“Chicago P.D.” Season 13 ended just as it began with Voight confronting right and wrong — morally and legally — head-on.
Wednesday’s finale continues exploring Imani’s recent reunion with her sister Shari, who was abducted when she was just six years old. Now, as a young adult, Shari says she has no recollection of Imani, and even accuses the officer of fabricating some connection between the two of them.
Shari refuses to cooperate with police in their search to find her captor Kirby, and they place her in a safehouse while his whereabouts are still unknown. There, Shari suffers a breakdown as she resists confronting the truth about her past: Might Kirby not be her husband as she previously thought? Could he be her kidnapper?
After it seems like she’s warming up to Imani, Shari agrees to go to the officer’s apartment to see proof of their relationship. Shari appears to soften, and decides to help Imani track down Kirby. She tells her where to find him, but when Imani shows up, Shari is already there. She’s teaming up with the guy to take Imani down so that the two can escape together.
Shari and Imani go head-to-head
The pair knock out the officer and use her own cuffs to restrict her hands. As the situation escalates, Imani goes into fight-or-flight mode, taking her sister into a chokehold, using the handcuffs to cut off Shari’s air supply. Ultimately, the girl breaks free, and Kirby, understanding that Shari has now learned about her connection to Imani, orders the girl to shoot her sister to prove her allegiance to him.
As Shari raises the gun, clearly struggling with fulfilling his order, the crew arrives on the scene to save Imani. Voight tracks down Kirby attempting to flee, knocks him to the ground, and brutally kills him by repeatedly slamming a door on his skull.
Shari gets taken into custody while the police assess the scene, and while sitting near a patrol car cuffed up on the curb, she uses a shard of glass to slit her wrists. Barely conscious, the team races the girl to the hospital.
Shari survives her injuries, but her future is in great jeopardy: Earlier in the hour, Voight discovered that Shari’s DNA was inside the wound of last week’s murder victim, Laura. It was Shari, not Kirby, who did the killing. As the episode ends, Imani makes a case for why Voight should not file charges, but he doesn’t say what his next move will be.
Will Voight press charges on Imani’s sister?
TVLine spoke to “Chicago P.D.” star Arienne Mandi and showrunner Gwen Sigan about the crossroads Voight now faces, and Sigan said neither path forward — filing charges or covering up the evidence — is “the perfect answer.”
“There are going to be consequences, there’s going to be emotional fallout,” she added. “There are going to be secrets and tension either way. It’ll be exciting to see where it falls for Voight. He’s always willing to sacrifice his job if he believes it’s for the right reasons.”
The majority of Season 13 seems to suggest that this could be the right reason — rather, Imani could be the right person to take a chance on. Voight and Imani have spent countless episodes bonding over their respective traumas, and Voight has supported Imani during her search for her sister. The sergeant has developed a soft spot for his newest agent — which was on full display during his violent and emotional reaction to finally catching Kirby, the source of all of Imani’s pain.
Voight will rely on his ‘moral compass’
But if Voight sacrifices his job and his unit yet again with another questionable call, will Shari and Imani even be able to move forward in any normal way as sisters?
“There’s so much compassion,” Mandi shared. “There’s so much understanding that Shari has been through so much, and there’s so much trauma there.”
Even after Imani was forced to turn on her sister, Mandi said Imani continues to feel a sense of “attachment” to her sister despite the heartbreak that unfolded in the finale.
In the end, Sigan believes Voight’s decision will come down to his personal relationship with what’s right.
“We probably won’t agree with it as the audience, but his moral compass is: Can I justify this?” she said. “Is this the right thing for me? Which would also mean, is it the right thing for Imani and Shari?”
What are your predictions: Will Voight skirt procedure and let Shari off with a warning? Or will he allow due process to do its thing? Grade the finale — and “Chicago P.D.” Season 13 overall — in the polls below, then sound off in the comments!