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Special victims unit: The beginning; Dann Florek's squad room walk-through
Full Product DetailsThe first spin-off of NBC's long-running Law & Order takes an even darker view of human nature than its progenitor. But that's to be expected, since the job of the NYPD's Special Victims Unit is to investigate especially heinous sex-related crimes. Thanks to Richard Belzer, whose caustic Det. John Munch moved up to New York City from Baltimore's Homicide: Life on the Streets, SVU is laced with black humor rarely seen on the original show (except in Munch's crossover episodes). SVU also noses around the detectives' private lives far more than Law & Order, where professional detachment is the modus operandi. Knowing that Det. Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay) was conceived during a rape and that her partner, Det. Elliot Stabler (Christopher Meloni), is a fiercely protective dad enhances our understanding of how they react to sexual assault cases. In the hands of award-winning creator Dick Wolf, even the perpetrators are complex. Dense storytelling adds layers of meaning to hot-button issues like pedophilia, and gives extra twists to kinkier cases, which uncover everything from Romanian sex slaves to a sadomasochistic stockbroker. Cree McCree, Barnes & Noble