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| “ | I know how to make you see me. | „ |
| ~ Bryan Hughes as he tries to kill an art gallery owner. |
Bryan Hughes is the main antagonist of the Criminal Minds episode "Magnum Opus". He is a serial killer who drains his victims' blood and uses it to paint portraits.
He was portrayed by John Patrick Amedori.
Biography[]
Early life[]
Hughes suffers from a severe form of hemophilia called Type B Christmas Disease. An aspiring artist, he tries for years to make it as a painter, only to be met with rejection.
Hughes gets into a car accident that kills the other driver, but leaves him unscathed. The trauma of the accident, combined with his obsession with artistic success, causes him to snap and develop the delusion that he can create the great art he has always dreamed of by killing people and painting with their blood, considering it his "signature". By the time of the episode, he has kidnapped and murdered two people, Pamela Hurd and Gary Porter, and created portraits with their blood.
"Magnum Opus"[]
After killing his latest victim, Lynn Stevens, Hughes fills a jar with her blood and uses it to paint an abstract portrait. He then lures Aimee Fortner to his apartment with the promise of a modeling job, incapacitates her, and removes her eyelids before killing her and using her blood as paint for a new canvas. He tries to sell his paintings to art gallery owner Madison Riley, but she disdains his work as amateurish. In an attempt to get rid of him, she makes a vague promise to take another look at his work if he can paint something more personal.
Hughes befriends Paul, a coworker at the gallery where he works as a janitor, and offers him a ride home. He then kidnaps and murders him, and mixes Paul's blood with his own to use for a new painting he intends to sell to Riley as his "signature" work. Riley once again rejects his artwork, however, and tells him not to come back. Enraged, he decides to make his next painting with Riley's blood.
Meanwhile, the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit (BAU) investigates Hughes' murders, and they theorize that the killer sees his murders as works of art because he leaves his victims' bodies near artistic works. They believe he wants recognition from his victims by removing their eyelids, he forces them to see him. Deducing that the killer would likely try to sell his "artwork", agents David Rossi and Alex Blake investigate purveyors of fringe and outsider art, finally finding one of Hughes' blood paintings in an S&M bar. They test the blood and find that it came from a hemophiliac, so they ask technical analyst Penelope Garcia to find reviews of professional artists in the area and cross-reference them with records of hemophilia patients, adjusting the profile to reflect that the killer may have been set off by a near-death experience. She finds records of Hughes' car accident, and he becomes their suspect.
The BAU arrives at Hughes' loft just as he is about to kill Riley, whom he kidnapped earlier that day. Agent Aaron Hotchner tries to talk him down by telling that he deserves to be recognized as an artist, but Hughes replies that the best way for him to achieve that recognition is to die a famous death, like his idol, Vincent Van Gogh. He then advances on Hotchner, forcing the agent to shoot him dead in self-defense.
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- Hughes is one of the serial killers portrayed in Criminal Minds whose M.O. and signature is copied by John Curtis, a villain the BAU faces later on in the eighth season.
External Links[]
- Bryan Hughes on the Criminal Minds Wiki
