Remember Me

So, so bad - I am literally surprised this got the green light to aor. The girl Lourdes was so unconvincing . Her acting was marginally better in part two. Miguel not much better. Storyline interesting enough but overall an underwhelming episode in an underwhelming season.

SPOILER: Way back when SVU debuted the episode concerned some women from Kosovo recognized a Serbian terrorist who was a serial rapist of Moslem women. 19 years later while at a club in Manhattan, Genesis Rodriguez spots the coyote took her across the border. Carlos Miranda. She instantly snaps, but she's worked out somewhat whatever she might do if she ran into this creep again.

She comes on strong and Miranda thinks he's getting a little something something. But she pulls a gun on him and takes him hostage and pistol whips the older man she was staying with.

An open and unsecured cellphone gives her situation away. But Olivia Benson gets caught up by the perpetrator in a truly stupid move which is why the episode gets so low a rating. She and another patrolman are now hostages as well.

While Miranda protests his innocence, maybe he just looks like the coyote who did her wrong. Mariska Hargitay starts to slowly believe her. Just a question of reaching Rodriguez.

Unlike the other reviewers I was blown away by Rodriguez. She is one scary and wronged woman. She was the best thing about this story.

First impressions on my first watch when "Remember Me" first aired were not good at all, with the dull, repetitive story, the unspeakably bad guest turn and Olivia's behaviour particularly standing out in a bad way. 'Law and Order: Special Victims' varied wildly when it came to episodes revolving around hostage situations or have one as part of a case. When it did it well, it was hard hitting and suspenseful, like the climax of Season 14's "Poisoned Motive". When done badly, like here, it was needlessly melodramatic and severely lacking in tension.

"Remember Me" on rewatch is every bit as bad as remembered. Even worse actually, with the flaws being the same but even stronger and also managed to find more wrong it. Is it irredeemable? No, the worst episodes (such as "Intimidation Game") are very bad they all still had a couple of halfway decent things and "Remember Me" did have those. That however were lost underneath everything that was wrong. For me, and this was true for first watch, this is the worst episode of Season 19.

Beginning with the very few things that were good, some of the production values were slick and gritty enough. The music has moments of unsettlement without being too intrusive.

Had a low opinion on the acting this time, but there was an exception and that was a sturdy Ice-T who was the only one who seemed involved and concerned properly about what was a potentially tense situation. Appreciated that he wasn't underused

Did on the other hand feel that this time the acting was poor near-all round, something that even most of the other lesser episodes didn't suffer from. This is including the regulars, Mariska Hargitay more often than not is good and more and even brilliant, but she is at her most one dimensional here with perhaps two or three repeated expressions. Genesis Rodriguez's overwrought performance particularly sticks out like a sore thumb. Didn't find myself caring for any of the characters, including and especially Rodriguez's because of how extremely she behaves.

The episode moreover suffers from a very thin story that would only just about been enough to fill 25 minutes or so but feels really over stretched. And from a dull pace, especially in the second half where the story was clearly struggling to keep the exhaust fumes going. The dialogue is very repetitive, as is everything that goes on in the apartment, everything regarding the past crime was like going round in wildly melodramatic circles. The tension is severely lacking, the climax is not nail biting or suspenseful but rather whatever.

Like most episodes from Season 19, this reviewer really hated Olivia's character writing, coming over as self-righteous and making up her mind and won't listen to another. Have had it with her being too trusting of victims and being insistent of them telling the truth when there have been some episodes where the victims lied. Team work is almost non existent for too much of the length, with a lot of staring at technology and there is nowhere near enough urgency.

In conclusion, very weak with many terrible things. 3/10.

I have had many things happen to me in life. It's unfortunate. It's frustrating. It's horrible. And it can be downright confusing. That doesn't mean I am going to hurt others equally (or more) to get my story told. That's not how life works. Years ago, I had my whole life changed by two racist professors in graduate school. They dug into my life and pretty well destroyed it. It took years for me to recover. Not many know of my story, not many can understand the significance of the hurt and damage they did to my life, nor did I get any justice for their wrongdoing, but I was also never taught to hurt others regardless of my perspective of needed justice for wrongs done to me.

This episode of Law & Order: SVU is teaching younger views - and, sadly, even some adults - that some crimes, especially if you have "had it worse," which is also a matter of your own perspective, is perfectly fine. If your story hasn't yielded enough attention, then commit a crime, especially against the person(s) that harmed you. And if someone gets hurt or killed in the process, as it did happen in this episode of Law & Order: SVU, then that's okay, too, because that's all that matters in the end, at least to those writing and running this show seem to suggest.

Seeking revenge is NEVER, ever an okay thing to do. It's that plain and simple. -CDM

Writers of this show clearly doesn't watch episodes written by other writers, there's just too much stupid inconsistencies regarding Olivia Benson. Sometimes she's just straight up refusing to bend the law in any way (just few episodes ago she gaslighted Alex Cabot to believe that she had no options and had to follow law and that costed abused women's life) but yet here we are once again with her defending murderer because she thinks something bad happened to her with absolutely no evidence at all. I can't even remember how many times they've talked the talk that vigilante justice isn't acceptable but they hardly ever walk the walk when it's alleged "rape victim". Murder is murder and that's absolutely black and white not any shade of grey.