Chicago PD season 6 character review: Jay Halstead

What it means

Even though Jay was not a part of a romantic relationship, he did get to interact more with a variety of characters, both within Chicago PD and the One Chicago universe as a whole. We got to see him work with Kelly Severide (Taylor Kinney) from Chicago Fire, as well cross over to Chicago Med a few times for valuable scenes with his brother.

Another relationship that got to grow was Jay’s partnership with Hailey. They leaned on each other a lot this season. In “True or False” Jay helped Hailey rationalize her interrogation tactics after a suspect died in lockup; and in “Brotherhood” we got to see them trust each other enough to accept their mistakes (Hailey not telling him about her relationship with Adam).

As far as Jay’s future in Intelligence, it’s quite possible we could see him take on a leadership role. In “Reckoning” he confronted Voight on how he was going to solve the Brian Kelton (recurring guest star John C. McGinley) issue. Jay pleaded his case to Hank, saying that if there was something to know, Voight should tell him so that he could help. After Voight revealed that he was going to see Kelton, he left Jay with the parting notion: “This unit is going to be yours one day. Do it the right way.”

With Voight driving off at the end of the episode, Jay, along with Kim Burgess (Marina Squerciati) and Kevin Atwater (LaRoyce Hawkins), were left to deal with Kelton’s gruesome homicide. Whether or not the Chicago PD season 7 premiere will pick up right after that moment is up to the writers, but if so, we may get to see Halstead delegate in Voight’s place.