Criminal Minds: Evolution has reached the midpoint of its fourth season and so far, we’ve had a string of truly disturbing cases and an enticing setup for the season’s major antagonist. However, Season 4, Episode 5 completely slows down the show’s momentum, which is slightly concerning considering there are only five episodes left to cover the BAU’s battle with the Fan while still balancing the screen time with compelling cases. Thus far, the Fan has only made one major move that teases how much of a threat he is going to be, and Episode 5 riles up the anticipation for the villain, albeit in a slow-moving storyline. Meanwhile, this week’s case kicks off close to home, right within the FBI’s training centers, where a familiar face meets an untimely demise.
‘Criminal Minds: Evolution’ Season 4, Episode 5 Delivers a Predictable Central Case
Episode 5 opens with what seems to be a hostage situation in progress, with two FBI agents cornering the perpetrator and the hostage. When there’s a clear opening, Agent Lowell (Xavier Jimenez) shakily takes the shot and hits a bullseye right in the attacker’s head. But then the lights flick on. Turns out, this was simply an FBI training exercise, and Lowell was supposed to have a blank in his gun, not a lethal bullet that ended the life of his trainer, Milliken (Jamison Jones). You may also recognize Milliken from Evolution Season 4, Episode 2, where he had approached the BAU with a case since he and Alvez (Adam Rodriguez) were close after joining a war veteran recovery program together in the past.
Upon the news of Milliken’s death, Alvez is plunged right back into the depths of grief so shortly after losing Roxy, though, strangely enough, his grief during this episode is not nearly as convincing as in Episode 2. Prentiss (Paget Brewster) decides to permit Alvez to work on the case, and naturally, he interrogates Lowell and the witnesses more aggressively and defensively than he usually would, especially when he finds out that Milliken was a borderline abusive trainer. Green (Ryan-James Hatanaka) and JJ (A.J. Cook) are constantly trying to reel him back in, particularly when they theorize that Milliken may have been orchestrating his own suicide rather than Lowell intentionally committing murder.
Collider Exclusive · Horror Survival Quiz Which Horror Villain Do You Have the Best Chance of Surviving? Jason Voorhees · Michael Myers · Freddy Krueger · Pennywise · Chucky
Five killers. Five completely different ways to die — if you’re not smart enough, fast enough, or self-aware enough to avoid it. Only one of them is the villain your particular set of instincts gives you a fighting chance against. Eight questions will figure out which one.
🏕️Jason
🔪Michael
💤Freddy
🎈Pennywise
🪆Chucky
01
Something feels wrong. You can’t explain it — you just know. What do you do? First instincts are the difference between the survivor and the first act casualty.
02
Where are you most likely to find yourself when things go wrong? Setting is everything in horror. Where you are determines which rules apply.
03
What is your most reliable survival asset? Every survivor has a quality the villain didn’t account for. What’s yours?
04
What kind of fear is hardest for you to fight through? Knowing your weakness is the first step to not dying because of it.
05
You’re with a group when things start going wrong. What’s your role? Horror movies are brutally clear about who survives group situations and who doesn’t.
06
What’s the horror movie mistake you’re most likely to make? Honest self-assessment is a survival skill. Denial is not.
07
What’s your best weapon against something that can’t be stopped by conventional means? Every horror villain has a weakness. The survivors are always the ones who find it.
08
It’s the final scene. You’re the last one standing. How did you make it? The final survivor always has a reason. What’s yours?
Your Survival Odds Have Been Calculated Your Best Chance Is Against…
Your instincts, your strengths, and your particular way of thinking under pressure point to one villain you actually have a fighting chance against. Everyone else — good luck.
Camp Crystal Lake · Friday the 13th
Jason Voorhees
Jason is relentless, but he is also predictable — and that is the gap you would exploit.
He moves in straight lines toward his target. He doesn’t strategise, doesn’t adapt, doesn’t outsmart. He simply pursues.
Your ability to keep moving, use the environment, and resist the panic that freezes most victims gives you a genuine edge.
The Crystal Lake survivors were always the ones who stopped running in circles and started thinking about terrain, water, and distance.
You think like that. Which means Jason, for all his indestructibility, would face someone who simply refused to be where he expected.
Haddonfield, Illinois · Halloween
Michael Myers
Michael watches before he moves. He is patient, methodical, and almost impossible to detect — until it’s too late for anyone who isn’t paying close enough attention.
But you are paying attention. You notice the shape in the window, the car parked slightly wrong, the silence where there should be sound.
Michael’s power lies in the invisibility of ordinary suburbia — the fact that nothing ever looks wrong until it already is.
Your spatial awareness and instinct to map every room, every exit, and every shadow before you need them is precisely the quality Laurie Strode had.
You are not a victim waiting to happen. You are someone who already suspects something is wrong — and acts on it.
Elm Street · A Nightmare on Elm Street
Freddy Krueger
Freddy wins by getting inside your head — using your own fears, your own memories, your own subconscious as weapons against you. That strategy requires a target who can be destabilised.
You are harder to destabilise than most. You’ve faced uncomfortable truths about yourself and you haven’t looked away.
The survivors on Elm Street were always the ones who understood what was happening and chose to face it rather than flee from it.
Freddy’s greatest weakness is that his power evaporates in the presence of someone who refuses to give him the fear he feeds on.
Your psychological resilience — the ability to stay grounded when reality itself becomes unreliable — is exactly the quality that keeps you alive here.
Derry, Maine · It
Pennywise
Pennywise is ancient, shapeshifting, and feeds on terror — but it has one critical vulnerability: it cannot function against someone who genuinely stops being afraid of it.
The Losers Club didn’t survive because they were braver than everyone else. They survived because they faced their fears together, and faced them honestly.
You ask the questions others avoid. You look directly at what frightens you rather than turning away.
That directness — the refusal to let fear fester in the dark — is Pennywise’s worst nightmare.
It chose the wrong target when it chose you. You are exactly the kind of person whose fear tastes like nothing at all.
Chicago · Child’s Play
Chucky
Chucky’s greatest advantage is that nobody takes him seriously until it’s already too late. He exploits the gap between how something looks and what it actually is.
You don’t have that gap. You take threats seriously regardless of how they present — and you never make the mistake of underestimating something because of its size or appearance.
Chucky relies on surprise, on the delay between recognition and response. You close that delay faster than almost anyone.
Your instinct to treat every unfamiliar thing with appropriate scepticism — rather than dismissing it because it seems absurd — is the exact quality that keeps you breathing.
Against Chucky, not laughing is already winning. You are very good at not laughing.
However, Alvez doggedly works on the case, trying to separate his emotions from the evidence in a glacially paced investigation. There’s also a redundant and predictable red herring, where Milliken is suspected of being suicidal due to issues in his marriage. But after Alvez reminisces about a conversation he had with Milliken about couple counseling and a conversation with his wife (Yvette Niper) that quickly dismissed the rumors of divorce, Alvez finally returns to Prentiss with a new theory, one that we are baffled no one considered before. What if Lowell was framed? Milliken had a history of being borderline abusive to trainees, and he constantly threatened to drop them from the FBI, so Lowell may have just been a patsy for someone else who wanted Milliken eliminated.
The Fan’s Storyline Continues at a Glacial Pace in ‘Criminal Minds: Evolution’ Season 4, Episode 5
Adam Rodriguez and Paget Brewster in Criminal MindsImage via Paramount+
Meanwhile, the elusive Fan makes his next move and sends a new stack of typewritten letters to Bryan (Paul F. Tompkin), the host of the podcast ‘The Sicarius Files’ and the bane of Prentiss’ life. Nestled between the fun references to The Shining, Bryan finally tells the team that these new letters say: “Some may call me a FAN. But HE must call me GOD.” If the entire ordeal around the Fan wasn’t chilling enough, the show also delivers the most creepily awkward and forced scene of Bryan hitting on Lewis (Aisha Tyler), who informs him that she is very happily married to a woman. Aside from the attempts at light-hearted humor, it is gratifying to see that Rossi (Joe Mantegna) is now firmly in Voit’s (Zach Gilford) orbit again, as he agrees to help Lewis with deciphering the message in the notes by meeting with Voit.
Upon speaking to Voit, it is clear that the Fan is not only challenging the renowned killer’s careless words about his fans being pathetic, but also seeking his ultimate approval — the Fan needs Voit, his idol, to grant him the status of GOD. By sending the notes to Bryan instead of the bureau, he is also sending another decisive message about communicating through the podcast. However, Voit decides that instead of himself, Rossi should be the one to participate in a live podcast with Bryan. If the Fan is following Voit closely, then he would also have read Rossi’s books. Thus, Rossi’s voice may be the only one the Fan could potentially respect and surrender to. These are all interesting explorations and set-ups for the season-long antagonist, but the storyline within this episode moves along at a sluggish pace that is hindered by prolonged, unnecessary scenes of attempted comedy and repeated theories.
‘Criminal Minds: Evolution’ Season 4, Episode 5 Ends on an Explosive Note
Paul F. Thompkins in Criminal MindsImage via Paramount+
The final ten minutes of Episode 5 is when the pace quickens and the stakes finally feel real. At the bureau, the BAU are finally connecting the dots about who could have access to the guns the trainees were using and who would actually want Milliken dead. Eventually, their suspicions land on his Chief of Staff, O’Connor (Nicholas Gonzalez). When Alvez pushes past his emotions, he leads a cognitive interview with Lowell and discovers that O’Connor switched out the agent’s blanks for lethal rounds, confirmed by a trap that proves that only O’Connor had access to the bullets Milliken was shot with. In the past, Milliken had forced O’Connor’s brother to drop out of the program after not reaching his high standards, leading to his suicide and making O’Connor’s motivation one of vengeance.
However, the real explosion arrives when we are transported to a conference room, where Bryan and Rossi begin their meticulously scripted live podcast episode to coax the Fan into calling. With Garcia (Kirsten Vangsness) ready to trace the call and Voit silently observing, they begin the torturous process of waiting. Soon enough, the Fan takes the bait, but he is actually using Lance (Connor Storrie), the decoy he placed in the previous episode, as a mouthpiece. Just as Garcia pins down a location, the Fan starts to suspect that Voit is also in the room with them and questions them. The room goes silent. Until it is filled with the horrific screams of Lance, who was undoubtedly being gruesomely tortured. Bryan breaks and goes off-script, confessing the truth despite everyone’s insistence for him to be quiet. As the phone call is cut, we are left with Voit’s haunting words: “You just caused a man’s death.”
