‘Law & Order: SVU’ season 17: Who is not returning?

Law & Order: SVU logoObviously, let us start this “Law & Order: SVU” article off with a massive spoiler warning: Stop reading right away if you have not seen Wednesday night’s new episode yet.

Still with us? Then let us go ahead and share the surprising news that Danny Pino is in fact departing after a few seasons on the job. After coming close to death, Nick Amaro clearly felt that it was right for him to resign from the NYPD and go somewhere new and California. There, he can have a new start without having to deal with so much of the pain from the past. In addressing this news further to TV Guide, executive producer Warren Leight had the following to say:

“It seemed to be, in a strange way, right for Amaro to start fresh somewhere else … It’s not to say any of us enjoys it, but it seems like that’s where the story was going and I think all of the actors felt like the exit was honored.”

We imagine that there could be someone new joining the series for season 17, unless the show just decides to give us more of Fin, Rollins, and Carisi as a way to compensate for losing Pino. He first arrived at a tricky time, as the show was trying to move forward after the exit of Chris Meloni after so many years on the job. With that being said, did anyone else feel like the show took a little bit of a shot at Stabler during the episode tonight? It was something that they really did not need to do.

(Photo: NBC.)

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