YMMV / Law And Order Special Victims Unit S 16 E 23 Heartfelt Passages

• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Dodds, an interesting character with a decent amount of story potential, dies after not even a full season with the series. While it's understandable that he had to be written out of the unit (since Andy Karl couldn't appear with that kind of regularity going forward), they could have, as mentioned below, written him off in a way that would allow the character to make occasional guest appearances or even potentially come back to the show on a more regular basis if Karl's schedule opened up at some point in the future, giving the character a chance to continue developing, instead of slamming that door shut permanently.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Sergeant Mike Dodds is leaving SVU for an assignment in the Joint Terrorism Taskforce just as the audience was getting to learn more about him. Instead of having him take the already built up Put on a Bus, leaving the door open for future appearances, he gets shot in a hostage situation gone bad and ends up dying in the hospital.
• Tear Jerker: Mike Dodds' death, made infinitely worse by the fact that it initially seems like he's going to be okay.
  • Watching Dodds Sr., who usually doesn't show much emotion at all, break down completely when he tells Olivia what's happened.