Criminal Minds is indeed bringing back one of its fan-favorite cast members, series star Paget Brewster has confirmed.
The new season of the crime drama reboot, Criminal Minds: Evolution, will welcome the brief return of Matthew Gray Gubler, who endeared himself to viewers as the prodigious Special Agent Dr. Spencer Reid throughout the entirety of the show’s original 15-season run.
“He’s back for a guest spot,” Paget, who plays FBI profiler Emily Prentiss, told The Independent in a new interview.
“It’s not a promise of a continuation, although we continue to try to lure him,” she clarified, cryptically adding that “we think that fans are going to be very happy about seeing him and how they’re seeing him.”
Gubler initially decided to sit out of the Paramount+ reboot to fan dismay.
“Matthew wanted to pursue a bunch of other things,” Brewster explained, “and so he said, ‘Listen, I just don’t think it’s for me, and I want to go and do other things.’
Matthew Gray Gubler (right) will make a brief return as Spencer Reid in ‘Criminal Minds’ season 18 (NBC)
“So while it’s our loss, it was great to see him,” she said, “and it was like falling right back into, you know, your high school soccer team. It’s like, ‘Oh, here we are.’”
Listing off some of Gubler’s recent accomplishments, including the release of his 2019 best-selling children’s book, Rumple Buttercup: A Story of Bananas, Belonging, and Being Yourself, and CBS picking up his Einstein procedural, Brewster said: “We’re happy that he’s doing stuff he wants to do.”
Paget Brewster as Agent Emily Prentiss in ‘Criminal Minds: Evolution’ (Paramount+)
Criminal Minds: Evolution debuted in 2022, three years after the cancellation of Criminal Minds in 2019. The reboot, which instantly became a hit with fans, welcomed back a majority of its original cast, including Brewster, Joe Mantegna (David Rossi), A.J. Cook (Jennifer “JJ” Jareau), Kirsten Vangsness (Penelope Garcia), Aisha Tyler (Dr. Tara Lewis), and Adam Rodriguez (Luke Alvez).
It takes a slightly different approach from its predecessor, which focused on standalone “crime of the week” instalments. Instead, it incorporates more overarching storylines, following the team as they investigate a singular serial killer, Elias Voit (Zach Gilford), who establishes a network of serial killers during the COVID lockdown while continuing to solve weekly cases.
Recalling the moment CBS announced it was pulling the plug on the original series, Brewster remembered everyone was “devastated.”
“I remember being at the [final] table read, and they had us go around and introduce ourselves and say a few words about the show,” she continued. “And I said, ‘I’m Paget Brewster. I play Prentiss, and I still think we’re coming back.’ And I genuinely thought that.”
It was a couple of years later, mid-pandemic, that Brewster said showrunner and executive producer Erica Messer approached the cast about getting everyone back together for the revival.
“We said, ‘Yeah.’ And then it took a long time to negotiate and to get everybody on board,” Brewster said, “but there was no hesitation.”
New episodes of Criminal Minds: Evolution air on Thursdays on Paramount+ until the season finale on July 10.
