Rick Eid Reflects on Setting Up Kelli Giddish’s ‘SVU’ Exit, Previews Missy Peregrym’s ‘FBI’ Return
Maggie is back! Missy Peregrym, who left CBS’ “FBI” in April for maternity leave, has returned to set and is filming again, showrunner Rick Eid tells Variety.
When viewers last saw her in Season 4, Maggie was hospitalized after breathing in sarin gas on a case. While OA (Zeeko Zaki) was able to rescue her in time and save her life, the episode ended with him at her bedside, letting her know that he has no interest in doing the job without her.
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Now, as Maggie and OA are reunited, he’s more protective than ever.
“The first two episodes explore that dynamic. We explore OA’s attempt to be overly protective and Maggie trying to stake out her own lane in this new chapter of their partnership. Perhaps OA is blaming himself for certain things he shouldn’t be blaming himself for, so we definitely explore their partnership,” says Eid. “It’s not always easy to come back after eight or nine months after something like this happens. It’s not just on the person who actually suffered the injury. It’s also complicated for the person who didn’t suffer the injury but maybe blames himself for the other person suffering the injury. We dig a little bit into that kind of psychology.”
Eid, who is the executive producer and showrunner on Season 22 of “Law & Order” and an executive producer on “Chicago P.D.,” also co-wrote the three-way “Law & Order” crossover event with “P.D.” showrunner Gwen Sigan.
The special included the beginning of the end for Kelli Giddish’s Amanda Rollins, as the news broke weeks before the episode that this would be her last season of “Law & Order: SVU.” The character was shot in the crossover, but survived and was awake in the hospital at the end of the three-hour event.
“I talked to David [Graziano], the showrunner, and he was telling me what he thought he was planning for her and they’d already had some idea of an arc. So what we tried to do and crossover hopefully sets up to what they were planning to do with her arc anyway,” Eid says. “We tried to work together.”
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