Law & Order laid the groundwork for the Dick Wolf television world we all live in today. The franchise has been around since 1990, and incredibly, has managed to keep pace with the various Wolf shows that have followed in its wake. Part of the reason why is the franchise's ability to stage memorable and impressive crossover events.
Law & Order has made a point of setting up at least one crossover a season for the past few years, and 2025 is no exception in this regard. Law & Order and Law & Order: SVU will be joining forces for a two part event on Thursday, April 17 (Law & Order: Organized Crime will close out the block but not be connected in terms of story). It's a tried and true formula, but this crossover is going to be different from all the rest, according to franchise showrunner Rick Eid.
Law & Order crossover was dubbed a "two-hour movie"
Eid, who formerly worked on Dick Wolf shows like FBI and Chicago PD, told TV Insider that the scope and ambition of the Law & Order crossover is unlike anything fans have seen before. He went as far as to compare it to a cinematic event. "The episodes will feel like a two-hour movie," he explained. "While it's still in keeping with Law & Order's format of the police investigating a crime and the attorneys prosecuting the offenders."
Part of the reason that Eid is so emboldened to compare the crossover event to a film is because of the way it incorporates the court and the streets in the case. We've seen plenty of instances in which Law & Order characters have taken the stand, most notably with Jessica Brady (Maura Tierney) in the season 23 finale of Law & Order, but the ways in which the these two settings will be integrated will be a step above what we've seen before.
The crossover will air on Thursday, April 17
"We'll also find the DA’s office conversing with detectives as they get closer to arresting a suspect," Eid added. "And some of our detectives will take the stand in court." This notion of integration was a big selling point in another recent crossover between Dick Wolf shows. One Chicago actors likened their three-part January crossover to Avengers: Endgame in the way that different worlds collided to ensure the culprits behind a crime were caught.
We expect nothing less from Law & Order (even if we still secretly wished Organized Crime was involved).