Reception
Hargitay has won a number of awards for her role as Benson: 'Individual Achievement for Best Female Lead' and 'Outstanding Female Lead' Gracie Awards in 2004 and 2009 respectively, an Emmy for 'Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series' in 2006, a Prism Award for 'Performance in a Drama Series Episode' in 2006, and a Golden Globe for 'Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series' in 2005. Of her Emmy win, Hargitay commented: "It makes me only want to be better. Now I'm an Emmy winner. I have to step it up."
The San Francisco Chronicle's John Carman has called Hargitay "the show's weakest performer" when the series originally premiered in 1999. In 2006, however, fellow San Francisco Chronicle writer Jean Gonick, deemed Benson a suitable role model for teenage girls, calling her "courageous and strong, and unspeakably gorgeous", and writing that "Olivia Benson is our own special hero. She battles evil, avenges her mother, faces her demons but refuses to date them." In 2001, Entertainment Weekly's Ken Tucker criticized Benson and Stabler as "the most naive, bleeding heart molester busters in America."
A poll on the Hallmark Channel voted her second-greatest detective in the Law & Order franchise, only being beaten by Law & Order: Criminal Intent's Robert Goren. She was included in TV Guide's list of "TV's Sexiest Crime Fighters". She was ranked No. 16 in AfterEllen.com's Top 50 Favorite Female TV Characters. AOL ranked her the 50th Most Memorable Female TV Character.
Read more about this topic: Olivia Benson
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“Aesthetic emotion puts man in a state favorable to the reception of erotic emotion.... Art is the accomplice of love. Take love away and there is no longer art.”
—Rémy De Gourmont (1858–1915)
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“To aim to convert a man by miracles is a profanation of the soul. A true conversion, a true Christ, is now, as always, to be made by the reception of beautiful sentiments.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)