#allthough i'll never be surprised if they let me down

[kim-ruzek]

I hate that Kevin is still in the same that he was in when we met him. The writers have done nothing for him, and they should actually be so ashamed, as well as the people who defend it.

They only use Kevin for crappy performative storylines which never go anywhere or when they want him to interact with Burzek and Makayla. And yes, when it is a police show, and the lead police officer is Hank Voight, with people like Ruzek (I think Adam has somewhat improved, but it was just in season 8 where he went off at Kevin when Kim was missing where he told Kevin to put aside all that crap when referring to racism and take a day off from being a proud reformist. He also threw the first punch. There is no justification for the way Adam acted).

The treatment of Kevin in terms of what he does and, usually, doesn't get is something I feel SOOO passionate about and I'll always get on my soap box to talk about the injustice.

But saying that, I do think it's a little unfair to say the writers haven't done anything for him - they haven't done much and honestly it's under the bare minimum in a lot of ways and I'll never deny how fucked up that is, but they did give him his building and showed us how he was being a force for good in his neighbourhood. Which, especially as i rewatched season one recently and he always had that entrepreneur streak to him, I do think is one of the best plot points they could've given him, imo. That, and his father's storyline because I truly do adore that storyline.

The problem is that now going into eleven years of plot lines and a very recent plot point is the only thing I can talk about positively without any disclaimers or annoyances is just so very wrong. Because really, it does feel like often we've barely seen him have ANY character growth. Which in one way isn't neccesarily bad because he's always, from the very start, been a Good character. Raised his siblings, had aspirations, a good friend and a hard working cop, so he didn't have any 'bad' traits to grow out of. But there's still ways to give characters development (for example, his building) and in these ten years, that has been extremely lacking.

And I will forever be mad about that the only plot points for character development has been race based and not even most of the time in a good, non performative way so I'm with you on that.

But finally, I will say I did LOVE Kevin and his treatment in season ten. He got multiple episodes, we got to see more of him just being him, we actually got to see him in burzek's stories which as their best friend he should be and he felt like, for the first time imo in a very long time, a multi dimensional character who wasn't just there to be black.

Obviously one good season doesn't erase all the injustices been dealt to him, or even remotely balanced the scales and the season still had it's deeply problematic aspects that I will never shut up about (i.e. Kev being the one to shoot the racist bastard) but it does make me optimistic that we're heading towards a time where Kevin will be treated more as a multi-faceted character, ESPECIALLY as this season will be Tracy's last.

I'm just hoping we'll continue to get more fleshed out aspects of his life, beyond the building, his siblings and father. And more stuff that could have been formed for anyone, white or black, because Kev is also just a human and not just a black human.

Also voight can go fuck himself, my feelings for the character may be complicated, but that's one thing I will always feel.

Thank you for sending me this ask!!

#ree's asks #chicago pd #kevin atwater #thank you for asking!! #sorry im on my laptop so now heart emojis :( #kev my king deserves better and i'm hopeful he's going to get it #well. not all and in every way he should #it will also be not enough but it will (hopefully) be better and i do truly believe this #naively perhaps. but I'm trying to be more positive and only using recent data instead of the decades of history #allthough i'll never be surprised if they let me down