‘The Rookie’ Boss Teases Monica’s Return, Nolan in Jeopardy in Finale & Lucy’s Sergeant’s Exam

As The Rookie nears the end of its seventh season (don’t worry, it’s already been renewed), there’s still the matter of a couple of the fugitives who were free at the end of the last finale, Monica (Bridget Regan) and Oscar (Matthew Glave).

But first, the ABC drama gives us another documentary-style episode on Tuesday, April 22. In “A Deadly Secret,” documentary filmmakers interview the LAPD on a complicated missing person’s case connected to John (Nathan Fillion). That episode, executive producer Alexi Hawley says, includes a “few unexpected revelations” for Tim (Eric Winter) and Lucy (Melissa O’Neil), “some things said that a camera caught that maybe they weren’t supposed to, which I think is fun.” Below, he previews more about what’s still to come in Season 7.

Monica is still out there, but we got a taste of what she’s up to with the “Speed” episode. What can you say about what she’s up to and how you’re going to be playing that out? 

Alexi Hawley: I can safely say that she’s going to come back around again in a big way by the end of the season. I don’t want to get more specific than that, but yes, she’ll be coming back.

Also out there is Oscar. Why leave his reintroduction for last out of the three fugitives from the end of last season?

I don’t know. I mean, partly it was just to give myself places to go, honestly. We had such big storylines with Jason [Steve Kazee], obviously, and then with Monica, but also wanting to be telling fresh stories. But then, I mean, absence makes the heart grow fonder a little bit and Oscar does come back by the end of the season in a big way. We were telling a lot of stories, obviously, as you’ve seen this season, and it just felt like he fell later in the season rather than earlier.

Disney / Raymond Liu

What can you say about what he’s up to and are he and Monica working together?

It’s all very spoilery. I can’t necessarily say what he’s been up to other than no good.

Nolan and Bailey (Jenna Dewan) hit a bump in their road to adoption due to the nature of their jobs. But what does that mean for them when it comes to expanding their family?

Yeah, I think ultimately what we lean into — because obviously it’s not like first responders are not able to adopt, but I think just this year volume of danger and trouble that they both get into is really where the obstacle was. I mean, I think for now, they’ve sort of gone down this road that ultimately ended up being unfulfilling and it’s going to be the two of them. I don’t necessarily have a plan beyond that at the moment, but we will see where we fall in Season 8.

So you brought back the documentary for next week’s episode, which is fun. Why did you bring it back at this point? And talk about figuring out the case for which you would do.

We love doing them. They actually were born out of the pandemic and the body cam or pod car episodes, which is what the bus one was, where it’s really filmed only with surveillance cameras and body cams and dash cams. Those were both sort of born from the pandemic of me trying to figure out how to do episodes honestly that were safest for the actors who at that point were unmasked and therefore putting an actor or two actors in the car together with no other crew was safe for the pod car episodes.

Then on the true crime documentary, if it’s all just them filming it themselves or surveillance camera set up with no crew around, again, that was safer, but they ended up being just sort of really fun ways to turn the show on its head. And the true crime documentary especially, they are a little difficult to break because there’s so many moving pieces and we don’t want you to know where it’s going. But this season, we really wanted to lean into sort of the horror motif a little bit more, the ghost hunter-y vibe, that sort of real-life scary places type thing. And that’s sort of where it came from.

What challenges the LAPD about this case?

Obviously, belief is one. We have some characters like Celina [Lisseth Chavez] and to a certain extent Lopez [Alyssa Diaz], who do believe in things that can’t be explained, in the supernatural. And then you have characters like Harper [Mekia Cox] and Nolan who are much more non-believers. But [it’s] just really threading the needle on how to have fantastical moments, but still ultimately ground the case in something that feels real, which I think we really did.

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In Episode 16, the team has mixed feelings when a familiar face returns hoping to prove himself. Is it Seth (Patrick Keleher)? What can you preview?

I don’t know that I want to get spoilery on that one just yet. I do think that yes, something from the past comes back and sort of turn things on its head. … It shakes up the station for sure. I think it’s polarizing for sure.

That episode will also see Tim support Lucy as she prepares for the sergeant’s exam. What can you say about what we’ll see from them when it comes to that professionally? Because their relationship is so mixed up in the personal and professional, but this is a big moment for her career.

It is a big moment for her career and the path that she thought she was going to go down with the detective’s exam ultimately ended up getting torpedoed because of the things she did to try and make Tim happy, because he had sort of sacrificed his career a bit to get out of her chain of command. And so I think in this season, part of the fallout from the breakup for her really was a sort of commitment to making sure that her career didn’t take a backseat to anything. The sergeant’s exam is really important for her to feel like she’s moving forward. I mean, obviously we’ve established that it would make them equals and therefore would solve the real obstacle or the sort of physical obstacle to them becoming romantic again in any sort of long-term thing. But I do think at its heart, it’s really important that that’s not the reason she’s doing this. Obviously it’s potentially a great bonus, but really, she’s ready to move to the next level. And yeah, we’ll see where that goes.

You’re nearing the season finale. What can you tease about it and how it ends to set up Season 8?

We’re sort of driving towards a big splashy episode, which we like to do obviously at the beginning and the end of the season. I think ultimately it will relaunch potentially some laid aside storylines, but also just really put Nolan in sort of primal jeopardy and then also just see where our station might be headed in Season 8.

How would you describe the cliffhanger?

I would say it is fun and it is unexpected and hopefully will make people very excited about what’s going to happen in Season 8.

The Rookie, Tuesdays, 9/8c, ABC