Paramount+ is still on track with its reboot of classic procedural Criminal Minds.
This comes despite reports last summer, stirred by comments by series star Paget Brewster, that the project might have been dead at the streamer.
Nicole Clemens, President, Paramount+ Original Scripted Series, said, “We are still very much in development on Criminal Minds. We’ll have more to share on that soon but it is alive and well.”
Clemens, who took on her new role at the streamer last summer, in addition to running Paramount Television Studios, said that the delay of the reboot was down to the executive shuffle at the company rather than anything to do with the project itself.
Last February, the streamer revealed that it was bringing back the series, which ran for 15 seasons on CBS, with the team coming back together to investigate a single case over 10 episodes.
Paget, who played Emily Prentiss in the series for nearly 200 episodes, said that the reboot was “unlikely”. However, this does not, in fact seem to be the case.
The original series, created by Jeff Davis, followed a group of criminal profilers who work for the FBI as members of its Behavioral Analysis Unit, using behavioral analysis and profiling to investigate crimes and find perpetrators. The show told the story of the team as they worked various cases and tackled their personal struggles.
Over the course of its 15-season run that ended last year, cast members included Mandy Patinkin, Shemar Moore, Joe Mantegna, Aisha Tyler, Matthew Gray Gubler, Thomas Gibson, Lola Glaudini, Adam Rodriguez and Brewster, among others.
Longtime Criminal Minds executive producer/showrunner Erica Messer was expected to lead the creative with talks reportedly to bring back most if not all cast members from the show’s final season on CBS.
The show has been a hit for Netflix, which is streaming the first 12 seasons. Criminal Minds was the third-most-streamed series in 2020 on Netflix behind The Office and Grey’s Anatomy, with 590M hours viewed last year.
Criminal Minds already has spawned two spinoffs, Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior, which ran for one season, and Criminal Minds: Beyond Borders, which ran for two seasons.
