Some of the decisions make you wonder why the writers didn't develop certain aspects of the show when it could have both improved the quality and further interested fans eager to explore the protagonists' personalities.
Especially Frank, the patriarch of the Reagan family. He is smart and calculating. However, he is traumatized by the tragic death of his middle son, Joe. Since Joe's murder in 2009, he has been emotionally disturbed, it affects both his approach to work and his attitude toward his children, which is mindful but rather detached.
The writers themselves do not always do a good job of revealing this storyline, though.
A good example is the episode “Keeping the Faith”. Frank's youngest son, Jamie, had been shot. The situation was quite serious, and he was admitted to the hospital where all his family and colleagues gathered. And while we can see obvious parallels between this incident and Joe's death, the writers have given us absolutely no insight into Frank's psyche and emotional background: the Commissioner just wasn't there.
“It would have given us a view of what he went through when he lost Joe. We never see Frank at Jamie's bedside. We never see Frank at the hospital at all until the end when he's outside,” Reddit user Lucyb95691 writes.
But not all fans agree. On the contrary, Frank's absence seems to be a good indicator of how much pain he felt, so he could not even enter the hospital.
“I don’t know where Frank was, when was he told Jaime was shot, but in light of Joe’s shooting, it might have been too painful for him to be there repeating history,” Redditor Kindc1497 explains.
Nonetheless, this is not the first time the writers have omitted such moments.
“It might not be what most of the audience wants to see, but then again, this is a show that avoids most opportunities for characters to demonstrate affection,” Conscious-Coffee5431 notes.
So the question is whether this is intentional, so as to emphasize the procedural component alone (boring!), or whether the creators are demonstrating how much police work leaves people unaffected.