Law & Order has remained one of television’s most enduring procedural brands. What began as a single series has since grown into a sprawling multi-show universe, complete with crossover episodes, notable guest appearances, and strong primetime ratings. The most prominent spin-off is widely considered to be Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, which debuted in 1999—nine years after the original launched. Although the show has welcomed many fan-favorite cast members over the years, they often return for guest appearances. The core of the series has consistently been Mariska Hargitay. Her performance as Olivia Benson—who rose from detective to captain—has become iconic and will likely endure well beyond the show’s conclusion. The series has also featured longtime regulars like Ice-T and Christopher Meloni, the latter of whom went on to headline his own spin-off, Law & Order: Organized Crime.
Yesterday was quite an up and down day for Law & Order fans, who were first treated to the news that the Christopher Meloni-led spin-off, Organized Crime, had been canceled after five seasons. NBC cited a decline in viewership and overall interest as the reason for not pursuing another season. The only silver lining to the day came when news broke that* Law & Order: Special Victims Unit *had been renewed for Season 28, which was expected to air before the end of this year. Buried in the new report about SVU, though, was the news that NBC is still deciding what to do about the flagship Law & Order series, which has been around since 1990. It’s aired 25 full seasons over the last 36 years, and Season 25 is set to conclude next month. It could yet be the end of the original Law & Order, which has spawned a number of spin-offs.
Your answers have pointed to one action hero above all others. This is the person built to have your back — for better or considerably, spectacularly worse.
Your partner doesn’t talk much, doesn’t need to, and will have assessed every threat in your immediate environment before you’ve finished your first sentence. John Rambo is not a man of plans or politics — he is a force of nature shaped by survival, loyalty, and a capacity for endurance that goes beyond anything training can produce. He will not leave you behind. He has never left anyone behind who deserved to come home. What you get with Rambo is the most capable, most quietly ferocious partner imaginable — one who has been through things that would have broken anyone else, and who chose to keep going anyway. You’ll never need to ask if he has your back. You’ll just know.
Your partner will arrive perfectly dressed, perfectly briefed, and with a cover story so convincing it’ll take you a moment to remember what’s actually true. James Bond is the most professionally dangerous person in any room he enters — and the most disarmingly charming, which is the point. He operates in a world of layers, where nothing is what it appears and every advantage is used without apology. You’ll never be bored. You’ll occasionally be furious. But when it matters — when the mission is genuinely on the line and the margin for error has collapsed to nothing — Bond is exactly the partner you want. He has survived things that have no business being survivable. He does it with style. That is not nothing.
Your partner will know the history, the language, the cultural context, and exactly why the thing everyone else is ignoring is actually the most important thing in the room. Indiana Jones is brilliant, reckless, and occasionally impossible — but he is also one of the most resourceful, most genuinely knowledgeable partners you could find yourself beside. He approaches every situation with a scholar’s eye and a brawler’s instinct, which is an unusual combination and a remarkably effective one. He hates snakes and gets personally attached to objects of historical significance, both of which will slow you down at least once. It doesn’t matter. What Indy brings is irreplaceable — and the adventures you’ll have together will be the kind people write books about. Assuming you survive them.
Your partner was not supposed to be here. He does not have the right equipment, the right information, or anything approaching the right odds. He has a sarcastic remark and an absolute refusal to accept that the situation is as bad as it looks. John McClane is the greatest accidental hero in the history of action cinema — a man whose superpower is stubbornness, whose contingency plan is improvisation, and whose capacity to absorb punishment and keep moving would be alarming if it weren’t so useful. He will complain the entire time. He will make it significantly more chaotic than it needed to be. And he will absolutely, unconditionally, without question come through when it counts. Yippee-ki-yay.
Your partner has already run seventeen scenarios by the time you’ve finished reading the briefing, and the plan he’s settled on involves at least two things that should be physically impossible. Ethan Hunt operates at the absolute edge of human capability — technically, physically, and intellectually — and he brings the same relentless precision to protecting his partners that he brings to dismantling organisations that shouldn’t exist. He is not easy to know and he will never fully tell you everything. But he will carry the weight of the mission so completely, so absolutely, that your job is simply to trust him — and the remarkable thing is that trusting him always turns out to be the right call. The mission will be impossible. He will complete it anyway.
The official synopsis for Law & Order, which was written and created for TV by Dick Wolf, reads as follows:
“Law & Order is a two-part drama series which focuses on the New York Criminal Justice System by showing a violent crime investigated by police detectives in the first half, then the trial of the accused in court by the prosecutors in the second half.”
Law & Order has helped pave the way for dozens of procedurals that have been on the air for years, and even if it does come to an end after Season 25, it will live on as one of the most important TV shows of all time.
Check out all episodes of* Law & Order* and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit on Peacock and stay tuned to Collider for more updates and coverage of the series.
Constantine Makris, Edwin Sherin, Jace Alexander, David Platt, Matthew Penn, Martha Mitchell, Don Scardino, Christopher Misiano, Jean de Segonzac, Michael Pressman, Daniel Sackheim, Alex Chapple, Fred Berner, Fred Gerber, Gloria Muzio, James Frawley, Jim McKay, Vincent Misiano, Michael W. Watkins, Vern Gillum, Alex Hall, Dann Florek, Darnell Martin, David Grossman
René Balcer, Matt Witten, David Slack, Aaron Zelman, David Wilcox, Morgan Gendel, Pamela J. Wechsler, Lynne E. Litt, Marc Guggenheim, Stephanie Sengupta, Scott Gold, Walon Green, Gerry Conway, Sean Jablonski, Nick Santora, Chris Levinson, Christine Roum, Gordon Rayfield, Hall Powell, Keith Eisner, Julie Martin, Gia Gordon, Joe Gannon, Jonathan Collier
Lieutenant Anita Van Buren