S10.E12: I Can Let You Go

[jewel21]

Quote

Sean O'Neal surprises Upton with a call from prison, revealing sensitive information; while Upton grapples with how to keep O'Neal at a distance, the team quickly mobilizes to stop a crime in progress before it's too late.

Airdate: 01/18/2023

[Snazzy Daisy]

Samantha Beck is not as innocent as she appears to be. Something is off about her.

What make the writers think that bringing Sean back is a good idea.

Quote

Hailey : “I can’t have you in my life. It’s not right. It’s not for me. I’m done.”

Sean : “That’s a good speech. You’re just giving it to the wrong person."

For how long do we have to suffer and watch the slow death of this marriage??!

The arc is far from compelling. It is boring AF.

 

 

[anna0852]

I was utterly shocked at how good Voight was at dealing with the kid.

[Sandman]

5 hours ago, SnazzyDaisy said:

The arc is far from compelling. It is boring AF.

I don’t find the collapse of Upton and Brown Halstead’s marriage boring. I hate that Soffer’s exit from the show has turned Brown Halstead into a contemptible coward. The audience has known all season that Jay was never going to come back. I think Hailey has suspected as much all along. And now it would seem she knows for certain.

I also hate that Sean’s instinct for exploiting vulnerabilities gives him a shiv to stick into Hailey over and over.

[Nintra16]

I have more to say but I’m rewatching the episode on Peacock right now and they really character assassinated Jay. I  couldn’t see the Jay of past seasons doing that to someone he loved. 
Just a weird way to write him out. 

[FnkyChkn34]

I watched the first maybe 3 minutes, and when I realized (remembered) that it was a Hailey centric episode, I turned it off.  From reading these comments, I'm glad I did, but I am outraged at the thought of sacrificing Jay's character for Hailey.  We all knew Jesse Lee Soffer was not going to return, but they don't have to do him dirty.

[Guildford]

3 hours ago, FnkyChkn34 said:

I watched the first maybe 3 minutes, and when I realized (remembered) that it was a Hailey centric episode, I turned it off.  From reading these comments, I'm glad I did, but I am outraged at the thought of sacrificing Jay's character for Hailey.  We all knew Jesse Lee Soffer was not going to return, but they don't have to do him dirty.

It's clear that the decision was made many seasons ago that Halstead whole character was going to be sacrificed at the alter of Upton. I'm surprised Jesse stayed as long as he did. 

[Sandman]

I get that Upton is somewhat unpopular. But I think it would be worse if Jay abandoned their marriage and Upton was seen to be blasé about it. Showing her having an emotional response doesn’t seem like sacrificing his character for the sake of hers, to me. 

[jewel21]

I am really liking this Sean character and I'm glad he wasn't killed off. He is so creepy and disturbing to watch and I found his whole arc compelling from the moment he was first introduced. I'm here for him continuing to show up from time to time. 

 

[Guildford]

4 hours ago, Sandman said:

I get that Upton is somewhat unpopular. But I think it would be worse if Jay abandoned their marriage and Upton was seen to be blasé about it. Showing her having an emotional response doesn’t seem like sacrificing his character for the sake of hers, to me. 

I didn't mean that she shouldn't be upset about it (even if I don't care about her story at all) I was more meaning that Jay is gone, he's not coming back, so they sacrificed the character to further her story, not caring about Jay now because he's no longer part of the show. Him abandoning her was about her story, not his. His exit stopped being about him and it was all about Upton and her story going forward so they completely changed his character to make it worse for her character.

As in the past few seasons his only story was to push her character along, he stopped having his own story, everything was tied back to Upton.

Even him punching Voight, wasn't because he was angry at Voight for being Voight, he was angry because Voight told him 'he didn't know who he was sleeping next too'... Jay's whole reaction to that story wasn't that what they did was wrong, it was about the effect it had on Hailey and saving Hailey.

I honestly get the vibe Jesse had been done with this for a while, but they fucked up his exit & have now assassinated his legacy.

My apologies if I didn't explain it very well.

 

[FnkyChkn34]

17 hours ago, Sandman said:

I get that Upton is somewhat unpopular. But I think it would be worse if Jay abandoned their marriage and Upton was seen to be blasé about it. Showing her having an emotional response doesn’t seem like sacrificing his character for the sake of hers, to me. 

Without having seen the most recent episode, my observation/complaint is that Jay leaving the unit and going to Bolivia was just so much of a "huh? wtf" moment that it was completely out of character from the Jay of seasons 1-5ish. The show made Jay a completely different person after they paired him up with Hailey - so much so that he might as well have been a new character played by a different actor. 

Remember in season 2 when Erin was supposed to go to Bolivia with the Fed task force? I hope she's down there now and Jay finds her again (as well as his personality) and they live happily ever after.  

[Attatude]

They don’t have many options when they write out a character. They either die, get a new job or have some tragedy or breakdown that gives them an exit.  I don’t blame the writers. They didn’t want to kill him off and he wouldn’t leave Haley without a good reason, so they gave him a problem he couldn’t overcome unless he left.  I don’t get the Haley Hate. She is what she is.  I get more annoyed with Kim. Isn’t it time she catches another bullet then survives again? She’s superwoman but very cold.

They didn’t end the Beck story well. She may return for another episode.

Sean needs to go.  I won’t watch him anymore.

Edited January 21, 2023 by Attatude

[anna0852]

37 minutes ago, Attatude said:

They don’t have many options when they write out a character. They either die, get a new job or have some tragedy or breakdown that gives them an exit.  I don’t blame the writers. They didn’t want to kill him off and he wouldn’t leave Haley without a good reason, so they gave him a problem he couldn’t overcome unless he left.

I'm glad they left the door open for Jesse to return and I do agree writers find themselves in a tricky spot once they've ruled out just killing off the character. But they could have at least made it bit less of Jay running off from his marriage, which seems wildly out of character for him. Sure, send him on a long term assignment to Bolivia but at least have him and Haley part on good terms. And it's easy enough for her to receive texts/emails from Jay going forward. Then maybe in a year or two, either have Jesse guest in and return to Chicago with a non-Intelligence assignment or confirm he's completely done, no guest spots at all and kill him off. That would have been my plan. 

But I'm not a writer.

[FnkyChkn34]

Jay Halstead died years ago, basically when Sophia Bush left the show.  Unfortunately Jay Halstead 2.0 was a hollow shell of what he used to be.  I guess we shouldn't be mad at what the writers have done to him now; we should still be angry with what the writers have done for years.

[Attatude]

They ran out of ideas for his character.

[Nintra16]

 

On 2/10/2023 at 5:37 PM, Attatude said:

They ran out of ideas for his character.

I disagree. I enjoyed that episode of them digging into his military past, but again, they made it all about Hailey's secret with Voight at the end. 

Jay was a whole person before Hailey. They sacrificed his character for her and it's a shame because he was an integral part of the show. I was looking forward to Jay taking over when Voight's style finally caught up with him. But we'll never get that. Honestly, Idk if this show makes it another season.