“Misplaced Freeway” – LAW & ORDER: ORGANIZED CRIME, Pictured: Christopher Meloni as Det. Elliot Stabler. Photograph: Virginia Sherwood/PEACOCK ©2024 PEACOCK. All Rights Reserved
Season 5 picks up months after the season 4 finale, and although a lot has modified within the lifetime of Elliot Stabler and people round him, a lot has remained the identical. Character dynamics have shifted and grown, however Stabler feels extra, nicely, extra steady than ever earlier than.
Youngest Stabler little one Eli is beginning his subject coaching, brother Randall has caught round, matriarch Bernie is protecting the household collectively, attempting, no less than, and Elliot is doing what he’s all the time performed, what he does greatest – placing everybody’s wants forward of his personal.
The Organized Crime activity drive’s latest case is undoubtedly one of the vital attention-grabbing up to now, and that’s saying rather a lot for a present that always knocks it out of the park. Ayanna has requested Stabler to go undercover but once more, this time as an enormous rig driver to convey down a world smuggling ring. It’s not lengthy earlier than he’s charmed the powers that be and is employed to haul unlawful weapons and explosives. Whereas working, he uncovers extra disturbing info to help his group, together with the uncanny disappearance of some “lot lizards”, that’s, the ladies who frequent the truck yard.
“Misplaced Freeway” – LAW & ORDER: ORGANIZED CRIME, Pictured: Ainsley Seiger as Jet. Photograph: Virginia Sherwood/PEACOCK ©2024 PEACOCK. All Rights Reserved
As if Ayanna isn’t already on edge about forcing Stabler to go undercover, she rightly senses that she has not been given the complete image by Particular Agent Bruce Sheppard, the liaison with the FBI’s Northern Border Smuggling Initiative. He downplays the biker gangs as “slippery”, omitting {that a} earlier encounter with the gangs left his prison informant lifeless.
“Misplaced Freeway” – LAW & ORDER: ORGANIZED CRIME, Pictured: (l-r) Dean Norris as Randall Stabler, Ellen Burstyn as Bernadette Stabler. Photograph: Ralph Bavaro/PEACOCK ©2024 PEACOCK. All Rights Reserved
The episode will get heavy rapidly, but it surely’s not with out its brilliant moments. Ayanna meets up with Elliot to indicate him footage of Eli in his police uniform (seemingly from his academy commencement) and shares that she obtained the photographs from Randall, prompting Elliot to ask, “My brother Randall? Since when are you two BFFs?”. As Elliot can’t be in attendance for Eli’s celebration, he sends him a heartfelt voicemail telling his son, “It’s been an honor to observe you develop as much as be the person that you’re as we speak. It’s an honor to be your dad. I really like you.”
“Misplaced Freeway” – LAW & ORDER: ORGANIZED CRIME, Pictured: (l-r) Nicky Torchia as Eli Stabler, Kiaya Scott as Becky. Photograph: Ralph Bavaro/PEACOCK ©2024 PEACOCK. All Rights Reserved
Stabler befriends the daughter of one of many working ladies, Bunny, and it’s his inquiry into her sudden departure that forces him to confront his boss in true Stabler type. After he valiantly rescues Bunny, stowing her away in a truck he borrows from the truck yard, he’s all of a sudden T-boned by the boss’ brother, Vic.
This episode was, as anticipated, fast-paced and energetic, and with the primary two episodes of the season premiering on April 17, followers had been led proper into episode 2, Dante’s Inferno. A extremely anticipated episode with a extremely anticipated particular visitor star, Mariska Hargitay. We hadn’t seen Olivia Benson since Season 3, when Elliot gifted her a compass necklace to information her therapeutic journey and function a reminder that he was nonetheless along with her even when out on an undercover project.
If we needed to give this premiere a score, it might be a stable 10/10. I’m keen to listen to your ideas on the episode and what you stay up for most this season. Let me know within the feedback!
