The 2025 Law & Order Crossover Was Great, But Undermined Benson’s Legacy

Although the 2025 Law and Order crossover, titled “Playing With Fire,” features one of its strongest stories, the plot undermines Benson’s (Mariska Hargitay) legacy. In “Playing With Fire,” Benson teams up with the Homicide Unit to solve a murder that is personal to her because of the events of one of Law & Order: SVU‘s best episodes. She is pulled into the case when an anonymous caller tips her off to the presence of a burned body in a warehouse, which piques her curiosity about why the tipster contacted her instead of the Homicide Unit.

The crossover soon becomes a sad episode of Law & Order: SVU after Benson learns the identity of the victim. However, the tragic news makes her even more determined to find the killer, though her methods and Brady’s (Maura Tierney) are completely different, leading the two to butt heads at every opportunity. While Benson’s quest for justice fits her character, the victim’s fate undermines the work she did in an iconic episode almost two decades ago.

The Law & Order Crossover Killed Off A Previous Victim Who Was Saved By Benson

The murder victim is identified as Maria Recinos, a girl whom Benson saved in “911,” a Law & Order: SVU season 7 episode that is widely considered a classic. In “911,” Maria was a child who called 911 and told Benson she was being held prisoner but couldn’t describe her surroundings. Most of Benson’s Law & Order: SVU team thought Maria was a prank caller and wasn’t convinced she was even a child, but Benson refused to hang up the phone or stop searching for her. She eventually found Maria just in the nick of time.

When Maria returned in Law & Order season 25, it helped buoy Benson’s spirits to learn that the child she once saved was now following in her footsteps by going into police work. This arc was a fitting sequel to the original story, as it showed that Maria had grown up to do something positive. However, she never interacted with Benson on-screen again after her re-introduction story, and her death in “Playing With Fire” occurs only about a year later.

Why Killing Maria Hurts Law & Order: SVU’s Legacy

The original Maria story reinforced Law & Order: SVU‘s central message of hope and empowerment for survivors. In this episode, Benson’s refusal to give up on Maria led to saving the child’s life, establishing again that Benson is the ideal SVU cop who will always put everything she has into helping survivors, even when the odds are against her ever achieving justice. It wasn’t necessary to have a sequel to this story, as Maria’s future fate was irrelevant, but if the procedural was going to do that, it should not have given Maria a tragic ending.

By having Maria survive and grow up to be a cop, only for her to be killed by her commanding officer, the Law and Order crossover undermines the message of her original story. This heartbreaking ending makes all the work Benson did to save Maria’s life seem pointless. Instead of saving Maria, it now appears she merely put off her inevitable violent death. Additionally, Maria’s death was little more than a plot point, which implies that she was disposable. This negative messaging contradicts Law & Order: SVU’s legacy of supporting survivors.