Law & Order Does a Luigi Mangione Episode

I haven’t watched Law & Order in years but it’s currently on season 24. Last night episode 16 was a thinly veiled retelling of the Luigi Mangione story with the title “Folk Hero.”

In the episode, Ethan, played by actor Ty Molbak, guns down the CEO of a fictitious health insurance company on the sidewalk as he is about to enter a Manhattan building. Ethan is eventually tracked down by detectives as he is preparing to kill another insurance company CEO. Investigators find the gun used in the slaying and a notebook where he details his plan to kill other healthcare CEOs…

During the fictitious trial on Law & Order, Ethan told the jury he killed the CEO because the insurance company refused to pay for the drug that he believed would cure his mother’s terminal breast cancer. 

This sort of “ripped from the headlines” storytelling is what Law & Order has been doing for years, so it’s really no surprise the writers would jump on the Luigi story. However, it sounds like they bent over backwards to make Luigi’s sympathetic.

American Crime alum Benito Martinez is wasted as Judge Moscatello, who does head-scratching things just to keep the story interesting. He allows Ethan — who admits he shot Andrews after OptiShield denied his mother’s cancer treatment — to tearfully monologue to the jury, lets him testify as to whether or not his mother would have survived despite Nolan Price pointing out that Ethan has no medical expertise, and a later scene has Price decrying Moscatello’s various responses to the jury’s questions. In no way is this character believable, which further pulls the audience out of the story. Ethan’s defense that he was protecting other people whose lives would be ruined by OptiShield requires some suspension of disbelief, but would be worth debating if it wasn’t couched in these other implausibilities.

In case that wasn’t clear, the defense offered in this fictional trial is that Luigi/Ethan was trying to save lives by murdering the executive.

To Price’s shock, Ethan’s lawyer, Megan Stratton (Laila Robins), in her opening statement (which she gives after the people rest), says that Ethan had a legal reason for killing Andrews: He was trying to save lives. Andrews caused the deaths of thousands of innocent people by denying legitimate claims, and more would have died as a result. Ethan killed him before he could kill again, and his actions are completely legal under the laws of New York.

The show then engages in the ultimate cop out by cutting to black before the verdict is read.

…the most difficult part of Law & Order Season 24, Episode 16 is that it cuts to black before giving a verdict or even any other kind of conclusion. The writers stir up an entire debate and then leave the whole thing open-ended.

The show defended this choice, but personally I get the impression they just didn’t want all the hate mail they would get from progressives if they dared to say murder is wrong and Luigi is guilty.

“I feel like this open-ended episode played incredibly well,” actor Jesse Metcalfe, who plays Sergeant Danny DeLuca told TV Insider. “It really works for this episode. We don’t really take a stand on what the verdict should be. We allow the audience to have their own opinion. I think a lot of times when a storyline isn’t resolved, it can cause the audience a little bit of frustration. I think in this episode, I think it’s still incredibly satisfying, which is important.”

The Free Press has a story up today about the real life supporters of Luigi Mangione, people who were probably pleased by last night’s episode. 

When I tracked down a working link to the private Discord group, I saw that there were nearly 1,100 members from all over the world. Some introduced themselves with they/them pronouns and stated they were not yet 18. Others revealed they were lawyers, HR specialists, and janitors. On the Discord, there is a strict culture of anonymity, accompanied by constant reminders not to identify oneself, but I was able to trace the usernames to a grocery store cashier from Kaysville, Utah, a Columbia University graduate, and even a software engineer at Lockheed Martin. One FreeLuigi moderator is a single mother in Missouri who is trying to raise money for her mother’s healthcare treatment through GoFundMe…

Taylor Lorenz, a progressive tech journalist who has publicly called former President Biden a “war criminal,” told me Mangione has captured the American imagination because many view him as a “class traitor.”

“He could’ve gone on to be one of these evil insurance executives,” she said, referencing his “privilege.” “But instead, he stood up as a man of the people.”

A man of the people? As Lorenz’ comment suggests, some of the adoration isn’t just jailhouse fandom for a good looking guy, but something a lot darker.

On the r/Degenerates_for_Luigi community on Reddit, I found moderator Marjorie Sutherland, a 24-year-old who told me that she has a younger sister with “health problems that need immediate attention.” When I messaged her, asking why she supported Mangione, she said she knows many say “violence isn’t the answer.”

“But this country is built on violence,” said Sutherland, a waitress. “Sometimes, the end justifies the means.”…

“Not everyone in this community supports him because they think he’s innocent. It’s because they think he did it, and I’m one of those people.”

I’ve said it before but there’s a straight line between the people cheering on this act of political murder, the people on college campuses cheering on Hamas terrorists and the people currently cheering on political arson and vandalism aimed at Tesla. The connection is this: The left is increasingly comfortable with violence as a solution. 

We’d almost certainly be hearing a lot more about that connection and what it means if their friends in the media didn’t quietly agree with them and seek to protect their fellow progressives from criticism.