History TearJerker / CriminalMinds

-->'''Samantha:''' "Don't leave me."
-->'''Victim:''' ''(just recovering from paralysis)'' "Let us go."
-->'''Samantha:''' "I can't."
-->'''Reid:''' ''(walking into the room)'' "Samantha? Hi. My name's Spencer. I'm with the [=FBI=]. Listen, I know what your father did to you, and I want you to know that he can never ever hurt you again."
-->'''Samantha:''' ''(mechanically)'' "He never touched me, he's a good father, he loves me."
-->'''Reid:''' "I know that he probably forced you to say those things, punished you if you got it wrong, send you to the 'room with the lightning'?"
-->'''Samantha:''' "Yeah."
-->'''Reid:''' "The dolls that your father gave you, after he hurt you, what would happen to them?"
-->'''Samantha:''' "He... he kept them in his office with the other toys."
-->'''Reid:''' "And that's where he let you play with them?"
-->'''Samantha:''' "When I moved out, I had to take my friends with me, I couldn't... leave them behind."
-->'''Reid:''' "Of course. So, you went to get them. What did... what did you find?"
--> ''*Flashback of adult Samantha walking into her father's office, seeing him stroking the hair of a little girl holding her dolls*''
-->'''Reid:''' "Yeah. He gave them to another girl, didn't he? ''(Samantha nods)''... [[Heartwarming/CriminalMinds do you want them back?]]"
-->'''Samantha:''' "He couldn't. He said they were gone for good."
-->'''Reid:''' "He lied. He's been lying to you for a very long time. Do you want to see them?"
-->'''Samantha:''' "... Can I?"
-->'''Reid:''' "Yeah! Yeah, do you want to play with them?"
-->''* Reid wheels out a child's suitcase and opens it, showing Samantha's dolls. She walks over with such a smile of childish delight as to inspire ManlyTears. She picks one up and starts to cry while cops and paramedics stream in.*''
-->'''Reid:''' "Listen, Samantha? You need to go with these men. But your friends can go with you, okay?"
-->'''Samantha:''' "They won't take... they won't take them away?"
-->'''Reid:''' "I promise, no one will ever take them away again."

** Even worse, we get a snapshot of some of the passengers in their final moments before the crash. They come from all walks of life and include a mother and her young son, a couple with their newborn baby, a woman flying with her friends to her own wedding (it is implied the groom is not on the same flight), and a white-collar man just trying to work. Their screams of terror as the plane takes a violent final nosedive reaches ''Film/United93'' levels of heartbreak.

** Hotch's interactions with Evan Abbey. He's able to relate to him as an absent father who works for the government in some way. It gets even more tragic when Hotch is informed that Evan is dying from leukemia, causing him to relate more when his own father was suffering in the same way. Not to mention Hotch being forced to watch the benzene fire, knowing that the man he's related to so much performed a HeroicSacrifice and a MurderSuicide.

* Reid's reply to a comment that he's good with kids is that he wanted to have some with Maeve. While he is assured there's still a chance for him to be a dad, his expression shows that he doesn't think so.

* The [=UnSub=] in "Fate" is a particularly tragic one. Ten months before the episode began, she suffered severe head trauma in a car accident. Because the frontal lobe of her brain was damaged, the [=UnSub=] lost her ability to control her anger, to the point that even a person doing something seemingly inconsequential to anger her would result in the [=UnSub=] flying into a homicidal rage. The [=UnSub=] is [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone clearly horrified]] by what she's doing, but literally cannot stop herself. When her husband realises she's the one committing the murders and gently tries to convince her to turn herself in, she panics, flies into another rage and kills him, only to instantly regret it, only for her daughter to walk in and then become the next potential target of her mother's rage. The BAU are quite sympathetic to the [=UnSub=], knowing her actions are beyond her control, and express hope a jury will go easy on her.

* Reid has to be honest with Cat Adams for fear of her blowing up the restaurant they're both in. He reveals that his mother has dementia, at one point she forgot who he was for 3 seconds. By the end Reid walks over to a swingset and has his own TraumaSwing moment.

* The killer in "Broken." He's killed six people, and at the end of the episode he tries to murder his father for the abuse he suffered after coming out, and then getting sent to [[CureYourGays a conversion camp]]. Later on he tries to make his best friend rape his father, to "turn him gay" in retribution for the abuse he suffered at the camp. In the struggle with his best friend for the handgun, the killer accidentally shoots him. He immediately regrets it, shoots his father almost as an afterthought, then starts clutching his friend's body and crying as he puts the gun to his own head. He's so horribly conflicted and desperate when the team arrives to talk him down that very few wouldn't sympathize with him. [[NightmareFuel Especially with what he suffered at the conversion camp.]]

* In "Fatal", the [=UnSub=] mentions that he went on a camping trip with his friend when they were six years old. It started to snow and they parted to search for more help. He made it out alive, but his friend did not and froze to death. Consequently, people said it was his fault, because they should not have split up and that is how they thought his friend died. Granted, the [=UnSub=] realizes that perhaps he made a mistake, but the entire ordeal left him suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, having to take antidepressants for most his life. Imagine being that young, stressed enough already that your friend died, and to make matters worse, people are blaming you for it. Thankfully, the discussion was quite brief and we do not see flashbacks, but still. The [=UnSub=] did mention after that occurred, his teacher visited him in the hospital and gave him a mythological book, which gave him a perspective on life and death.

* At the end of "Demons", Alex explains to Reid why she called him "Ethan" after he had been shot. Ethan was her son, who died at the age of nine because of a rare neurological disease. Alex is so traumatized by what has happened to Reid that she decides to quit the BAU. Lily Kershaw's song "Maybe", played during the final scenes, only makes it sadder. Finally, Reid caps it off with, "[[PutOnABus Goodbye, Alex]]."

* While they stop managed to stop the [=UnSub=] in "Rabid" and administer the cure to one of the victims before the rabies virus progressed too far, another victim who managed to escape was infected for far too long and she eventually slipped into a coma and died, leaving behind a husband and two daughters.
* The Day of the Dead celebration at the end of "In the Blood" straddles the line between this and heartwarming. The saddest moment has to be that while everyone gave an explanation of who they were honoring, Reid wordlessly displays a photo of Maeve.

* “25 to Life”: a man is wrongfully charged for the murder of his wife and daughter and spends 25 years in prison. For a long time, no one believed he was innocent. Upon his release, he’s immediately pegged as a murderer when he’s forced to kill a man in self-defense.
** The tape one of the [=UnSubs=] kept in her apartment contains footage from Don’s family. The team tries to prevent him from watching it as it also contains footage from the night his wife and daughter were killed. However, Don begs for them to watch it as it’s the only way he can remember his family. When he does, he replays the first part a couple of times.

* "Remembrance of Things Past" begins with a family heading to a sports game and not pausing to take a phone call from their eldest child before heading out the door. When she goes to voicemail, her dialogue gradually makes it clear that she's the terrified prisoner of a SerialKiller who is about to kill her and is making her give a message to her family. The way that she whimpers about how she'll probably be dead by the time they get the message as the camera pans over photos of her and her family hanging near the phone is brutal. A couple scenes later, her parents look especially devastated as the team interviews them.

* Morgan's eyes during Prentiss' return.

* J.J. telling her son a bedtime story over the phone, because she's trapped in Kansas overnight as a result of the weather.

* "The Company" is a rare tearjerker on the positive side. Morgan reuniting his presumed dead cousin, Cindi, with her family after eight years. The scene at the end and Morgan tearing up is the clincher.
** The entire plot with Cindi. She was abducted, conditioned, and raped by Malcolm Ford for years. If she ever did anything to displease him, he would physically harm her and force her into submission. When her family finds out what kind of life she’s been living, they are heartbroken and angry towards Ford. The team has to make sure Morgan is kept in line due to how personal the case is to him.

* "Mosley Lane": "He was alive yesterday?!"
** Just the way Stephan's father says it as it dawns on him that his son had been alive all those years, only to die just before the children were rescued.
** Let's face it, the whole end of that episode. Dry eyes are impossible.
* "Exit Wounds":
** Garcia, when one of the victims dies in her arms, and later, when she and Morgan discuss if her being able to handle blood in person means she's losing her humanity.
*** Garcia explaining that the reason she ran to the dying victim despite the danger it put her in was because when she was bleeding out from being shot, she despaired that the last person she would ever see would be the person who killed her, and she couldn't let someone else die believing the same thing.
** This episode has one of the ''[[{{Woobie}} woobiest]]'' [=UnSubs=] ever who kills people who leave town because of SEVERE abandonment issues and has a home life that redefines 'terrible'.
** Also, when suspect Josh is told that while he had been locked up, the serial killer struck again, which means it's not him. Unfortunately, the victim was his mother, his lone surviving relative. Kudos to Creator/EricLadin (Josh).

* In "Roadkill," Coakley realizing that he was responsible for his wife's death, resulting in him driving off the cliff. As he goes over the edge, he thinks he's holding his wife's hand again.
* In "Risky Business," when the teenaged [=UnSub=] who turns out to be the real [=UnSub=]'s most tortured victim and fully intends on killing himself to escape it all, Christopher gives Garcia his earring.
** J.J. pushing the case and having a ridiculous amount of insight as to why she believes the victims didn't commit suicide, revealing at the end that her sister killed herself when J.J. was eleven after giving her the necklace she'd worn throughout the entire episode.

* From the same episode, Matt as he talks to Cy and learns just what a PsychopathicManchild he is (he knew Cy was mentally handicapped, but always thought he was completely harmless). Cy tells him (in his usual cheerful, childish voice), how he "did things" with Matt's daughter and then burned away her ability to feel with sulfuric acid, and makes it clear that he's always hated his supportive and patient brother. When Matt eventually asks why Cy didn't hurt him instead, Cy then tells him that he planned to burn away his hearing, after making him listen to his daughter and wife's screaming. Ultimately, Matt forces himself to watch the tape Cy made of torturing his daughter, and tries to close his eyes and cover his ears when Cy burns her hands.

** The arrest of the [=UnSub=] is difficult to watch. "Daddy!... Daddy!" It's hard not to feel bad for Joe the clown with the state he's in, especially since he has the mental capacity of a young child, and the only reason he went to the Galen house was because he wanted to play with the eldest daughter. Unfortunately, he went into the parents' room by mistake and the father, believing Joe was there to hurt them, attacked in self-defense. Joe, being a rather a large man with no idea how strong he really is, retaliated out of fear and ended up killing the parents. Then there's the fact that Joe's father (the circus owner) tried to protect him by cleaning up the crime scene, taking Joe away (likely because he knew Joe would probably never survive prison), and making Joe pick a toy for each of the siblings from the circus booth in an attempt to have Joe make amends to the Galens. Poor Joe and his father. Even Rossi, [[ItsPersonal who's devoted 20 years of his life to the case]], looks saddened at the tragedy of it.

* During the aftermath of "The Wheels on the Bus" as Trent's body is wheeled out of the warehouse, Addyson has a look of pure shock and sadness on her face since she was forced to kill him during the game.]]

* Some sympathy can be thrown at Donnie Bidwell in "Carbon Copy." Before he become the [=UnSub=]]] of that episode, he was suspected and thrown in jail as he was suspected be the [=UnSub=] by the law enforcement in the area and the BAU for killing four nurses in 1998. While he was eventually exonerated and set free with the real [=UnSub=] being caught, his reputation was basically ruined and was made a pariah by the media. On top of that, a man who still thought he was a killer attacked him, leaving him him with a serious head injury that caused him chronic seizures and eventually led to a nervous breakdown. Combined with being bankrupt from paying all the legal fees and lawyer, losing his business in the process, his wife divorcing him, taking their children with her, remarrying and becoming pregnant with that man's child and can't seem to hold a job, it is no wonder he snapped and became easily manipulated by the Replicator. While it doesn't totally excuse his actions, and he did have a charge on his record, there is some truth in his words when he shouts ""Hard? Hard? You ruined my life!" at Alex during interrogation.
* "The Brothers Hotchner" Hotch's younger brother, Sean, witnesses a woman die (by bleeding out of literally '''every opening in her face''') at the nightclub he works at. He calls Hotch, and tells him what happened. After hearing Sean's story,he agrees it's suspicious, and says he'll asks the cops about any others deaths like that. Sean immediatly says he knows about one that happened a week ago. Another woman, Linda Hang, had died just like the woman Sean saw. Sean then goes on to answer every question Hotch asks about her, and even provides personal information about her. Hotch eventually asks Sean why he knows so much about her. Sean's answer?

* The backstory of the unsub from "Strange Fruit". When Charles was younger, he was captured by a small group of teenage Klansmen and was hung from a tree where they proceeded to castrate him because they believed that he raped a female classmate of his. A tragic highlight is Charles crying for help while he was being surrounded and dragged away to be punished for a crime he didn't commit.

* In "A Place at the Table" Hotch's father-in-law, Roy, is diagnosed with Alzheimer. Aside from still blaming Hotch for his daughter's death, he says that his illness is a blessing in disguise, so he can seemingly find peace while forgetting everyone else.

* William Taylor's story from "Awake". He was driving home with his five-year-old daughter after working a double shift. To prevent an accident due to his sleep deprivation, he pulled into a rest stop to shut his eyes for a little bit. When he woke up, his daughter was missing. Unable to cope with the guilt or to move on, he targeted random men, believing that one of them is the man who took his daughter. Things aren't much better when he found his daughter's dead body during a search. There's also the song associated with him and his daughter: "You Are My Sunshine". Not only that his daughter will not get real justice anytime soon as it is revealed that the man he suspected took his daughter is still real and still active and the BAU had a hard time believing that the Unsub is real as they brush it off as the man being sleep-derived.

* The old couple in "Future Perfect." The elderly lady was suffering a neurological disease that was terminal with her being given months to live and she and her husband were desperate to find a cure. The Unsub promised them a "treatment" and they eventually agreed to it. At the end though the "treatment" came at the expense of others and it will most likely wouldn't had worked anyway. The old lady eventually died the next day with her husband deeply mourning her death as the team looks on.

* The mother of one of the girls abducted by the Unsub in "Hostage" has spent years wondering what happened to her daughter, only to finally find out her child was held captive and abused by a sexual sadist, and to get to the hospital to find her daughter dying of complications from a miscarriage due to her abductor impregnating her by rape. The woman goes on to shoot the Unsub as the BAU are taking him away, and Hotch and Rossi clearly take no pleasure in having to arrest her for killing her daughter's tormenter.
** From the same episode, mixing with Awesome and Heartwarming, the Unsub's oldest victim finally breaking through the years of brainwashing and abuse he inflicted on him and screaming her real name defiantly in his face while crying and hitting him.
* As awful as the [=UnSub=] was in "Inner Beauty", it's hard not to sympathize with him after learning he was in love with a disfigured girl with anxiety and working to make her feel beautiful and confident. After helping build her up he brings her to a public place to help her with her anxiety, she feels as if everyone is staring and laughing at her. When he leaves to get their favorite wine for not two minutes, she has a panic attack, runs away and turns up dead two days later. Just imagine the sheer amount of guilt he could carry, for someone he was trying to help and love unconditionally.

* Reid in "Surface Tension" stays home with his mother for the most of the episode and boy does he get put through the wringer. He's trying to create a supplement to help her fight her dementia, using her as a guinea pig even though on some level he knows it won't work. There are some moments where she reminisces about things that even Spencer forgot, moments where his mother doesn't remember who he is, but the worst of it all is when she says she hates him after she flushes the medication.

* "Wheels Up" has the death of Stephen Walker. His wife, Monica identifies him in the morgue and breaks down in Luke's arms. The funeral for Walker is simply the icing on this cake of sadness.

* "The Bunker" has Joanna Miller reuniting with her sister Chrissy (who had been missing for years) at the end and also has Joanna finally meeting her nephew Joe.

* "Twenty Seven" has two [=UnSub's=] who attack innocent people with machetes in the middle of the street, the reason behind that being that they wanted to see how fast emergency services would react as a year prior, their younger brother was shot in front of a night club and the ambulance took twenty seven minutes to arrive at the scene. By that point their brother had already died. The sad tear jerker here being not only the younger brothers senseless death but also the fact that his brothers were with him the entire time, desperately waiting for the ambulance to arrive.

* Nathan Harris sitting in church, thinking the only way to help people in the future is to kill himself in the episode "Sex, Birth, Death". At the end of the episode he picks up a prostitute and, instead of playing out his fantasy, he attempts suicide to prevent himself from hurting others. He fails.

** Reid goes back to take the dilaudid from Tobias' pocket.

** A veteran with PTSD believes himself to be in a war zone. When the cops find him he sees a young boy and, believing that there is shooting going on, he runs toward the child and is shot when his action is misconstrued. As he dies he can only ask if the boy is all right.

* "In Name And Blood": Gideon's goodbye letter to Reid, ending with the words, [[WanderingTheEarth "I guess I'm looking for it again. The belief in happy endings."]] and set to "Barely Holding On" by Wes Nickson.

* All of "Penelope". Garcia almost dying on the table. Morgan not picking up his phone and his absolute despair at finding out Garcia's been shot. Battle trying again and Morgan pushing a crying Garcia into the corner and giving her his gun. Garcia talking about how everything has to happen for a reason, and if she stops believing that, then nothing makes sense.

** The final scene has him sitting in a padded cell, calling his dead fiancee's cell phone over and over, just so he can listen to the away message. "Hey, this is Vicky! I can't come to the phone right now because I'm out living my life." He thought up the away message for her.

** The arrest of the [=UnSub=] is difficult to watch. "Daddy!... Daddy!" It's hard not to feel bad for Joe the clown with the state he's in, especially since he has the mental capacity of a young child and the only reason he went to the Galen house was because he wanted to play with the eldest daughter. Unfortunately he went into the parents' room by mistake and the father, believing Joe was there to hurt them, attacked in self defense. Joe, being a rather a large man with no idea how strong he really is, retaliated out of fear and ended up killing the parents. Then there's the fact that Joe's father (the circus owner) tried to protect him by cleaning up the crime scene, taking Joe away (likely because he knew Joe would probably never survive prison), and making Joe pick a toy for each of the siblings from the circus booth in an attempt to have Joe make amends to the Galens. Poor Joe and his father. Even Rossi, [[ItsPersonal who's devoted 20 years of his life to the case]], looks saddened at the tragedy of it.

** Reid tells Morgan about a particularly cruel prank played on him in high school; while in the library, a girl told him that another girl, the prettiest in school, wanted to meet him later. Going to the meeting place, Reid found the girls, the entire football team, and several other students all there. Stripped naked, Reid was tied to the goal post and despite all his begging, no one helped him. When he finally got loose around midnight and went home he discovered his mother, who was having one of her episodes, didn't even notice he was missing. Did we mention he was only twelve at the time?

--->'''Reid:''' That kid's face is really, uh, stuck in my brain. It's really, uh, I can't... and I... I wanna forget about him, and... I want to escape. [[note]]Even worse when you realize that the kid he's talking about is the [=UnSub=] from "3rd Life", in the moment mentioned above.[[/note]]

** Adam/Amanda. Abused by his step-father until he developed DID. The second personality, Amanda, regards it as her job to protect him and takes over when she realizes that, if he can be found competent, he'll go to jail for the crimes she committed. Reid's desperate "Adam?" and Morgan replying "He's gone" is heartbreaking.

* Re-watching "A Shade of Gray" once you know TheReveal. Those scenes at the beginning become absolute wet-works. The family holding a press conference, asking for the return of their son that they ''know'' will never come back. The way the mother leaves the interview with Prentiss, saying only "I have to lie down." The husband and wife embracing each other the whole time, trying to keep up their act while hiding the grief in their hearts. One more thing that could possibly be terrifying instead is watching the reactions of their other son throughout the episode. The way he averts his gaze at the press conference, or leaves the room to go play during the interview... they seem poignant at first, but once you know he's the [=UnSub=], the sadness becomes something else. This kid has absolutely no remorse for his actions, and his innocent kid brother died meaninglessly. Seeing the callous actions of the surviving brother just makes the victim's death more horrible to stomach.

:: : After four years of sexual sadists, sociopaths, and every other kind of disturbed individual, Vince is probably the most tragic villain yet. While his acts are horrible, he's really a victim of his traumatic past and his mental illness, and is so consumed with remorse for his actions that even when he falls back into his old habit, he provides evidence for the police and FBI to use to catch him.

* Hotch watching Jack playing in the playground ''through a webcam'' in the beginning of "Reckoner". Oh, ''Hotch''. Also when Garcia chokes back tears as Hotch says "Happy birthday, buddy", to Jack on the camera.

* Tamer than most other examples on the page, but it can be quite upsetting to see Paul Davies, AKA Dante, from "The Performer" break down in tears in his manager's arms - and this is before he realizes that the murders are linked to him in any way. Watching him spend the episode desperately trying and failing to keep up his celebrity alter ego and knowing that it's driving him to drinking and taking drugs until he can't even remember what he spends his nights doing makes you wonder about the mental states of real life celebrities. Davies even asks if he has to attend a party "as him", and the actor's tone makes it clear that Dante isn't considered a character any more; he's a person who's taken over and completely ruined the life of a performer who used to genuinely enjoy their work.

* "Exit Wounds"

*** Garcia explaining that the reason she ran to the dying victim despite the danger it put her in was because when she was bleeding out from being shot, she despaired that the last person she would ever see would be the person who killed her and she couldn't let someone else die believing the same thing.

-->'''Reid:''' "Of course. So you went to get them. What did... what did you find?"

-->'''Reid:''' "Yeah. He gave them to another girl, didn't he? ''(Samantha nods)'' ...[[Heartwarming/CriminalMinds do you want them back?]]"

* Poor Jodie Hatchett in "Solitary Man." Not only was her father the criminal of the week, he ends up killing himself in the end. Not only did she lose her mother sometime back, but she lost her father also. It's even sadder that even if he had lived, he would had been thrown in jail. Even if he didn't do those horrifying acts, they will never really be a true family as his job prevented him from properly taking care of her and Child Services agreed that wasn't a good idea, deemed him as a unfit parent and had her be put in foster care until she could be adopted. The only reason why her father did these things was so he can find the perfect woman to be a mother to Jodie so he didn't have to be separated from her. Not only that, the family that was going to adopt changed their minds and only thanks to an aunt taking her in that she didn't have to stay in the foster care system and have a chance at normal life.

** Also the bit after Ellie is rescued, and we learn from her mother that she's been blaming herself for getting kidnapped even though she is in no way to blame.

** Shortly before this, we have this dialogue during the stand off.

-->'''Emily:''' Don't start. (sees Garcia's hurt look) I'm sorry. I'm--I'm gonna be all right.

-->'''Emily:''' (laughs) No. No, I just... I'm not sleeping. I'm having this nightmare. It's a recurring nightmare. There's a hill and there's a little girl on top of the hill... She's, like, six years old, dark hair... and she's just dancing in the sun. But somehow I know she's waiting for me, so I start to walk up the hill, but the hill gets steeper and steeper, and by the time I climb to the top, the little girl's gone. And I, I look everywhere for her, and when I can't find her, I start to panic, and I panic because I know what's waiting out there for her. I know what the world can do to a girl who only sees beauty in it. Like you. (Garcia is taken aback, touched.) Somehow, you... you always make me smile. And I don't think I've ever thanked you for that.

** Reid's reaction to grief counseling is particularly gutting. "I mean, what are we doing? If we can't even protect one another, then what's the point of it?" Of course protecting one another is their first priority.

* In "Dorado Falls", the [=UnSub=], Luke Dolan, was a highly decorated Navy [=SEAL=] who had gotten out of the service but had walked into his former [=CO's=] tech business and executed everyone in the building. He then kidnaps a high-ranking General and behaves like he's suffering from a paranoid delusion that there is a massive government conspiracy that only he can unravel. He later visits his parents, but kills them after he believes that they are impostors. Reid deduces that he has [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capgras_delusion Capgras Syndrome]] after suffering head trauma in a recent car accident, which makes him believe that everyone he sees is an impostor or fake. He is talked down by his wife and daughter via intercom [[hottip:*:The delusion works visually; hearing the "real" person's voice does not trigger the impostor reaction]] and he surrenders peacefully. He is convinced to keep his eyes closed by his wife, and is being blindfolded to head to the hospital, when his daughter enters the room and cries to him. He wriggles out of the blindfold, sees his wife and daughter, and instantly believes them to be impostors. He is then dragged from the room kicking and screaming. It is heavily implied that now that the [=UnSub=] has connected his family into his delusion so that it will be almost impossible for him to ever see them as "real" again.

** Also from "Epilogue," Prentiss' revelation that when she briefly died the previous year, she didn't see anything but darkness and cold. Given her very complicated history with religion -- and the fact that Reid remembers warmth and bright light from his near-death experience, even though the place he died wasn't warm or bright -- it's clear that the implications are scaring her.

*** Also Hope's childhood friend, who blames herself for what happened (not helped by the fact that the [=UnSub=] left her a note thanking her). As if all that wasn't enough, the [=UnSub=] truly believed himself to be in love with Hope. It devastated Monica, having to be told by the [=UnSub=] how her daughter was kidnapped, seeing the place where she had to live with him and then learning of her pregnancy and suicide...

* In "A Thin Line" the [=UnSub=] murders families with children and then kills African-American men and undocumented immigrants to try and let them take the fall for the murders to help a bigoted racist win election for Mayor. The murder of the families and the innocent fall guys would be bad enough on it's own but in the opening scene in which the second family is killed Mackenzie, the young daughter, is instructed to call 911 by her father while he goes to check out the situation. As she is on the phone with the operator we hear gunshots and her family screaming until finally, Mackenzie herself is dragged out from under the bed and shot dead. To make matters ''even'' worse, we later find out that her younger brother was only six months old and he died as his mother tried to shield him with her own body.

** Tony Todd playing the RedHerring. On the surface it's NightmareFuel, because of his behavior around Reid and the fact that it's Creator/TonyTodd. However, his behavior is really because he's in anguish that his ex-wife and children have been slaughtered. A crime he himself was accused of committing.

** Throughout that whole episode, Sarah Jean is just the nicest and kindest woman on death row ever. She tells Reid that his mother should be proud of his being a doctor so young, she tells Gideon that he has a lovely smile, and she and the Warden get along so well that he's willing to talk to her about his children. And despite the fact that she was innocent, she still dies.

** The UnSub's life. His father went off the rails and descended into apocalyptic ranting. He verbally and physically abused Tobias, even branding him on the forehead at 10-year-old and beating him harder if he wore a hat. The abuse was so bad that Tobias' AA sponsor's reply to being told that the BAU suspects Tobias of killing Charles is "Good for him," and that Tobias deserves to get away as far from reality as possible. After Reid shot Charles (as Tobias' alter), Tobias manages to front for the last moments of his life. He sounds overjoyed when he tells Reid that "You killed him," and wonders if he would see his mother again (she had left his father for another man), DyingAsYourself.

** The [=UnSub=]'s backstory is heartbreaking. She was raped by two men, and [=LaMontagne=] Sr. was the only person who believed her, which is why she contacted him. The trauma led to her dropping out of medical school and killing men, writing that they were asking to be stabbed, ripped, killed, just like they claimed she was asking for it.

** Frank's entire life situation even before the tragedy. His sister clearly cared for him and wanted to support him and did so financially, but her husband seemingly would have none of it, so Frank wasn't to visit his sister at her house. It's clear that to Frank his sister meant the world to him and having to get by with limited contact with her was not easy for him.

* While they stop managed to stop the [=UnSub=] in "Rabid" and administer the cure to one of the victims before the rabies virus progressed too far, one of victims who managed to escape was infected for far too long and she eventually slipped into a coma and died, leaving behind a husband and two daughters.

* In "Fatal", the [=UnSub=] mentions that he went on a camping trip with his friend when they were six years old. It started to snow and they parted to search for more help. He made it out alive, but his friend did not and froze to death. Consequently, people said it was his fault, because they should not have split up, that is how they think his friend died. Granted, the [=UnSub=] realizes that perhaps he made a mistake, but it left him scarred the entire ordeal left him with post traumatic stress older having him take antidepressants for most his life. Imagine being that young, stressed enough already that your friend died, and to make matters worse, people are blaming you for it. Thankfully, the discussion was quite brief and we do not see flashbacks, but still. The [=UnSub=] did mention after that occurred, his teacher visited him in the hospital and gave him a mythological book, which gave him a perspective on life and death.

* While they stop managed to stop the [=UnSub=] in "Rabid" and managed to administer the cure to one of the victims before the rabies virus progressed too far, one of victims who managed to escape, was far too long and she eventually slipped into a coma and die, leaving behind a husband and two daughters.