After Blue Bloods came to an unceremonious end in December, CBS has announced it is reviving the franchise with a spinoff centring on Donnie Wahlberg’s Danny Reagan.
According to Variety and Deadline, CBS has ordered a series that will follow NYPD Detective Reagan to the Boston police department and will find him reporting for duty with a new partner.
The new police procedural comes from S.W.A.T. writers Brandon Sonnier and Brandon Margolis and is tentatively titled Boston Blue.
The storyline came out of a pitch that would have followed “a family of police officers in Boston whose eldest daughter is partnered with a new transfer from LAPD.” Sources tell Deadline that CBS saw the series as a way to expand the Blue Bloods universe, and asked Sonnier and Margolis to change “the LAPD transplant character to a NYPD one.”
The show is expected to debut during the 2025-2026 broadcast season.
In 2023, CBS announced the 14th season of the Tom Selleck-led police series would be its last.
The long-running drama followed multiple generations of the Reagan family working in New York law enforcement and starred Selleck as New York Police Commissioner Frank Reagan. The cast also included Wahlberg (Det. Danny Reagan), Bridget Moynahan (ADA Erin Reagan), Will Estes (Sgt. Jamie Reagan), Len Cariou (PC Henry), Jennifer Esposito (Chief of Police Jackie Curatola), Steve Schirripa (Det. Anthony Abetemarco), Marisa Ramirez (Det. Maria Baez) and Vanessa Ray (Officer Eddie Janko).
The news of its cancellation came as a surprise as Blue Bloods was the top-rated series on Fridays. According to Deadline, it averaged more than 9.5 million viewers per week last season. It is also the third most-watched broadcast drama on TV.
Wahlberg, 55, said that after more than a decade on the air he and his castmates felt they were “letting (the crew) down a little bit” when it came to an end.
“That was tough. That was tough to process, you know. And I know the crew wouldn’t feel that way. But in some ways, we just kept sort of believing we would keep the show going,” Wahlberg told Fox News Digital. “When that finale ended, it was kind of like reality hit us all. It was definitely a part of it, a bit of like, ‘Gosh, you know, if we could have just kept going a few more years, you know?’”
Ahead of the series finale, Wahlberg said that he and his co-stars did everything they could to try and keep the show on the air after 14 seasons.
“We tried to keep the show going. We tried to help the show carry on, and we couldn’t. We couldn’t do it. You know, we did everything we could, everything in our power, to have the show carry on,” Wahlberg told the website in December.
Every episode of Blue Bloods ended with the Reagan family gathered around the dinner table. Wahlberg said their final scene together left him in “tears” as Selleck read the poem Love Is Not All by Edna St. Vincent Millay.
“Literally, my life passed before my eyes,” Wahlberg said in a separate interview with Variety as he reflected on the series’ end. “I was listening to his voice mesmerize this room and thinking about what a magical journey, and what a gift that this boy, who didn’t know where his next meal was going to come from half the time, in this scrappy family, who grew up watching this man on TV, is sitting next to him, sharing this magical moment of his wisdom and grace.”
Meanwhile, Selleck was critical of CBS’ decision to end the show.
In an October interview with TV Insider, the veteran actor didn’t hold back as he spoke of how the popular crime series “was always taken for granted.”
“I’m kind of frustrated … I haven’t wanted to talk about an ending for Blue Bloods but about it still being wildly successful,” the 80-year-old Emmy winner said.
But during a shareholder meeting last summer, Paramount Global co-CEO Brian Robbins hinted that the network was looking for ways to breathe new life into the Blue Bloods franchise.
“In TV, new franchise extensions are coming for Dexter, Billions and Blue Bloods,” Robbins said.
Still, even as talk of a spinoff swirled, Wahlberg was unsure of how it could work without the rest of the Reagan family.
“It’s going to be a very delicate dance to keep that integrity. Where’s the family going to be? They can’t be in New York. I would probably drive to New York from Ohio, if I was Danny, to go to every dinner and back,” Wahlberg told Variety of his character before the police drama ended. “Until we know that there’s absolutely no way this show can be resurrected somehow, I think we’re all walking forward… but taking a peek back.”
All seasons of Blue Bloods are available to stream on Paramount+.