The Criminal Minds reboot's new title - Criminal Minds: Evolution - resolves one of its biggest problems. Paramount+ is bringing back FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit (BAU) to the small screen not long after the team wrapped up its run on CBS for 15 years. While the profilers will miss a couple of their co-workers such as Matthew Gray Gubler's Spencer Reid and Daniel Henney's Matt Simmons, the rest of the squad will be intact as they track down a network of UnSubs which was established during the coronavirus pandemic. Many aspects of the original Criminal Minds run will stay the same, but Evolutions has some fresh aspects, including a new title.
Retitling Paramount+'s Criminal Minds revival as Criminal Minds: Evolution is appropriate given this new version of the show. The project is a continuation of its CBS run, so technically, it isn't really a "reboot" as it has usually been referred to. The cast remains the same and its events take place in the same continuity. Instead of calling it Criminal Minds season 16, however, giving it a different title allows it to separate itself from the CBS procedural without totally severing its ties with it. It also hints that everything in Criminal Minds: Evolution is an evolved version of the original show, which seems to be the case.
Why Criminals Minds: Evolution Isn't Just Season 16
It has been a while since the profilers' last on-screen case, but the characters' stories continued during that period. Granted that revival retcons the Criminal Minds finale in several ways, it's essentially the same thing. That being said, Paramount+ just cannot simply use the title Criminal Minds season 16 because the project is different in a couple of significant ways from its original run. That includes veering away from its episodic storytelling format to a more serialized one, not to mention being darker and more disturbing than CBS' iteration.
Criminals Minds' New Title Lets It Be A Reboot & A Show Continuation
By giving the Criminal Minds revival a new title, Paramount+ allows it to be both a reboot and a continuation of the CBS series. Calling it Criminal Minds season 16 could also be confusing if the project doesn’t address every single plot line that the finale left loose, which puts a lot of burden on the new series. Having its official title of Criminal Minds: Evolution quickly establishes that the show is part of the Criminal Minds brand, which could entice some formers fans to check it out, especially those who haven’t been keeping track of Paramount+’s efforts to bring back the BAU on the small screen.
Overall, despite the series of changes coming the BAU's way, it's all for the better. Showrunner Erica Messer and her team are fully taking advantage of the creative wiggler room offered by being on a streaming platform than on network TV by coming up with a more disturbing UnSub that poses a big challenge to the profilers, which makes for a more interesting narrative. In that regard, "Evolution" feels like the best way to describe the Criminal Minds reboot.
Criminal Minds: Evolution premieres with a two-episode special on November 24 on Paramount+.