Spoilers ahead for the Season 12 finale of Chicago P.D., called "Vows" and available streaming now with a Peacock subscription.
As expected for a finale that would involve Voight pondering his "mortality" and Deputy Chief Reid making a big move against the Intelligence Unit, Chicago P.D.'s final episode of the spring 2025 TV schedule was pretty intense for most of the hour. It did end on a mostly high note, however, after the unit had been – to quote showrunner Gwen Sigan – in "so much trouble." When I spoke with Sigan about the finale, I had to ask about the guest list for Burgess and Ruzek finally tying the knot, as well as why an episode called "Vows" didn't actually include any wedding vows.
The wedding was pretty traditional by One Chicago standards, complete with a beautiful gown on Burgess, Ruzek looking dapper in his suit, a walk down the aisle, and plenty of people in the pews. Happening at the end of the episode also meant that it couldn't be ruined by Reid crashing it, although Voight's move in defeating the Deputy Chief did somewhat sour the nuptials when Chapman couldn't help but bring it up.
Still, Burzek finally got to tie the knot, and we officially have the first married couple on Chicago P.D. since Upstead's untimely end. In speaking with Gwen Sigan about the latest wedding in the wide world of One Chicago, I asked about how the writers decided on the guest list for the wedding. She explained:
Oh man! We had a wish list, and it was basically, 'Who can we get?' [laughs] It's always a scheduling thing. It becomes a production thing, really, at the end of the day. If we could have every single member of One Chicago there, we would have, but of course, that's not necessarily the reality. They're working! They gotta defend the city. We were really excited to get Mouch because it felt like, of course Mouch has to be there. He's with Platt. I mean, he's gotta be there with her as her plus one. And then we were just hoping [for] as many as we could get, basically.
Mouch was the only character from Chicago Fire or Chicago Med who joined the P.D. festivities, with Christian Stolte making an appearance not too long after his eventful episode of Med. There were no former P.D. stars who turned up either, although I hadn't gotten my hopes up for that after a previous Burzek development. Still, we saw all the main P.D. players as well as Makayla and Bob Ruzek, plus a bunch of unnamed characters, so Kim and Adam had a full enough house to say "I do."
Although if anybody was hoping to actually hear the "I do" after some lengthy vows from Chicago P.D.'s longest-running couple, that didn't happen in the Season 12 finale. When asked if vows were ever even scripted for Burzek, Sigan shared:
No, you did not hear any. There weren't [any scripted]. I think there were, at one point, perhaps in the beat sheet outline phase, there were as far as we thought we would do some sort of voiceover and have their vows. It just began to feel a little bit too soft and almost too sweet for the the tone we wanted at the end. With all the stakes that we had set up and everything, it was just a bit too jarring to suddenly be in this other tone. So, there was never any [vows] shot or scripted on a page in an actual script form.
Well, if the finale was going to fit in one last conversation between Voight and Chapman in the audience of the wedding, then the ceremony couldn't be entirely light and fancy-free for fans to watch from home. Voight's decisions that led to Reid's death and even post mortem downfall were a result of him falling back into some old bad habits, and being dressed to the nines for a wedding didn't stop Chapman from calling him out on it.
So, we didn't hear how Burgess and Ruzek proclaimed their love for each other to finally start off their marriage. Still, seeing them surrounded by loved ones at the altar, we can at least be happy that they were none the wiser that Voight and Chapman were having a very different kind of conversation several pews back. They're married, and with no sign that Marina Squerciati or Patrick John Flueger is leaving the show like Jesse Lee Soffer did to throw a wrench in Upstead's marriage, the good ship Burzek seems to be sailing strong into Season 13.
The wedding was the last that we'll see of these characters for the next several months, as summer hiatus has officially kicked off. Fans will have the option of rewatching earlier episodes streaming via Peacock, and NBC renewed all three One Chicago shows to return to Wednesday nights in the fall. The Windy City action isn't going anywhere despite other NBC cancellations like Suits LA and Night Court, so it's just a matter of waiting.
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