Airs Next:CBS at Thursday 9:00 PM (60 min.)
Status:Returning Series
Premiered:October 6, 2000
Show Categories:Drama, Action/Adventure

CSI is an innovative, new type of crime drama because the characters use cutting-edge forensic tools to examine the evidence to solve the case. Rather than a 'whodunnit' cop show (investigating witnesses/suspects), CSI explores the 'howdunnit'. CSI has been the number one scripted series in the Neilsen ratings for four years running. In 2007 nearly 84 million people watched CSI,...
The second season of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation consolidates the show's well-deserved popular appeal, while beginning to explore (gently at first) beneath the slickly professional surface of the investigators themselves. Gradually we learn more about what makes Grissom and his astonishingly gifted forensics team tick, beyond merely that they are workaholics who seem to require no sleep at all. The show's trademark reveals of vital evidence--be it on the autopsy slab or under the microscope--add a fresh spin to what is, at heart, a good old-fashioned whodunit series. William Petersen brings the requisite air of antiquarianism to a character whose meticulous demeanor and love of order consciously inherits the mantle of Sherlock Holmes (whose vast collection of tobacco samples and bottles of chemicals are the ancestors of CSI's high-tech crime lab). This is a series in which scientific evidence-gathering is elevated to the status of a religion. "When a tree falls in the forest, even if no one is around to hear, it does make a sound," affirms Grissom with the calm assurance of a yogi on the path to Enlightenment. CSI: Crime Scene Investigation is an American crime drama television series. CSI premiered on CBS on October 6, 2000. The ninth season began airing on October 9, 2008 and currently airs in the United States on Thursdays at 9:00 p.m. The show was created by Anthony E. Zuiker and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer. It is filmed primarily at Universal Studios in Universal City, California.
CSI trails the investigations of a team of Las Vegas forensic scientists as they unveil the circumstances behind mysterious and unusual deaths and other crimes. For the first eight and a half seasons, the show starred William Petersen as Dr. Gil Grissom, the night shift supervisor who excels in crime scene investigation. In the middle of the ninth season, Petersen left and was replaced by Laurence Fishburne as Dr. Raymond Langston, a former medical doctor who turns criminalist in an attempt to rid himself of past demons.
Reception of the show is generally good, with ratings making it the number one show on the network several times in its history, although it has been criticized for its inaccurate portrayal of how police investigations are performed and for its often extremely violent depictions of the crime. CSI has been nominated numerous times for industry awards and has won nine awards during its history. The success of the program has led it to be spun off into two additional shows, an exhibit at Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry, a series of books, and several video games.