Criminal Minds is one of those psychological crime thriller TV shows that has a cult following and has it for good reason. The series has been going on since 2005 and has been a staple in the world of TV as well as in the world of crime dramas. One of the actors there from the very start was Mandy Patinkin, but he quickly left the series, leaving his fans with more questions than answers. If you have always been curious, Mandy Patinkin finally shared why he left Criminal Minds.
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When Criminal Minds first aired in 2005, the fire that was lit quickly spread through fans worldwide. Because of the very dark nature of the show, never shying away from graphic content and showing the reality of what some criminal profilers have to deal with daily, it captured the essence of psychological intrigue.
This tendency to look the darkness of the world in the face without flinching earned it a solid and loyal fanbase because the ones who managed to stick around through the graphic content were fiercely loyal to the show.
Mandy Patinkin was there at the start of Criminal Minds, helping to pave the way for the show and doing so in the role of Jason Gideon. Gideon was one of the principal actors, a criminal profiler and a senior supervisory Special Agent of the FBI’s behavioural analysis unit. He excelled from 2005 to 2007 before abruptly leaving the show after two episodes in season 3.
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His departure from the show was so sudden that fans were left shocked and with many questions that wouldn’t be answered until 2012. His speedy departure was explained on the show by blaming the emotional issues that Jason Gideon had as a result of the murder of his girlfriend, saying that he was looking for “The belief in happy endings.”
When Mandy Patinkin spoke with New York Magazine in 2012, his sudden departure from the show was explained. Patinkin shared that the show was not only the most extensive public mistake that he had ever made in his career but that the show was destructive to his soul and personality and that he needed to get out of the show, leaving him wishing that he had never chosen to be a part of the show in the first place.
“I thought it was something very different.” I won’t mention the very dark topics that Patinkin was speaking on for sensitivity purposes, but the fact that these things were shown “every night, every day, week after week, year after” was draining on him. “After that, I didn’t think I would get to work in television again.”
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Patinkin most definitely returned to television and remained a very successful actor. His time on Criminal Minds was respected and loved by the fans and the cast members he left behind.