"Through the Looking Glass" pitted the BAU against an unsub who had a difficult time dealing with his disappointment around the lack of idyllic families. After murdering the first of two, he decided to teach the second family a lesson. 

It wasn't quite so easy this week to sympathize with our UnSub I suppose. As Blake said, "there is no such thing as an ideal family."

Mind you, the Acklins pretty much epitomized the dysfunction junction of families, so perhaps he couldn't have picked a better group to satisfy his goal to ensure that they "appreciate what they had," what with those blank bullets and all. Their list of sins didn't seem all that spectacular. just a little banal: dad was unfaithful, mom was a shopaholic and daughter was either a recreational druggie or junkie. Although it was a little unsettling to find out that mom's view of homicide was a little bit...flexible.

He did manage to get the family unit talking to each other, so there's that.

It was interesting to see Blake beginning to fit in with the unit. I have to admit, this week she sort of grew on me a bit, particularly when she threw a quick joke at Reid about his perhaps having Asperger Syndrome (which of course he missed). I kind of expected she and Morgan would have some more sparks as they did in the Season 7 premiere, but this time they seemed to work well together in questioning one of their suspects.  

Reid is always an unintentional source of amusement actually: his quick reply to the Ravenwood Camp director's question about the problem with America got me laughing out loud:

Camp director: Do you know what the biggest problem in America is today?
Reid: We're losing the war against antibiotic resistance.
Camp director: Smartphones. | permalink

Has anyone ever heard of Japanese minivans from the 90s being referred to as "base camps of pleasure"? That was news to me - and Google appears to be silent about it.

Beth's big news came as a surprise. I expected her to say she was pregnant. Instead she's moving to New York to take on a new job, so it looks as though she and Hotch will be doing some travelling. I was glad to see that they didn't sabotage that relationship, given his previous ex-wife's horrific death. Plus, she's a good fit: sexy, loves to laugh and seems to really like Jack. I'm guessing that we won't see much of her this season.

And, finally, we have another good exchange between Morgan and Garcia. Of course, one person's cute is another's cloying:

Morgan: Hey sweetness. What have you got?
Garcia: Tidbits as juicy as you, love shack. | permalink

So what did you think of the episode? Are you enjoying the Garcia-Morgan weekly flirt-gab? What's your impression of Blake?  

Douglas Wolfe was a staff writer for TV Fanatic. He retired in 2016. Follow him on Twitter

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