S.W.A.T. Exiles Completely Chickens Out Of Hondo's Best Story

Published Sep 25, 2026, 9:30 AM EDT

Cher Thompson is a Senior Staff Writer at Screen Rant, where she covers everything from explosive reality TV moments to cast interviews about the twists and turns of scripted dramas. With a background in creative writing, marketing, and teaching, Cher knows how to spot both the storytelling genius and the guilty pleasures in pop culture. Her work blends wit with insight, making readers feel like they’re chatting with a friend who just happens to know way too much about TV.

Despite the fact that S.W.A.T. Exiles had the chance to make some genuinely heartbreaking changes for Daniel "Hondo" Harrelson (Shemar Moore) with the show's first tragic twist, the spinoff series failed to deliver the best story possible. When CBS' S.W.A.T. came to a close after three different attempts at cancelling it, the series had fairly obviously been on its last legs with the network for some time. The narrative of the CBS hit hadn't shifted all that much, but the tone and direction of the procedurals on the network had changed significantly enough that S.W.A.T. was consistently a tough sell.

After the original show's cancellation, S.W.A.T. Exiles was a surprise. While Moore's passion for the series never wavered, the fact that a darker-toned and grittier version of the series was finding its way to a platform that would allow it to function less like a network TV procedural and more like a crime drama wasn't expected by the show's original viewers. When it was announced that the new series would be including limited members of the original cast and feature a heartbreaking twist from the jump, an excitement rippled through S.W.A.T. fans, albeit one tinged with a sense of fear.

Unfortunately, the opening episode of S.W.A.T. Exiles quickly proved that despite featuring a crushing death for Hondo at the jump of the series, the show didn't take a big swing in the way it should've. Instead, the new series chickened out of using S.W.A.T. to its advantage, choosing an easier path.

S.W.A.T. Exiles Doesn't Have Any Deaths That Truly Matter

After teasing a heartbreaking twist that would rattle Hondo and surprise viewers, S.W.A.T. Exiles opens up with the discovery that on top of being divorced and retired from S.W.A.T., the former Twenty squad leader was reeling from an off-screen death that we as viewers don't have much insight to. Throughout the premiere, we learn that a rookie officer, Nico (Alejandro Akara), was fatally wounded during an operation that Hondo had given him guidance on, which led to his forced retirement and hangs over his head. Nico, whose name sounds suspiciously close S.W.A.T.'s Miguel "Miko" Alfaro (Niko Pepaj), is haunting Hondo.

While the death is clearly something that consistently resonates with Hondo as he moves through the paces of returning to the LAPD, it's not one that rattles the audience in any real capacity. Losing a character we never really knew and only see as a plot device doesn't hit hard, which makes Hondo's consistent pain about it far less sharp. Despite the fact that Hondo is struggling throughout the episode, S.W.A.T. Exiles doesn't take a big swing by killing off one of the franchise's more beloved characters, or even one that's known to the audience prior to the spinoff.

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How A More Emotional Death Could Have Set Up S.W.A.T. Exiles For Success

While S.W.A.T. Exiles still has an entire season to roll out the gut punches, the fact that a heartbreak was teased throughout the press cycle for the show's premiere and, ultimately, is nowhere to be found is disappointing. Hondo's grief over the loss of his rookie and the subsequent steamroll it did on his life is valid, but the fact that the character he lost is someone the audience has no emotional attachment to makes the death itself feel like something that can be brushed off. Instead of resonating emotionally with viewers, it just points them to the show's headspace.

Hondo's time with his original team on S.W.A.T. always had an expiration date, and S.W.A.T. Exiles choosing to bump that date up was the right move overall. The team leader coming out of forced retirement, which is a piece of the puzzle that continually became more interesting as the episode went on, is a good move, but refusing to reach back into the S.W.A.T. cast to make that grief more resonant left everything feeling short-lived. Rather than S.W.A.T. Exiles choosing setting up dark moments for Hondo as he got on his feet, the series chose the least impactful way forward.

Cast

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  Shemar Moore

  David 'Deacon' Kay

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  Jay Harrington

  Daniel 'Hondo' Harrelson Jr.

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  Patrick St. Esprit

  Robert 'Bob' Hicks

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  Lucy Barrett

  Sammy 'Sam' Bishop