Chicago PD’s 3 most frustrating characters in season 6

2. Hank Voight

You might have noticed that Voight is on both of our lists, and there’s a reason for that. While he continues to be one of Chicago PD‘s most entertaining characters, there are also things about him that have gotten more and more frustrating.

Season 6 felt like a retread of season 5 in many ways: it started with a broader issue, but quickly simplified down to a personal vendetta between Voight and someone else (first Denny Woods and now Brian Kelton). Voight dealing with his enemies has come to overshadow anything else going on in the show.

And that leads to a bigger issue with Voight. As Chicago PD strives to be a show that’s timely and talking about the policing situation in the city, it hasn’t acknowledged that Voight represents a lot of what it’s supposed to be talking about. The way that he does things—routinely roughing up a suspect, breaking a few laws, occasionally letting crimes slide to get cooperation—makes for TV that’s entertaining, but it doesn’t seem so heroic with the way we look at police today.

It’s frustrating that the writers want to be topical but continue to write Voight getting away with things largely unchecked (in fact, enabled, since most of Intelligence rarely disagrees with him for more than a scene or two). He easily could have been arrested by now.

And he doesn’t have to completely change: it’d be an interesting storyline if Voight had to do some self-reflection and if he just toned things down a little bit. It wouldn’t be easy for him to adapt to the new realities of policing. Maybe some of the other characters, like Kevin Atwater (LaRoyce Hawkins), could help him and he could learn something from them. But if Chicago PD wants to be topical, it’s going to have to admit that Voight being Voight won’t quite fly anymore.