‘Criminal Minds’: How Fans Really Feel About Penelope Garcia
Criminal Minds is an iconic series that fans truly like to binge in a single sitting. There are some interesting characters on the show, and one of them is the technical analyst Penelope Garcia (Kirsten Vangsness). How do fans really feel about the quirky character? Read on to find out.
Fans weigh in on Penelope Garcia
Not everyone seems to be a huge fan of the unique and upbeat Garcia. Some fans think she brags too much and jokes around when she really shouldn’t in such stressful circumstances. Some even consider her to be “unprofessional.”
“Garcia is so unprofessional,” a Reddit user explained. “I can’t stand her. She should have been fired early in the series when she was doing personal **** on her computer that exposed the unit staff’s personal information. I cringe every time she does the ‘sweetie’ stuff or flirts or just brags about her skill set. Lives are on the line. Situations are time-sensitive and she plays games.”
Penelope Garcia adds a lighter aspect to ‘Criminal Minds’
Others think Garcia’s character adds a nice “lightness” to a darker type of show. The humor offsets the terrible things happening all around the main characters of the Behavioral Analysis Unit.
“To be fair, most of them would have been fired permanently many times over,” another Reddit user interjected. “Realistically she would not be there…in the open. However, she adds lightness to what would otherwise be a very, very depressing show. For me every great drama has that humor.”
Viewers really like the dynamic between Garcia and Morgan
Some viewers enjoyed the dynamic between Garcia and Derek Morgan (Shemar Moore). Their relationship provided fans with multiple laughs over the years. Since Moore left the show however, things have been different.
“I’ve always liked her for the most part–I thought her relationship with Morgan was funny and good comic relief for the show,” another Reddit user explained. “Of course, her behavior is technically unprofessional so I can’t say you’re wrong there. And I think that as the show has gone on I’m starting to get a little tired of it at times because her character just does the same old stuff–and without Morgan a lot of it falls flat.”
Penelope Garcia isn’t professional all the time
Numerous people agree that Garcia isn’t always professional. One fan even admitted that they wouldn’t be able to work with someone like her character in real life.
“Yeah, she’s 100% unprofessional and you could probably find a justifiable reason to fire her in every single episode,” another user said. “IRL I couldn’t stand working with someone like her, but since it’s just a show I’m more forgiving.”
Garcia may use humor to deal with the cases
A fan of the show brought up an excellent point that the way Garcia acts could actually be a form of coping with the material she is surrounded with every single day. She is also not around a lot of public people. She stays in an office setting most of the time, so she is allowed to be slightly less professional in a sense.
“I think some of it is her coping mechanism for having to deal with the emotional toll that being surrounded by so much violence and death takes on her,” someone else said. “Part of it is that she’s not really interacting with the public so she’s allowed to be a little less polished. Another part of it is that she’s portrayed as being so phenomenal at her job that she’s allowed some leeway.”
Not everyone is a fan of Penelope Garcia, but she’ll be back for season 15 of Criminal Minds. The final season premieres on Wednesday, January 8, 2020, at 9 p.m. E.S.T.
