'Chicago PD' Season 7: Vanessa Rojas could join the Intelligence Unit eventually and here's why we like that idea
When 'Chicago PD' returned for its seventh season last week, Jon Seda was not part of the cast. His character, Antonio's absence was explained by Voight who said that he helped the former check into an off-the-books rehab so that Antonio's career is not affected.
Meanwhile, Ruzek is off the team while he is under investigation by Internal Affairs, so the Intelligence Unit was left with just Voight, Halstead, Atwater, Burgess, and Upton.
In the second episode, not only are Ruzek's charges dropped (with Voight's help, of course), we are also introduced to an undercover cop, Vanessa Rojas, played by the new addition to the cast, Lisseth Chavez.
Chavez was announced as a recurring character for this season. We see Kevin and Rojas working well with each other and considering Voight has decided to work with mob boss Darius Walker, we might see more of Rojas as well.
This begs the question, will Vanessa Rojas join Intelligence? Sure, Ruzek will be back on the team by next week but the team could use the extra hand.
In season four, after Burgess joins the Unit (and before Sophia Bush as Erin Lindsay exited), the team had eight people including Antonio and Olinsky. So yes, Voight could certainly use more people in his team, and Rojas could easily fit in.
We also saw Atwater and Rojas share some good scenes together in the second episode and we know they can work together well. Since Rick Eid, the showrunner, had teased a romance, possibly for Atwater, this could be it.
Whether Rojas continues to work undercover so the Intelligence Unit has someone to keep an eye on Walker or moves back to being a cop is yet to be seen, but we think it could be gradual.
Chances are that Voight will not trust Walker to cooperate with them fully, so he is going to ask Rojas to remain at The Chatham and keep an eye on Walker and his runners.
Once the Walker problem is dealt with — which will most probably take the whole season — Voight could ask her to come on board the Intelligence Unit full time.
With Ruzek back, the team does need to be evened out so in that aspect as well, Rojas would be perfect. Ruzek and Atwater are partners, so if Rojas joins (and we hope she does), she could be partnered with Burgess, and this holds so much potential.
We don't know how they will interact with each other, but we could possibly see that coming up in future episodes. And let's be honest, the Intelligence Unit does need to be more diverse.
The only person of color on the team right now is Atwater and the addition of Rojas would certainly improve that. Over the last season, we've seen how big the Latin players have become in Chicago's crime scene and Rojas provides so many opportunities for undercover work.
'Chicago PD' airs on Wednesdays nights on NBC.