Throughout the 15 seasons of Criminal Minds, fans met and fell in love with Dr. Reid Spencer. This might have seemed unlikely at the start when he was a socially awkward and neurotic member of the procedural crime show. However, out of everyone on the show, no one was a more well-rounded and complex character than Reid, and he quickly stole fans’ hearts.
Thanks to his quirks, his insecurities, and his tough life before ever joining the team, he was a perfect member of the BAU to put front and center in more episodes than other members. Whenever a Reid-centric episode arrived, fans knew they were in for something special. Now that Criminal Minds is over, fans are periodically looking back at the best Reid episodes. These are the top contenders.
Updated on July 11th, 2022, by Shawn S. Lealos: Criminal Minds ended its run in 2020 after 15 seasons and 324 episodes. The latest news is that there is a Criminal Minds revival coming as a streaming show on Paramount+. Most of the core cast has signed on and the entire season will be dedicated to solving one single case. However, in some distressing news, Matthew Gray Gubler, who played Reid, has not been announced as a cast member yet.
This is tragic since most fans fell in love with Reid the most when it comes to the stars of the series. While each of the characters has their own tics and traits, it was Reid that seemed the most human, even if he was unique in his own complicated way. With the new season coming, it is a good time to go back and watch some of Criminal Minds’ best Spencer Reid episodes.
Somebody’s Watching (S1 E18)
“Somebody’s Watching” was a first-season episode with Reid still connecting with Gideon as the two built a great relationship. This episode showed the two agents at a profiling seminar when they are asked to consult on a series of murders.
A stalker has targeted a Hollywood actress, and she develops an attraction to Reid that he reciprocates. This puts Reid in danger when the stalker comes for him. It is rare to find Reid crossing into a romantic situation, and his awkwardness is always charming.
Sex Birth Death (S2 E11)
In the second season episode “Sex Birth Death,” a vigilante is killing prostitutes to help clean up the streets. However, the more interesting part of this Criminal Minds episode about Reid was a young man who approached him to help him understand the murderous urges he has suffered throughout his entire life.
This made the young man look like he was the killer, but the truth is that he wasn’t. It seems that broken people gravitate toward Reid and in this case, Reid shows up in time to save him after he slits his wrists to try to stop the urges. It is a tragic episode and one that has developed Reid as someone who wants to help people, not put them away.
The Instincts (S4 E6)
Reid’s biggest struggle in life is his relationship with his mother. In “The Instincts,” that relationship hit one of his biggest breaking points. A young boy was kidnapped and while the team is investigating, Reid begins having nightmares that start to pull up repressed memories from Reid’s childhood.
These nightmares are about a dead boy, and this reminds him of his childhood imaginary friend, Riley Jenkins. Morgan helps him understand this better when he reveals that Riley was a real missing child. That is when Reid dreams about the child again and this time sees his dad, which leads to some huge moments in later episodes that almost breaks Reid completely.
52 Pickup (S4 E9)
The Criminal Minds fourth season episode “52 Pickup” allowed Reid to find another love interest, if only for one episode. In this case, it is a bartender that Reid hits on by using the magic trick of pulling a card with his number on it from behind her ear.
It is cute things like this that made Reid such a fan favorite. As for the episode, there was a man gutting women and then forcing them to clean up the blood before he finally killed them. However, what made this such a great Spencer Reid episode was him getting a chance to flirt with the woman, even if it only lasted for the one episode.
Corazon (S6 E12)
In Season 6, “Corazon” was another important Criminal Minds episode about Reid. This was during the time when Reid’s headaches were getting worse and they were getting in the way of his work. During the case of a serial killer in Miami, one of the suspects told Reid that he thought the headaches were caused by spirits.
This was a huge moment for Reid because he also learned his headaches were not caused by medical issues and he worries that he might be developing the same issues that had affected his mother her entire life.
L.D.S.K. (S1 E6)
After Criminal Minds got rolling, it was time for fans to get to know Reid a little better. While most of the team was adept at fieldwork, Reid was not ready for action outside of using his big brain to help solve crimes and figure out unsubs.
In “L.D.S.K.,” that was shown when he was trying to get his gun qualification and failing, before he ended up killing his first unsub, saving a room full of hostages.
Revelations (S2 E15)
One thing that remains twisted about Criminal Minds was how the show worked over Reid, breaking him down over and over again. The first time came in Season 2 when the terrifying serial killer Tobias Hankel kidnapped and tortured Reid.
Tobias had a split personality disorder and forcibly injected Reid with the drug Dilaudid, which Reid ended up addicted to after his rescue. What hurt more was that Reid was unable to save Tobias, who Reid felt bad for due to his inability to control his split personality.
Damaged (S3 E14)
In Season 3, Reid was having a hard time dealing with the fact that Gideon left without saying goodbye and felt the same rejection he felt as a child with his father leaving him and his mom. However, Reid pushed himself into his work and ended up once again saving Hotch in the episode “Damaged.”
In the episode, the unsub had Hotch and Reid and planned to kill them both, but Reid started talking and delivered a 13-minute lecture on the medical reasoning for the unsub’s behavior. The delay helped them survive, although Reid admitted he might have made up some of what he was saying.
Elephant’s Memory (S3 E16)
In “Elephant’s Memory,” Reid was still affected by the fact that he couldn’t save Tobias Hankel in Season 2 and determined that he would help others who had mental deficiencies like that. When the team set off after an unsub that Reid connected with, in “Elephant’s Memory,” he jumped into action.
Owen was a high school student who was bullied by both kids in his school and his father, a Deputy Sheriff. He finally snapped and started to kill the people who pushed him for so many years. When Owen finally decides he will commit suicide by police, Reid steps between him and the police and talks him down.
Minimal Loss (S4 E3)
In Season 4, Criminal Minds took on the idea of a polygamist cult-like church in “Minimal Loss.” In this episode, Luke Perry stars as Benjamin Cyrus, the leader of the church and one of Criminal Minds’ most memorable unsubs. While the BAU was there to infiltrate the church and free young girls, it turned into a hostage situation when the members refused to leave.
Reid and Prentiss are inside when the state police show up, and a Branch Davidian-styled siege took place in one of Criminal Minds’ best Spencer Reid episodes.
Memoriam (S4 E7)
It took Reid a long time to open up to his teammates at the BAU about his personal life and problems, and that included his mother. Diana is a schizophreniac who is institutionalized and is someone that Reid has a fear that he will develop the same symptoms due to genetics.
In “Memoriam,” one of Criminal Minds’ weirdest cases introduces Reid’s father, William. When Reid believes his dad might have killed someone, he learns something about his mom that changes everything.
God Complex (S8 E4)
In Season 6, Reid started suffering from headaches and was beginning to feel ill. He even started having hallucinations and believed that he was starting to lose his mind, the long-standing fear that mental illness was hereditary, and he was beginning to break. This lasted for a long time.
By the time Season 8 rolled around, it looked like Reid was finally going to get help. In “God Complex,” he learned that there might be a treatment to help him. The woman offering to help him was Maeve, and the two of them ended up in a romantic relationship.
Zugzwang (S8 E12)
It seems that Reid isn’t allowed to remain happy for very long. Just eight episodes after Maeve told Reid that she loved him, the woman that she was worried about stalking her in that same episode attacked in “Zugzwang,” one of the best episodes in Criminal Minds history.
This was Diane Turner, played by Michelle Trachtenberg, who ended up killing herself and Maeve at the end of the episode despite Reid doing everything he could to save her. This broke Reid for the rest of Season 8.
Red Light (S12 E22)
Moving ahead to Season 12, Reid was becoming the center of attention for much of the season. In this season, Reid is arrested and ends up in prison. The charges were drug possession and intent to distribute, and he ended up behind bars, where his life was in danger.
In “Red Light,” it turned out that Reid’s old enemy Cat Adams set him up. What makes this one of the best Criminal Minds episodes is that Reid spends this episode in a battle of wits with her.
300 (S14 E1)
The Season 13 finale had a significant cliffhanger where Reid was forced to help a double agent inside the FBI break a cult leader out of custody, or they would kill Penelope Garcia. This led to the Criminal Minds Season 14 premiere.
The cult kidnapped both Reid and Garcia, and it turned out the leader and cult was an offshoot of the one led by Benjamin Cyrus a decade before. They wanted revenge against Reid for his part in destroying it, and what resulted was one of the best Spencer Reid episodes.
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