From the moment it premiered Sept. 24, 2010, and throughout its 14 seasons on CBS, “Blue Bloods” distinguished itself as more family drama than police procedural. Its series finale, which aired Friday, stayed true to that concept by honing in on a heightened case for the cop family involving a notorious gang leader joining forces with other gangs to orchestrate violent hits around the city in a play for amnesty, rather than a grandiose send-off or flashback-driven series reflection.
Eddie Janko-Reagan’’s (Vanessa Ray) partner Luis Badillo (Ian Quinlan) was killed in an ambush, making the case personal for the entire Reagan clan, including her husband Jamie’s nephew Joe. Even from a hospital bed, Eddie refused to back down from the case. Because the Mayor was also shot, Frank (Tom Selleck) was even more tied to the case professionally. And of course, there is a personal tie for Danny (Donnie Wahlberg) because there almost always is.
An ensemble show since its inception, “Blue Bloods,” created by “Sopranos” alums Robin Green and Mitchell Burgess, followed the Reagans, an Irish Catholic family intimately tied to the NYPD: 1980s “Magnum P.I.” star Selleck as NYPD Police Commissioner Francis “Frank” Reagan, his father Henry Reagan (Len Cariou), known as “Pop,” as a retired NYPD Police Commissioner, along with son Danny Reagan serving as a detective, daughter Erin (Bridget Moynahan) filling the role of Assistant District Attorney and youngest son Jamie (Will Estes) blowing off Harvard Law to become a cop himself. For seasons, Frank’s son Joe, also a cop, being killed on the job also haunted the show. His death is even referenced in the finale.
Although catching bad guys and helping good people was always one of the show’s main features, it’s the bygone belief in honor and justice that fueled “Blue Bloods.” In the worst of moments, Frank especially stood above the fray, almost always opting to do what was right and not what was popular, frequently sparring with whomever the NYC mayor was at the time. The weekly Reagan dinner with the entire family, including kids, grandkids and significant others with Frank and Pop sitting as heads of the table at opposite ends, served as a powerful symbol of the honor, respect and love that bonded the Reagans to each other, while also implying that their values is what kept New York City principled.
Today, nepotism is called out frequently. But on “Blue Bloods,” Frank following in his father’s footsteps and his children working in law enforcement, with two of his sons working directly under his command, was simply shown as “the good side” of the family business. In the past, that family police dynamic wasn’t at all uncommon in this country’s biggest cities, which is why “Blue Bloods” presented it as a dying practice, leaning into its upside while downplaying the potential negatives. Frank, for his part, let his children make their own decisions in life and on the job. In many conversations with his daughter in the District Attorney’s office, he gave his side of a given situation but left her to determine which way to proceed. Whenever his kids came to him, he usually found an ethical way to help them out.
The Reagans, of course, have relatable quibbles of their own. Sibling rivalry appeared early in the show. Mere minutes in, Danny, the hothead of the family who served in Iraq, teased Jamie, “the golden boy,” about disappointing their dead mother to become “another boot in a suit” like the rest of the Reagans to which Erin interjected, forcing Danny to acknowledge her loftier status in the District Attorney office. That moment also foreshadowed Danny’s many clashes with his family. While Selleck’s Frank is the show’s anchor or North Star, Wahlberg’s Danny was arguably the star as his antics and cases primarily drove the drama in many of the show’s episodes. His evolution over time as a police officer also reflected the American public’s changing attitudes about what constitutes acceptable police behavior, undoubtedly in the aftermaths of Tamir Rice and George Floyd.
In that very first episode, Danny’s de facto waterboarding of a suspect via dumping his head in the toilet to rescue a young, diabetic Hispanic girl from not just death but also potentially unspeakable harm gets him in trouble. Several times throughout the series, Danny is taken off the streets, with his gun seized, for going too far, with his desire to do the right thing always saving his badge in the end.
By the show’s finale though, Danny became far more tamed and rule-abiding than when he started, no doubt due to the personal tragedies he’s suffered in the line of duty.
For both Erin and Jamie, their personal lives and professional lives intertwined with their main storylines from the jump. Erin was raising her daughter Nicky (Sami Gayle) while seeking a divorce from Jack Boyle (Peter Hermann), a formidable defense attorney in a recurring role at various points throughout the show’s run, including a surprising turn in the series finale.
Jamie’s dating life, beginning with Sydney (Dylan Moore), the lawyer to whom he was engaged until after he blindsided her by becoming a cop, was always a topic. Impressively, “Blue Bloods” successfully managed his attraction to his partner Eddie from the first episode of Season 4 until they became engaged at the end of Season 8, announcing it during a Reagan Sunday dinner, and married at the end of Season 9. Leaving their mutual attraction on the backburner for so many seasons to protect their jobs of course deepened their bond and love for each other. Keeping a potential relationship brewing that long is a television feat few shows successfully achieve, especially when the coupling still leaves more story to tell.
But Jamie’s role in the show entailed far more professional subterfuge than that of Erin’s. Immediately after becoming a cop, FBI agents approached him about his deceased brother Joe working with them undercover to investigate potential corruption in an internal group within the NYPD known as the Blue Templar. It’s a secret Jamie initially kept from his father, but that culminated in an explosive Season 1 finale with the entire family and close cohorts working secretively to bring Joe’s killers to justice and weed out corruption.
That episode, “The Blue Templar,” is frequently acknowledged as one of the series’ most iconic episodes. One of the show’s heartwarming Joe-adjacent moments was the discovery of his son Joe Hill (William Hochman), whom he never knew, who joined the Reagan family Sunday dinner in the Season 10 finale, titled “Family Secrets.”
Danny’s devoted wife Linda (Amy Carlson), whose return to her career as a nurse presented growing pains for the couple in previous episodes, being dramatically shot in the hospital by a co-worker’s son threatened by a powerful gang with Method Man guesting as the leader Mario, for the Season 5 finale “The Art of War,” was another emotional family moment. It was already a charged episode for Frank, who was seeking justice for his friend Deputy Chief Kent’s (Dennis Haysbert) murder in the background. But though Linda survived Season 5, she would indeed be reported dead in an off-camera tragedy in the Season 8 premiere. Danny’s struggle to raise their two sons Jack and Sean (brothers Tony and Andrew Terraciano) and do his job through the grief was tough, which makes the family rallying to his aid to have dinner in his new home all the more heartwarming.
Cast members, recurring guests and guest stars throughout the 14 seasons have included more than Dennis Haysbert and Method Man. Whoopi Goldberg, Treat Williams, Lou Diamond Phillips, Aidan Quinn, Stacy Keach, Bebe Neuwirth, Kevin Dillon, Jennifer Esposito, Nicholas Turturro, Tamara Tunie, Ali Stroker, Cassandra Freeman, Michael Imperioli, Chazz Palminteri, and Billy Magnussen, among the many others, with Edward James Olmos helping to close out the series. Tony Bennett’s performance with Carrie Underwood in the Season 2 premiere is an especially treasured moment. Frank’s battles with the New York City mayors have also been epic, with Bruce Altman playing Mayor Frank Russo (not to mention former Mayor Robert Levitt in the season 3 episode “Men in Black” in what some call an error in continuity), David Ramsey playing the city’s Black mayor, Mayor Carter Poole, Lorraine Bracco stepping in as the female mayor, Mayor Margaret Dutton, and Dylan Walsh closing the series out as Mayor Peter Chase.
In addition to the core Reagan family, fan favorites also include Frank’s trusted assistant Detective Abigail Baker (Abigail Hawk), his advisors Garrett Moore (Gregory Jbara) and Lt. Sidney Gormley (Robert Clohessy), Erin’s trusted ace Anthony (Steve Schirripa from “The Sopranos”) in the DA’s office, and Danny’s longest partner Det. Maria Baez (Marisa Ramirez).
Saying goodbye is always hard, especially when a show has lived at the end of a Friday night for 14 years, even during COVID. That hard part is territory covered by the one-hour “Entertainment Tonight” special “Blue Bloods: A Family Legacy” that aired Nov. 29.
The wonderful thing about this “Blue Bloods” series finale is that it’s not a dramatic departure from the very first episode. Instead, “End of Tour”reaffirmed the core values of family and honor in duty that has kept us hooked through 293 episodes while also offering much promise for the future, with Danny showing up to the family dinner with Baez after a presumed date prompted by his grandfather advising him to find love again in an earlier scene, capped off with Jamie and Eddie announcing a baby is on the way, which prompted Erin to hold back that she and Jack had re-married.
An ending like that with so many new beginnings definitely gives “Blue Bloods” fans hope that this may not be the last time we see the Reagans. And that is a good thing.
All episodes of “Blue Bloods” are available to stream on Paramount+.
