Bad Faith

Of all the various hard-hitting and controversial topics covered throughout Season 5 (including mastectomy, battered woman syndrome, suspicious infant deaths, abortion, pro-choice, autism, drugs, racism and fertility), the topic here is likely to be one of the most harrowing. While Logan was already a great character beforehand with great chemistry with Briscoe, he had not had up to this point of the show had this much development since the Season 2 opener "Confession".

"Bad Faith" is, in terms of character writing and development, is one of Logan's finest episodes. Not just of the original 'Law and Order' but also of the whole franchise (he went on to being a regular on 'Criminal Intent' mid-run). There is more though to "Bad Faith" than Logan's character development, with it being an episode that shocked, disturbed and touched me. It is a brilliant episode and one of Season 5's clear high points in a for more less consistent season compared to the previous four.

As usual for 'Law and Order' and its spin offs, the production values are solid and the intimacy of the photography doesn't get static or too filmed play-like. The music when used is not too over-emphatic and has a melancholic edge that is quite haunting. The direction is accomodating yet also alert.

The script is very intelligently crafted and has intensity and gritty edge while handling the topic sensitively too, didn't find anything ham-handed or one-sided about how the topic was dealt with. The story has still not lost the ability to shock and its uncompromising approach to quite hard-hitting material is quite scary, yet it is all done with class at the same time. Logan's character development is most revealing.

It was great to see Dann Florek again, in full sympathetic mode, and the same goes for Carolyn McCormack. Bill Raymond is truly creepy, but Chris Noth shines brightest. It's the first time since "Confession" that he has shown vulnerability to this extent and where a case is so personal to Logan, and he matches that with his usual tough steel beautifully.

Summing up, brilliant. 10/10

If this episode wasn't a pre-cursor to the movie Spotlight, the masterful film starring Mark Ruffalo, Michael Keaton, and Liev Schreiber, and don't know what is. This was more than a typical ripped-from-the-headlines L&O storyline. This was art imitating true life amongst the sordidness of the Priests in the Catholic Church.

This episode was truly ripped from the Nineties headlines as the general public finally learned what a lot of us knew as an open secret, that the Catholic church had pedophile priests and they got transferred around the country like a clerical shell game to avoid the law. When your organization for a millennium has been the cover for gay men and self loathing ones at that, this kind of thing was inevitable.

For Chris Noth this is bringing back bad memories. A fellow cop is found shot dead in Central Park. He was with sex crimes and he's a former childhood friend of Noth's and back in the day he and Noth were abused by a priest who has left the church, played by Bill Raymond. He went the usual route of being transferred to a different parish. Now he's married with kids of his own.

It takes a bit of legal legerdemain from Sam Waterston and Jill Hennessy to get Raymond into court on charges that will stick. That thing called the Statute of Limitations you know.

Noth takes center stage in this Law And Order episode. He's revealed quite a bit about himself in his various stints with the franchise. He was never more revealing than in this story.

Part of L&O's charm, and a huge part of why I love it, is that it focuses mostly on the characters' jobs instead of on their soapy "personal lives." While that may be part of the reason SVU is still on the air and the "mothership" series isn't, I'll always appreciate the latter's gritty, classy, fearless focus on plot over insipid clichés (most of the time, at least!). It's a show that's content to let character moments ooze through the cracks of individual plotlines, rather than smacking viewers over the head repeatedly with, say, season-long arcs centered on their love lives.

So when L&O does decide to slightly tweak its formula and focus more on the backstories one of the main cast members, it's usually worth sitting up and taking notice. Here, it's all about Detective Logan and a pedophile priest from his past played by Bill Raymond, along with a dead sex crimes detective Logan was friends with as a kid.

Chris Noth is more than up to the task, showcasing a more vulnerable side to his tough guy character. Dann Florek makes a welcome reappearance too as Donald Cragen; he helps Logan reconcile his complex feelings regarding what was done to him as a child and new revelations about his dead cop friend Marino. And Carolyn McCormick is here as Dr. Olivet, providing insight into the psychological tricks pedophiles use to ensnare their victims.

It's great stuff, and the DA's office has lots to do as they try to nail Father Joe Krolinsky for a growing list of decades-old crimes.

Ultimately, though, this is Logan's episode; the camera lingers on him before the end credits roll, his mind processing the preceding whirlwind events of "Bad Faith." Will he find closure? Watch and find out!