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Law & Order: SVUorSpecial Victims Unitworked on the perfect storylines to establish itself as a major fan-favorite in the crime drama genre, considering how it is still raging on the screens as one of the best television shows of all time, its 26th season underway as of this writing. But perhaps all this success wouldn’t have been possible had one major thing not been taken care of.
For one that had a titular group of specially trained detectives from the NYPD trying to solve crimes related to s-xual assault and harassment, this series had to take care of one very special element without which it would have risked itself to be doomed. This element was having women writers heading the project since most s-x crimes have women as their victims.
This majorLaw & Order: SVUelement ensured its success
AfterLaw & Orderbecame famous, it didn’t take long to spawn its first spin-off before going on to give birth to multiple more:Special Victims Unit. This one dealt with cases related to s-xually related crimes, with Detective turned Captain Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay) – now the commanding officer ofSVU– leading her team to investigate these crimes.
This series didn’t take long to gain flight and attention among viewers worldwide, becoming one of NBC’s most-watched shows to date. One major reason behind this commendable success was none other than the fact that the show had women writers on board right from the start.
This ostensibly added a layer of ‘feminine sensibility’ to the show, which was much-needed because most of the victims of s-x crimes remain women to this date. In an interview withMarie Claireback in 2018, executive producer Julie Martin emphasized the importance of the same, saying:
You need something of a feminine sensibility to tell these stories, because unfortunately, most victims of sex crimes are women.
Why Elliot Stabler Actor Christopher Meloni Exited “Law & Order: SVU” Abruptly After 12 Long Seasons
Adding to this, she went on to explain how the writing staff waspretty balancedalong the same lines, saying, “The writing staff here has always been pretty balanced, too—and traditionally, television writing has not been a level playing field in that way. A lot of the women on set shared the experience I’d had early on in my career: Of being the only woman in a room full of men and having to work twice as hard to get half the recognition.”
That said, this contributed to making the series seem as authentic and real as possible, eventually leading to it earning as much acclaim as it did. This includes its 78% critical and 83% audience approval score onRotten Tomatoescoupled with 8.1 stars out of 10 onIMDb.
“The edit room has always been pretty balanced”:SVUeditor
On the one hand, while the executive producer acknowledged the problem of a lot of shows having minimal females leading in a team full of men, the editor emphasized thatSVUensured not to walk along those same chauvinist lines. Perhaps it was because the theme of the series mostly had female victims, butshe stressed that the show‘s edit room has “always been pretty balanced.”
During the same interview, editor Karen Stern shared the same while talking about when she joined the show in the first place, saying,
A colleague called me and said, “There’s going to be a spinoff of Law & Order, and they’re looking for a female editor.” I never asked why they were hiring a woman specifically, but the edit room has always been pretty balanced. Over the years here, I’ve become one of the only women to cut 100 episodes of an hour-long series.
In the long run, this decision most certainly seems to have worked in their favor, considering howit ostensibly contributed significantly toadding that realistic element to the show which, in turn, allowed it numerous Primetime Emmy nods and wins for the same, among other accolades.
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit can currently be streamed on Hulu.
Mahin Sultan
Senior Writer
Articles Published :2478
Mahin Sultan is a Senior Writer at FandomWire, where she brings a fresh perspective to entertainment news. Having been in the field for over 3 years now, she has already written more than 2,000 articles across a variety of niches, from entertainment to health and fashion. This diverse experience has allowed her to quickly build a solid foundation and a deep understanding of the industry.
