It seems the closest man in Hailey’s life these days is a creepy serial killer, and that may not be changing anytime soon.
We got more of Sean O’Neale on Chicago PD Season 10 Episode 12, as he led them to another case and a potential mystery surrounding Richard Beck.
Something tells me we will have Sean and Beck for a while this season.
We may as well get the Upstead of it all out of the way first. We were due for an update on that front.
Honestly, it feels like the only one who doesn’t know or is in denial about the state of her marriage to Halstead is Hailey herself.
From the moment Jay hightailed it out of town on some assignment in Bolivia, there’s been some finality to the couple’s relationship.
And it’s not solely because the actor has departed the series either. Jay was distant and checked out by the time he left Hailey. It’s as if he knew something he hadn’t voiced out loud to her.
That’s okay, Hailey. That’s okay. It’s a good speech. You’re just giving it to the wrong person.
Sean
And because he never flat-out said whatever it is he was feeling at the time about their future, we’re stuck watching the slow death of a marriage as Hailey unravels before our eyes, clinging to what amounts to a ghost.
She hasn’t even been talking to Jay. He’s essentially been ghosting her since he left, likely months ago. It’s a crappy thing to do, and whether or not any of you want to debate if it’s in character for him or not is up to you, but it’s undoubtedly a rough patch for Upstead.
The news from the Major that Halstead chose to extend his assignment and hadn’t bothered to tell Hailey about it was such a colossal blow to the woman that it left her in tears.
Her whole apartment feels like a shrine to a love that isn’t there anymore. She’s been living on some form of autopilot with his absence.
At the risk of sounding insensitive here and siding with the freaking serial killer, Hailey may need to leave one final message to Halstead, letting him know she’s done and start on a new path of trying to move on however she can.
Regardless of how one feels about their romance, no one deserves to be in limbo like this.
At this rate, should we anticipate a handwritten letter calling it quits from Jay in the near future? It will at least give Hailey some closure if that happens.
Everything with Jay will likely push her closer to Sean in their twisted connection and arrangement.
That ending didn’t mean much. We all know that Hailey will likely keep up her end of the bargain because now she feels like she has nothing left and can reason that it’s for some greater good.
In some warped way, it also gives her a bit of solace that someone can see her, even if the person doing the seeing is a sick, twisted individual like Sean.
When you land an actor like Jefferson White for a role like this, it will make sense for them to milk it for all it’s worth. We’re halfway through the season, and it already feels like cockroaches and Sean O’Neal will prevail during an apocalypse.
I won’t go as far as to suggest that he’s overstayed his welcome, but they’ve crammed a whole lot of Sean into this season. On the one hand, Sean is creepy and awful, and the idea of spending more time with him is daunting when it feels like we’ve already had more than enough.
Sean: You can’t hurt me more than I already am.
Hailey: Give me a name.
Sean: I will if you promise to come back. Once a week, every week. You come back, and I’ll give you names, I’ll give you cases. I’ll give you everything that the freaks in here give me. I’ll be your informant.
But on the other hand, Jefferson White is so damn good in this role. Even if the Sean thing is on the verge of overkill, White is captivating to watch.
They’ve opted for some Hannibal Lector-type of arrangement, and it’s enough to make you roll your eyes, but it’s also a concept that the actors will sell you on despite any misgivings.
Sean’s intel about Samantha was legitimate. It was a good thing that Hailey finally broke down and went to see him.
It’s trippy that she can’t get the man she loves to call her back, but Sean reaches out at all hours of the day and night. It’s the perfect setup for an unhealthy, symbiotic relationship between her and Sean that no one else will understand.
The guy is obsessed with her. It’s distressing that he accessed Trudy’s home phone and called her just to get a message to Hailey.
It puts Hailey in this position where she feels compelled to gravitate into Sean’s web to save people and protect her colleagues and friends.
His intel was enough to set her on the path to save Samantha, and there’s no telling what other type of information he’ll get from his time in jail that he can pass along for the sake of it.
Sean claims that his motivations are to do some good after the bad he’s done and make things like his father’s death worthwhile.
It all seems like some bullcrap. If he genuinely cared about any of that, he wouldn’t need to only report to Hailey.
It’s totally self-serving on his part, and he gets a kick out of toying with Hailey and taking advantage of whatever connection he feels they have.
But does he know something more about Beck? It was an unusual case for them to take on because of him, and the intel he got from Parker would reveal more about who Beck could really be.
The only Beck in that family that garnered sympathy by the end of the hour was Callum.
I had to. I had to! He wasn’t going to come for me. He wasn’t going to pay for me.
Samantha
Hailey and especially Voight were so good with him. Both of them have their moments when they seem more hardened.
We rarely see that softer side of Voight, and he was so gentle and patient with Callum. It was so incredibly sweet and endearing. Voight is so good with kids, and it’s such a shame he doesn’t have more of them in his life.
Samantha’s abduction became a puzzle, particularly when they had to learn through other means, Sean, that there was a ransom video and demand for a million dollars.
Beck wasn’t nearly as frantic about his daughter going missing as you would expect from a father.
Then he omitted the ransom situation from them. If he was the one who brought up that cases take a turn for the worse after 48 hours, and she was at the 30 mark, why wouldn’t he do whatever he could to save his daughter?
All Beck did was lie and interfere with the case.
None of them are stupid. When the million-dollar ransom came into play, red flags were rising all over the place because the kidnappers would have good reason to expect that much.
Unfortunately, we still never found out the truth about that, but it had an open ending implying that we’ll see Beck and his daughter soon.
Hailey: Who is your father, and what does he really do for a living? He did not lift a finger-
Samantha: My father is a good man. I have no idea what you’re talking about.
But by the time they tracked down Samantha and the kidnappers and ended up on that high-speed chase, which was filmed brilliantly, especially that van flip, Samantha became as shady as her father.
The team went guns blazing, and Kim popping that guy in the chest was such a badass moment, but it also reminded me of some of the demons she’s still struggling with these days.
Everyone was pouring their all into this case; it could’ve been a sham from the start.
Was Samantha really in shock when she shot that abductor or was she killing him so he couldn’t say anything?
One of the first things out of her mouth was that Becks handled things on their own, but also that her father didn’t pay for her.
She knew her father had all this money, but the message she gleaned was that she wasn’t important enough for him to give it away to save her.
It’s like the unit got in between a weird family spat or Samantha’s attempt to shake down her own father.
She’s angry at him, but it’s not enough for her to snitch to the police about him either. But surely, this will blow up between them, and the unit will emerge in whatever dirty business Beck is in.
It’s not a matter of if they’ll cross paths with this man again, but when, and now inquiring minds want to know in what capacity.
Becks handle things on their own.
Samantha
He has off-shore accounts and shell companies. Whatever he’s into, it’s big and shadier than ever.
The series leaning into extended cases that take more than an installment to wrap up is different and more realistic. Not every case can be solved instantly, and it’s nice they’re keeping up longer-term cases in the background.
Right now, we have this Sean fiasco, and now Beck is someone new. At least one of them is interesting to watch at the moment, but the possibilities of where the other could lead may be interesting if done well.
Over to you, Chicago PD Fanatics.
Is Upstead over for good? Will Hailey honor the deal with Sean? Do you have any Beck predictions? Hit the comments.
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Jasmine Blu is a senior staff writer for TV Fanatic. Follow her on Twitter.