult to pursue and prove can bear fruit, and it's especially satisfying to see Mariska and company providing both the sympathy and support for victims that what we hope all police would bring to their jobs.

As with most episodes of this series, the details and up to date circumstances of a case (this time, key evidence is encrypted on the suspect's computer and can't be unlocked) are significant factors. What has seemed simple at the outset mushrooms into a powerful expose of the consequences of the sensational (but somehow remote) issues of a serious problem and disturbing psychology behind the Cosby or Weinstein headlines.

Another Dumb, Dumbed Down Episode

[bkkaz · 2/10 · 30 December 2020]

So, SVU used to be about complexity. That's what made the mysteries interesting because, frequently, you were led down one path prompted by the latest buzz about this or that only to find out the actual mystery was somewhere else. There was also character complexity. The victims weren't always pure and the villains weren't always evil. Often, they were more like real human beings, which is to say, full of flaws and weakness that defined them as much as strengths and attractiveness.

This episode has none of that. The bad guys -- apparently "incels" -- are, as Finn sneers, "losers." Their entire existence is defined by such (which is ironic since, if I understand correctly, one of the gripes of real incels is that people who easily get dates despise and ridicule them for being losers). The victims are completely absolved of any contribution to their situation. That last bit today would be called victim blaming (imagine Donald Sutherland from Invasion of the Body Snatchers saying that with his finger out).

But only a few years ago on SVU it was called complexity and giving shades of gray to the characters. The lead incel, who calls himself "one of the nice guys, is about as nerdy and twitching as they can get. It doesn't help that he's got the whole 1950s nerd kit going on -- high forehead, childllike features, big black glasses. Because, you know, form always follows function in the real world.

Solving for Unknowns is just a stupid episode, dumb for the sake of being dumb. It's like a comic book version of SVU, which itself was always the dumber of the Law and Order franchise but got by on being salacious and dramatic. Now it isn't even that -- just juvenile.