Elliot Stabler
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| Law & Order character | |
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| Det. Elliot Stabler | |
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| Time on show | 1999-Present |
| Preceded by | Current |
| Succeeded by | N/A |
| First appearance | Payback |
| Portrayed by | Christopher Meloni |
Det. Elliot Stabler is a fictional character on the TV crime drama series Law & Order: Special Victims Unit portrayed by Christopher Meloni.
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[edit] Character overview
Stabler is a Detective with Manhattan's 16th Precinct, also known as the Special Victims Unit, which investigates sex crimes. His partner is Detective Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay). He is dedicated to his job, but this dedication occasionally turns into obsession, as he often takes cases personally, affecting his judgment. Nonetheless, Stabler has a 97 percent case closure rate, as revealed in season 8 episode, "Haystack." He lives in Glen Oaks, Queens (a section of the Floral Park neighborhood) with his family. His wife is named Kathy (Isabel Gillies); when the series began, they had four children: Maureen, Kathleen, twins Elizabeth and Dickie; a fifth child, Elliot Jr., was born during season nine.
He is a devout Catholic whose faith sometimes complicates the cases he works on. He does not adhere blindly to Scripture, however; He has on occasion said that the Bible contradicts itself, especially about women's rights and homosexuality, both topics on which he holds tolerant views.
In the episode "Annihilated", it is suggested that Elliot was a Hand-to-Hand combat specialist while he served in the U.S. Marines since he displayed great knowledge in that field while dealing with a case involving those skills.
[edit] Character history
Stabler comes from an Irish-American family with three brothers and two sisters. His father was also a police officer who lost his pension shortly before his retirement. Stabler had a difficult relationship with his father, who physically abused him. Stabler served in the U.S. Marines. There is some confusion over his years of service, however. In the season 5 episode "Shaken", Stabler says that his eldest daughter Maureen was a toddler when he returned. As she was approximately 15 in the 1999-2000 season, this would mean he had been discharged by 1985 or 1986. In the season 6 episode "Goliath", however, one of his colleagues mentions his service in the Gulf War, meaning he was not discharged until at least 1991. He also bears three tattoos. One tattoo is located on his right forearm and is a picture of a Eagle, Globe, and Anchor with USMC written under it. The second is a located on his left shoulder and is a picture of Jesus being crucified. He has another tattoo located on his right shoulder, close to his neck. It is small so it is never fully clear what it pictures.
He attended Queens College, where he earned his BA.
[edit] Family
Stabler often mentions his family, particularly his children, sometimes as a way to gain trust with victims. He is protective of his children and becomes defensive if a suspect asks about his family. In the episode "Tragedy" Stabler reveals that he helped deliver all of his children to that point, and he sees aspects of them in every child molestation victim. As a result, he has an intense hatred for pedophiles, admitting in the episode "Slaves" that he sometimes fantasizes about killing them, almost losing his job as a result. Stabler finds it particularly disturbing when he sees aspects of himself in a child abuser, as in the episode "Shaken" when an abusive parent reminded him of a time he lost his temper and slapped his then-toddler daughter Maureen. While he restrained himself from hurting her further, he was frightened by his loss of control.
Stabler often connects with child victims on a fatherly basis, and has been very willing to use physical force to apprehend a suspect that he believes to have harmed a child. In turn, many victims tend to respond to him very warmly. In the episode "Resilence," Stabler successfully reaches out to a 15-year-old girl (Rachael Bella) who regresses to a child-like state after being attacked by her father.
It is revealed in the Season 6 episode "Doubt" that Stabler and his wife had separated, and that Kathy had moved in with her mother. Though she had sole custody of their children they frequently visit their father, once surprising him at work on his birthday. In the season 7 episode "Raw" it is revealed that Kathy had sent him divorce papers; in a later episode Stabler realizes during a case involving a divorcing couple that "when love twists into hate, there's nothing you won't do," and silently returns the signed papers to his wife. However, in the season 8 episode "Dependent," Stabler shows up at Kathy's house at night after being cleared in the supposed beating death of a suspect. He tells her that he loves both his job and his family, and couldn't live with the thought of losing either. In the final scene, Stabler asks for a reconciliation with his wife. In a later episode, "Sin," he is in the process of moving back home with his family; he is meeting Kathy for drinks to discuss rebuilding their relationship. In "Annihilated," they are once again intimate.
In the episode "Responsible," he takes his daughter Kathleen's driver's license while dining burns it with a candle. He does this because, two years ago, Kathleen had been arrested for DUI and Elliot had used his clout as a police officer to get the charge to disappear. Reasoning that he could not be a good father if he did that, he decided to take away Kathleen's license. At the end of the 2007 season finale, Kathleen is arrested again for the DUI. Kathy, also in the season ender ("Screwed"), tells him that she is pregnant and that she wants him to come home; as of the season nine premiere ("Alternate"), he has done so, and has reconciled with Kathy. In that episode, Kathy is briefly held hostage in their home by a knife-wielding perpetrator (Cynthia Nixon) who allegedly suffered from multiple personality disorder and who appeared to be stalking Stabler.
In "Alternate" we also learn that Kathy's pregnancy continues to progress normally, and that Kathleen did not receive jail time for her DUI conviction but was sentenced to community service.
In "Paternity" Kathy is seriously injured by a drunk driver who hits Benson's car when she is driving Kathy to a doctor's appointment. Benson and a team of firefighters get Kathy out of the car and into an ambulance, where she gives birth to a baby boy. Kathy's life appears to be in jeopardy but she survives. Stabler is immensely grateful to his partner, who asks him what name he and Kathy chose. He says Kathy wants to name the boy after him. "Just what the world needs," Olivia quips, "another Elliot Stabler".
In the 5th season, Stabler states that when he was involved in a shootout, his wife saw it on the news and "she had our second kid right then and there". He says it was "years ago" so it is not clear if it happened while he was in the Marine Corps or he was a detective at the time.
[edit] Partners
[edit] Olivia Benson
Stabler's partner is Olivia Benson, whom he counts as a close friend. Their relationship is not without friction, as the two sometimes argue over the cases they work on; Benson is quicker to side with the victims, while Stabler is more impartial. This became obvious in the season 3 episode "Ridicule", where three women are charged with raping a male stripper; Benson and Alexandra Cabot (Stephanie March) are quick to come to the man's aid, while Stabler takes a cynical view of his claim from the start.
Benson and Stabler are separated at times during the show. She is briefly reassigned to Computer Crimes in the season 7 episode "Fat", and replaced by a Queens SVU detective, Lucius Blaine (Anthony Anderson). Benson returns to SVU in the next episode, "Web". In the season 8 premiere "Informed", Benson teams up with an FBI agent and eventually goes undercover in Oregon to infiltrate an eco-terrorist group.
While Stabler was still married, Kathy became jealous of his close relationship with Benson. Combined with his long hours on the job and away from home, Stabler's work at SVU placed considerable strain on their marriage, eventually culminating in their divorce; they later reconciled before it became final. They have recently welcomed the birth of their fifth child, Elliot (named in "Inconceivable").
[edit] Dani Beck
Stabler is assigned a temporary partner named Dani Beck (Connie Nielsen), who remains until Benson returns full-time to SVU. After an altercation with a nearly mute homeless man, Benson re-enters Stabler's life as his partner. Upon their reunion, they both comment on how the other has changed since their original partnership. Beck had helped Stabler loosen up, while Benson had picked up a few health conscious habits from her stint infiltrating the eco-terrorists.
[edit] Notable episodes
In the season 6 episode "Charisma", Stabler is forced by Capt. Don Cragen (Dann Florek) to take sick time in lieu of being suspended, for refusing to seek counseling while working on a case where a cult leader had murdered multiple children. Benson instead worked the case with John Munch (Richard Belzer) when Munch's partner, Odafin Tutuola (Ice-T), also took a sick leave.
In the Season 4 episode "Grief", Stabler lets his feelings interfere with his duty when he is called to the stand by the ADA Alexandra Cabot when he provides unsubstantiated information (that the victim had been raped) to a dead girl's father he sympathized with.
Stabler has a close call in the season 7 episode "Raw" when he is shot in the arm by a white supremacist during a trial. He makes a full recovery. Stabler has another close call in the season 7 episode "Blast" when he is held hostage by an armed suspect, later shot by Melinda Warner (Tamara Tunie). In the season 7 episode "Fault", Stabler is held at gunpoint for several minutes in a warehouse by a murder suspect (Lou Diamond Phillips). Benson refuses to shoot the suspect, for fear of hitting Stabler. At the conclusion of the episode, Benson asks to be reassigned due to their increasingly strained working and personal relationship.
In the season 7 episode "Ripped", Stabler encounters a former partner whose son is the prime suspect in an assault case. Cragen orders him home for the remainder of the day after Stabler advises the family of the victim not to file charges. After the arraignment, which Stabler attends, he witnesses his former partner assaulting his son in the bathroom. While defending the son, Stabler loses his temper and beats the father unconscious. He seeks counseling from Dr. Rebecca Hendrix (Mary Stuart Masterson), a forensic psychiatrist and former police officer, who helps him to deal with his long-repressed feelings toward his father.
In the season 8 episode "Informed", Stabler is injured in an explosion involving dynamite, but recovers from his injures. Stabler is also stabbed with a pen in the chest, during the season 8 episode "Cage". He also sustains a deep cut to the hand while searching a car garage in "Victims."
In the season 8 episode "Loophole", Stabler is injured after Cupid (Bill Goldberg) throws him out the window, severely damaging Stabler's arm in the process.
In the season 8 episode "Dependent", Stabler is put on suspension after it is alleged he beat a teenage murder suspect to death. An eye-witness uses a video phone to record the incident of Stabler punching and restraining the much smaller teen. Stabler is cleared of the charges when it is determined that the teen died due to a cardiac syndrome during the struggle, and the teen's internal injuries were actually caused by Stabler's attempt at using CPR.
Stabler has twice had to use deadly force. During the season 4 episode "Risk", a corrupt police officer raises his weapon at Stabler in fear of being caught, forcing Stabler to shoot him. In the season 6 episode "Debt", Stabler shoots a suspect who is threatening to shoot his hostage despite the suspect's willingness to work the situation out with Benson.
In season nine's episode "Blinded" he is temporarily blinded by a schizophrenic rapist (Arye Gross) who throws him into a car window. However, the injury is not permanent and he returns to duty within a week. In the end of the episode, Casey Novak (Diane Neal) convinces Stabler to take the stand to testify against the defendant but then surprises him with her questions so that the defendant could not be extradited to Louisiana, where he could face the death penalty.
[edit] References
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