"Father Dearest" | ||
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← | SVU, Episode 13.20 | → |
Production number: 13021 First aired: 2 May 2012 First aired (US): 2 May 2012 First aired (UK): 22 July 2012 First aired (CAN): 2 May 2012 First aired (AUS): 21 June 2012 | ||
Teleplay By John P. Roche Story By John P. Roche & Warren Leight Directed By Rosemary Rodriguez |
Dr. Huang reunites with the SVU Squad to track down a twisted seducer of teenage girls looking for their biological father, an anonymous sperm donor.
Summary[]
Detectives Benson and Amaro investigate the disappearance of a teenaged girl after her young brother calls 9-1-1. While Fin and Rollins look into a possible abduction, they discover the girl had been searching for her biological father, an anonymous sperm donor. The investigation takes a startling turn when a suspect is found to be targeting several young, vulnerable women, all with the same personal connection. But the suspect isn't what he seems, and Dr. Huang must delve into his past to save the women.
Plot[]
Detectives Benson and Amaro investigate the disappearance of a girl, Cate Avery, who was researching children born through sperm donation. They learn that Cate was conceived with donor sperm, and that she had tracked down the donor. She was going to meet the man against her mother's wishes.
Tutuola and Rollins locate the girl, who insists she wasn't kidnapped, but refuses to tell them about her donor father. Rollins notes that on a child donor website that Cate viewed, four other possible girls discussed the same sperm donor; their mystery man suddenly had an urgent need to meet his potential offspring. Tutuola and Amaro interview another teenager (Ryann Shane) who met with "donor 141" through a donor connection website thinking that he was her biological father.
Dr. George Huang says it could be genetic sexual attraction, a condition where children who are separated from their parent or siblings at an early age find a sexual attraction takes place when they're reunited with them. Rollins finds a Dr. Colin Barnes who matches the description from the file that she and Benson got from the donor bank. Detectives Benson and Amaro meet with Dr. Barnes, his wife Anne, and his teenage daughter, Taylor. They ask him about his relationships with his offspring that came through sperm donation. He denies ever meeting or wanting to see any of the children conceived through his sperm. Benson puts Colin in a line-up, but none of the girls identify him as the man claiming to be their father. The girls are devastated to learn that they slept with a random stranger.
The squad checks with Colin and Anne to tell them that someone is framing him and asks if they have any enemies and discover that Colin had a contentious relationship with Phillip Kelly. Colin fired Kelly from the hospital after he discovered him operating while under the influence. Rollins and Fin interview Kelly, who does not fit the description of the suspect but does reveal a fellow that Taylor spoke to at his birthday party. Later, Colin anxiously tells the SVU detectives that his daughter Taylor is missing. The detectives look in Taylor's room and discover that she was listening to the same jazz song, My One and Only Love, that the other teenage girls were listening to when they danced with their donor father.
Anne recognizes the song as one her ex-boyfriend played all the time while Colin tells the detectives about the man Sean Albert, whom Anne stopped seeing when she met Colin. Dr. Barnes had Sean arrested when he discovered him taking the MCAT exam for other people, likely being his motive along with having Anne as a wife. Anne suddenly receives a text message from Sean who threatens to hurt Taylor unless she meets him at a bar. Later, Fin and Rollins confront Sean at the bar, but he refuses to talk to anyone except Anne. Sean confesses to having a vendetta against Colin and the egotistical attitude he throws in everybody's face. He reached out to Colin's daughter because she needed someone who truly cared for her. He also did the same with the donor daughters as well so they can have a father.
Sean realizes that Anne is watching his interrogation from behind the glass mirror. He says he'll only tell Anne where Taylor is, and only if she dances with him. Anne reluctantly agrees. When the song ends, Sean whispers in her ear that he killed Taylor. Anne screams in agony as everyone rushes in to separate Sean from her. Rollins says killing Taylor doesn't fit Sean's MO. Benson and Amaro follow up a hunch to search east side hotels. They find Taylor in a hotel room, alive and well, awaiting Sean's return.
Benson tells Taylor that Sean deceived her, but she insists that he's her real "father." The episode ends with Taylor crying nonstop at being deceived.
Cast[]
Main Cast[]
- Mariska Hargitay as Detective Olivia Benson
- Danny Pino as Detective Nick Amaro
- Kelli Giddish as Detective Amanda Rollins
- Richard Belzer as Sergeant John Munch
- Ice-T as Detective Odafin Tutuola
- Dann Florek as Captain Donald Cragen (credit only)
Recurring cast[]
Guest cast[]
- Eric Close as Colin Barnes
- Nikki M. James as 911 Operator
- Clarke Thorell as Geoff Avery
- Tina Benko as Grace Avery
- Ryann Shane as Ashley Riggs
- Shannon Maree Walsh as Cate Avery
- Kathryn Rossetter as Mrs. Riggs
- James Van Der Beek as Sean Albert
- Sonya Walger as Anne Barnes
- Sarah Hogrefe as Taylor Barnes
- Linda Marie Larson as Emily Potsdam
- Maria-Christina Oliveras as Nancy Dale
- Heather Marie Wolf as Melissa Stack
- Mark Boyett as Philip Kelly
- Lissette Espaillat as Sofia Riva
- Samantha Cordero as Angela Riva
- Jake Katzman as Sam Avery
- Nestor Rodriguez as Ian Vaughan
References[]
Quotes[]
- [about a missing teenage girl]
- Amaro: So what's your gut? You think - she's out partying, does the walk of shame in the morning?
- Benson: Well, nine times out of ten, but I don't want to take a chance if this is a homicide. We keep going.
- Tutuola: I know librarians can be prickly, but you've heard of the Patriot Act?
- Nancy Dale: Oh, now this missing girl is involved with terrorism?
- Dr. Huang: [after being asked how he's been] Single, gay Chinese-American man, living in Oklahoma City, opposed to the death penalty. It's heaven.
- Cate Avery: My little brother watches too much "Cyberchase." I wasn't kidnapped, all right?
- Munch: Make you wish you had a daughter?
Background information and Notes[]
- B.D. Wong reprises his role as Dr. George Huang after last appearing in the Season Twelve episode "Bombshell".
- Gretchen Egolf returns as the character Kendra Gill who is now working as a Defense Attorney.
- Colin Barnes suggested that SVU may not be up for finding his missing daughter and that they call the FBI. This maybe an in-joke to Without a Trace, the show his actor, Eric Close, starred on which was about the Missing Persons Unit of the FBI.
- Though the characters played by Close and Van Der Beek went to medical school together, Close and Van Der Beek are 10 years apart in age.
- When Rollins logs onto a donor matching website, she reads a post from another child of Donor 141 who says she has met him. Following this lead, the team goes down to Baltimore and speaks to the poster (Ashley) to find out the identity of the donor. However, when the camera zooms in on the computer screen, Ashley has already identified Donor 141 as Calvin Baker.
Episode scene cards[]
1 | 2 | 3 |
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Apartment of |
Apartment of |
New York Cryogenics |
4 | 5 | 6 |
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Apartment of |
Home of |
Flannery's Bar |
Previous episode: "Street Revenge" |
"Father Dearest" Law & Order: Special Victims Unit Season 13 |
Next episode: "Learning Curve" |