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    The Bittersweet Lessons of <em>Law &amp; Order: SVU</em>

    Twenty years into its run, the show has fallen prey to a revealing paradox: As it has grown in relevance, it has lost its urgency.
    by Megan Garber Dec 02, 2019 8 minutes
    Source: Klara Auerbach / The Atlantic

    Here is something that will come as no surprise if you are familiar with Law & Order: Special Victims Unit: The show, as it airs its 21st season on NBC, currently has a character caught in the limbo of a cliffhanger. During SVU’s most recent episode, members of the New York City Police Department’s sex-crimes squad, under the leadership of Captain Olivia Benson, investigate a shady billionaire who lured teenage girls into his orbit, grooming and, finally, sexually abusing them. The story is uncanny in its contours, and the detectives spend the episode steadily building a case against the Jeffrey Epstein–esque mogul and his Ghislaine Maxwell–esque assistant. The conclusion, however, will also come as no surprise if you are familiar with reality: The billionaire buys his way out. The detectives are left to watch as he hosts a party on his yacht—attended by both the victims of his abuse and the power brokers whose loyalty had a purchase price.

    But the party isn’t, it turns out, the final scene of the episode. The show instead tacked on one more twist. The father of two of the girls who had been abused by the billionaire tracks down Amanda Rollins, one of the detectives who had been working his daughters’ case. Distraught, desperate, he holds a gun to her head.

    “To be continued,” the.

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