The Angel Maker
Directed by Glenn Kershaw
Written by Dan Dworkin & Jay Beattie
An UnSub copies the MO of a serial killer who was executed a year ago, planting his semen at the crime scene and stabbing holes into the victims' abdomens, leading the town the murders are occurring in to fear he's come back from the dead. The investigation soon reveals that the copycat is the serial killer's groupie, trying to complete his work in order to get closer to him.Written by Dan Dworkin & Jay Beattie
Hotchner: "We all die. The goal isn't to live forever. The goal is to create something that will." Chuck Palahniuk.
Tropes
- Elephant in the Living Room: How Rossi address the DNA of a dead man being found at a crime scene.Rossi: Do we have parachutes on [the jet]?
Reid: Standard-issue on all federal aircraft.
Rossi: Then let's use one on the elephant in the room, get him out of here. - "Eureka!" Moment: Emily trying to work out what the dots on the victims' stomachs mean, walks outside and looks up at the stars – and then it dawns on her. They represent constellations.
- Evil Twin: On the plane ride over, Reid in all seriousness suggests that they're dealing with the original killer's eviler twin. The rest of the BAU can only stare at him dumbfounded, and even he seems to realize it was a dumb idea.
- I Can Change My Beloved: The BAU discusses this trope when they mention the reformer type of killer groupie, those who believe they can make their object of obsession into a better person. The UnSub on the other hand has hybristophilia and is attracted to the killer for their violent nature.
- I Can Still Fight!: Hotch still has a concussion from the explosion a couple episodes ago. but insists on working on this case.
- Jack the Ripoff: The UnSub is a woman obsessed with the executed Angel Maker who continues where he left off.
- Monster Clown: Garcia comments that John Wayne Gacy was one.
- Monster Fangirl: The Angel Maker had a number of these. The UnSub is one, while Prentiss and Rossi meet another who tries to follow in her footsteps.
- More Deadly Than the Male: The BAU initially think the copycat is a male fan, but eventually realize the UnSub is a woman.
- Must Have Coffee: When Reid says he'd need the ability to clone himself and a year's supply of Adderall, Rossi decides that coffee will suffice.
- Never Found the Body: Subverted, as the Angel Maker was executed with witnesses, but when they try to exhume him the casket is empty, and they start doubting whether he was dead in the first place. Turns out the Unsub engaged in some grave robbing.
- Public Secret Message: The Angel Maker sends incredibly bad poetry to the fan who is his real girlfriend. Reid figures out it uses a 16th century binary code that he can solve in his head.
- Ripped from the Headlines: Subverted. The real-life serial killer known as the Angel Maker was a 19th-century Englishwoman who murdered children left in her care by single mothers. This episode features a female serial killer with a celestial theme, who is copying the male serial killer who was in-universe dubbed "the Angel Maker".
- Shout-Out: Rossi says he only has groupies coming to his book signings if Barry Manilow isn’t in town.
- Someone to Remember Him By: Subverted. The Angel Maker's girlfriend tried to invoke this trope by having his baby, only for the baby to die shortly after birth.
- Steel Eardrums: Averted. Hotch hasn't fully recovered from the explosion last episode. The air pressure on the plane causes him visible pain, and gunshots in the finale make him double over.
- Stylistic Suck: The Angel Maker and his girlfriend wrote horrible poetry to each other, Rossi even comments that you'd have to actually try to be this terrible. Reid sees that it's a code right away. It helped that the poems describe non-existent locations and experiences which the Angel Maker never had, and that his actual writings indicated that he was a decent writer.
- Suicide by Cop: The UnSub commits this after stabbing the last constellation onto herself.
- Western Zodiac: Averted. The constellations the Unsub makes on her victims are from a family called the Heavenly Waters.
- Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Garcia and clowns, ever since a birthday when one groped her chest and made a honking sound.
- Hotchner: Wendall Berry said, "The past is our definition. We may strive, with good reason, to escape it, or to escape what is bad in it, but we will escape it only by adding something better to it."
