The Rookie S5 Finale: What Should Have Happened During That Chenford Fight Scene
Contains spoilers for "The Rookie" Season 5, Episode 22 — "Under Siege"
Season 5 of "The Rookie" has officially come to a close and the final episode is action-packed from start to finish. The installment starts off with a bang when Celina Juarez (Lisseth Chavez) and Aaron Thorsen (Tru Valentino) are ambushed after a night out playing Dungeons & Dragons. Masked assailants shoot Aaron before giving Celina a riddle to memorize and once word gets back to the precinct, the hunt is on. It's all hands on deck to find the perpetrators, but the investigators keep hitting dead ends. The team finally gets a lead, but Lucy Chen (Melissa O'Neil) and Tim Bradford (Eric Winter) find a group of masked men waiting for them, armed with tactical shields and batons.
The odds are stacked against Chenford, but they don't do themselves any favors. Even though the suspects are heavily armed, fans wonder why Lucy and Tim didn't aim lower. "I won't lie, I was just thinking [to] shoot their legs??" asked Reddit user u/HanikTheMesh. Common sense definitely went out the window during Chenford's fight scene. "This! I was like... why not just get the legs," said user u/SwanAffectionate8004. Reddit user u/NoleFandom wondered the same, writing, "That's exactly my thought. Their legs were unprotected. Why did they keep shooting at the shields?"
Despite the shocking reveal that the masked men were meant to distract from something far more sinister, fans wish the final fight scene was more realistic.
The Rookie fans think Chen and Bradford should have switched tactics
Even though "The Rookie" is based on a true story, it's still a television show, so it makes sense that certain scenes are over the top just for the sake of drama. The Chenford fight scene is the last big takedown of the season, so it makes sense that the stakes are high. Chen and Bradford are outnumbered, and the bad guys have set a trap for them. Still, if they aimed their guns a little lower, the fight scene might have been over a lot sooner.
"Damn! That Chenford fight scene was something else! Not necessarily realistic but dang I was nervous," said Reddit user u/RecommendationTop594. For a dynamite duo like Chenford, shooting at the shields even when their opponents' legs have no cover seems far-fetched. "I was mainly wondering why they were wasting their bullets. They kept firing at the shields knowing it wasn't going to do anything. And why they didn't pick up the shields and really use them? Chen did for a moment, but dropped it as soon as she pushed some of them back," pointed out Reddit user u/gsmumbo.
"Def not realistic. Upsetting because this show is good with realism. Especially with firearm functions being realistic in the show. This episode lacked that realism," wrote Reddit user u/806llama. Thankfully, the show has already been renewed for Season 6, so Chenford have plenty of chances to prove their marksmanship when new episodes return on ABC.