Mosley Lane
Directed by Matthew Gray Gubler
Written by Simon Mirren & Erica Messer
A couple who can't have children biologically has been kidnapping children for years. The mother of an earlier victim believes it's the same people who took her son eight years ago. The BAU and the police are thrown up by the lack of bodies, stating that preferential offenders like these would most likely be getting rid of the kids when they got "too old" if they had been kidnapping eight-year-olds for years. However, the UnSubs own a crematorium, enabling them to dispose of the kids' bodies without raising suspicions.Written by Simon Mirren & Erica Messer
Jareau: Nietzsche wrote, "Hope is the worst of evils, for it prolongs the torment of man."
Provides examples of:
- Bittersweet Ending: The three kids are rescued and returned to their families, but Stephen’s parents are informed that their son was killed by the UnSubs.
- Bond Villain Stupidity: Anita rants and hesitates when she has one of her victims on the brink of going into the crematorium oven, giving Charlie time to wrestle the girl away from her and grab a gun.
- Convection, Schmonvection: Standing in front of an open, lit crematorium oven never hurt anybody.
- Deliver Us from Evil: Invoked by Emily when she says that most female offenders aren't mothers. As we've seen in previous episodes, they are sometimes bereaved mothers, but the way she says it makes it sound like mothers are inherently better people.
- Determinator: Sarah never gave up hope that she would find her lost son. Thankfully, she’s reunited with him after an eight-year separation.
- The Dog Bites Back: After living as a prisoner in the UnSubs’ house, Charlie finally fights back by grabbing a gun and shooting Anita when she is preparing to cremate Aimee.
- Driven to Suicide: The male UnSub kills himself in the house's bathroom after their crimes are discovered.
- Grief-Induced Split: Sarah's husband left after she insisted she saw their missing son crossing the street, as he took that as her not moving on from the loss as she'd promised they'd do together.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Stephen's death.
- Innocently Insensitive: Charlie just wanted Stephen's parents to know their son died a hero, but what they heard was that he was alive yesterday. However, this trope is downplayed because they would've found out anyway.
- Improbable Infant Survival: While the young Stephen was murdered (and who knows how many other children), all the youngest victims, including Aimee, survive due to a combination of Contrived Coincidence and luck.
- Killed Mid-Sentence: The fate of the UnSub Anita.
- Meaningful Name: Oswald Mosley was a British fascist and a staunch supporter of Nazi Germany, so Mosley Lane is a fitting address for a couple of unsubs who dispose of their victims in a crematorium.
- Oh, Crap!: The male Unsub when he realises Morgan and Prentiss are onto him.
- Non-Protagonist Resolver: Charlie has the marvelous luck of having a gun on hand, averting You Are Too Late when it comes to himself and the two girls.
- Parents Know Their Children: Sarah recognized Charlie as a teenager and frantically called out to him when she saw him with other kids.
- Secret Underground Passage: How the couple hide their victims.
- This Cannot Be!: Anita's final expression when Charlie fatally shoots her in self-defence.
- Whole-Plot Reference: To The People Under the Stairs. The antagonists are a terrifying middle-aged couple (although, in this case, they are actually elderly or at least skew older) where the man is The Heavy but the woman is clearly More Deadly Than the Male. They keep multiple children imprisoned in a vast, labyrinthine house for long periods of time, that makes a lot of use of secret passages, traps, and rigging to trap their victims for long periods of time in the vast underground level of the house.
- You Wouldn't Shoot Me: Anita mocks Charlie when he pulls a gun on her, convinced of this. She's proven wrong.
- Jareau: Emily Dickinson wrote, "Hope is the thing with feathers, that perches in the soul, and sings the tune without words, and never stops at all."
