Monica Dies on ‘The Rookie’: Bridget Regan Explains Her Exit and Wesley Goodbye (Exclusive)

The clock is ticking for Monica (Bridget Regan), and she knows it in the Monday, April 27, episode of The Rookie.

The corrupt lawyer tries to play both sides as she moves pieces into place for her ticket out of Los Angeles and away from the Feds to somewhere that isn’t witness protection in a land-locked state. But that’s easier said than done, with the people she’s crossing. TV Insider spoke with Bridget Regan about Monica’s choices and that shocking ending. Warning: Spoilers for The Rookie Season 8 Episode 17 ahead!

Monica turns to Malcolm (Sean Patrick Thomas), Liam Glasser’s (Seth Gabel) lawyer, who has proven to be dirty just like she is, to help her outsmart the FBI task force. She does have the wheels in motion for an exit package via Aiden (Tim Griffin), but to make that happen, she has to sell out Cooper Johnson, who is not someone anyone wants to cross. It’s essentially signing her own (ugly) death certificate if anything goes sideways, but she feels she has no choice with her immunity deal. The only problem? Going after Cooper is something that will take the task force months, and they’ll have to prosecute the international weapons dealer for financial crimes to make a case.

But when Aiden gives her 24 hours to make it happen, or he’ll tell Cooper she sold him out to the FBI. Then, she realizes that the Feds have found the files she had been holding as leverage and are deleting them. Monica realizes she has to run before she’s arrested. After swatting Cooper, she calls Aiden for her exit package, and he tells her a private plane will be at LAX that evening.

Before she goes, however, she stops to see her ex, Wesley (Shawn Ashmore), taking off the wig she donned while running from the LAPD. She needs to be herself for their conversation. By the end of the night, she’ll be gone or dead, she tells him, and with her last hour in L.A., he’s the only person she wanted to say goodbye to. He tries to offer to help her, but she knows she’s looking at life in prison if she doesn’t run. She recalls one of their professors who said law was by human action, not design. She knows she did what she wanted and owns every choice she made, but she still doesn’t know how she got here. He suggests it’s not too late to make another choice, but she knows it is. She asks if he ever really loved the person she was before she changed, and he says he did, calling that version terrifying, radiant, and razor-sharp. With a goodbye and a kiss to his cheek, she leaves.

Monica then gets in a rideshare, only for the driver to pass the LAX exit. When she parks, Monica just has one request: “not in the face.” She’s shot twice in the chest, and her body is left on the side of the road. Tim (Eric Winter), Nolan (Nathan Fillion), Nyla (Mekia Cox), Angela (Alyssa Diaz), Grey (Richard T. Jones), and Garza (Felix Solis) are at the scene when Wesley joins them.

Disney/Mike Taing

Elsewhere in the episode, Aaron (Tru Valentino) returns and introduces Tim to his jeweler, Pierre, played by Michael Nouri, to pick out a ring for Lucy (Melissa O’Neil). (Because everyone’s finding out about his plans to propose, he pulls a Chandler Bing move and makes her think that he hates love and marriage.) Pierre has Tim talk about Lucy, and he sweetly rambles a bit about how she loves helping people and hearing their stories, how she’s kind and fierce. She makes him feel loved in a way he never felt like he deserved, he admits. And so when Pierre comes back with more options for Tim, with his mom Joy (Sela Ward) there as well, he has vintage rings, each with a story to tell. The one that Tim picks up belonged to a couple who were friends for years before realizing they were in love and overcame obstacles before being together for over 50 years. That says forever to Tim.

Below, Bridget Regan opens up about Monica’s death, why she loved her last scene with Shawn Ashmore, and much more.

I am sad to see Monica go.

Bridget Regan: You and me both. You and me both. But you know what? When Alexi [Hawley] called me — I mean, well, first of all, whenever a showrunner calls you, you have to be worried that it’s the call of death. But truly, I was not surprised. I was thrilled that she lasted as long as she did. If you play with fire, as long as she has, eventually you’re going to get burned. And as I said to Alexi and everybody, I was like, she’s not on her ninth life. She’s on her 37th. She’s escaped multiple assassinations and prison time and being thrown in a wood chipper. When her number was finally up, I wasn’t surprised. I thought, fair enough. She’s had an amazing run, four years on this show. I’m only filled with gratitude.

But what I was surprised by was just how incredibly sad I was for her. Not that she died, but that she never truly flipped, that she actually succumbed to the dark side and couldn’t find her way back. And I felt like there was this version of Monica that could have been something else, but she just could never get there. So to me, that was the real heartbreak of it all.

Oh, I agree. When Alexi called, did he tell you how she’d be dying and all of that, or just that she’d be dying?

All he told me was, “I promise a Viking death.” And I was like, “Well, it’s The Rookie. No one’s going to go out quietly.” And every time I would get a script, I thought, oh, she’s going to get … I was always like, you hear about all these famous shows where everyone’s dying all the time, like The Sopranos, et cetera. Everyone’s reading the script, going, “Do I die? Do I die? Do I die? Do I die?” I always had that in the back of my mind because I felt like it was inevitable. Either at some point, she was going to go to jail, or she was going to die.

But what I was most moved and thankful for was this just incredible scene that Alexi and Brynn Malone wrote for Monica and Wesley when she went to say goodbye to him. And I mean, the scene was so beautifully written. I was like, “OK, well, it’s almost worth dying to get to do this stunning scene with Shawn.” And she articulates it. She says, “I always did exactly what I wanted. I own every choice that I made, and yet I still don’t quite know how I got here.” And I just thought it was so profound and so beautiful. And then Wesley says back to her, he’s trying to be like, “No, it’s not too late. You can make another choice.” And then she says, “Oh no, no, no. It’s far too late for me.” It’s like she knows. She knows she’s in way too deep. She’s past redemption at this point. She has actual blood on her hands. She knows how guilty she is.

And that scene to me was the Everest of my experience on that show. I’m just so thankful for it. And also, Shawn Ashmore is just the most incredible actor. Oh my God. How lucky am I?

Disney/Mike Taing

That scene was so good because also this season, Monica had two very real, very honest conversations with Wesley — when Elijah claimed they had the affair and then here when she goes to say goodbye. Why is she able to be honest and real with him in that way and let him see that vulnerable side of her? Is it the history and just who she used to be with him and kind of missing that part of herself?

Yeah, I think that’s exactly it. I also think she’s actually a really lonely character, especially in Season 8. We got to see through this massive guard that she has up, and we got to glimpse through these windows to her humanity, to her true self. And I think a lot of her persona is just that. It’s a persona. It’s an act of confidence and bravado. It’s a performance of who she wants to be. A lot of it is like, “Make it so, make it so. If I’m going to present this way, I’m going to make myself be this way.” And Wesley is that window to her past before she broke bad, before she crossed over and started injecting assassins with — killing people and doing all sorts of bad behavior. I think it’s heartbreaking to see, but I was so thankful for it as an actor that I got to show that side of Monica.

And she needed to hear that he did love her at some point.

I think so. I mean, it’s the question, “Am I worthy of love? Was I worthy of love?” Because I think at this point, she doesn’t think she is. I mean, I think that the second she saw the name Cooper Johnson, she knows, she starts to feel death creeping close to her. But you have to give it up for her. I love her for this. She’s scrappy AF. She’s always thinking on her feet. She’s always pivoting, always looking for the back door, always finding a laundry cart to hide in.

But it all caught up with her. Her destiny was written. I mean, she said it herself after the FBI discovered her leverage, “I’m just a paper tiger now.” But yet she doesn’t succumb. She keeps running. She has go bags and wigs and clean passport. But I feel like from that moment on, it’s like the clock has started ticking, and she knows she’s on this suicide mission, but she goes down fighting. And honestly, that’s the most Monica thing she could have done. And I love her for it. I love her. I love her so much. That’s what I’m most sad about. I just love her. I’m going to miss her.

How was filming that last scene with Shawn, knowing it was the last one you guys would have?

Oh, I was a mess. I was an absolute mess. I walked on set, and I saw Bill Roe, and I was like, “Oh God, how am I going to get through this?” Because Monica wouldn’t cry as much as Bridget is. So I really had to hold it back and keep it together. But it was also just the beauty of the writing. I have to give it up to Brynn and Alexi. It was just such a stunning scene. And it was also really special. The episode was directed by Ryan Krayser, who is a longtime first AD of the show and also directs. And so it’s like, The Rookie is such a family, they’re in their eighth season now. And that’s the hard part. It’s really saying goodbye to the people because for the last four years, Rookie has been my … It’s been the four hardest years our industry has gone through — COVID, the strikes, and everything. And Rookie has meant so much to me and my family. I’m just honestly filled with nothing but gratitude.

How was filming Monica’s last scene and death? Because I love when she says “not in the face.” Then we get that really long shot of her dead body, and you don’t really get that on shows.

I know. It’s so wild. I think also, Alexi wanted to be like, “She’s dead, dead. She’s dead. Dead, capital D, Dead, period.”

I mean, what’s so fun about her is she is who she is. The “not in the face,” she’s always going to be her vain, fabulous, greedy self. That’s just who she is. She can be terribly smug. And for the last four years, I was constantly checking in with our directors and myself being like, “How’s the smug level? Am I too smug? Is this too much?” Because sometimes it felt it. But with Monica, you’re always walking that line. She has to be confident enough that you believe she can hold her own in this criminal world, but I always wanted her to be believable, but there’s also something deliciously over the top about who she is. She’s so fun, and she refuses to be anything but herself. And so yeah, we were always calibrating.

But the death, I was particularly … I mean, because it felt very symbiotic because Bridget knew the clock was ticking on Monica’s life, and I think Monica knew the clock was ticking on her life. She could feel it. So it was emotional. It was heavy. I was bummed. I was like, oh man, this is such an incredible show to be a part of. But I did feel like, creatively, it was time for her to go. Because if we’re going to say that she’s messing with all these dangerous criminals from Elijah to Aiden to Cooper Johnson, it would be unbelievable if it didn’t catch up with her at some point.

You said she knew the clock was ticking, she never flipped, and she succumbed to the dark side. And we know how she felt about WitSec and going to Kansas. She was very much against that.

Oh my God, I love that line. “You got to give me a coast.” She’s so, so good. I can feel the writers love writing for her. I’m like, “Y’all are going to miss me. Y’all are going to miss Monica.”

With that in mind, as that clock was ticking, did she ever regret not taking that option?

I think so. I think it goes back to what I said before about her being who she is, which is one of the things that I find her really admirable for a character. In the script, it’ll say, Monica’s wearing flats, so she can run quickly. And then I’ll go to my fitting, and I’m like, “Flats?” And they’re like, “Let’s do more like a three-inch wedge.” [Laughs] Because she is who she is. She’s just not going to be practical and move to Kansas and work at a strip mall. She can’t do it, and she knows she can’t. And I have to respect that. Know thyself, right?

There are always flashbacks. So is there a chance of seeing you again?

Well, I mean, that’s not up to me. You know who that’s up to, Mr. Hawley. But at this point, I’m only grateful for what it has been. She grew from a one-off guest star to four years of not just employment, not just having an amazing job to go to work to drive on the Paramount lot and work with Nathan, who is the best king, number one of actors, so talented, so kind, so brilliant, and the rest of the exquisite cast and crew, and Alexi is the ultimate leader. It’s all those things.

But for me, it’s also like Monica got to change and sometimes in TV, you don’t have a character that — Sometimes the characters you play are kind of who they are from the beginning to end. Monica had a terrific arc of changing, and it was so fun to have her go from criminal defense attorney to mastermind crime lord. I mean, it’s just too fun. It’s like if you can’t have fun playing Monica, you should retire, right?

The Rookie, Season 8 Finale, Monday, May 4, 10/9c, ABC