To say The Rookie Season 6 wasn’t an easy one for Tim Bradford (Eric Winter) would be an understatement, but he certainly comes out of it in a better place.
Not only did Tim get a blast from his past, the fallout of which included him breaking up with Lucy (Melissa O’Neil), but his time at Metro was cut short as well (also as a result of the aforementioned history). He’s back at patrol, but as the actor tells us, it’s not like he doesn’t enjoy that work.
Below, Winter takes a look back at Tim’s journey in Season 6 and shares his hopes for the future. Plus, watch what he had to say about Chenford here.
What do you know about what next season holds for Tim?
Eric Winter: I don’t know a whole lot. I do know Tim is going to be back in his good old-fashioned training officer style, doing what fans I think loved early on and the way that Bradford does it with new rookies, and I think that’ll be very fun. I’m excited to get back in the field in that sort of role as a true training officer, not just to partner with Aaron [Tru Valentino] or with Lucy or whoever, but he’s out there to try to train and make the next generation of police better. So I think that’s going to be exciting to see him out there in that element.
Tim did finally go to therapy this season, and he tells Lucy that Blair (Danielle Campbell) opened the door on some stuff he didn’t know was in there. How is he feeling about therapy after everything that went down when he actually did give it a try?
I think he’s really positive on it, believe it or not. I think Tim was, as you saw, very closed off to any therapist and that’s ridiculous. I think somebody allowing him to open up—and I credit Lucy for that, giving him the courage to even want to do that, to be better as a person and then trusting a therapist enough to open up and let down the walls from his childhood and his past and everything else. I think he’s enjoyed it. I think it’s probably going to make him a stronger character next season.
happened?
No, I think it took the walls to come crumbling down to get him to that place to possibly accept therapy.
Looking at his journey this season, is there anything he would’ve done differently or do you think that he’s happier being back on patrol than he would’ve been if he stayed at Metro?
I think Tim loves training the next generation, for sure. But obviously, I think a dream gig for him was being in Metro, sergeant in Metro, being on the forefront of the action and catching the baddest of bad guys, and being out there and impacting the community like that. So I think that was the dream gig, although I think he loves the training officer job as well. But I think his main focus was protecting Lucy and Lopez [Alyssa Diaz], not letting them get into trouble, obviously trying to salvage what was left of his career that he could. Whether he did it the wrong way or not, Ray [David Dastmalchian] was not a good guy, so I think in Tim’s mind he’s justifying his actions, but it came at a cost and now that’s why he spiraled so far out of control and has to rebuild.
I love the Tim and Lopez dynamic, and I loved seeing that again this season.
Yeah, absolutely. And I was so glad we circled back to that. Obviously, he was in her wedding and he’s so important to Lopez and they have such a great bond, but there are so many characters and we’re servicing so many stories that sometimes a story gets set aside for too long. And it was great to see that circle back and have Lopez be there for him, have his back, which kept that sort of storytelling alive, which I liked.
Especially in a shortened season, because you only had 10 episodes.
Which is a bummer. Don’t get me started. Don’t get me started on that. [Laughs] Now we’re in midseason for Season 7, so it’ll probably be a little shorter of a season, I’m sure, as well.
I talked to Alexi Hawley and he said he thinks it’s going to be 18 episodes, so that’s still more than this season.
Yeah, 18 is better, for sure, than anything else. I would love to get back to our 22, but let’s see if we can somehow sort that out.