Chicago PD season 7 character review: Kevin Atwater

What Chicago PD season 7 means for Kevin Atwater

It somewhat feels like a tale of two seasons when you look at Kevin Atwater’s storylines recently. On one hand, the Chicago PD writers are still plugging him into the same slots. He’s either getting a story about racism, or going undercover, or both. And when he’s not doing one of those two things, then viewers don’t see a lot of him. So in that respect, the overall problem of making sure LaRoyce Hawkins is utilized enough and in enough different ways still exists.

However, the way the season ended does open up tremendous possibilities going forward. It’s not often that we see a main character on Chicago PD come out and tell the truth; usually they go with whatever the company line is, whether it’s what is best for Intelligence or whatever is better in the big-picture sense. Atwater broke that pattern, and as evidenced by the last few minutes of season 7, he’s going to have to pay some kind of price for that.

But the show has an opportunity here. Usually, the writers pick the most cynical or bleakest end to a story, because it’s the most dramatic. They could change that trend and have Atwater ultimately be vindicated in choosing to do the right thing. There’s no reason he can’t struggle first, but seeing him beat the bad guys and come out on top would send a message that you don’t have to bend the rules to be a good cop—you can also be a good cop when you play by the rules, too. This show doesn’t have too many of those kinds of characters.