It's unbelievable to think that this week Law & Order: SVU will begin its 22nd season. The cop-centered series has, over the years, taken trend-worthy, real-life crime stories and used them as inspiration for plot lines. Ice-T recently caught up with TMZ to discuss what viewers can expect from the forthcoming season and revealed that the show is attacking police-centered controversies unabashedly.
"We're hitting it head-on. When we come back, we come back right in the midst of the pandemic," the rapper-actor said. "You're gonna see us in masks, you're gonna see us social distance and the season finale, I killed a Black man. So now you got Finn going through the mental dilemma like, can he be a police officer in these times? The last thing he ever wanted to do was to be a cop that shot a Black man and killed him in front of his family."
"You're gonna see Mariska [Hargitay who portrays Olivia Benson] deal with the challenge of is she racist?" Ice-T continued. "We have this Karen situation where we pick up this Black guy but did we profile him? Was implicit bias involved? Why didn't we question the White lady? So, I really commend Law & Order for hitting these topics head-on. I'm very proud to be on a show that tries to stay current and tries to stay conscious."
Real-life public figures whose scandals inspired SVU include serial killer Aileen Wuornos, Ray Rice assaulting his girlfriend in an elevator, the Slender Man child case, the Brock Turner rape case, and the harrowing story of Gypsy Blanchard. Watch Ice-T on TMZ below.