Chicago PD season 5 episode 7 review: Halstead’s powerful story
When Intelligence uncovered a ring of child abductors that included a former Army Ranger, Halstead thought that the right way to get answers was for him to go undercover himself. He could relate to one of the guys mixed up in it (Luis), and then gets emotionally invested with both Luis and his sister Camila. When things start to go sideways in his investigation, he’s not exactly able to detect it as early as he should. He makes mistakes out in the field and it leads to many heartbreaking moments over the case. At the end of the episode we saw some terrible things happen — he was able to rescue the kidnapped child, but in the process also lost Luis.
What was even scarier was the moment when he failed to recognize (right in front of him) that Upton was on his side. He pulled a gun on her in the midst of the shootout and it took him a moment to realize both who she was and that he was trying to help him. She’d been trying to help the whole episode, and in the closing minutes he ignored her call in order to go console Camila instead.
What a great performance it was tonight from Jesse Lee Soffer, as you got a real sense of Jay’s PTSD struggle in a way that you don’t often see on the show. What happened with Luis brought him back to his days in the Army and was brought back to this time in his head. He grew distant and detached, and we’re not sure how he comes back from this.
What’s happening with Ruzek?
In the last episode Adam ended up finding himself blackmailed by Woods and in order to protect his family, he chose to serve as his undercover mole. He thought that following some of Woods’ instructions and getting him enough intel to go after Voight was going to be enough to satisfy him. Not so much. Adam may not like it, but Woods has him firmly under his control. He doesn’t want Voight to get a slap on the wrist; he wants to clearly ruin him both for the sake of his own image and further along his career.
We did see a sympathetic side to Adam at the start of the episode — he was one of the first people tonight concerned for Jay when he saw him sleeping up in the cage.
CarterMatt Verdict
Chicago PD season 5 episode 7 was anchored largely by Soffer’s performance; it was nice to get more backstory here on his time in the Army and how it’s impacting him today. While we didn’t see a lot of the supporting cast, it’s pretty clear that the story of Ruzek and Woods isn’t going anywhere in the immediate future.
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