Is this the end? Jesse Lee Soffer addressed his exit from Chicago P.D. after Jay Halstead made the difficult decision to move on.
“I left it all out there for this one. Episode 1003 of Chicago PD, ‘A Good Man’ airs tonight at 10/9 central on NBC. Who’s watching with me?” the actor, 38, captioned several stills from the episode on Wednesday, October 5.
During the episode, viewers followed Jay as he made the decision to leave Chicago. After breaking the law while on a case, the detective chose to resign from Intelligence. He revealed to his wife, Hailey Upton (Tracy Spiridakos), that he would be joining an Army group in Bolivia for eight weeks to deal with his personal issues.
“I took the job. I’ll be posted in Bolivia. It’s black and white. It’s good and bad. It’s right and wrong. It’s no more of this. I need that. I need that back,” Jay explained during the emotional moment. “It’s not forever. It’s eight months, maybe a little longer. But I swear to you that we’re going to get through this because you’re the love of my life, and if I’m yours, then you’ll know that you have to let me go.”
Soffer, who has played the character across multiple Dick Wolf shows since 2014, shocked fans when he revealed earlier this year that he would be leaving the NBC series.
“I want to thank the incredible fans for their unwavering support during the past 10 years and want to express my deepest gratitude to Dick Wolf and everyone at Wolf Entertainment, Peter Jankowski, Matt Olmstead, Derek Haas, Michael Brandt, Rick Eid, Gwen Sigan, NBC, Universal Television, my fellow castmates and our incredible crew,” the New York native told Variety in a statement in August. “To create this hour drama week after week has been a labor of love by everyone who touches the show. I will always be proud of my time as Det. Jay Halstead.”
At the time, Soffer’s onscreen love interest showed her support for his decision, writing via Instagram, “Jesse, what can I say, you’re the absolute best. Thank you for your kindness, your guidance and your friendship. You’re the greatest onscreen husband a girl could ask for. I’ll miss being on set with you every day. I can’t wait to see what the world has in store for you next. #upsteadforever.”
Ahead of his departure, showrunner Gwen Sigan opened up about how Jay and Hailey’s marriage will be affected.
“It’s certainly been a challenge, but I’m really proud of where we came out of it, because I think we’ve given Upton a really interesting story this season as to how she deals with this. She’s someone that is so loyal and so attached to him,” she told Variety in September. “It’s not just a marriage, they also are partners and they’re partners in a job that is a pressure cooker. Their lives are at risk all the time, especially how we play it on the show.”
The screenwriter continued: “To suddenly not have that second half of who you are puts you in a very vulnerable and raw place. As we know, Upton is very strong and she’s also someone who’s very guarded and likes to have control of her emotions and likes to be able to deal with things. This puts her in an interesting spot, and we definitely see how it falls out. That’s been really exciting to write and I think will be something really interesting for Tracy to play. She’s been killing it.”
