'The Rookie' Killed off Monica — Here’s Why Her Story Had to End

Monica Stevens (Bridget Regan) has seen her final days on The Rookie. Season 8, Episode 17, which aired on April 27, 2026, marked the end of Monica’s life on the show, and while we can’t say it was a complete surprise, her death was still tough to watch and accept.

Monica first appeared in Season 5 and quickly became a series regular.

But her time on the show was pretty tumultuous, considering she was a corrupt defense attorney and criminal mastermind who was caught up in all the wrong things. She also stirred up plenty of conflict, and despite that, she never really faced consequences for her actions, until Season 8, Episode 17, that is, when she finally met her demise.

But why did they have to kill Monica off the show? Couldn’t she have just gone to jail?

Monica was killed off The Rookie in Season 8 because her antics and corrupt behavior finally caught up with her. She basically reaped what she sowed, and instead of being locked away for who knows how long, the show’s creators gave her a taste of her own medicine, and it was a lethal dose.

Just before her death, Monica was planning on selling out Cooper Johnson, who, as any viewer can attest, is not someone you want to screw over.

But she would need a way to get out of town fast if she did, and while Aiden (Tim Griffin) had a “ticket” ready to help her get out of dodge, delivering Cooper wasn’t as simple as saying the magic words and calling it a day. The clock really started ticking when Cooper gave her a 24-hour deadline to get it done; otherwise, he’d personally tell Cooper that she had handed him over to the FBI on a silver platter.

To make matters worse, the feds had discovered documents she had been holding onto, which they began destroying, which pushed her to try to run before her arrest, and what we imagine would likely be a very long time behind bars.

Monica ends up swatting Cooper and informs Aiden she’s ready to leave Los Angeles. While he tells her he has a private plane waiting for her at LAX, she decides to make a pitstop before heading to the airport to see Wesley (Shawn Ashmore). She then hopped into a rideshare, which is where her story basically ends.

After the driver passed LAX, Monica realized what was coming, telling the driver, “Not in the face.” And just seconds later, she was shot twice in the chest.

It was hard to see Monica go, and even Bridget agreed in an interview with TV Insider. While she acknowledged that Monica had long passed her ninth life, telling the outlet, “She’s on her 37th,” it was still sad to see her story play out the way it did. Bridget admitted she was “surprised by 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.”

She added, “And I felt like there was this version of Monica that could have been something else, but she just could never get there.” But she wasn’t surprised when she got a call from the showrunner informing her of Monica’s fate. “If you play with fire, as long as she has, eventually you’re going to get burned,” she told the outlet. Still, she said she was “thrilled that she lasted as long as she did.”