As well as having diverting cases and thought-probing courtroom/legal scenes, 'Law Order' (and the franchise in general) excelled when it tackled challenging subjects and themes often still relevant today. A lot of very challenging subjects and themes were explored, even controversial, more often than not done in a way that provoked thought and debate, induced a wide range of emotions and didn't come over as too polite or trivial.
That is certainly the case with "God Bless the Child". For me it is among the best Season 2 episodes and one of the most emotionally hard-hitting and complex. It has one of the season's most difficult and most complex subjects (as well as controversial), in how to deal with it without any bias or upset and in how to purposefully not make it an easy watch without getting preachy. The execution of this subject makes for one of the gutsiest and most powerful episodes of Season 2 and of the early seasons.
"God Bless the Child" has a riveting case that is a tough, uncompromising watch but handled with tact and in a way that induces a lot of tears and perhaps anger. The investigative elements intrigue and Cerreta and Logan have started to gel, but it was the legal scenes that resonated with me more. Done in a way that was thoughtful, making one think quite hard about what their stance on the situation is (found myself personally really hating what happened to the girl but couldn't bring myself to completely hate the parents either and understood their dilemma).
It is so easy when tackling a subject like this, where people would have strong opinions on it on either side, to execute it in a way that takes too much of one side and pass judgement. "God Bless the Child" doesn't do that, actually found it surprisingly balanced, in that it didn't take one side and trash the other (avoiding being too anti-anything), and that it was handled thoughtfully and sensitively without trivialising or being too careful. The moral issues and how to deal with the case had traps, again bias and heavy-handedness, traps not fallen into and found myself seeing where both sides were coming from. As the story progressed, the harder it hit and more emotional it got. Stone's conflict is easy to identify with and he is still a juicy character.
As ever, the episode is well made and scored and the script is taut and intelligent. All the acting is very good, Michael Moriarty doesn't disappoint while Byron Jennings and particularly Kaiulani Lee give powerful performances as the Driscolls, where one can see their moral dilemmas without completely hating or completely sympathising with them.
On the whole, wonderful. 10/10