The Rookie (Season 3) - *SPOILERS*

I don't know if we have any fans of The Rookie, but I freely admit to liking just about anything Nathan Fillion does. I think he's one of the better comedic actors currently working.

I really enjoyed the first two seasons. I thought they did a good job doing several things:

1. A diverse cast without overselling the diversity.
- The rookies are Fillion's character (an over 45 rookie), a black recruit who is a prodigy (dad is a career cop in IA), and a woman of mixed Hispanic-Asian heritage. Their TOs are a no-nonsense white guy who is a former Marine, a black woman (who left after season 1 - the new one is a former undercover cop now wanting to get back home to be there for her child who the father has full custody of), and a Hispanic woman who is more of a balance personality and desires to be a detective. The sergeant is a black man who's been in the force for a long time and is nearing retirement (played by Richard T. Jones).
- During the first two seasons, while the racial differences do come up, they're not over done and rarely the overall theme to an episode. It's more along the lines of, "I expected this person to speak Spanish" or the like.

2. Mostly serious with mixed comedic moments. I mean, come on - that's Fillion's bread and butter.

3. A fairly decent grasp on actual police procedure. (Very little nonsense like the stuff you see on NCIS and the like).


The came along season 3. Season 2 ended on a hell of a cliffhanger, and the opening to season 3 closed it up. Mostly bringing it back to status quo, except for the fact that they kill off the detective that you kind of grow to like in season 2 (played by Harold Perrineau - Link from the 2nd and 3rd Matrix movies), but in what I consider a "not so great" writing exercise, goes from being a cop who broke some rules to capture a serial killer to a full on police informant (but still won't kill) to being almost giddy at the thought of shooting Fillion's character. That's for another rant though.

After that, season 3 has taken a deep dive into "wokeness". Now, I'm typically the kind of guy where you have to go a bit overboard before it bothers me much. So far, I've only completely stopped watching a show because it got too political (Doctor Who), but The Rookie is getting dangerously close to that for me. If not for Fillion, I definitely would have dumped it to the side.

There are so many over-the-top examples of this, but by FAR the most egregious, IMHO, is the example of the "obviously racist cop", played by Brandon Routh.
First, and most obviously, is that Brandon Routh is best known for playing Superman and The Atom. So it's a bit of a stretch for my brain to accept hearing him say things like, "I bet you and your homies do X..." or answer the phone with, "What's up my brother?" while asking the black rookie under his wing if he got into UCLA by playing sports.

It doesn't stop there, though. Even tiny things, like "this male OBGYN must be a complete a-hole that doesn't listen to his patients, so let's ask the nurse who directs us to the female doctor". Yeah, I get that it is a thing - but my wife's OBGYN is male and he absolutely listened to everything she told him (and found a cyst on her ovaries that they were able to safely remove). I don't think it's as common as they want us to think.

IF it had just been those two, I would probably have shrugged them off, but there are examples o'plenty. It's getting to the point that I'm not sure I want to keep watching, Fillion or not.

In the first two seasons, the main plot points were a crime family, a serial killer, a dirty cop, the death of the police captain. All stuff you expect in a crime series.

So far the main plot point that extends beyond single episodes is over-the-top racist cop.




Also, apparently to be Nathan Fillion's mom in a series you have to be a redhead and somewhat terrifying to be someone's mom.