The opening scenes of Law & Order: SVU Season 26 Episode 16 showed Benson visiting her mother’s grave for the first time since Serena Benson’s death in season 3.
Serena died off-screen so long ago that there could be a whole new generation of Law & Order: SVU fans who don’t know the backstory — or that she appeared on Law & Order: SVU’s pilot episode in 1999.
The graveside scene was effective, but it also convinced me further of one thing: the series should never have killed Serena off in the first place, especially considering that they did it off-screen.
Serena Benson Seemed Different In Her One Appearance Than How She Was Described Later
Serena Benson appears only in one scene of the pilot episode of Law & Order: SVU.
She and Benson have wine together, and Serena discourages her daughter from continuing to work for SVU after learning that Benson’s first case involves a woman who castrated and killed the man who raped and impregnated her.
During this brief scene, Serena seems like a loving, concerned mother who also happens to be a rape survivor. The implication is that Benson is still traumatized from knowing she is the child of rape, but her mother has moved on and put it behind her as best as she can.
Serena is never seen again; what happens later is pure character assassination.
Benson describes her on several occasions as an emotionally abusive alcoholic who has relapsed into drunken behavior — are we supposed to forget mother and daughter drinking wine together in the pilot without anyone getting drunk?
Serena dies off-screen on Law & Order: SVU Season 3 Episode 2 after getting drunk yet again and falling down the steps, and years later, Benson tells Rollins she learned she was the child of rape at the age of 13 when a drunk, angry Serena blurted out that she wished she never had her.
Obviously, Law & Order: SVU completely changed direction after the pilot, deciding to eliminate Serena and retcon her into an abusive alcoholic so that they could give Benson the backstory of having gone into this line of work because the rape completely destroyed her mother.
In some ways, that was effective.
Benson epitomizes “turning pain into power,” choosing to use her traumatic experiences to make things better for other survivors instead of self-destructing like her mother.
Most of the time, anyway. I vaguely recall an arc on Law & Order: SVU Season 17 where Benson flirted with alcoholism herself, and the knowledge that her mother died in an alcohol-fueled accident made that story more powerful.
Still, Serena Benson had so much potential, and it’s a shame it never came to anything.
At The Very Least, Serena Benson’s Relapse and Death Should Have Been On-Screen
It’s not outside the realm of possibility that Serena turned to alcohol when Benson was young.
Raising a child who only exists because you were raped brings up complicated feelings.
I have no doubt that Serena loved her daughter, but Benson’s presence was also a constant reminder of the assault — especially if Benson looked like her father.
And if Serena didn’t have support from family or otherwise, it’s understandable that she turned to alcohol to numb the pain.
However, that was not the Serena Benson we met on Law & Order: SVU’s pilot. She didn’t appear to have a problem with alcohol then, and her daughter wasn’t concerned about her drinking wine.
Thus, if the writers wanted to do an arc where Serena relapsed into alcohol use and eventually died because of it, it should have been on-screen.
It would have been far more powerful if Benson — and the audience — experienced her mother’s descent into self-destructive behavior in real-time, culminating with her tragic death.
Instead, it all happened off-screen, including Serena being retconned into this person who had always been an abusive alcoholic and caused Benson nothing but trouble.
How disrespectful!
That didn’t match her one on-screen appearance, so if the writers were going to go that route, they should have put her final story on-screen instead of hoping no one remembered what Serena Benson was like in the pilot.
That said, I don’t think it was necessary to write Serena out or kill her off at all.
Serena Benson Would Have Been The Perfect Complicated Foil For Her Daughter
Serena and her daughter clearly had opposite ways of dealing with the trauma of the rape.
Whether or not you buy the Serena-as-alcoholic story, it’s clear Serena’s primary coping mechanism is avoidance.
In the pilot, her main function is to convince Benson not to work for SVU because doing so would require her to face her own trauma.
Benson takes the opposite view — she’s here to help other survivors, and she’ll stop at nothing to accomplish that. Unfortunately, this dynamic is never repeated in any other episode, but imagine if it had been.
Over the years, Serena could have been both a sounding board and an impediment for Benson, wanting to support her but truly believing her daughter would be better off without this job.
This would have been a compelling recurring conflict, equivalent to Stabler’s ongoing marital and family issues.
Serena Benson Missed So Many Of Her Daughter’s Milestone Stories
Imagine if Serena had been around for Benson’s most important life changes!
Her take on Benson’s adoption of Noah and her discovery of a half-brother would have added extra emotional drama. I would have especially loved her reaction to learning her rapist had a whole other family.
And with the ongoing Benson/Stabler drama, Serena would have had many opportunities to put in her two cents about her daughter’s love life!
And I could just imagine her going head-to-head with Stabler’s mother! Now that would be must-see TV.
Of course, people sometimes die prematurely in real life and miss their children’s and grandchildren’s most important life events.
It’s tragic when that happens, but on a TV show, it’s completely avoidable.
Serena Benson’s unnecessary death didn’t have to be written in at all. She could have remained in the show on a recurring basis and popped up every now and then to annoy her daughter with her opinion.
What do you think, SVU fanatics?
Were we cheated out of some great storylines by killing off Serena, or is it better the way it is?
Hit the comments with your thoughts.
Law & Order: SVU Season 26 airs on NBC on Thursdays at 9/8c. The next new episode will air on April 3, 2025.
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