Many fans of Criminal Minds: Evolution are already looking forward to Matthew Gray Gubler returning as Spencer Reid when Season 3 of the revival premieres on the 2025 TV schedule, and now they’ve got something else to celebrate. The crime drama has already been renewed for Season 4, and Aisha Tyler’s reaction to the good news included an A+ reference to the movie Se7en.
It was confirmed on March 5 that Criminal Minds: Evolution (which can be streamed with a Paramount+ subscription) would return for a fourth cycle — or 19th, if you count the first 15 seasons that aired on CBS. Aisha Tyler was excited as she posted the news to her Instagram Stories, but I can’t help but be a little freaked out by her reference to one of the most mind-blowing plot twists in movie history, as she wrote:
It’s practically impossible for anyone who was around in 1995 to hear the words, “What’s in the box?” and not immediately flash to Se7en’s infamous ending and Brad Pitt as detective David Mills wailing as he realizes that his wife has become a victim of John Doe, one of the smartest movie villains, who murdered her to carry out the “envy” portion of his seven deadly sins rampage. (Sorry for the spoiler, but it’s been 30 years.)
Given the BAU’s Hannibal Lecter-esque relationship with serial killer Elias Voit (Zach Gilford), which is expected to continue in Season 3 following that unexpected Season 2 finale, the parallels between Se7en and Criminal Minds: Evolution aren’t lost on me. (Some commenters even suggested Spencer Reid was in the box, but I hope they weren’t just talking about his head.)
It is pretty exciting, and in addition to her cryptic Stories post, Aisha Tyler — aka Tara Lewis — also gave a spirited, “LFGOOOOOOOOOO 🔎🩸📝” on her Instagram page.
Meanwhile, Joe Mantegna (who plays David Rossi) invoked a different excellent piece of ‘90s media to celebrate the series’ continuation, using *NSYNC’s “Here We Go” on his own Instagram Stories post as the cheerful ditty to accompany that same image of the BAU members circled around a table staring at an open box that sits in the center of it:
I get fewer serial killer vibes from *NSYNC, but still, the box thing is pretty unsettling.
Criminal Minds: Evolution often occupies a space in Paramount+’s Top 10, so I’d imagine fans are pretty hyped about being just a couple of months away from Season 3’s premiere. Like the first two, the third season will contain 10 episodes, and this time, we'll pick up six months after the events of the Season 2 finale.
The Criminal Minds revival began filming its third season in August and wrapped in December, which is when Matthew Gray Gubler revealed that he’d “filmed a new episode of Criminal Minds.” We’ll have to see if Spencer Reid does, in fact, materialize for just one episode — and in what capacity — when Evolution Season 3 premieres on Thursday, May 8, on Paramount+.
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