'Criminal Minds' Season 15 Episode 8: David Rossi gets shot chasing a killer as the show ties up loose ends
Spoiler ahead for 'Criminal Minds' Season 15 Episode 8
This week's episode of 'Criminal Minds' was creepier than ever and shocking — to say the least. 'Family Tree' took us to Texas, where people started disappearing in pairs and their bodies were found days later with their ears, tongues and a hand cut off, dumped or buried.
The UnSub turns out to be a white male in his 30s, who is delusional and is using the victims as surrogates for his mother and father. As the team chases him down, in a moment that terrified us all, David Rossi gets shot and stumbles backward.
The team finds a real lead to the UnSub after he gets into a bar scuffle, urging his female victim to come away with him to a family tree and that they could start over. She refuses and he's thrown out of the bar.
He kidnaps her later and takes her to their abandoned family home. The tree that he's talking about has the bodyparts of his victims hanging on its branches like Christmas decorations. Creeped out, she refuses to comply and he means to kill her too but being a serial killer, he has to prepare first. A kill is a ceremony for him.
However, by the time our crazed killer gets his branches in order, the BAU gets to the spot. Rossi is first to get out of the car and chases the UnSub on foot. What he doesn't know is that he is armed with a gun.
As the killer scuttles off into the bushes, Rossi chases him and we see him shoot the guy. He misses. Then, we see Rossi has no more bullets left and the killer comes around and shoots him dead.
Thankfully, we realize a minute later that all of it was only happening in the killer's head. Phew! close save, right? Wrong.
As it turns out Rossi was the one who shot the killer and when he leaves the crime scene, he realizes that he has PTSD even though he had lived in denial for too long. "The last time I was chasing someone in the woods it was Everett Lynch," he tells Matt at the office later. He was shot at the time and Lynch is still on the run.
Ross realizes that the job and what came with it was eroding him away and he's seen contemplating it. Now we know we just have two more episodes to go, so it would make sense if the show was trying to get Rossi to retire.
It is hinting towards JJ heading the unit and Prentiss moving on too to head the FBI, so it would make sense. However, he's got the Lynch puzzle to solve. All we can say is be prepared for next week's episode because it will definitely be a scary one.
The final two episodes of 'Criminal Minds' is set to air on CBS on Wednesday, February 19, at 9 pm ET.