Voit’s New Criminal Minds: Evolution Arc After Season 18 Cliffhanger Broken Down By Showrunner

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The popular series Criminal Minds is coming back for a 19th season, and the show’s creator has given a sneak peek at what’s in store for the character Elias Voit in upcoming episodes.

Erica Messer, who began writing for Criminal Minds and later became its showrunner in 2011, recently told ScreenRant’s Grant Hermanns that the character Voit will continue to explore the complex duality of being a dark person while also attempting to maintain a normal life with his family.

The podcast about Voit brought him a level of attention he’d never faced before. According to Messer, Voit would have preferred to simply disappear and remain unknown, but the podcast made that impossible.

Now that the public knows him well – and some have even compared him to Ted Bundy – he’s also dealing with how people perceive him as he continues to grow and change.

Voit desperately wanted to keep his past hidden, ashamed of his actions and the life he was leading while trying to appear respectable with a family. However, it was this hidden darkness that truly motivated him. Ironically, he’s now incredibly well-known – as infamous as someone like Ted Bundy – and is the subject of a popular true-crime podcast hosted by Paul F. Tompkins. This outcome represents a complete reversal of his desires; he would have preferred to live and die in obscurity, but now his story is public knowledge. It’s a dramatic turn of events for him.

After Criminal Minds transitioned to Paramount+ from CBS, the show’s creators gained more freedom to delve into more intense and complex stories, particularly regarding the character of Voit. The move away from traditional broadcast standards allowed for a darker exploration of the narrative.

According to Messer, Elias Voit has presented the team with challenges unlike anything their heroes have faced before. They’ve never had to interrogate someone in a prison basement who holds crucial information about Gold Star, or deal with the difficult task of extracting that information.

In season 18 of Criminal Minds, Voit was assaulted in prison, resulting in a traumatic brain injury and memory loss. This event continues to affect him, leading Messer to question whether his amnesia is genuine or a convenient excuse.

As a fan, I’m really excited about what ‘Evolution’ is bringing to the table. We’ve always seen our heroes face physical threats, but this season, they’re dealing with something completely new: a genuinely unsettling villain. Elias Voit has thrown them into situations they’ve never encountered before – like interrogating a prisoner who holds crucial secrets about Gold Star, and really pushing them to their limits. Plus, the mystery surrounding his traumatic brain injury – is he faking it, or is he truly lost? – adds another layer of complexity. It feels like the writers are exploring uncharted territory, and it’s incredibly compelling. It’s stuff we’ve never seen in the show before, and I can’t wait to see how it all plays out.

Voit has consistently introduced fresh storylines to the series, tackling subjects that haven’t been explored before. For season 19, which is also known as Criminal Minds: Evolution season 4 and premieres on May 28th, Messer decided to focus on the theme of copycat criminals.

The show’s creator explained that some viewers become obsessed with the show’s villains and want to copy their actions, something the show has only briefly addressed in a single episode previously.

Because of the similar crimes popping up, the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit (BAU) needs to collaborate with Voit in a different way. Instead of David Rossi, Tara Lewis will now be leading the questioning of Voit.

With season 19, we really wanted to explore the idea of copycat killers – it’s a huge part of the real world of serial crime, and we hadn’t fully delved into that before, usually just touching on it in a single episode. That became the core of the season. It’s about the uneasy, almost forced, connection the BAU develops with this particular killer, and Tara really steps up to handle it. She basically says to Rossi, ‘Let me take the lead on the interviews – you don’t need to be involved.’

According to Messer, the core of Criminal Minds has always been interviewing serial killers, and season 19 will focus on that aspect of the show. Given where the character Voit currently stands, it’s an ideal time to explore this storyline.

“Why not use Elias Voit now? We have him, so let’s take advantage of that,” said Messer. He explained that the hallucinations will remain important to the story, especially after the surprising vision Voit experienced in the season 18 finale of Criminal Minds.

The show explored the imagined scenario of Rossi experiencing hallucinations, which was a playful way to maintain the dynamic between those two characters. Joe Mantegna and Zach Gilford have great chemistry, and the writers plan to keep their characters interacting, but in a way that feels fresh and avoids becoming predictable.

We’ve always believed that interviewing serial killers is central to what the BAU does. So, we wanted to make that a major theme throughout the season, and Elias Voit presented the perfect opportunity. We thought, ‘If not now, when?’ We also enjoyed the idea of mirroring the hallucination storyline – with Rossi experiencing a hallucination of Voit, and Voit experiencing one of Rossi – as a way to keep those two characters interacting. Joe Mantegna and Zach Gilford have great chemistry, and this allowed us to explore that dynamic without it feeling like we were repeating ourselves.

The cast of Criminal Minds: Evolution features Joe Mantegna, Zach Gilford, A.J. Cook, Kirsten Vangsness, Paget Brewster, Aisha Tyler, Adam Rodriguez, and RJ Hatanaka.

The show originally ran for 15 seasons on CBS, concluding in 2020. However, it was brought back by Paramount+ just two years later, and has been consistently releasing new seasons almost annually ever since.

The popular series Criminal Minds: Evolution will return with ten new episodes starting May 28th, concluding on July 23rd. Due to its continued success, Paramount has also ordered a twentieth season.

Criminal Minds season 19 premieres Thursday, May 28, 2026, on Paramount+.

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2026-05-26 21:30