How The Rookie’s John Nolan Will Handle The ‘Profound’ Betrayal In Season 2 Finale

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Warning: Spoilers ahead for The Rookie's two-part Season 2 finale!

Well, it turns out that Harper was right: Nolan did, in fact, jinx them when he called out what a slow work day it was on Part 1 of The Rookie's two-part Season 2 finale. It didn't take long for that quiet day of policing the mean streets to get super messy, with two fellow officers eventually getting killed, the team realizing that they have at least one dirty cop on their hands and Nolan figuring out just who that offender is. Nolan is now faced with trying to get all the evidence needed to take down someone he's trusted, and we know how he's going to handle this "profound" betrayal.

The Rookie's executive producer, Alexi Hawley spoke to Give Me My Remote recently to preview the finale of Season 2, and said that fans can expect Episode 20 to be "powerful" as we watch Nolan figure out his next steps and try to take down Nick Armstrong. Here's what he had to say:

John Nolan and Nick Armstrong have gone through a lot this season: They became friends, Armstrong was a mentor to him. I think this sort of betrayal is profound. What you’re going to find is Nolan trying to make sense of [everything]. Obviously, if Armstrong is a dirty cop, then Nolan needs to prove that, because Armstrong killed Erin Cole at the end of the last episode. [Episode 19] was sort of this big, action-y, emotional roller coaster; [the season finale] is really a thriller. It’s now [a] ‘two men on the hunt’ kind of story.

Whoa, boy. It sounds like we are going to be in for quite the ride when we can finally set our eyes on The Rookie's Season 2 finale. First things first? Nolan doesn't have any hard evidence right now that Armstrong is the mole who's been giving info to the Armenian mob. All he knows is that Cole said Armstrong's name without seeing him and right before he shot her dead in front of Nolan. Of course, all of this was after she confessed to being in on some mob dirty dealing, so Nolan needs to secure evidence against Armstrong before saying anything officially.

Nolan was so eager to learn from Armstrong this season, and, as Alexi Hawley said, the two had become friends as Armstrong mentored the rookie, who was looking to up his game so he could become a detective. Now the men need to face off, and we're going to have to watch them try to take each other down. I mean, it's clear that Armstrong will now be gunning for Nolan, right? He may have managed to kill Cole, but he has no idea how much she may have told Nolan before biting the dust. And, we all know you need to take out anyone who might know your dirt if you wanna stay dirty.

It's clear that Nolan is going to have to do some serious work against the clock in the Season 2 finale of The Rookie, and my main question is whether or not he will trust anyone with this tidbit of information that he's gotten and his current suspicion, or if he's going to lone wolf the situation and try to take down his former friend all on his own.

We can all see how things turn out for Nolan (and Armstrong, for that matter) when The Rookie airs on Sunday, May 10 at 10 p.m. EST, on ABC. For more on what to watch, be sure to check out our Netflix guide, see what's new to Hulu this month and look into your summer TV viewing options!

Adrienne Jones
Senior Content Creator

Covering The Witcher, Outlander, Virgin River, Sweet Magnolias and a slew of other streaming shows, Adrienne Jones is a Senior Content Producer at CinemaBlend, and started in the fall of 2015. In addition to writing and editing stories on a variety of different topics, she also spends her work days trying to find new ways to write about the many romantic entanglements that fictional characters find themselves in on TV shows. She graduated from Mizzou with a degree in Photojournalism.