Law & Order: Criminal Intent is an American police procedural drama television series set in New York City, where it was also primarily produced. Created and produced by Dick Wolf and René Balcer, the series premiered on September 30, 2001, as the third series in Wolf's successful Law & Order franchise. Criminal Intent focuses on the investigations of the major case squad in a fictionalized version of the New York City Police Department set in New York City's One Police Plaza. In the style of the original Law & Order, episodes are often "ripped from the headlines" or loosely based on a real crime that received media attention.
The series aired on NBC for the first six seasons but was moved to the NBCUniversal-owned USA Network starting with the seventh season to share costs and due to declining ratings. During its NBC run, each episode aired on USA the week after its original NBC airing. The 10th and final season premiered on Sunday, May 1, 2011, at 9 p.m. EDT with original cast members Vincent D'Onofrio and Kathryn Erbe starring as Detectives Robert Goren and Alexandra Eames, respectively, and featuring Jay O. Sanders as Captain Joseph Hannah. The series concluded on June 26, 2011, after 10 seasons comprising 195 episodes.
Premise
Criminal Intent follows The NYPD Manhattan "Major Case Squad", a force of detectives who investigate high-profile cases (in most cases, murder, kidnappings or major robberies), such as those involving VIPs, local government officials and employees, the financial industry, and the art world.
This series in the franchise is notable for its heavy focus on the motives and actions of the criminals, paralleling the investigation with scenes of the suspects' lives that show the audience circumstances that the investigators can, at most, only attempt to deduce. Each episode features a cold open of the victim and suspects in (at most) a few days leading up to the crime; these scenes are presented without context, and maintain suspense as to the perpetrator's identity and often motive, until the ensuing investigation reveals these. However, some episodes reveal the offender at the start, while leaving out other key details and presenting a puzzle, over which the detectives labor, and agonize, to discover; thereby they provide the plot conflict of the episode, and (usually) the resolution of the case: solving the crime, and (likewise) insinuating a plea, or verdict, of "guilty". Occasionally, however, either the detectives resign themselves to conviction being infeasible—or an acquittal or dismissal dramatizes the limits of criminal prosecution. Unlike other Law & Order series, most Criminal Intent episodes end with the detectives eliciting confessions, rather than continuing to the trial phase.
Seasons 1–4 (and 10) focus on Detectives Robert "Bobby" Goren and Alexandra Eames as the primary detectives in every episode. In seasons 5–8, the episodes then typically alternate between that team, and one composed of veteran Detective Michael "Mike" Logan and three female colleagues, Carolyn Barek in Season 5, Megan Wheeler in Season 6, and later episodes of Season 7, and Nola Falacci, in early episodes of Season 7. After season 7, Mike Logan retires from the NYPD, and 8 and 9 feature Detective Zack Nichols (Jeff Goldblum), paired with Wheeler (and occasionally Eames) in Season 8; and Serena Stevens in Season 9. In season 10, the Goren and Eames characters returned as lead characters.
The UK-aired version of Law & Order: Criminal Intent features the song "There's Only Me" by Rob Dougan in the opening credits (seasons 1–5). (Another Rob Dougan track, "I'm Not Driving Anymore", is used as the theme music for Law & Order and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.) From season 6 of the UK-aired version, the theme music is "Urban Warfare" by Paul Dinletir.
History Law & Order: Criminal Intent was created in 2001 by René Balcer and Dick Wolf. Balcer served as the show's executive producer, showrunner, and head writer for its first five seasons. The show dominated its original time slot on Sundays at 9:00 p.m. for its first three seasons (routinely beating its competition, ABC's Alias and HBO's The Sopranos, in households and in the 18–49 demographic), and was often the highest-rated show of the night, with an average audience of 15.5 million viewers. The show aired Sundays on NBC, with each week's episode being repeated on USA Network the following Saturday.
Beginning in season 4, it faced stiff new competition from ABC's night-time soap opera Desperate Housewives, a show that soon became the No. 1 drama on television. Although ratings for Criminal Intent further eroded in season 5 amid stiff competition, the series maintained respectable ratings through the season, enough to get it renewed for a sixth season on NBC.
Balcer left the show at the end of season 5, and the show was handed off to Warren Leight, a longtime Criminal Intent staffer. Under Leight's leadership, the show acquired a new, more melodramatic tone.
When NBC had acquired the rights to Sunday Night Football for the 2006–2007 season, Law & Order: Criminal Intent was moved to a new time slot on Tuesdays at 9:00 p.m., to serve as a lead-in to fellow Law & Order spin-off, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. For its first five airings, it faced CBS's The Unit and baseball on Fox. In late October, Fox's hit series House moved opposite Law & Order: Criminal Intent.
In May 2007, NBC faced a choice of renewing either Criminal Intent or the original Law & Order, which had seen a ratings increase in the last few episodes of its 17th season. Ultimately, because of Criminal Intents weak ratings, NBC picked up Law & Order. Criminal Intents new episodes were moved to the NBCUniversal-owned USA Network, where it could be expected to attract a much larger audience than the cable channel's average. The remaining episodes from the seventh season began running on June 8, 2008. Production on the show was halted temporarily in December 2007 due to the writers' strike.
For its move to the USA Network, the version of the Law & Order theme used for the show's opening credits was replaced by the version originally used on the short-lived Law & Order: Trial by Jury.
On May 22, 2008, USA Network renewed Criminal Intent for an eighth season. Season 7 was the top-rated television series on basic cable, having more than quadrupled the audience for the 10 p.m. Thursday slot on USA Network when compared to the ratings from the previous year. Nielsen ratings for the week of July 13, 2008 showed that Criminal Intent was ranked sixth overall on top 20 cable ratings, with a viewer base of 4.899 million viewers. The network ordered 16 episodes, which were originally to begin broadcasting in November 2008, but the network moved the premiere back, first to February 5, 2009, then with an expected date of spring–summer 2009, and finally announcing the start date as April 19. The only change in cast members from the seventh season was Chris Noth's departure and replacement by Jeff Goldblum. At the end of season 7, Leight, who left to focus on In Treatment, was replaced by new executive producers Walon Green and Robert Nathan. In December 2008, Nathan left the show after completing two Goldblum episodes. Law & Order co-executive producer and writer Ed Zuckerman then picked up Nathan's assignment while continuing his duties for the original Law & Orders 19th season. Michael Chernuchin co-executive produced Green's episodes, and Tim Lea co-executive produced Zuckerman's episodes. Other executive producers on the series were Norberto Barba, Peter Jankowski, Diana Son, Julie Martin, and Arthur W. Forney. Charlie Rubin was the supervising producer, and Balcer, Eric Overmyer, and Siobhan Byrne O'Connor were consulting producers. In April 2009, NBC began airing Law & Order: Criminal Intent season 8 encores a few days after they premiered on USA.
D'Onofrio, Erbe, and Bogosian left the series in the season 9 premiere, which aired in two parts on March 30 and April 6, 2010. Walon Green, Peter Jankowski, John David Coles, and Dick Wolf were the executive producers for the ninth season of Criminal Intent.
Media outlets reported in August 2010 that actor Jeff Goldblum (Detective Zachary Nichols) had decided to leave the cast of Law & Order: CI, citing concerns about the show's future. The option to return on all the actors formally expired on July 31, 2010 after being extended by a month on June 30, 2010 when they were originally up. A final decision by the USA Network over whether the series would be renewed for another season had not been announced at that time.
On September 22, 2010, Variety announced that Criminal Intent had been renewed, and that Vincent D'Onofrio would be returning to the series as Detective Robert Goren for its final season. Kathryn Erbe subsequently signed on to reprise the role of Detective Eames for the eight-episode final season of Law & Order: Criminal Intent. Chris Brancato was announced as the executive producer/showrunner for the final eight-episode season of Law & Order: CI. Brancato succeeded Walon Green, who served as the showrunner during the eighth and ninth seasons.
Prior to the season premiere, creator Dick Wolf was hoping the series would be renewed for an 11th season, versus ending with season 10. "Being the unbridled optimist that I am, I still have hope that this is a 'victory lap' and not a 'swan song,'" Wolf said during a conference call. "Based on the work so far, I think the audience is going to be very happy, relieved, and welcoming ... and hopefully enough fans will come out so the powers-that-be reconsider their decision." New showrunner/EP Chris Brancato suggested that the show could be picked up for an 11th season if the intended final episodes garnered sufficient ratings. The tenth season ended on June 26, 2011, and USA Network announced the following month that they were choosing not to air more episodes of the series due to costs. When asked if LOCI would be taken back by NBC, Wolf tweeted, "USA Network decided not to pick up #LOCI for another season. We hoped ratings & fans could change their mind but. ... I've learned to never say never but most execs are looking for something new. We truly appreciate our loyal fans! Thank you."
In August 2012, it was announced that Kathryn Erbe would be playing her character Alexandra Eames again in Law & Order: Special Victims Units fourteenth season. Detective Eames transferred out of Major Case, and is now working for a joint City/Federal Homeland Security Task Force, and crosses paths with the SVU squad when their investigation of a sex trafficking ring uncovers a connection to terrorists. Warren Leight, who now is showrunner and executive producer on Law & Order: SVU, tweeted that Erbe's first episode would be the fourth of the season, "Acceptable Loss". Erbe later returned to guest star again in the fourteenth season of SVU in the episode "Poisoned Motive".
In February 2013, Warren Leight further tweeted on Criminal Intents ending, "... simply put, USA didn't make enough money on LOCI to justify even the final 8 [episodes] they did. they felt they owed it to the fans. ... And they certainly showed LOCI more loyalty than NBC did the Mothership." Leight further tweeted, "I think fans should enjoy the long run we had, and maybe hope for a MadeForTV movie if anyone ever makes those in future."