William Petersen

William Petersen plays Gil Grissom on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, the 2000s CBS hit that let Las Vegas criminalists solve murders with stylish science until lab work looked like nightclub cinema. Anthony E. Zuiker turned the who into the how, spawned a franchise mitosis machine, and put the “CSI effect” into real courtroom talk. 2000s procedural TV as a global export. Petersen is the supervisor as weather — curiosity, stillness, a flashlight that photographs as philosophy.

CSI: Crime Scene Investigation — CBS, 2000–2015 — is the 2000s hour this page is for. Las Vegas criminalists solve murders with stylish science, moody lighting, and forensic close-ups that made lab work look like nightclub cinema. Gil Grissom is Petersen's job here. He keeps the seating chart from looking like merch, and 2000–2015 is the proof the hour kept hiring him.

Pilot turns Las Vegas criminalists into stylish science: Zuiker's CBS hit making lab work look like nightclub cinema, the who now the how. That is s01e01, still behaving like a contract. s02e01 proves it survived opening night: Burked opens year two already fluent in the grammar: flashlight noir, close-up evidence, 2000s procedural TV as a global export language. s16e02 is the later hour — Immortality (2) is the original-run closer of a franchise mitosis machine — the mothership taking a bow after the CSI effect entered court talk. William Petersen as Gil Grissom is why those numbers still have a face.

The franchise cloned the night; he is the original mood. On TV Flash Petersen is 2000s lead craft: not a logo in a vest, a scientist who made evidence feel like character. Watch the lab. Grissom is why CSI still has a pulse under the blacklight.