CSI: Crime Scene Investigation kicked off an era of television shows that focused on forensics and the investigative process surrounding crimes instead of being a legal drama or a straight-up police procedural. CSI still had its fair share of investigators who analyzed and experimented with evidence, though.
The original series, set in Las Vegas, premiered in 2000 and was followed by CSI: Miami, CSI: New York, CSI: Cyber, and, more recently, a revival series in CSI: Vegas. The CSI franchise timeline covers more than 20 years. Each show featured a different cast of investigators setting out to solve grisly murders.
These investigators are the best the CSI franchise has to offer, thanks to their specialized skill sets and their ability to pursue evidence both in and out of a lab.
Mac Taylor (Played By Gary Sinese)
CSI: New York
Mac Taylor is the supervisor for the main CSI team highlighted in the New York spinoff series. While the first two series made a point of how science-leaning the team leaders were, New York is different.
Mac actually seems less suited to work in a lab and much more suited to the interrogations and witness statement sessions that the police detective in charge of the cases would be handling. As a result, he seems like he is in a good position as a supervisor, but not necessarily someone who can do all of the detailed work.
That being said, he runs his team like a tight ship. He knows which parts of the investigation each member of his team is best-suited for, and Mac makes sure that CSI: New York does not see any major evidence mistakes.
Mac is meticulous and someone who can see the big picture while everyone else is looking at the smaller parts of it.
Raven Ramirez (Played By Hayley Kiyoko)
CSI: Cyber
CSI: Cyber is the anomaly in the franchise in that the work is not done with a local police department. Instead, the work is done as part of the FBI. Computer forensics is also very different from physical forensic investigation, but that does not mean there are not skilled investigators on the team.
Haley Kiyoko plates Raven Ramirez, one of the youngest members of the team. She is a former hacker who begins using her skills to catch those who put other people in danger.
She also becomes an expert in cyber trends, social media investigations, and becomes the international relations representative for the team. Raven wears a lot of hats in the short-lived chapter of the CSI franchise, and no aspect of her work ever suffers for it.
Raven makes coming through the wide net of social media and online trends look easy all while she uses the very things we take for granted to bring down criminals.
Sara Sidle (Jorja Fox)
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, CSI: Vegas
Sara is one of the rookie investigators when the original CSI series premieres, compared to the rest of the team. She is initially very clinical in her approach to dealing with forensic evidence, but gradually shows more empathy and understanding for those affected by all of the evidence she gathers.
Sara shows some of the most growth during her initial time in the franchise. She has a great understanding of many different forms of forensics work and is detail-oriented in a way that is almost unbelievable.
Despite being so good at her job, Sara never has one specific area in which she excels. She does, however, know when to step away from the work that can become too much. She leaves the field for a time to focus on her life outside of her career before eventually returning to work in forensics.
Sara also appears as a recurring character in the CSI: Vegas revival series, still working in the field over a decade later.
Stella Bonasera (Played By Melina Kanakaredes)
CSI: New York
Stella is not the supervisor in CSI: New York, but she is Mac’s right hand. She is, also, however, a better investigator than Mac is.
Stella is the one who seems to excel when investigations lead to puzzles. In one episode, she even reassembles shards of glass to get a complete picture of what the glass used to be and how it relates to the murder at hand.
Stella is able to balance the actual science of the forensics with the more boots on the ground investigative work. She is equally adept in the lab and on the street with Detective Flack (Eddie Cahill).
Stella eventually leaves CSI: New York, but when the character is written out of the show, it’s not to abandon a life of crime-solving. Instead, she gets an offer to head her own forensic lab in another state. Fans wished that would have meant her own CSI spinoff series.
Calleigh Duquesne (Played By Emily Procter)
CSI: Miami
Calleigh Duquesne is a fascinating character, juxtaposing the put-together Southern belle with someone who has no problem putting her heels in the mud to dig out bullet fragments in the swamp.
While Horatio Caine is in charge of the CSI: Miami team, Callie becomes the day shift supervisor during her time on the show. She also has a very important area of expertise in a show like CSI: Miami, where so many of the cases in the series involve shootings.
Callie is a ballistics expert. There is no firearm she is not familiar with, willing to take apart, and willing to test at a shooting range. Though that is a very niche part of forensics work, Callie is also adept at nearly any other aspect of dissecting evidence as well.
Eric Delko (Played By Adam Rodriguez)
CSI: Miami
Long before Adam Rodriguez was an FBI profiler on Criminal Minds, he was a forensics investigator on CSI: Miami. He was also the team’s renaissance man.
Eric Delko never met a pattern comparison he was not interested in. If the team needed someone to examine tire treads, identify drug compounds, or check out fingerprints, Delko was their man. He could also find a variety of creative ways to retrieve fingerprints from surfaces other investigators might have thought they could not.
The CSI: Miami team places a heavy emphasis on the importance of science as well. Many of the team members have degrees in chemistry, including Delko.
The downside to Delko’s work is that he is a bit of a hot head, and his emotions can often get in the way of him doing his investigative work.
Raymond Langston (Played By Laurence Fishburne)
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
Raymond Langston is unique among the CSI investigators across the franchise because he does not start out in that line of work – or in law enforcement. Instead, he starts out as a medical doctor.
Langston is an accomplished doctor who specializes in forensic pathology. He is also a published author. His career, long before he becomes a forensic investigator, gives him a unique perspective on cases.
While that perspective is helpful when dealing with the body, Langston is not a medical examiner. That means more of his work is going to be with physical evidence. His work in the medical field has given him the eye for detail that a forensic investigator needs, but he does not have the same kind of experience.
That means Langston narrowly misses out on being one of the top three investigators in the CSI franchise.
Gil Grissom (William Petersen)
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, CSI: Vegas
Gil Grissom is the very first supervising investigator in the CSI franchise. As a result, he is a fan-favorite and is very memorable. Long after he left the original series, fans longed for him to come back, and he did in several guest appearances, including in the revival series.
Grissom is the best in the original series when it comes to combining the science of the forensics with the detective work, much like Stella in CSI: New York. Grissom does not initially have the same level of empathy as Stella, but he becomes better able to connect with people over the course of the series.
That ability starts to aid him in his investigations. Also aiding him is the fact that he has a Biology degree, an interest in a seemingly encyclopedic level of subjects, and has studied under a criminologist.
Grissom has the academic market of forensics truly cornered.
Catherine Willows (Marg Helgenberger)
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, CSI: Vegas
Like Sara and Grissom, Catherine Willows also returned for the CSI revival series. She outranks them both as an investigator because she did not go the academic route when it came to forensics work, but a practical one.
Catherine began her career in Las Vegas as an exotic dancer and fell in with a bad crowd, but she turned her life around and focused on a career that allowed her to help people. Catherine also found an interesting area of study within her forensics work – blood splatter. Catherine became her team’s expert on it.
Catherine also started her career as a forensic investigator in the 1980s, making her one of the longest-running investigators in the franchise since she is still active in the field and as a supervisor in the 2020s.
Catherine has no problem navigating a lab, working every inch of a crime scene, or talking to witnesses herself. She is the complete forensic investigator package.
Horatio Caine (David Caruso)
CSI: Miami
Horatio Caine narrowly edges out Catherine Willows and Gil Grissom as the best investigator in the CSI franchise. He seems to combine aspects of both of their skill sets.
Horatio is the team leader of the CSI: Miami investigators. Like many of his team members, he also has a degree in chemistry. That degree comes in handy since he also happens to be an expert in explosives.
That’s a dangerous field to work in, and it’s not one that comes up often in the series. That works in the show’s favor, however, because he is able to put all of the different pieces of the puzzle his team brings to him together to often solve the case.
Horatio also spends more time talking with both detectives and witnesses compared to other forensic investigators. His excellent communication skills in English, Spanish, and French mean that he is often able to read between the lines of what a witness is hiding and get the truth out of them.
Horatio Caine’s one-liners, dramatic delivery, and iconic sunglasses are just bonuses that endear him to the audience of the CSI franchise.
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