Law & Order: SVU Finale Recap: Stabler’s Gift to Benson Leads the Way Once More — Plus, Grade It!
One of Olivia Benson’s more emotionally taxing seasons of Law & Order: SVU (and that’s really saying something) comes to a close in Thursday’s episode. The season that began with Maddie Flynn ends with her, too, as well as with a coda that puts Olivia’s compass necklace front and center once more.
In a minute, we’re going to want to hear what you thought of the season finale. But first, read on for the highlights of “Duty to Hope.”
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As we come into the hour, Liv is briefing the NYPD about a serial rapist who binds his victims’ wrists with untwisted wire hangers and who is escalating. She’s interrupted by Heidi Russell, a brash new Assistant District Attorney (played by Kate Loprest, Boardwalk Empire) who is chief of the trial division/Carisi’s new boss and who wastes no time letting Liv know that her office would like the assailant caught as quickly as possible. Geez, thanks lady.
That night, the rapist strikes again. When Benson and Curry interview the victim in the hospital, she tearfully recalls how the guy violated her with a gun and then watched her bleed copiously. A thumbprint on the victim’s apartment window leads Velasco and Bruno to a Sanitation Department worker who swears he’s innocent. But his alibi is shaky and he’s got a record, so Russell pushes Carisi to take it to a grand jury; the guy pleads guilty, and Russell celebrates. But Liv, Carisi and the rest of the squad know he’s likely not their serial rapist, and they get confirmation of that when another rape occurs, and the victim is bound with a wire hanger.
Fin points out that it could be a copycat, but Liv is convinced that the bad guy is still out there “and he’s trying to prove us wrong.” The new victim lets them know that she was able to kick the rapist’s leather holster under her stove when he was distracted for a moment by her neighbor’s knock.
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That night, Fin is taking out his garbage when a kid ambushes him in the alley next to his building and points a gun at him. “You put my dad in jail!” the boy, whose name is Toby, yells — Fin realizes he’s the son of the sanitation worker who pled guilty. The kid saw him on a news report and looked up his address; Fin tries to wrestle the weapon away from Toby, but it goes off during the scuffle and grazes Fin’s arm. Toby freaks out — he didn’t mean to hurt him — and Fin orders him to take off, promising he won’t say anything.
Fin patches himself up and goes to work, but winds up passing out right after he turns in a gun to evidence that he claims a neighbor woman gave him. At the hospital, Liv does not have time for his lies: “Who shot you?” He tells her the truth and she softens a little, so she gets Carisi to take Fin with him when he goes to talk to Hedges — the sanitation worker — at Riker’s Island.
During that conversation, the men realize that Hedges’ thumbprint likely was leftover on the victim’s window from when he handled it while he was an employee at a building supply company within the last year or so. That means reasonable doubt — and Liv & Co. realize that around the same time that touch DNA from the holster has linked a dishonorably discharged member of the military named Glenn Duncan to the crimes.
Benson and her team are about to descend upon Duncan’s building when he starts firing at them from an upstairs window. He hits a uniformed officer, and Olivia risks her life during the ensuing shootout to get the wounded cop out of the line of fire. (“I’ll yell at you later,” Fin tells Liv when things have calmed a bit. “I look forward to that,” she responds.)
When Duncan is unwilling to come out, the Emergency Service Unit officers bust in, drop a few flash grenades and shoot him in the head, killing him. His girlfriend tells the cops that he kept women’s underwear — she thought they belonged to women he was having affairs with — and the lingerie is the type of evidence that ties him to all of the crimes (and exonerates Hedges).
The hour ends with Liv attending Maddie Flynn’s 16th birthday. Maddie’s mom admits to Liv that she’s having a hard time navigating life after Maddie’s ordeal. “Maybe I need one of those,” she says offhandedly, gesturing to Benson’s compass necklace. So Liv takes the jewelry off her neck and puts it on the other woman’s. “This has gotten me through some tough times, and you can return it whenever you want,” Liv says. “It’s not like we’re going to lose touch… we’re family now.”
Later, we see Benson on the phone with Stabler. She tells him she hasn’t taken off the compass since he gave it to her. “I wanted you to know it’s been incredibly meaningful to me. It has guided me in terms of my healing. And I just wanted to let you know that I lent it to someone, a victim’s mother,” she says. He instantly knows she’s talking about Maddie. “Sounds like she needed it a lot more than you do,” he says easily. “I knew you’d understand, she responds, smiling.
Now it’s your turn. Grade the finale and the season as a whole via the polls below, then hit the comments with your thoughts!
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