Chicago P.D. has recruited one of The 100's most dastardly bad guys to play a crime boss in its upcoming seventh season. Michael Beach, who played the prejudiced and deadly Chancellor Pike on The 100 before the character came to an untimely end, has joined the Chicago franchise, and while it's probably safe to say that his P.D. character won't take him in the same post-apocalyptic directions as The 100, his new character definitely sounds like one not to cross if you don't have his community's best interests at heart. Maybe the P.D. team should keep Voight away!
Michael Beach will play a Chicago crime boss by the name of Darius Walker. Although he has clearly worked on the wrong side of the law to earn "crime boss" status, Darius is now working to try and "revitalize his African American community," according to TVLine, and Chicago P.D. showrunner Rick Eid revealed that he "uses his profits from his drug business to funnel back into urban communities and, literally, help innovative and ambitious young entrepreneurs."
Darius is a businessman and philanthropist as well as drug dealer, and he'll be good at all of them. Will this be a case of the detectives being better off to let him go about his business and keep the streets of Chicago in balance, as has happened in the past on both Chicago P.D. and Chicago Fire? They can't put down all crime, and it does sound like he's a crime boss with a heart of gold. Michael Beach will recur throughout Season 7.
If Darius is going to be around on a recurring basis, however, I'm guessing the detectives won't trust him to keep mostly on the straight-and-narrow, or else he starts crossing too many lines. It's also possible that Voight and Co. (if Voight is back in the mix) will be ordered to crack down on Darius by the new interim superintendent, who has already been cast.
A new undercover cop has already been cast as well, and she could be gritty enough to compensate for the absence of Antonio Dawson, who didn't really get much of a sendoff in his final episode of the series. His departure came only a year after Monica Raymund left Chicago Fire as Antonio's sister. Jon Seda isn't the only big actor to leave the Chicago franchise after the 2018-2019 TV season.
No, Jon Seda Will Not Be Returning To Chicago P.D., But He Did Thank Fans
Fans will have to wait and see what kind of crime boss Darius is and how Michael Beach tackles the role. Beach is a veteran of many series on top of The 100, including Dynasty, The Rookie (which recently made headlines for some very troubling reasons), and Swamp Thing, to name only a few.
Chicago P.D. returns to NBC for Season 7 on Wednesday, September 25 at 10 p.m. ET. NBC is keeping the big Chicago block going on Wednesdays, with Chicago Med airing new episodes (without some former key series regulars) at 8 p.m. ET and Chicago Fire airing new episodes at 9 p.m. ET in the fall TV lineup.
