Villainess Review: Dr. Susan Langdon (Quantico)

This weekend, Lifetime aired the emotionally charged thriller, Girl in Room 13, which starred the late Anne Heche. The film, as I expected, was amazing and very gripping, and a huge part of that was due to Heche's performance. Anne Heche tragically passed away on August 11, 2022 at the age of 53, and what I will not do is talk about how she passed, as it had drawn too much negativity and scorn towards a person we should be mourning. Heche's career was immensely stellar; among some of the films she starred in was the 1998 reboot of Psycho (opposite Vince Vaughn as Norman Bates), as well as the film, Six Days, Seven Nights. Regarding TV, Heche appeared on many shows, with my memory still retaining watching her on the short-lived HBO series, Hung. Heche also recurred on All Rise as the contemptible lawyer, Corrine Cuthbert, with her final appearance being in the third-season opener, "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'."

One TV appearance of Heche's that remains fresh in my mind was her guest spot on the ABC series, Quantico. In the episode, "Guilty," Heche played Dr. Susan Langdon, a forensic pathologist who was tasked with teaching the FBI trainees, with one of them, Simon Asher, establishing his idolatry of Susan. As the episode quickly revealed, Susan was once an FBI agent and profiler leading the pursuit to capture the "welfare mom killer," who had murdered nine women, and she would go on to write a book about her pursuit. Her objective was teaching the trainees about how serial killers operate, and she later presented files of notorious serial killers and tasked them with finding the one murder these killers didn't commit.

Susan was immensely impressed with Simon and his knowledge, but a night out at a bar with the trainees would suddenly change Susan's thoughts on Simon. A conversation between the pair centered on the "welfare mom killer" case; mainly the killer's ninth victim, a woman named Ronnie Moore. Simon noticed a few inconsistencies regarding Susan's story, namely the stove--Susan said it was off, but it was clearly on. Susan attempted to explain the inconsistencies, but it all led to one simple conclusion from Simon: Ronnie was not killed by the same murderer, this was a copycat. Even worse, Susan had known that; as Simon revealed, the killer relentlessly taunted Susan during the case, and after learning that someone saw the killer near Ronnie's house, Susan headed there and found Ronnie dead, but Susan quickly realized that her target didn't commit the murder.

With that, as Simon deduced, Susan falsified evidence to fit her version of the events--turning off the stove, moving the high chair, and even planting the killer's DNA at the scene. Susan cryptically boasted that everything worked in her favor, and even informed Simon that she couldn't prove a thing, even threatening to kill Simon to silence him. Afterwards, the villainess took Simon and left the bar with him, with Ryan Booth following the pair and noticing that something was amiss. Susan--while holding a syringe as a threat to Simon--attempted to explain her departure, but in actuality, Susan saw her opportunity to eliminate Simon was gone. She kissed Simon and whispered that he couldn't prove anything, but later on, it was reported that Susan's villainy was reported by Simon, as her actions had made the headlines.

"Guilty" was the ninth episode of Quantico's first season, and aired on November 29, 2015. The main reason why I loved this episode was Anne Heche's performance as the evil Susan Langdon, mainly Susan's heel turn and how Heche performed during her character's reveal. I had known that Anne Heche had played a villainess before, but this episode was the first time I had ever seen Heche in a villainous role. Susan Langdon was ambitious and obsessed with justice, but as we would learn in the second half of that episode, Susan's traits would turn her into quite a ruthless and maniacal villainess. Not only did she resort to falsifying evidence to get what she wanted, she was willing to kill to keep her evil secret hidden. That mentality and a massive amount of intelligence? Very dangerous combination. Quantico only lasted three seasons on ABC, but Susan Langdon was one of the series' best one-shot villainesses, and we have Anne Heche to thank for this contribution.

Check out Dr. Susan Langdon's profile on Villainous Beauties Wiki!