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"Mature Content!" |
| “ | Over half a million women are raped in this country every year, and only a fraction of them report it because they’re too ashamed. It’s a really screwed up world but it’s not your fault; and what happened to you, it doesn’t make you the monster. | „ |
| ~ Olivia's best and most iconic speech/quote |
Captain Olivia "Liv" Margaret Benson is the main protagonist of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, and one of the deuteragonists of Law and Order: Organized Crime.
She's the brave member of the SVU team and an inspiration for women. She was tragically the product of rape, and that motivated her to help the special of crime cases.
She is portrayed by Mariska Hargitay.
Her Good Ranking[]
In General:[]
- Olivia had some corrupting qualities such as vengeance and hatred, but she overcomes and subverts them as the series progresses.
- From season one to the present, she has been dedicated to her job in Manhattan with little to no rest, doing her heroic job for over 20 years, as she mostly puts her personal life aside as her job is her main priority.
What Makes Her Close to Being Pure Good?[]
- Olivia constantly helps victims of rape, abuse, torture, etc., no matter what jurisdiction the crimes had taken place.
- She doesn't judge victims as she is always supports them.
- She's always supportive and a role model for young women.
- Whenever her partner, Elliot Stabler, or anyone else got into fights with suspects and criminals via physically or verbally, she always made them stand down, not allowing their personal rage to go too far.
- While Olivia had certain arguments and disagreements with Captain Donald Cragen, she never turned against him as she always looked up to him as a great boss and a father figure until his retirement from the NYPD.
- Despite clearly despising Internal Affairs Bureau officer Ed Tucker because of his strict vigilance and false precautions over her in the earlier seasons, Olivia eventually forgives him as her attitude and demeanor towards him changed dramatically in later seasons before they officially started dating, despite several of her fellow detectives disapproving.
- Olivia acts as a mother figure for child and teenage victims as she gives out guidance, directions, and even consolation to them, thus earning trust and respect from them.
- She's never unfair towards others, criminals and victims alike. While clearly despising rapists and pedophiles, she never takes joy in hearing about them being raped and brutalized in custody, as she genuinely expresses remorse whenever one of her former suspects confront her about it.
- In the episode "Baby Killer", Olivia expresses how much affection she has as she tries to help a young boy who committed an accidental shooting against his classmate, as she and the squad found out that he was actually a witness of a crime who tried to protect himself during the scenario while he did not premeditate the shooting against the classmate.
- In the episode "Mean", she expressed sympathy for a female teenage shooter who was the victim of frequent bullying over her physical appearance at her high school, and Olivia listened to the shooter's tearful apology and confession about that the bullying against her would never stop, even after the three primary bullies got imprisoned for murder. As the police escorted the shooter away, Olivia could do nothing but to watch in sadness for her instead of giving judgment.
- In the episode "Venom" when everyone other than Fin Tutuola wanted to give up on Ken Randall, Olivia always stood by his side even though he was a suspect of a murder.
- In the episode "911" when the entire law enforcement had almost given up on saving a young Hispanic girl because of an extremely complicated investigation regarding her disappearance, Olivia always stood by her side as she encouraged the girl to remain on the phone for several hours. While everyone was at first convinced that the actual disappearance of the girl was a hoax because of the criminal's advanced technological tactics, Olivia never fell into this trap as she continued investigating, thus eventually saving the girl's life.
- In the episodes where Dale Stuckey, an CSU technician turned spree killer, has appeared, Olivia was the only one from the squad to not have been irritated or angered by his nuisance, as she politely puts up with him even during extremely inappropriate times regarding crime scenes.
- In the episode "Zebras" where Dale was exposed, while Olivia did play with his emotions as she gave him a kiss, it was justified considering it was only a distraction to get him to drop his guard long enough to save Elliot as the latter was ambushed, tied up, and tortured with a knife by Dale moments before Olivia appeared and stopped him
- She has a special relationship with kids, and even when they are killers, she still tries to help them.
- She was tragically the product of rape and her mother didn't love her, but Olivia always loved her mother even though she was drunk and unfortunately abused her because Serena eventually came to her senses and realized that she loved Olivia as her daughter.
- She will never pull a gun on someone unless needed.
- In one of the earlier episodes, Olivia shot herself to protect a little girl as the villain made her choose.
- While Olivia had lost trust in Detective Amanda Rollins following the latter's multiple illegal procedures, which also involved illegal gambling, that put their jobs and reputations at risk in the episode "Gambler's Fallacy", she forgives Amanda sometime after her traumatic past was revealed in the episode "Forgiving Rollins", and from thereon their relationship grew further healthier all the way towards Amanda's departure from the NYPD.
- Olivia may have even threatened to transfer Amanda because of her actions, but from the episodes "Gambler's Fallacy" to "Forgiving Rollins", it implies that Olivia was more lenient than Cragen, as she did not expose Amanda's illegal gambling activities to anyone else other than their SVU colleagues.
- Based on Cragen' previous statement to Amanda that he would definitely fire her from the NYPD if she had fallen into gambling once again, he would not show any more mercy for Amanda had he remained on the job as the captain.
- While Olivia did lie under oath about William Lewis being un-cuffed while beating him, she soon recanted her statement publicly by choice when Lewis had escaped from prison and kidnapped an innocent girl. Olivia accepted the consequences of committing perjury before planning to submit her resignation papers (though Lieutenant Declan Murphy stood up for her during trial so she didn't have to go to prison and lose her job and pension).
- In the crossover episodes with Chicago P.D., Olivia helped Detective Erin Lindsay and Sergeant Hank Voight by busting a pedophile ring and solving other rape/murder cases that have their departments connected because of crimes committed within their jurisdictions.
- Olivia provided guidance and encouragement to Erin as the latter struggled to keep her emotions together with her job affairs.
- Also, while Olivia worked with Hank, she prevented him, an extreme dirty cop himself, from using his usual methods to interrogate a suspect, and warned him she would have to arrest him if he crossed the line.
- In the episodes where the Dominican gang BX9 have appeared, Olivia did her best to peacefully persuade the younger members to give up information regarding their leaders and crimes without trying to be violent, even after being stalked and attacked by a few in retaliation on one occasion.
- While visibly angered by the crimes BX9 had committed, Olivia understood that some of the members were still kids, and she did not try to be unfair to them as long as they collaborated with her.
- She adopted Noah Porter, an orphan whose mother died in prison. She loved Noah like her own and accepts him as bisexual and a too curious adventurer.
- Even though she is taken very seriously as she rose through the ranks over the years, she is still taken lightly.
What Prevents Her From Being Pure Good?[]
- It is great for Olivia to always stand up for the victims as a sympathetic woman and a kind officer, but that kind of dedication sometimes has turned into bias, as suspects she and her partners had arrested over the years weren't always guilty. By the time Olivia learns the errors of her ways as she rechecks the evidence, it would be too late, as suspects would have their reputations destroyed, seek revenge, or worse, they would end up being brutalized, raped, and/or killed in prison or elsewhere.
- While a dedicated officer, she is more likely to go to bat for women, children, and even teenagers she deals with during cases than men, and has shown skepticism during cases where women, along with children and teenagers, are the offenders and men are the victims, or allows her sympathy of the victim to cloud her judgement and make her commit actions without thinking.
- She beat William Lewis with an iron bar because he was going to rape and torture her. Now, this might not sound preventing, but Lewis was cuffed, and he couldn't do anything, Olivia knew that, but she still beat him violently and left him with a scar on his face. Although she had all the right to be angry and disgusted, in this scenario, she briefly became an outright lethal berserker, which was too violent for her to be Pure Good. That said, Lewis more than deserved it considering everything he has done.
- While not a dirty cop or an abusive officer, she has certain mean-spirited, controversial, hypocritical, and authoritarian moments to qualify as PG (though she never takes it too far considering some situations that are drastic, so this is a minor prevention).
Trivia[]
- Benson is (so far) the only character in Law & Order franchise to be Near Pure Good.
External Links[]
- Olivia Benson on the Heroes Wiki
- Olivia Benson on the Law & Order Wiki
- Olivia Benson on the Law & Order: Organized Crime Wiki