Personality[]
«The origin of ‘nice’ is 12th-century middle-English meaning foolish or stupid. I hope you’re referring to the modern use of the adjective.»
In «The Silencer», Blake comes off as intelligent, with a mind possibly equal to that of Reid’s. However, she is also somewhat rebellious, as evidenced when she finds that the BAU didn’t do much in the initial investigation of The Silencer. Her primary motivation in rejoining the BAU after spending a leave as a forensic linguistics professor was to restore her reputation within the FBI after her downfall during the events of the Amerithrax case. As a result, she doesn’t get along well with Strauss, although the two make amends in «Carbon Copy». As her role in Season Eight progresses, she gets along well with the rest of the BAU.
In «Bully», it is revealed that she is a rather private person in regards to her personal life, as evidenced when she doesn’t tell the rest of the BAU about her family life, especially her deceased brother Danny.
Notes[]
- She understands sign language. («The Silencer»)
- Her sidearm is a SIG Sauer P229R. («The Silencer»)
- She didn’t get along well with her roommate during her freshman year in college. Later, her roommate at the FBI Academy made her promise that if anything happened to her, Blake would «get rid of anything her parents shouldn’t see.» («Broken»)
- When she is bothered by something, she whispers lyrics to herself. She has a particular fondness for Nas. («#6»)
- Her dissertation was on the fluidity of metaphors. («#6»)
- Her mother introduced her to crossword puzzles, which, in turn, inspired her to pursue a linguistics career. («In The Blood»)
- She understands some Portuguese. («The Caller»)
- Her family is heavily involved in law enforcement. («Bully»)
- Her older brother, Danny, was a police officer killed in the line of duty during . («Bully»)
- She understands Pig Latin. («»)
- She may have developed a fear of water after nearly being drowned by an unsub. («Blood Relations»)
- She had a son named Ethan, who died at age nine from an unspecified neurological disease. She later admits that she sees Reid as her own son and that Ethan would’ve been «a lot like «. («Demons»)
- She has appeared in a total of 48 episodes, «Demons» being her last.
Background[]
Blake was born in a family of mostly police officers. Her father, Damon Miller, was a captain for the Kansas City Police Department before his retirement, while one of her brothers, Scott, is a homicide detective. She had another brother, Danny, who also worked as a police officer and was killed while intervening in . Sometime during her adult life, she met and married a member of Doctors Without Borders, James Blake.
Blake graduated from Berkeley University with a double major. Recruited by the Bureau when she was only 24, she became a veteran FBI agent who made a name for herself by helping solve the Unabomber case, but has a rocky history with Strauss stemming from the Amerithrax case, in which Strauss let Blake take the blame when things went south over a linguistics flub and the wrong suspect was arrested. In fact, having been with the FBI since she was 24, Hotch and Rossi to have known her from her career in the Bureau.
At Georgetown, she teaches forensic linguistics to students that are apparently as intelligent as Spencer Reid. She and Reid have some history together since he makes appearances as a guest lecturer in her classes. She has written a book titled «The Route of Linguistics», which she presumably uses during her lectures.