Criminal Minds

An elite team of FBI profilers analyze the country's most twisted criminal minds, anticipating their next moves before they strike again. The Behavioral Analysis Unit's most experienced agent is David Rossi, a founding member of the BAU who returns to help the team solve new cases.

Criminal Minds (2005-present) is a US crime procedural series created by Jeff Davis for CBS, a long-running franchise now in its nineteenth season. Veteran profiler David Rossi (Joe Mantegna) leads a Behavioral Analysis Unit team alongside Aaron Hotchner (Thomas Gibson), Emily Prentiss (Paget Brewster), Derek Morgan (Shemar Moore) and tech analyst Penelope Garcia (Kirsten Vangsness). Their engine is the hunt itself: each episode they fly to a new city, study a crime scene and the victims left behind, and build a psychological portrait of an unknown offender before he strikes again. The format is largely case of the week, with occasional multi-episode arcs, and the grim subject matter is balanced by the team's close bond and dry banter. Tone is tense, methodical and often harrowing, with dread built through profiling monologues and brutal crime scenes. Fans of Mindhunter, Hannibal and Law and Order: Special Victims Unit will find resonance here.

Viewers broadly rate the series as a consistently solid, well-crafted procedural whose ensemble of profilers and sharp case-of-the-week plotting hold steady across its long run.

• Mindhuntershared procedural crime tone, serial killer profiling, case of the week structure
• Law & Order: Special Victims Unitshared police procedural format and ensemble investigative team
• The Silence of the Lambsshared criminal psychology focus and investigative team dynamics
• Hannibalshared profiler-driven investigations of violent offenders

Created by

Jeff Davis

Release Date

2005-09-22

Episode runtime

42 min

Rating

8.1 / 10 (4199)

What is Criminal Minds about?

An elite FBI Behavioral Analysis Unit team hunts America's most twisted serial killers by thinking like the criminals they pursue.

What is Criminal Minds like to watch?

Ember's analysis rates the pacing of Criminal Minds as brisk, its intensity as strong and its storytelling as easy to follow.

Is Criminal Minds violent?

Yes. Ember rates the violence in Criminal Minds as graphic.

What did critics think of Criminal Minds?

Viewers broadly rate the series as a consistently solid, well-crafted procedural whose ensemble of profilers and sharp case-of-the-week plotting hold steady across its long run.

Which shows are like Criminal Minds?

Shows with a similar feel include Mindhunter, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, The Silence of the Lambs, and Hannibal.

How long is Criminal Minds?

Criminal Minds: 19 seasons, 364 episodes.

Is Criminal Minds still running?

Yes, Criminal Minds is still running.