Why Seamus O'Meara From Law & Order: Organized Crime Looks So Familiar

By now, it's not a stretch of the imagination to believe that the "Law & Order" franchise is going to be around for as long as TV content is being produced. Now on its seventh series, the latest installment is "Law & Order: Organized Crime," starring Christopher Meloni and Danielle Moné Truitt. With lead detective Elliot Stabler (Meloni) returning from retirement, the focus is on the dangerous underworld of organized crime and its shady characters. 

One such character is Seamus O'Meara, played by Michael Malarkey, who works directly under crime boss Eamonn Murphy (Timothy V. Murphy). The character is eyed by the agency as a possible target to flip on his boss. The criminal is pulled in by the phony flirtations of Detective Jet Slootmeakers (Ainsley Seiger). However, things get complicated when Seamus catches on to Jet's plan. Fans of "Law & Order" will surely follow what's next for Malarkey's character, but in the meantime, these same viewers may be wondering where they've seen this actor before.

Just around the time a certain vampire book series by Stephenie Meyer was hitting big screens, fans' blood thirst for more vampire content found some quenching with the CW's "The Vampire Diaries." The show, which was also based on a book series by L.J. Smith, ran for eight seasons. The series followed the character Elena (Nina Dobrev), who falls for an ancient vampire named Stefan (Paul Wesley). This leads Elena into the shadowy world of the undead, who cross between reality and a mystical realm. One member of the toothy goths is Enzo St. John, played by Malarkey.

Malarkey joined the cast in the middle of Season 5, appearing in a total of 72 episodes. His character, Enzo, immediately became an antagonist for Stefan, giving fans some entertaining battle scenes. Many viewers were surprised at the sudden death of the character in Season 8, having his heart literally ripped out by Stefan. However, Malarkey's Enzo stuck around on the show for a while, post-death, as vampires have a tendency of doing.

There are so many streaming options for TV series and films nowadays, that sometimes it feels like you need random luck to land on a show worth revisiting. For those fortunate enough to find the needle-in-a-haystack streaming channel Crackle, which is owned by Sony, you may have come upon a crime series called "The Oath." Premiering in 2018 and starring Sean Bean and Katrina Law, the series centered on secret gangs who swear allegiance to each other, while secretly protecting society.

First appearing in the pilot, Malarkey played the recurring character Sam Foster, a police officer and member of a rival gang who is involved in a star-crossed love affair with an opposing gang member. The series, which was shot in Puerto Rico, pulled in enough fan support to be renewed for a second go-around a year later. However, that's as far as the show went as it was sadly canceled after two seasons and 18 episodes.

The subject of UFOs has been seeping into our news cycle more and more in recent years, and TV shows and films are surely jumping on that bandwagon. One of these series is History's "Project Blue Book," which spanned two seasons, premiering in 2019. The series, partially produced by the great Robert Zemeckis, follows a team of selected personnel who have been sanctioned to investigate UFO sightings from the '50s and '60s. Dr. J Allen Hynek (Aidan Gillen) heads up the team, with his Air Force Captain partner.

If you haven't figured it out by now, Hynek's partner, Captain Michael Quinn, was played by Michael Malarkey. Quinn, along with Hynek, work together throughout this series investigating different UFO sightings across the United States, "X-Files" style. The show was actually based on the real-life Project Blue Book study (via the New York Times), and fans of Malarkey got to see him attempt to explain the unexplained for all 20 episodes.