What happened to Linda Reagan (Amy Carlson) on Blue Bloods? Why did she Leave the show?
What happened to Amy Carlson from Blue Bloods? Why did Linda Regan leave the show and will she come back? These are the things we have all answered in out video. Was there any serious issues leading to Linda Regan’s exit from the show? Find out all the tragedies of the character’s backstory and also learn what Amy Carlson is doing now.
We have to say, we really did not give Amy Carlson enough credit for playing the role of Linda Reagan in CBS’s hit police drama series Blue Bloods. She must have done something to have this much pull with the fans who still wonder about her even after it had been so long after she left the show. Why did she leave the show?
The reason as to why Amy Carlson left the series is still pretty unclear, but we can paint a decent picture from the information that we do have. In the show, Danny Reagan, being the dutiful cop that he is, pissed off quite powerful drug lords after a big bust. As an act of vengeance, the organized crime family made a move on his family, as we saw in the Season 7 finale when they burned his house with Linda and their kids still in it. However, Linda managed to get herself and her children out in time for safety. Fans breathed a sigh of relief, thinking that they won’t have to worry about Linda anymore since she did not die in the season finale, which was the common time when characters are killed off. Imagine their surprise when the show returned for Season 8 and Linda was nowhere to be seen. It would only be known later on that Linda Reagan had died in an undocumented helicopter crash between Seasons 7 and 8.
In the beginning, fans thought that Amy Carlson had simply left the show to pursue other opportunities. After Amy publicly said, “I’m so grateful to CBS and the Blue Bloods cast and crew, mostly I’m grateful to the fans who have supported me and the show.” However, there seemed to be something fishy going on when her co-star and on-screen sister-in-law, Bridget Moynihan, who plays Erin Reagan, was asked about Linda’s exit from the show in the 2017 Paley Fest. She responded, “We were all disappointed to see that she was going. It was unfortunate that she made the decision at the end of Season 7, so we were stuck with the storyline as we could get it. But I’m really thrilled for her to go off and pursue other things and follow what she felt was best for her.”
This did not sit well with Amy, who displayed her unsettlement by tweeting, “I am appalled and sad about comments made at Paley Center about Linda’s demise on Blue Bloods #inaccurate.” She further responded to her former co-stars’ words by saying, “I would just respond and say it’s standard to have conversations with actors whose contracts are up prior to the season ending. It’s not that you start to shoot and don’t know.” From this debacle, one thing is certain: Amy really did exit the show by her own choice but was unhappy to see the writers kill off her character so hesitantly without a proper discussion with her.
While many fans were shocked, others claimed they saw it coming. After all, Linda Reagan is a character that has had a history of tragedies, full of near-death experiences. If we look all the way back to Season 5, Linda was shot in the episode “New Rules” by a teenage gangbanger in a case of mistaken identity. She survived, as she was right there in the hospital, and made a full recovery. However, the same season, she gets mugged when volunteering to work for the community health van in the projects. It leads her to using her commissioner father-in-law’s help to legally get a gun, but in the end, she decides not to get one.
All that being said, there is a strong possibility that Amy could return to the series. We saw Blue Bloods air its Season 9 episode “Common Enemies,” where Danny Reagan helped Lewis put the killer of both their wives behind bars. Right after the episode aired, Linda Reagan went on Twitter to write a very cryptic message: “Get the Kleenex. One man killed another’s wife. Now that man helps his wife’s killer find who killed the killer’s wife. Whose wife will be next? Or is the first wife really killed?” New things to ponder on an all-new Blue Bloods.
While Amy said nothing more, fans lost their minds, thinking that she may still return to the series as she was trying to hint that Linda may not be dead. Over 100 people commented and retweeted the message, and curiosity and bewilderment ensued. Her on-screen husband, Danny Reagan, who is played by Donnie Wahlberg, also was speaking about how much he missed his co-star and on-screen wife of over seven years. He also said that he would very much like her to return, even if it’s for a short while, since the only way he could imagine her return is as a ghost or a flashback in sentimental scenes.
Amy Carlson has continued to look for other opportunities after vacating the role of Linda Reagan. After leaving Blue Bloods in 2017, Linda did take some time off, only appearing in one movie, A Bread Factory Part 1, in 2018. In 2019, we saw her appear in one episode of the NBC series The Village, which was about a bunch of residents from a New York City apartment building and how their life intertwines. She played the recurring role of Amanda Pressman in the mystery teen drama series The Society on Netflix the same year. As of 2020, Linda returned to CBS, taking on the role of Jackie Ward, a veteran bounty hunter quoted to be a force of nature and good at her job but a thorn in the FBI team’s side, in Season 2 of FBI: Most Wanted.
