Law and Order Criminal Intent ( LOCI for short) made its debut on September 28th 2001 on the US Channel, NBC. The series was devised by Dick Wolf and was the second spin-off from the hit television series, Law and Order which debuted in 1990 ( Pilot Episode Shown in 1988 ).
The original series, which was known as "The Mothership" series, treated audiences to two sides of story: The police investigation and the prosecution in court. The series became a hit with viewers and gathered a large fan base, the first spin-off for the series was released in 1999 and was entitled Law and Order: Special Victims Unit or SVU for short and dealt with sexual crimes and domestic violence. Both series are still going strong. A fourth spin-off was made in 2004 entitled Law and Order: Trial By Jury, however it was less successful and was axed after one season.
Criminal Intent was to be different from its predecessors, as the audience would see the criminal act first and then see the case being investigated by the detectives of the Major Case Squad, but mostly by the shows central character, Detective Robert Goren.
In 2005 the show changed its format and a second team was introduced, to be headed by Law and Order actor, Chris Noth who reprised his role as Detective Mike Logan.
Since the show rarely dealt with the prosecution side, some court scenes were shown in the first series, from season 6 onwards the show no longer had a permanent A.D.A.
Up until the fifth season, Criminal Intent featured the trademark Law & Order date boards and "clunk clunk" between scenes, however this was dropped from the seasons afterwards. This Law & Order trademark has now been re-introduced for Series 9.
In 2007, the show moved to NBC's sister channel, USA Network and gained a new theme tune at the same time. Since head writer and executive producer, Warren Leight left the show at the end of season 7 to pursue other projects, season 8 was given two different writers for both teams:Walon Green writes for Goren and Eames, and initially Robert Nathan wrote for Nichols and Wheeler, but was replaced mid-season when he left. Actor Chris Noth also left at the end of season 7, so season 8 also had a new lead detective, Detective Zach Nichols played by Jeff Goldblum. Season 9 will see a further change in the show, when regular cast members: Vincent, Kathryn and Eric, leave the show and Jeff Goldblum takes on the lead role.
The worldwide success of the show has made other countries produce their own versions; Russia has its own version which is filmed in Moscow and up until recently France also had its own version shown on TF1 entitled, Paris: Enquêtes Criminelles ( Paris: Criminal Investigations) starring Swiss actor, Vincent Perez.
Law and Order gained a UK remake recently broadcast on ITV1, and due to the success of the first series, the network has commissioned a second series.
Two PC video games inspired by the show were released in 2005 by Legacy Interactive, the games featured the voices of Vincent D'Onofrio who plays Goren, and Jamey Sheridan who used to play Captain James Deakins. They were entitled "The Vengeful Heart" and "Dark Obsession" respectively.
NBC broadcasts repeats of the season previously shown on USA.
In the UK the series is broadcast on both Channel Five and The Hallmark Channel and the new channel Quest, has recently shown Series 1 in widescreen format.
Channel Five uses a different title sequence than the one in US and a different theme tune.