Criminal Minds generally isn't the show many of us think of when it comes to television romance, and the show has always focused more on catching criminals than sending its characters into the dating pool. Well, one big romance already began blooming (or re-blooming, in this case) in Season 14, and now another is in the works. Emily Prentiss is getting a love interest, and he should be able to keep up with her.
The new love interest for Emily Prentiss will be a Supervisory Special Agent by the name of Andrew Mendoza. Stephen Bishop of Imposters fame landed the role. You don't have to worry that Mendoza will be introduced in one episode and then solely exist as an off-screen love interest for Prentiss. TVLine reports that Bishop is on board to recur in Season 14, so we should see a decent amount of him.
You also don't have to worry that Prentiss and Mendoza will bond over something mundane. They'll come together in an exceedingly Criminal Minds kind of way. She'll meet him in an unexpected way, and showrunner Erica Messer (who recently weighed in on how long she thinks Criminal Minds should last) states that "they are able to kind of hit it off even though" the circumstances aren't ideal for building a romance.
What are these circumstances? Well, unsurprisingly, they will be bloody. The episode will center on a situation in which someone is being killed every 27 minutes in Washington. The murder weapon? A machete. Erica Messer also teased that the episode "almost plays in real-time," so it should be an intense hour of television.
For this case, Pretiss will be working closely with the field office in Washington, and she'll have to collaborate with Mendoza, whose position is more or less equal to hers in her own office. Unless Mendoza is transferred to the BAU we all know and love, these two won't be direct coworkers as they work out their feelings for each. That's probably good news for the rest of the BAU!
Honestly, good for Prentiss that she's getting some love in Season 14, along with Rossi. Given that Season 14 could be the final for the long-running series, perhaps the introduction of Mendoza could lead to a happily-ever-after for Prentiss. Of course, that wouldn't be riding off into the sunset for somebody like her, but she deserves to be happy.
Three episodes of the 15 that were ordered for Season 14 have already aired, and one of those was the 300-episode milestone. If Criminal Minds does wind up cancelled at the end of Season 14, nobody can claim that it wasn't a successful series for CBS. Ending at Season 14 would mean it falls short of someday matching the season count of fellow CBS show NCIS or NBC's juggernaut Law & Order: SVU. We'll have to wait and see.
Hopefully we won't have to wait too long to see Stephen Bishop in action as SSA Andrew Mendoza. New episodes of Criminal Minds air on Wednesdays at 10 p.m. ET on CBS. For more viewing options now and in the not-too-distant future, swing by our fall TV premiere schedule.
