Criminal Minds: Evolution Season 3, Episode 6 “Hell Is Empty…” Meaning Explained

In Criminal Minds: Evolution season 3, episode 6, one of Voit’s acolytes delivers a cryptic message to the BAU that comes to pass in the shocking cliffhanger ending. In Criminal Minds: Evolution season 3, Zach Gilford’s Elias Voit has been recovering from a traumatic brain injury from the season 2 finale that has left him a truly changed man, with the medical tests to prove it. However, even if Voit himself is no longer a threat, his network of like-minded killers is clearly mutating beyond even what he created, insidiously meaning the BAU doesn’t know what it’s up against.

JJ has been obsessively checking BAU-Gate instead of dealing with her grief over Will’s death, and in Criminal Minds: Evolution season 3, episode 4, she discovers a new video uploaded by The Brutal Man. JJ is able to successfully talk the unsub, Ronald Graber, into surrendering in Criminal Minds: Evolution season 3, episode 5, but he has one condition: Ronald wants to meet Sicarius in person. In a tense meeting where Voit has to pretend to be his old self, Ronald gives his coded message to Voit and the BAU: “Hell is empty, and all the devils are here.”

“Hell Is Empty And All The Devils Are Here” Is From Shakespeare’s The Tempest

The Line Describes A Group’s Descent Into Chaos After A Shipwreck

The quote “Hell is empty and all the devils are here” comes from Act I, Scene II of Shakespeare’s The Tempest, a play that begins with a violent storm shipwrecking a group of nobles on a remote island. Stranded and frightened, the group quickly begins to turn on each other, scrambling for resources and abandoning civility. A young nobleman named Ferdinand utters the famous line after witnessing the chaos and cruelty that unfolds among the survivors.

Stripped of civilization, the survivors fight over limited resources, revealing their darkest instincts. Ferdinand’s words aren’t meant to suggest literal demons walking the earth—but rather that the true horror lies in the capacity for cruelty within any person. Civilization has barely slipped away, and already their worst instincts have taken hold. Shakespeare uses this descent into disorder to expose an unsettling truth: humans are fully capable of monstrous behavior, even without supernatural influence.

The presence of darkness inside everyday people means hell doesn’t need to be imagined as a distant underworld. The BAU is no stranger to hellish behavior masquerading as humanity. From sadists and manipulators to entire murder networks like Sicarius, the agents are constantly confronting people who, like those in The Tempest, have discarded empathy, morality, or sanity. These criminals aren’t supernatural—they’re human. And yet, their actions make Hell feel tangible and disturbingly familiar.

Criminal Minds: Evolution Reframes Shakespeare’s “Hell Is Empty” Quote

The Sicarius Network Has A Message For The BAU

In Criminal Minds: Evolution, the quote “Hell is empty and all the devils are here” is reimagined not as a reflection on human nature, as in The Tempest, but as a direct threat. Spoken by Ronald Graber—known to the BAU as The Brutal Man—it’s not a spontaneous expression of horror, but a rehearsed message Ronald insisted on delivering directly to Sicarius, not realizing the Sicarius he knew no longer exists.

Ronald didn’t know Voit had murdered his family when he was 10 years old; he believed they had abandoned him. Yet even before learning the truth, Ronald had committed to delivering this cryptic line—suggesting it was part of a larger scheme orchestrated by forces beyond Voit.

New episodes of Criminal Minds: Evolution stream on Paramount+ Thursday. Season 3, episode 7, “…All the Devils Are Here” will drop June 19, 2025.

The quote is reframed here not as reflection, but as prophecy. In its original context, it observes the chaos and cruelty of humanity in crisis. Here, it’s a veiled message to the BAU: the network isn’t dormant, and the devils are already loose. Ronald’s demand to speak with Voit gives the appearance of a disciple seeking closure, but the message seems intended for the BAU—suggesting Ronald is no longer just a follower, but a messenger for something bigger.

Criminal Minds: Evolution season 3, episode 6 ends with that threat materializing. A new unsub cracks open JJ’s theory that the network is in communication and activating one by one, insinuating that they wouldn’t limit themselves to one killer at a time. Simultaneously, a mask identical to The Brutal Man’s is delivered to Quantico, triggering lockdown. “Hell is empty” isn’t just a line—it’s a signal that the nightmare is far from over. The quote becomes a grim bellwether of chaos.

It Could Have A Double Meaning That Refers To Elias Voit Himself

The Former Voit Is Gone, But We Don’t Know For How Long

While Ronald means the Shakespeare quote as a taunt to the BAU, it also has a potential double meaning that refers to Elias Voit himself. So far, every medical test suggests that Voit’s post-coma transformation in Criminal Minds: Evolution season 3 is genuine: advanced brain scans and behavioral assessments prove that the areas of his brain responsible for empathy are now active. Voit’s willingness to help others comes at his own expense – the more information he can give to the BAU, the more remorse he has to live with.

Paramount+ has already renewed Criminal Minds: Evolution for season 4.

However, the delivery of this Shakespearean quote by Ronald Graber, one of Voit’s most devoted disciples, opens the door to a darker interpretation. If Voit is truly changed, then the message is about others in the network—hidden monsters waiting to be activated. But if Voit is not as reformed as he seems—or if his empathy begins to fade, and he conceals it—then the quote becomes a chilling taunt.

“Hell is empty” might mean the devil is no longer locked away. He’s here, inside Quantico, sitting at the BAU’s table. Penelope Garcia even uses her ultra-powerful laptop chip to plug into the new Sicarius network, but if that drive contains a digital trap, then the devil didn’t just walk in—he was invited. This possibility reframes Voit as a potential ticking time bomb. Whether consciously or subconsciously, Ronald’s message in Criminal Minds: Evolution may hint that the greatest threat isn’t outside the BAU anymore. It’s already inside, wearing the face of redemption.