The Best Episodes of Criminal Minds

The BAU team races to help Hotchner find The Reaper and save his family before it's too late.

Director: Edward Allen Bernero

Writer: Erica Messer, Edward Allen Bernero, Simon Mirren, Rick Dunkle, Chris Mundy, Breen Frazier, Oanh Ly

The BAU implements an elaborate strategy to try and take down the “Dirty Dozen” hitmen ring, with Reid playing a central role.

Director: Heather Cappiello

Writer: Breen Frazier

In this conclusion of a special two-part episode, finding the serial killer becomes critical to the BAU when the team realizes Reid is being held captive and a live feed of him being tortured is shown on the internet. Meanwhile, Reid's troubled childhood is revealed in flashback sequences as he drifts in and out of consciousness.

Director: Guy Norman Bee

Writer: Chris Mundy

The BAU is called by local authorities in Ashburn, Virginia, to profile a predator who may have been abducting children for at least eight years.

Director: Matthew Gray Gubler

Writer: Erica Messer, Simon Mirren

The BAU team continues to unravel the clues given to each of them by a psychopath in order to save his most recent victim. Gideon decides not to focus on the personal aspects of the case. Rather, he tells the team to profile the killer as they would in any other investigation. Reid stays behind to work on a personal connection that could solve the case as one member of the team fights for life.

Director: Gloria Muzio

Writer: Edward Allen Bernero

As a team member fights for life, the BAU continues the search for an attacker that leads the unit to believe the assailant could be someone close to the investigation.

Director: Félix Enríquez Alcalá

Writer: Chris Mundy

The BAU tracks a serial killer who chooses junkies, prostitutes and the homeless off the streets of Detroit as his victims and takes them across the border into Canada, and an agent's life is in peril.

Director: Edward Allen Bernero

Writer: Edward Allen Bernero

As Prentiss faces off against Ian Doyle, JJ receives a call and returns to help them find Prentiss and capture Doyle before it's too late.

Director: Matthew Gray Gubler

Writer: Breen Frazier

When three people implicated in murders claim they were attacked by a “clawed shadow monster” at the moment each crime occurred, the BAU searches for an UnSub who is controlling their minds. Also, the search for the culprit puts one of the team in jeopardy.

Director: Matthew Gray Gubler

Writer: Breen Frazier

After interviewing a couple on death row for serial murders, Gideon suspects that the woman is actually innocent. But since she's set to be executed in two days, it's a race against time to prove it.

Director: Chris Long

Writer: Simon Mirren

When Reid discovers that his girlfriend has been kidnapped by her stalker, he and the BAU team band together to find her before it's too late.

Director: Jesse Warn

Writer: Breen Frazier

The investigation in Texas reveals a deep web of corruption; Garcia must save a friend.

Director: Glenn Kershaw

Writer: Erica Messer

After a father and daughter get kidnapped, a former foe of the BAU returns with very specific demands for Dr. Reid that give a whole new meaning to the phrase “wheels up".

Director: N/A

Writer: N/A

While on their vacations, each of the team receives a clue from a psychopathic killer challenging them to save his next victim.

Director: Edward Allen Bernero

Writer: Edward Allen Bernero

The BAU is called to investigate a series of murders of prostitutes in Washington D.C. and Reid suspects a teenager he met asking for his help is guilty of the crimes. The case becomes complicated when a congresswoman, who about to make a speech to praise the city's lower crime rate, threatens to take away the case if Hotchner calls a press conference to discuss it.

Director: Gwyneth Horder-Payton

Writer: Chris Mundy

The BAU faces one of its toughest cases when the team is called to New York City to determine if a series of random shootings is the work of one serial killer or a team of killers working together.

Director: Glenn Kershaw

Writer: Chris Mundy

When an SUV carrying members of the team explodes, the rest of the team fights to save them and catch the terrorists responsible for the bombing.

Director: Edward Allen Bernero

Writer: Simon Mirren

Agent Hotchner revisits the first case he worked at the BAU when details come forth that one of the deadliest serial killers in New England's history has struck again after a 10-year hiatus.

Director: Nelson McCormick

Writer: Andrew Wilder

As the BAU team continues to pursue the bank-robbing serial killers, the team determines that the suspects have a bigger target in the Nation's capital, and with one of the team still a hostage, they must work quickly to diffuse an explosive situation. Also, wedding bells ring for one of the BAU, and Prentiss ponders her future.

Director: Glenn Kershaw

Writer: Erica Messer

When Reid discovers former FBI Special Agent Owen Quinn locked inside a storage unit, the BAU questions the credibility of Quinn's bizarre accounts of searching for an UnSub that he named "The Strangler".

Director: Glenn Kershaw

Writer: Breen Frazier

As Reid's investigation of a young boy's murder in Las Vegas continues, he discovers possible connections to his own past.

Director: Guy Norman Bee

Writer: Dan Dworkin, Jay Beattie

The team travels to Fort Lauderdale during spring break to find a serial killer who is targeting co-eds on vacation.

Director: Jason Alexander

Writer: Rick Dunkle

When a new type of chemical warfare is released into the open air, the BAU must act quickly to find the source before any more innocent people are exposed.

Director: John Gallagher

Writer: Oanh Ly

The BAU tracks a serial killer who chooses junkies, prostitutes and the homeless off the streets of Detroit as his victims and takes them across the border into Canada, and an agent's life is in peril.

Director: Charles Haid

Writer: Chris Mundy

An unusual personal obsession is at the center of a BAU abduction case. Meanwhile, Hotch struggles with his return to work.

Director: Anna Foerster

Writer: Breen Frazier