Criminal Minds Season 16, also the first for Paramount+'s Criminal Minds: Evolution, has become the revival of the iconic police procedural and introduced major changes to its format.
Among other alterations, the show now relies on an ongoing storyline rather than a 'villain of the week' approach. At the center of this storyline is the unsub, who, according to the official synopsis, was supposed to become the BAU's 'greatest threat yet.'
Zach Gilford's Elias Voit, aka Sicarius, was actually quite frightening with his psychopathic tendencies, dozens of victims, and a network of serial killers he controlled. More than that, Voit's arc is not over yet, with a Gold Star mystery resurfacing in the Season 1 finale.
But was Sicarius really BAU's deadliest and most memorable unsub? Over the course of its original 15-season run, Criminal Minds introduced several killers that the Evolution antagonist failed to top. Here they are.
Frank Breitkopf
Appearances: S2, S3
Keith Carradine's character only appeared in the early seasons of Criminal Minds, but he is hard to forget. The main antagonist of Mandy Patinkin's Gideon, he outsmarted the BAU team and got them to let him go by threatening the entire bus full of children.
He later returned to target Gideon's loved ones, which, though the suspect was killed, scarred the profiler and led to his departure from the BAU.
The Womb Raider
Appearances: S7, S12
The body count of Adam Nelson's Tommy Yates is truly staggering. He has stabbed and removed the reproductive organs of over a hundred victims. But what viewers will remember most about him is the way he tortured Joe Mantegna's Rossi, forcing him to come to prison every year on his own birthday to get the name and location of another victim.
Rossi later hunted down and killed the unsub as he escaped from prison, but something like that leaves scars.
Cat Adams
Appearances: S11, S12, S15
Aubrey Plaza's hit woman turned vigilante who punished abusive men, also known as Miss .45 and The Black Widow Killer, was a memorable foil for Matthew Gray Gubler's Spencer Reid.
Almost as clever as Reid, she managed to cause quite a stir in the BAU when she framed the Boy Genius for murder and sent him to prison.
Mr. Scratch
Appearances: S10, S12, S13
The episode that introduced Bodhi Elfman's Peter Lewis, aka Mr. Scratch, was pure nightmare fuel. The unsub used hallucinogens and hypnosis to make his victims see a terrifying monster and kill their loved ones.
But the rest of his story was even more terrifying. Lewis targeted and psychologically tortured BAU members, causing Thomas Gibson's Hotch to witness the death of his team, kidnapping the brother of Aisha Tyler's Tara, and causing the death of Damon Gupton's Walker and the abduction and torture of Paget Brewster's Prentiss.
The Boston Reaper
Appearances: S4, S5, S9, S15
C. Thomas Howell's George Foyet was probably the worst enemy of the BAU. And not because he killed over 30 people, but because of what he did to Aaron Hotchner, from stabbing him multiple times to shooting his ex-wife Haley and trying to kill his son while Hotch and the entire BAU team were on the phone.
How can any new storyline top something as emotional as that?