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| “ | Shoot me, how you gonna save them? Without this. Or maybe... that was the plan all along. Good luck. | „ |
| ~ Fowler taunting the BAU just before killing himself |
Franklin Fowler is the main antagonist of the Criminal Minds: Evolution third season premiere "Swimmer's Calculus". Fowler is an enraged serial killer drowning various victims to emulate his childhood abuse.
He was portrayed by Sam O'Byrne.
Early life[]
Fowler's father worked as a lifeguard and demanded he follow the same career path, forcing him to train rigorously even though his asthma made the training very painful. At age ten, Fowler finally snapped and drowned his parents and sister in the family's swimming pool in Chesapeake. Police suspected his involvement in their deaths, but they never had enough evidence to charge him.
Fowler never fully satisfied his bloodlust, so he went on a killing spree in 2023, drowning his victims to relive the sense of power he felt when drowning his family. Fowler maintained a profile on the AllBeachandBed.com vacation rental service, where he would find guests to target. Fowler would gain their info, drug them with fentanyl spray, and torture them by stabbing around their ribs, which was to emulate Fowler's own asthma. He would then force them into the same water torture Fowler suffered in the 7-foot-deep region of the pool until they drowned.
"Swimmer's Calculus"[]
Fowler first kills Joel Tanner and Mila Stevens, who were in Chesapeake, but Fowler's sadistic cravings lead him to abduct people from all over the East Coast, killing Simon Gladwin from Boston and Parker Hollings in Providence. David Hartle, an Ocean City resident, narrowly escapes Fowler, but when a cop catches them both, Fowler lies that David is his drug-addled brother, and Fowler takes him back to murder him.
Chet Williams from Delaware is next to be murdered. While at the beach, Fowler sees Curtis and Kristi Estes and their daughter Vivian celebrating Curtis' birthday. Furious over how they resembled his own dead family, Fowler abducted them and tried to make them enter the pool. When Curtis refused, Fowler shot him dead. Kristi and Vivian are then thrown in with Curtis' corpse, the pool cover being closed to hasten their deaths. Kristi pokes a hole in the cover with Curtis' corkscrew to breathe. Fowler reacting by shooting and injuring her in a rage.
The FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit (BAU), who are investigating the murders, arrive in time to to stop him, and while taunting the agents, Fowler smashes the pool cover's remote and shoots himself dead. Agent-in-Training Tyler Green cuts the cover open with his military blade, and Agent Luke Alvez brings the mother and daughter to the surface, narrowly rescuing them.
Trivia[]
- Fowler is inspired by multiple real-life serial killers:
- The unidentified "Smiley Face Killer(s)", at least one suspected killer of dozens of college-aged men by drowning across the U.S.
- The late Jeffrey Dahmer, a.k.a. "The Milwaukee Cannibal", a serial killer/rapist of men and boys using drills to torture them with lobotomies, once kidnapping a murdered boy again by lying to responding cops when the boy escaped.
- Danny Rolling, a.k.a. "The Gainesville Ripper", a serial killer/rapist of college students in Florida, with a violent father and a preceding record of a family's murder in his hometown.
- AllBeachandBed.com is a clear reference to the vacation rental service AirBnB.
External links[]
- Franklin Fowler on the Criminal Minds Wiki
