History YMMV / TheRookie2018

* SpecialEffectFailure : The use of CGI for muzzle flashes and bullet hits is obvious and jarring. It's made even worse by the fact that semi-automatic weapons are never seen to cycle or eject empty cartridges.

* HilariousInHindsight: Brandon Jay [=McLaren=] playing Season 4’s early ArcVillain Elijah Stone, when one considers that [=McLaren=] is best known for playing Jack Landors, the Red Ranger in the police themed ''Series/PowerRangersSPD''.

* SpiritualSuccessor: To ''Series/RookieBlue'', which features the same premise where new rookie officers are accustomed to everyday law enforcement work. Both shows have Canadians in the main cast, although Creator/NathanFillion has dual nationality with America and Canada
* SpotlightStealingSquad: If there is a Moment of Awesome to be had, it will ALWAYS be performed by John Nolan. If Nolan is not involved in a storyline, it will not be the A-Plot. If it is the A-Plot, Nolan WILL be shoehorned in. Despite the series literally revolving around Nolan being a rookie police officer, the show never misses an opportunity to make him the smartest, bravest, most badass cop in the entire show.

** ''[[Series/TheRookieFeds Feds]]''' "I Am Many": [[SoftSpokenSadist Foster Mills]] is a brilliant yet narcissistic psychopath, who dresses up his murderous sadism beneath the illusion of righteousness. In 2004, Foster, a self-admitted angry man, became a terrorist, sending [[YouGotMurder letters laced with anthrax to his targets]], killing multiple people. Gaining a sense of focus from his death sentence, Foster vowed not to die without leaving his mark on the world and reinvented himself as a cult leader. Creating "[[{{Cult}} I Am Many]]", based around twisting religious philosophy into "even God requires the devil to act", Foster, smuggling messages out of the prison, converted multiple disenfranchised individuals into fanatics willing to kill themselves rather than fail him. The day before his execution, Foster had them carry out two [[DeadlyGas hydrogen cyanide gas attacks]], causing ten people to agonisingly choke to death. This was merely a prelude to his real plan, whereupon the day of his execution, his zealots would carry out multiple simultaneous gas attacks on major cities, writing the anniversary of his death into the history books with their blood, with his final target being the one victim to survive his original anthrax attacks for [[EvilIsPetty "defying" him]].

** "[[Recap/TheRookie2018S2E10TheDarkSide The Dark Side]]" & "[[Recap/TheRookie2018S2E11DayOfDeath Day of Death]]": "[[BitchInSheepsClothing Caleb Wright]]" is Rosalind's sadistic protégé and fellow SerialKiller. An identity thief and professional criminal who admired Rosalind's fame, Caleb stole a guard's identity to meet her. Enacting her plan, Caleb murdered Bryan Coleman and stole his identity. His MO was to kidnap one woman every three months, [[CallingCard tattoo her]] with DOD (Day of Death) and that date, then slowly suffocate her inside an oil barrel so that she would die screaming. Having already succeeded in killing two women, Caleb's third victim was rescued by the police. Catching Officer John Nolan, Caleb attempted to drown him in a water tank, repeatedly pulling him out to prolong the brutal experience. Following a chance encounter, he turned his attention on Officer Lucy Chen, who he kidnapped then [[BuriedAlive buried in an oil drum in the desert]]. Capturing Armstrong, Caleb intended to [[ForcedToWatch make him watch Lucy die]] before killing him in the same manner. Fatally wounded, Caleb interfered with the attempts to save him just to ensure Lucy would also die, his final words being him laughing that it was already too late.

* SpiritualSuccessor: To ''Series/RookieBlue'', which features the same premise where new rookie officers are accustomed to everyday law enforcement work. Both shows have Canadians in the main cast, although Creator/NathanFillion has dual nationality with America and Canada.
* TearJerker: "Breakdown" in season 4. While Tim and Lucy help his sister renovate the old Bradford house, they discover a pistol hidden in between the walls. Tim initially suspects [[spoiler:his dying father killed the neighbor because the latter found out the former was having an affair with his wife.]] But the end of the episode reveals [[spoiler:the neighbor's wife did it because he was a wifebeater, and Tim's father helped cover it up because he felt that the neighbor deserved it. Tim visits his father one final time and calls him out for being an abusive hypocrite who completely ignored the fact that he was hurting his family the same exact way the neighbor was hurting his wife.]]

* AuthorsSavingThrow: The significant increase in attention to police murders of people of color after the murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor in 2020 caused a significant overhaul in the show's tone, as the direct focus was put on the issue. This includes Bradford admitting his stunt in the first episode (roping a group of Mexican civilians into one of his tests for Lucy and hassling them on their way to work) was wrong.

** [[SerialKiller Rosalind Dyer]], notorious for her [[TheChessmaster complex gambits]], is driven by a combination of sadism and an obsession with [[FameThroughInfamy attention]]. Over two years, Rosalind enacted a series of vicious murders by torture and mutilation with no set victim type, killing random men and women of every race and ethnicity, making her the most prolific killer in the history of California. Imprisoned, Rosalind, upon meeting up with "Caleb Wright", had him enact a twisted plan to keep her game going, first burying the women he killed amongst her still-missing victims, whilst she played [[CriminalMindGames mind games with the LAPD]], finally having Caleb go after Detective Nick Armstrong who arrested her. Returning for her new trial, Rosalind escaped by corrupting her lawyer into murdering a deputy in exchange for slaughtering her parents, carrying on her murder spree until deciding she wanted to go out in a blaze of glory, she imprisoned Nolan's girlfriend Bailey in a DrowningPit, attempting to force Nolan to kill her to prove "even saints can become murders".

** [[SoftSpokenSadist Rosalind Dyer]] is a vicious killer obsessed with [[AttentionWhore attention]]. Over two years, she enacted a series of murders by torture with no set victim type, killing men and women of every race and ethnicity. Her methods including peeling the face off a woman; pulling every individual tooth out of the mouth of an anesthesiologist, and removing the hands and feet of a man she drugged so he was paralyzed but conscious. Finally caught, Rosalind was convicted of killing seven people, although her actual total was much higher. Imprisoned, upon meeting up with "Caleb Wright", Rosalind had him enact a twisted plan to keep her game going, first burying the women he killed amongst her still-missing victims and bragging his kills were also hers, [[CriminalMindGames playing mind games with the LAPD]], and finally having Caleb go after Detective Nick Armstrong, whom she had developed an obsession with for arresting her.

** "[[Recap/TheRookie2018S2E10TheDarkSide The Dark Side]]" & "[[Recap/TheRookie2018S2E11DayOfDeath Day of Death]]":
*** [[SoftSpokenSadist Rosalind Dyer]], who also appears in "[[Recap/TheRookie2018S2E20TheHunt The Hunt]]" and "[[Recap/TheRookie2018S3E01Consequences Consequences]]", is a vicious killer obsessed with [[AttentionWhore attention]]. Over two years, she enacted a series of murders by torture with no set victim type, killing men and women of every race and ethnicity. Her methods including peeling the face off a woman; pulling every individual tooth out of the mouth of an anesthesiologist, and removing the hands and feet of a man she drugged so he was paralyzed but conscious. Finally caught, Rosalind was convicted of killing seven people, although her actual total was much higher. Imprisoned, upon meeting up with "Caleb Wright", Rosalind had him enact a twisted plan to keep her game going, first burying the women he killed amongst her still-missing victims and bragging his kills were also hers, [[CriminalMindGames playing mind games with the LAPD]], and finally having Caleb go after Detective Nick Armstrong, whom she had developed an obsession with for arresting her.
*** "[[BitchInSheepsClothing Caleb Wright]]" is Rosalind's sadistic protégé and fellow SerialKiller. An identity thief and professional criminal who admired Rosalind's fame, Caleb stole a guard's identity to meet her. Enacting her plan, Caleb murdered Bryan Coleman and stole his identity. His MO was to kidnap one woman every three months, [[CallingCard tattoo her]] with DOD (Day of Death) and that date, then slowly suffocate her inside an oil barrel so that she would die screaming. Having already succeeded in killing two women, Caleb's third victim was rescued by the police. Catching Officer John Nolan, Caleb attempted to drown him in a water tank, repeatedly pulling him out to prolong the brutal experience. Following a chance encounter, he turned his attention on Officer Lucy Chen, who he kidnapped then [[BuriedAlive buried in an oil drum in the desert]]. Capturing Armstrong, Caleb intended to [[ForcedToWatch make him watch Lucy die]] before killing him in the same manner. Fatally wounded, Caleb interfered with the attempts to save him just to ensure Lucy would also die, his final words being him laughing that it was already too late.

* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Is Sergeant Grey [[ReasonableAuthorityFigure a tough but fair]] [[AFatherToHisMen father to his men]] who just wants his Rookies to be the best they can be? Or is he a jaded cop who is scared of rocking the boat and thus lets corrupt cops continue because he's too 'by the book' and prejudice against those that don't fit his idea of the 'ideal cop'?
** As the series progresses its clear that its the more towards the former interpretation such as helping Jackson West to make sure that DirtyCop Stanton's true nature is exposed if he can't be kicked off the force. There's also his interactions with Nolan where he is openly critical of what he sees as a white man going through a mid-life crisis and treating the [=LAPD=] as his "sports car." Yet he is neither more lax nor tougher on him than the other rookies and by the third season has accepted him as a fellow officer.

%%* NightmareFuel: [[KnightOfCerebus Rosalind Dyer and Caleb Wright]].

* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Is Sergent Grey a tough but fair father to his men who just wants his Rookies to be the best they can be? Or is he a jaded cop who is scared of rocking the boat and thus lets corrupt cops continue because he's too 'by the book' and prejudice against those that don't fit his idea of the 'ideal cop'?

* TearJerker: "Breakdown" in season 4. While Tim and Lucy help his sister renovate the old Bradford house, they discover a pistol hidden in between the walls. Tim initially suspects [[spoiler:his dying father killed the neighbor because the latter found out the former was having an affair with his wife.]] But the end of the episode reveals [[spoiler:the neighbor's wife did it because he was a wifebeater, and Tim's father helped cover it up because he felt that the neighbor deserved it. Tim visits his father one final time and calls him out for being an abusive hypocrite who completely ignored the fact that he was hurting his family the same exact way the neighbor was hurting his wife.]]
* UnintentionallyUnsympathetic:
** Wade Grey. On Nolan’s first day, he said that he would “harass, harangue, and haze” Nolan to get him out of the LAPD, all of which is illegal. He said he would do this because due to his age, Nolan would have a lifetime of habits to unlearn, making him a danger to his fellow officers. Age discrimination is also illegal. He seems [[TookALevelInKindness to soften on Nolan]] when he assigns Harper as Nolan’s new training officer, saying that a younger officer wouldn’t be able to handle her, but this just means that he is purposefully assigning Nolan to a training officer that he knows to be problematic because of Nolan's age. Sure enough, Harper violates procedure and nearly gets Nolan killed on her first day as his training officer, but Grey allows her to continue training him. Harper then talks Nolan out of reporting Armstrong to InternalAffairs, for which Grey gives Nolan a letter of reprimand that he says all but guarantees Nolan will never get promoted. Grey [[NeverMyFault never owns up to his part]] in creating the situation, which makes his softening on Nolan seem insincere since he couldn’t have planned it better if he was still trying to wreck Nolan’s career. He also tells Nolan and Harper that they are guilty of noble-cause-corruption, and says that it is a cancer he cannot abide, which is [[{{Hypocrite}} incredibly hypocritical]] because by his definition, his initial age discrimination of Nolan would make him every bit as guilty of noble-cause-corruption as Nolan and Harper.
** Nyla Harper. On her first day as his training officer, she violates procedure and nearly gets Nolan killed. Despite this she is allowed to continue as his training officer. She also talked Nolan out of reporting Armstrong to InternalAffairs, for which they both received a letter of reprimand which destroyed his career prospects, but in her position was meaningless. Despite having proven herself to be a horrible training officer, she is allowed to keep her position and the salary bump that comes with it, and she continues to verbally abuse her new rookie and acts like he’s lucky that he gets to be trained by her. Add to that, she often comes across as a StrawFeminist, all while cheating on her new boyfriend with her ex-husband, for which she was [[KarmaHoudini never caught]].

* TearJerker: "Breakdown" in season 4. While Tim and Lucy help his sister renovate the old Bradford house, they discover a pistol hidden in between the walls. Tim initially suspects [[spoiler:his dying father killed the neighbor because the latter found out the former was having an affair with his wife.]] But the end of the episode reveals [[spoiler:the neighbor's wife did it because he was a wifebeater, and Tim's father helped cover it up because he felt that the neighbor deserved it. Tim visits his father one final time and calls him out for being an abusive hypocrite who completely ignored the fact that he was hurting his family the same exact way the neighbor was hurting his wife.]]

* TheScrappy: Tim’s sister Ginny tends to get a lot of hate from fans who see her as dismissive of the abuse Tim received as a child, as well as whiny when it came to renovating their old family house to prevent it from being sold despite the aforementioned history about Tim’s abuse.

* NightmareFuel: [[KnightOfCerebus Rosalind Dyer and Caleb Wright]]. See the CompleteMonster entry above for more details.

*** [[SoftSpokenSadist Rosalind Dyer]] is a vicious SerialKiller obsessed with [[AttentionWhore attention]]. Over two years, she enacted a series of murders by torture with no set victim type, killing men and women of every race and ethnicity. Her methods including peeling the face off a woman; pulling every individual tooth out of the mouth of an anesthesiologist, and removing the hands and feet of a man she drugged so he was [[AndIMustScream paralyzed but conscious]]. Finally caught, Rosalind was convicted of killing seven people, although her actual total was much higher. Imprisoned, upon meeting up with "Caleb Wright", Rosalind had him enact a twisted plan to keep her game going, first burying the women he killed amongst her still-missing victims and bragging his kills were also hers, [[CriminalMindGames playing mind games with the LAPD]], and finally having Caleb go after Detective Nick Armstrong (whom she had developed an obsession with for arresting her).

** "The Dark Side" and "Day of the Dead": [[SoftSpokenSadist Rosalind Dyer]] is a vicious SerialKiller obsessed with [[AttentionWhore attention]]. Over two years, she enacted a series of murders by torture with no set victim type, killing men and women of every race and ethnicity. Her methods including peeling the face off a woman; pulling every individual tooth out of the mouth of an anesthesiologist, and removing the hands and feet of a man she drugged so he was [[AndIMustScream paralyzed but conscious]]. Finally caught, Rosalind was convicted of killing seven people, although her actual total was much higher. Imprisoned, upon meeting up with "Caleb Wright", Rosalind had him enact a twisted plan to keep her game going, first burying the women he killed amongst her still-missing victims and bragging his kills were also hers, [[CriminalMindGames playing mind games with the LAPD]], and finally having Caleb go after Detective Nick Armstrong (whom she had developed an obsession with for arresting her).
** "[[BitchInSheepsClothing Caleb Wright]]" is Rosalind's sadistic protégé and fellow SerialKiller. An identity thief and professional criminal who admired Rosalind's fame, Caleb stole a guard's identity to meet her. Enacting her plan, Caleb murdered Bryan Coleman and stole his identity. His MO was to kidnap one woman every three months, [[CallingCard tattoo her]] with DOD (Day of Death) and that date, then slowly suffocate her inside an oil barrel so that she would die screaming. Having already succeeded in killing two women, Caleb's third victim was rescued by the police. Catching Officer John Nolan, Caleb attempted to drown him in a water tank, repeatedly pulling him out to prolong the brutal experience. Following a chance encounter, he turned his attention on Officer Lucy Chen, who he kidnapped then [[BuriedAlive buried in an oil drum in the desert]]. Capturing Armstrong, Caleb intended to [[ForcedToWatch make him watch Lucy die]] before killing him in the same manner. Fatally wounded, Caleb interfered with the attempts to save him just to ensure Lucy would also die, his final words being him laughing that it was already too late.

* CriticalResearchFailure: The first time Nolan has to use lethal force. Oh, boy does it make Nolan's TO look like an idiot.
** Officers can't declare a suspect is dead, like Nolan's TO does.
** No officer would cancel an ambulance. At a minimum, it would be needed for the family involved.
** Nolan would NOT be a suspect nor would the incident be declared a homicide instead of an officer-involved shooting as it clearly was. The scene would be contained and bodycam footage would be reviewed before any such actions would be deemed necessary.
* FunnyAneurysmMoment: The cold open of "Casualties". Funny when it aired. Less funny when a few months later, a homemade glitter bomb at a gender reveal party in California sparked an enormous wildfire that did serious damage.
* HarsherInHindsight: Jackson's talk with Sergeant Grey and his father about his possible future role in "Bad Blood" becomes this when [[spoiler:his death in "Life and Death" makes the whole topic pointless]].

* NarrowedItDownToTheGuyIRecognize: The second the phrase 'Dirty cop' comes up during "The Q Word", any viewer with a brain can instantly deduce [[spoiler: it's the show's biggest name recurring guest star, Creator/HaroldPerrineau.]]

TheScrappy: Tim’s sister Ginny tends to get a lot of hate from fans who see her as dismissive of the abuse Tim received as a child, as well as whiny when it came to renovating their old family house to prevent it from being sold despite the aforementioned history about Tim’s abuse.

* NightmareFuel: [[KnightOfCerebus Rosalind Dyer and Caleb Wright]]. See the CompleteMonster entry above for more details.