Then Alec Baldwin said he was retiring from the biz in that affected, woe-is-me letter recently, he obviously didn’t mean it literally. The actor returned this week in a minor role on Law & Order SVU, doing what he does best – being a jerk. Playing. Playing a jerk that is. Baldwin joined the SVU team (or rather, got in their way) as an over-eager, overly intrusive New York Ledger columnist who publishes inflammatory articles about a rape case being investigated by the SVU team.

Alec Baldwin
Alec Baldwin seemed to declare a hiatus from the biz recently, but he's back with a vengeance.

The episode kicks off with Jimmy MacArthur (Baldwin) shadowing Sgt. Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay) for a profile. In the process, he manages to alienate a rape victim by questioning her story (it turns out that her rape was not motivated by her religion as the victim claimed) and publish a story, declaring the whole thing a “hoax”. Classy move, that one.

Mariska Hargitay
Alec Baldwin joined the show's star Mariska Hargitay, mostly to butt heads with her character.

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So Baldwin’s character ends up clashing with Benson and the team and comes out of it all in a less than favorable light. After the victim claims her attackers called her a "Muslim bitch" and told her to "go back to India," Baldwin's character cries foul, doubting men that would commit such a crime would know there were Muslims living in India. There might need to be a trigger warning on this particular episode.

Alec Baldwin
It was about time we saw Baldwin in action again.