Career of Thomas Gibson Prior, During and After the TV Show Criminal Minds

If you are an avid follower of the CBS series Criminal Minds, then the face of Thomas Gibson would be quite familiar. He starred as Aaron Hotchner, a former prosecutor and one of the most experienced agents in the BAU who has a hard time balancing the demands of his job with his family life.

Let's take a look at his life, career, and the infamous circumstances under which he parted ways with Criminal Minds.

Early Career of Thomas Gibson Prior to Criminal Minds

Born on the 3rd of July 1962 into a Roman Catholic family in Charleston, South Carolina, Thomas Gibson's career path was set very early. While his father, Charles, was a lawyer and politician who served in the US Senate and House representing the South Carolina state, and his mother, Beth, was a social worker, the young Thomas was sent to Little Theater School and later Bishop England High School.

He went on to attend the College of Charleston from 1979 to 1981. He later applied to the Juilliard School, New York for a scholarship and was taken. There, Thomas studied for a bachelor's degree in Fine Arts, graduating in 1985.

Prior to his professional training for performing arts, as a child, Thomas had always had a flair for drama. As a nine-year-old, he had appeared in children's theater and also made an appearance in Seize the Street: the Skateboard Musical, produced by the Charleston Stage production company. His first foray into television was in 1987 in CBS' legal drama Leg Work. He appeared in another CBS production As the World Turns. 1992 was the year Gibson made it to the big screen in Ron Howard's Far and Away, where he played the role of Stephen Chase.

Over the years, his career trajectory has been upward, with numerous impressive performances. Movies he has appeared in include Denys Arcand's Love and Human Remains, Barcelona, Men of War, Sleep with Me, Eyes Wide Shut, Next Step, amongst others.

He has been nominated three times for a Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series. He also has two Golden Globe nominations for Best Performance by an Actor in a TV Series - Comedy/Musical. In 2010 he won the Entertainment Weekly online poll for Under-appreciated Entertainer of the Year for his performance in Criminal Minds.

Apart from the awards that he has to his name, Gibson has also come a long way in financial achievements. He has a net worth that has been estimated at $5 million. He has come by this fortune thanks to his showbiz career.

Why Did Thomas Gibson Leave Criminal Minds?

Thomas Gibson and other cast members of Criminal Minds

In 2005, the actor got the role of Aaron Hotchner in the highly followed TV show, Criminal minds and he remained a part for the next 12 seasons. On August 12, 2016, ABC Studios announced that Thomas Gibson had been fired after he had already appeared in two episodes of the twelfth season of the American police procedural crime drama television series Criminal Minds. This was after he had an onset mini brawl with co-executive producer and writer, Virgil Williams.

Giving his side of the story after he was shown the way out, the actor revealed that he discovered a line in his script which contradicted a previous one and when he met Williams, the latter said he had to do it. Later, Williams would walk into a room where the actor was talking about the issue with other cast members and a small altercation happened between them. After the scene, he revealed that after the day's shooting, he went home and was never invited back.

Even with the explanation, it was reported that his firing from the show came as no surprise to most of the cast and crew as Gibson was seen as a difficult character who had trouble controlling his fiery temper. The altercation that led to his dismissal from the show was the third time he had gotten into trouble on the set of Criminal Minds. On the first occasion, in December 2010, he shoved Assistant director Ian Woolf during a late-night location shoot and was subsequently mandated by his bosses to take eight hours of anger management classes.

In January 2013, he was arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol after cops had trouble stopping him from driving through a part of L.A cordoned off for a marathon. When pulled over Gibson refused a breathalyzer test after it was apparent he smelled of booze. After the incident, his driver’s license was seized for a period and had to rely on staffers on the set of Criminal minds to drive him to set.

His dismissal from the production was seen as a culmination of the above events and the fact that the sources from the cast reported that he felt most of the cast were incompetent and inferior to him.

After he was yanked off the production, subsequent episodes portrayed Gibson's character Aaron Hotchner (a Former BAU unit chief and senior supervisory special agent) as being away on a special assignment. Thomas Gibson had been on Criminal minds for 12 years.

What Is He Up To?

Since he left Criminal Minds, the actor has not taken any new role on TV until 2019 when he got to play the main role of Colonel Branson in Shadow Wolves.

With speculations of the final season of the show set to premiere in 2020, there have been speculations that the actor may return to play Hotchner for one last time. The speculation is further empowered by the idea that since he was not killed from the show, he could still find the door open in the Season 15 of the show. There is no serious likelihood of this considering the way things ended.

In his personal life, things have not moved so well for him as he only finalized his divorce from Cristina Parker in 2018, after they had been married for more than two decades. He currently lives in San Antonio.