List of The Shield characters


The following is a list of character summaries from the FX Networks television series The Shield.

Main characters

Captain Monica Rawling is a fictional character from the FX television show The Shield, played by Glenn Close, who received an Emmy nomination as Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series for her performance, and Golden Globe Award nomination as Best Actress in a Television Series - Drama.

Character history

Monica Rawling succeeded David Aceveda as Captain of the Farmington precinct. A morally strong woman, she tried to redeem Vic Mackey and Ronnie Gardocki by involving them in a controversial asset forfeiture program designed to clean up Farmington, by destroying the neighborhood drug trade. The program was extremely unpopular with the local citizens, yet she kept the seizures in place, believing they did more good than harm.
Rawling began her police career in Farmington, where she started as a patrol officer partnered with Rich Nelson. In "Back in the Hole", drug kingpin Antwon Mitchell reveals that Rawling and Nelson had an affair, but the married father Nelson eventually returned to his family. When Mitchell murdered a 14-year-old girl turned police informant, Rawling was determined to take him down. A video recording of him confessing the murder to Shane Vendrell and ordering Vic Mackey's death provided the means to send Mitchell back to jail. However, after finally proving that Mitchell was responsible for ordering the brutal stabbing deaths of two Farmington police officers, Rawling learned that David Aceveda had arranged an immunity deal for the imprisoned drug lord. Learning that the DEA was using Antwon's information to build a case against the Salvadoran drug cartel which had been supplying him with heroin, Captain Rawling ordered Vic and the Strike Team to build a case against the Salvadorans first.
The DEA was enraged and subsequently threatened to cut off all Federal funding to the LA area unless Rawling was fired. Although the Chief immediately complied, Rawling was allowed to remain at the Barn until Mitchell was delivered to the police station and formally arrested for the Farmington cop killings.
Vic informally visited Rawling one last time in her residence in Farmington. She has a small chat with him about the future and asks if he ever thinks about how things would end for him, Vic responds that he will take things as they come. Monica tells him to promise her to be mindful of his actions and to take good care of himself, a subtle warning to Vic unaware that IAD will be investigating him and the Strike Team. Mackey tells her to do the same and wished each other good luck for the future before departing. Right after closing the door, Rawling broke down in tears, visibly devastated by having been fired. She was the only member of the Farmington Police Division to not attend the celebration at the local bar of Mitchell's arrest. Her final scene shows her alone in her house, sitting on the couch drinking a beer, in contrast to the crowded, boisterous, noisy celebration at the bar.

Relationship with Vic Mackey

Before Rawling arrived at the barn, Aceveda disbanded the strike team and wrote a burn notice on Mackey. This made Mackey "untradable" because no other department would take him afterwards. As Rawlings put it, he was the "red-headed stepchild of the barn before came."
Rawling gave Vic more responsibility, and took him on as a sort of right-hand man, despite Aceveda's protests. Despite a few arguments, their relationship was usually cordial. While Mackey serves as a good cop, he was also a political liability.
Early in the season, Rawling opens an investigation into Mackey to prove to Aceveda that Mackey was clean. However, IAD confirmed Monica's suspicions about the Strike Team correct when they found a brick of heroin in Lemansky's car that he confiscated from a drug dealer and never turned in as evidence. Rawling, having lost her job as Captain, said it was someone else's problem now. This eventually leads to IAD Lieutenant Jon Kavanaugh's investigation into the Strike Team.

Danielle Sofer

Sergeant Danielle "Danny" Sofer is a fictional Los Angeles Police Department sergeant in the television drama series The Shield. Sofer is played by Catherine Dent.
Danny started the series as a patrol officer who aspires to become a detective. She has an on-again, off-again sexual relationship with Vic Mackey, and a complicated history with Dutch Wagenbach. Captain David Aceveda trusts her, helping her get reinstated after she is fired and arranging for her to be reassigned to Julien Lowe. Sofer becomes a mentor for Lowe, though the two don't see eye to eye on several personal issues and aspects of police work. She is forced to kill an Arab man, and the repercussions haunt her through several episodes as she is continually harassed. In season 5, she is assigned to desk duty as a result of her pregnancy. The identity of the father is unknown and is the subject of an office pool among her co-workers. Even though she is driven to the hospital by Julien, in her hospital bed after giving birth, Vic asks if Danny will tell the baby who the father was and she tells Vic that she will let the baby know, "when he's old enough," implying that Vic is indeed Lee's father. In Season 6, Captain Claudette Wyms promotes Danny to the rank of sergeant; however, since open sergeants positions were filling rapidly, Danny was told she would have to end her maternity leave immediately in order to get a guaranteed full-time position.
Danny is partnered up with Tina Hanlon and the two clash frequently as Danny feels that Tina is too inexperienced to be relied upon while Tina feels that Danny doesn't respect her or her skills. Things escalate when both women fix their eye on Kevin Hiatt, though Danny later admits that it was only to see if she could still "get her girl on." Later on, after hearing a confession, Danny consoles Dutch in the locker room and the pair share a kiss.

Ronnie Gardocki

Detective Ronald Everett "Ronnie" Gardocki, is a fictional character who appears in the FX crime drama The Shield. He is portrayed by David Rees Snell. Ronnie is known for his extremely calm demeanor, well-groomed appearance, and quiet nature.

Background

Little is known about the background of Detective Ronnie Gardocki. His surname is of Polish origin, but no other clues about his past are given. A DVD commentary by Michael Chiklis said that all the show's characters are from where the actors themselves are from, which would mean that Gardocki is from Wichita, Kansas.
Ronnie has very few lines in comparison with the rest of the Strike Team members, and consequently it is difficult for the viewer to ascertain much information about him through what he says. He is trusted implicitly by Vic Mackey, who at times often shields Ronnie from the darker schemes involving the Strike Team. Ronnie, either deliberately or unconsciously, tends to stay in the background, rarely speaking up about anything, though he radiates a manner of unshakable confidence.
Superficially, Gardocki can be described as "geeky" due to his interest in electronic equipment and computers. In episode "Blowback" he comments that he went to California State University, Northridge. Besides this aptitude with computers, he has been shown to enjoy the band Journey, beer, and is an avowed atheist. He has severe allergies. He appears to favor the Beretta 8045 Cougar F as his sidearm. He had a thick mustache in the first two seasons for which he was occasionally mocked for, before growing a full beard in the Season Three, to cover up the scarring caused by Mexican drug lord Armadillo Quintero.
Gardocki's personality changes somewhat over the course of the show. Initially he is somewhat of a geek, speaking awkwardly with a woman during a prostitution sting. After Season Three begins, he takes on more of an extroverted manner, participating in more dangerous, hands-on police work with the Strike Team. This is reflective of his experiences over his time working with Mackey. Over the course of the show he is seen flirting with several women; he is also admired by Officer Tina Hanlon, though the potential relationship never develops, and during Season Seven is shown taking an attractive Asian woman back to his apartment.
His calm and quiet personality sharply contrasts with the more aggressive members of the Strike Team. However, he has also been shown to have a violent side: when the Strike Team tried to break up a riot between a group of black and Hispanic gang members at a funeral home, a black gang member struck Gardocki in the back of the head with a crucifix hanging on a nearby wall. After finding out the identity of the culprit, the Strike Team tracked him down so that Gardocki could beat the man bloody.
Gardocki ultimately distinguishes himself from the other three members of the Strike Team as being the most careful and smart in maintaining his outward image as an upstanding, incorruptible cop. Although he committed and was involved in as many crimes as the other three members, Gardocki manages to evade his superiors and their wrath as an individual, unlike the three other team members who all get caught for individual crimes or questionable actions made separately from the overall Strike Team. This is due to Gardocki being extremely guarded and intelligent in the way he handles not only the team's illegal activities, but his own, and he never leaves evidence or proof of his involvement with the majority of his questionable actions. He was the only member of the Strike Team to escape the majority of the damage of IAD Lieutenant Kavanaugh's investigation due to there being no direct evidence on his use of the Money Train money, his involvement with Terry Crowley's death, and other crimes more visibly committed by Mackey and Vendrell.
Only in the final episodes of the series do Gardocki's crimes become known by his superiors, though his careful personality is not the cause of it. His involvement in crimes is only exposed because of his team leader and best friend Mackey, who revealed the Strike Team's criminal acts—Gardocki's included—in order to gain immunity from ICE, sending Gardocki to prison for life.