Criminal Minds (TV Series) Our Darkest Hour (2010) User Reviews

I'm a huge fan and I cannot watch this episode

[kelly-691-723019 · 9/10 · 8 March 2021]

I am a huge fan of criminal minds so don't get me wrong here. I live this show and I have seen it at least a dozen times. With that being said. I cannot watch this or the next episode. I love love love Tim Curry and he creeps me out so bad in these episodes I cannot watch him. I have seen the entire series at least a dozen times. With the exception of the two episodes that he is in.

This show is amazing and Tim Curry is so believable that it turns my stomach everytime I see the episodes that he stars in. I know that's what criminal minds wanted to do and they have great writers and their performances are amazing. I love this show so much. Great job Tim Curry. You found a way to make the hair on the back of my neck stand up.

Solid finale to Season 5

[TheLittleSongbird · 8/10 · 29 June 2016]

Since first viewing 'Criminal Minds' seven or eight years ago now, it became a favourite and while there are better episodes and seasons than others it still is.

While not one of the best episodes of the entire seasons, "Our Darkest Hour" for me is one of the better season finales of the show. As ever, it's stylishly filmed, very atmospherically lit with chilling use of darkness and lovely locations. The music fits well and doesn't undermine the tension in any way, with the theme tune still hypnotic. Who can't argue with one of the most effectively haunting uses of Leonard Cohen with "I'm Your Man" to grace my television set?

Most of the writing is solid, apart from a couple of inconsistencies and continuity lapses to other seasons (particularly with Morgan) and Morgan's dialogue at the end stretches credibility somewhat. It doesn't undermine the investigation in any way though, because much of the dialogue thought-provoking and with some nice tension and little out of place humour.

The story throughout is riveting, with very few 'Criminal Minds' episodes having as creepy an atmosphere (so creepy it's almost disturbing) and despite being only the first of a two parter it's always cohesive and the twist three quarters of a way through is very clever. The ending is quite intense, helped by the presence of Tim Curry's Billy Flynn and his dialogue, which is golden in how frighteningly twisted it is.

'Criminal Minds' regular cast are on top form, particularly Shemar Moore, and Eric Close and Robert Davi are good in supporting roles. The only "weak" performance is that of Isabella Murad, her performance is much better in the season 6 opener but she does come over as forced here and the terror that Ellie should have been feeling at that point was not particularly believable.

"Our Darkest Hour" however belongs to Tim Curry, who is skin-crawlingly brilliant as not just one of the show's most memorable and perhaps its creepiest unsubs but also his second most terrifying villain (even when not saying a word, even his appearance here unnerves you) role after Pennywise in 'It'.

In conclusion, solid finale though better was to follow in the second part of this two parter story. 7.5/10 Bethany Cox

One Man's Fate

[ttapola · 8/10 · 6 October 2011]

Criminal Minds season finales tend to deliver. They are usually good, like #4.25, "To Hell… And Back", and occasionally even 9/10 like #1.22, "The Fisher King: Part 1" and #3.20, "Lo-Fi". Of course, there is also the exception that proves the rule: the flawed #2.23, "No Way Out, Part II" (notice the inconsistent use of numerals). So how does the fifth one fare? The five-minute opening justifies it length, seeing as this is the first part of a two-parter. There is a nice montage that portrays the passing of decades, something that will be understood later. The unsub is kept out of view, his attack presented in still images. This too is not done because of style over substance (a common mistake in this series, and, ironically, the style chosen often does not even work). He preys in the dark, so he is kept in the dark. Plus, it allows for the later reveal of the actor performing the unsub.

It's clear that more effort was put into this episode than a typical one: we have Tim Curry, Robert Davi and Eric Close, all in fine form (though Davi, a regular on Profiler, could do this kind of role in his sleep). Curry naturally steals the show. He's aided by the script that, on the rare occasion that his character speaks, the lines are golden. Also, this is the biggest, baddest case Hotch's team has yet faced. And, three quarters in, there is a marvellous twist. To cap it all, direction, camera-work and music are on the level with the script.

There's only one flaw. No lessons were learned from #4.1, "Mayhem" – a character introduced in this episode is killed off and we are supposed to find it shocking. Unfortunately it's hard to mourn a character less than 40 minutes old. Not to mention the fact that ever since #5.9, "100", the credibility of Criminal Minds has been highly debatable because of the way Hotch's brutal actions in that episode were swept under the mat and his son seems in no way traumatized by the loss of his mother. Ever since that mess, the fictional world of Criminal Minds loses one star until Hotch is out of the series. Which is probably as long as the series runs. Too bad, since this would have been the third 9/10 season finale out of five, but the burden of continuity makes it only an 8/10.

Wow! As oppose to this weak season, the finale was brilliant

[ranakatan · 8/10 · 3 June 2010]

Although there were weaker parts in the plot, mainly inconsistencies of some characters (Derek especially) most of it was a very good cliffhanger. And when I say it was good, I mean it was EVIL, WICKED, SATANIC, you name it. This is my favorite unsub by far, even better than Foyette. A very nice comeback for Tim Curry, who always looks like a sleek evil character. Here, for a change, he manages to look more authentic, grittier if you like. A very solid performance by Curry which will make your skin crawl. After a weak season in my opinion, I find to my surprise that I can't wait for the next one. This chapter was as sick and creepy as the first season. If you liked the first seasons, you'll love this chapter! P.S. - Having said that, the title for "the most shocking finale episode" has to go to Grey's Anatomy, which literally made me shake for a whole hour after it ended. Probably the best finale of any show for a long long time. Oh, I should probably mention the finale of House's 4th season (the bus accident) as well.

End of the episode cliffhanger revealed but in a very frustrating way!

[cksound · 7 December 2016]

OK if you watch this episode you will probably be upset just like I was... this next statement I am writing contains what happens in the end of the episode... as you watch the end of this episode you can clearly see that the detective is at standoff with the unsub and the unsub is using the daughter of the detective as a shield but as you can see Morgan is duct taped on the floor unable to really do anything but he is yelling at the detective not to give up his gun because the unsub would never hurt his daughter... The detective could have easily put a bullet in the unsubs head but then all of a sudden he drops his gun like a pathetic idiot and of course the unsub doesn't do anything to the daughter but he moves towards the detective and the detective tackles him but he is absolutely useless with his tackle like he was tackling like a 6 year old child so of course the unsub is just holding the gun to the detectives chest and just kills him and then continues to kidnap the daughter so they can have a cliff hanger and then go into the next season with this amazing kidnapping scene. This episode was very frustrating to watch. They intentionally wanted to make this into a 2 episode series just because they needed a cliffhanger for the seasons finale. Very frustrating episode...,

A SICK SOB EVER..8-3-21

[holtdeborah · 10/10 · 3 August 2021]

This was one Of the best CM'S episode ever. It Had me rooting for Morgan and rooting for Ellie, the kidnapped little girl. She was so cute and extremely smart, and extremely clever. She could out maneuver that sick SOB, even I wanted to pull his knarley brown teeth straight through the tv screen. I kept telling myself I said...myself, calm tf down, its not real, lol, its gonna turn out just fine. But watching this episode was really sick. Smh the end. Lol 😆 not for real lol.

Started out interesting but ultimately disappointing

[addamonik · 6/10 · 27 September 2020]

I liked the moodiness of the music, and the added spook factor of the darkness, but the ending was extremely frustrating. It's like they really really wanted an excuse to prolong the storyline. That's the only way I can wrap my head around why Morgan acted so stupidly, with all that training and experience under the belt. He walked into a house without backup and acted carelessly once he knew the unsub had to be there. He walked into that room head first, like a scene from a silly horror flick, then he somehow gets disarmed and ducktaped by a 50 yo unsub (which we don't ge to see). I wish we'd at least been shown a bit of struggling, to make it lore believable. In this entire scene, both experienced men of law acted incredibly stupid. Morgan was subdued without struggle and spent the rest of the scene yelling nonsense and the other guy basically surrendered with 0 fight and accepted his fate. I couldn't believe such bad writing, especially for a season finale. I kept expecting Morgan to find his balls on the floor and fight back, but nope. They needed to make this 2 episodes after all.

Interesting cast

[Jackbv123 · 7/10 · 30 September 2019]

Robert Davi from Profiler (which I consider to be a forerunner to CM) appears early and often, but doesn't really do much. Eric Close has a bigger part. Linda Purl, Fonzi's girlfriend has two quick scenes mostly hysterical. But Tim Curry is Tim Curry. We get brief glimpses until the last scene and they his essence comes through.

I found it really strange that Morgan resists going in without backup, and rightfully so. But that is almost never true in other episodes. He is almost always chasing off alone and usually wins out, although a couple of times he gets winged for it.

Season finale so you know something is going to carry over until next season and this time, it is the fate of Spicer's daughter. It really doesn't fit the unsub that he leaves Morgan and Spicer's sister alive. The sister maybe since he didn't really have time to do what he usually does. I wouldn't put this one near the top of finales, but it has its moments.

Season finale...tad disappointing yet mildly enjoyable

[hannah2093 · 7/10 · 15 July 2010]

I have to say that the start of the season was absolutely fantastic! the whole drama with Hayley and Jack and all was great viewing. however some of the episodes towards the end of the series were a little bit disappointing with the episodes being slightly dull. I had hoped that the finale would pick up but unfortunately it didn't. It had all the ingredients to be a truly gripping episode but personally I believe it fell short. I love criminal minds and will continue to watch it, but as far as series finales go, it was nothing great :( they have such a great, strong cast with the likes of Matthew Grey Gubler (Reid) and Kristen Vangsness but i felt that the episode was left on the shoulders of the LA police dept actors. Season finales are all about cliffhangers and really there was nothing huge (yes i know the cops daughter is missing but generally the cliffhanger involves the life of a main cast member hanging in the balance and Morgan should have a concussion at most). i found it similar to the end of Grey's anatomy season finale in that there was no major cliff hangers. hopefully the next series will come alive immediately with a fast paced Our Darkest Hour (Part 2)...

Bad season finale!

[Ophelia_Chennai · 1/10 · 12 March 2018]

This was not just a bad season finale, it was a bad episode. Till the end the team doesn't make any headway with the profile, ppl keep falling brutally dead, there's too much focus on the 2 police guys u'd think they were some spl guest stars... It's like someone wanted to make a grand grotesque season finale with a fearsome villain, instead they made one that's just incoherent and flat. The villain does look repulsively ugly, but character-wise, we've seen much much worse sick villains on Criminal Minds! This one's nothing! Tch tch... extremely disappointing, I had to come here and post it somewhere!

Stupid Finale

[luvroedtahil · 1/10 · 3 August 2015]

One word: Disgusting. I knew something really stupid would happen because Morgan was in the scene. Novody really notice it? Every time he is in some "major" scenes everything goes downhill. He is the most pathetic and useless character. And to think when Hotch stepped down he took over, really? Out of all of the team members he is the most stupid. He cannot even put two and two together. There were episodes wherein I thought that finally the writers got an improvement and made him intelligent...turned out, they were doing it to rationalized his take over. What the? Going back to this episode, the actors were really good except for Morgan (I am not interested in knowing his real name because that is how much he is useless to me) were terrific BUT the story was just awful!!! They did not wait for back up and the freaking policeman just gave up and followed the killer's instructions despite of what he knew. That was a stupid move. Yeah right. I won't watch the next season because I think Criminal Minds quality is deteriorating...for such an " intelligent" show, a lot of STUPID THINGS happen.

Lame. Pathetic. Feeble. Shallow

[cristinakurashima · 1/10 · 11 January 2024]

Lame, Pathetic, Feeble, Shallow episode, Lame, Pathetic, Feeble, Shallow script, Lame, Pathetic, Feeble, Shallow directing, Lame, Pathetic, Feeble, Shallow cliffhanger...

The screenwriters relied on Tim Curry's brilliant creepiness and were too lazy to add suspense to the story. They were lazy to write, lazy to think.

Nevertheless, even if the script is lame, a good directing can save some appearances. No director here. He was out of office, on a sick leave.

Shallow, Feeble, Pathetic, Lame.

Shame.

I love Criminal minds, I cried during some episodes, I foung challenging the profiling and deduction in previous seasons but this episode Is. Just. Lame.

Beginning scene

[sabrinasdaydream · 22 July 2019]

The beginning of this episode is intensely reminiscent of "Natural Born Killers", by Quentin Tarantino; both the music and filming style contribute to this impression. I hope the rest of this episode (as with most!) fulfills its starting promise.