‘Blue Bloods’: Meet New Reagan Family Member Returning for Season 11 Finale

Blue Bloods Season 11 wraps up with an action-packed finale on Friday night, and it continues the story of the newest Reagan family member, Joe Hill. The two-hour finale, featuring the episodes “The End” and “Justifies The Means,” is the first time Will Hochman is appearing on Blue Bloods since he was in the first three episodes of Season 11. Joe officially joined the family in the Season 10 finale “Family Secrets.”

As CBS has already revealed in teasers for the finale, the Reagan family will be shaken to its core after they learn that Joe has really been working undercover for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to track down gunrunners. Joe’s actions remind everyone of his father, Joe Reagan, who died while going undercover before the series even began. The Reagans rally to work together to make sure Joe doesn’t meet the same fate as his dad. The season finale starts at 9 p.m. ET on CBS.

Hochman 28, made his Broadway debut in 2019, starring in Adam Rapp’s The Sound Inside at Studio 54. In an interview with Broadway.com, Hochman said his first love was sports, and he did not decide to try his hand at acting until he was 20. As a kid, he loved playing basketball and football. He was bit by the acting bug in college when he took an acting class. Even though he was already a junior, he tried to double major in theater. That was difficult, but he took as many acting classes as possible while earning a degree in economics.

Despite only being at the beginning of his career, Hochman has already worked alongside major stars. The Sound Inside co-starred Mary-Louise Parker. “She is a special one. She’s a titan. [I’ve learned] so much just from being on stage and rehearsing with her,” Hochman told Broadway.com. “The things that I can soak in are unbelievable.” On Blue Bloods, Hochman shares the screen with Tom Selleck, Donnie Wahlberg, and Bridget Moynahan. In Let Him Go, Hochman acted alongside Costner and Diane Lane.

Hochman’s appearances on Blue Bloods prove that Joe is not going to disappear from the storyline completely. Joe is the son of Joe Reagan, the deceased eldest child of Commissioner Frank Reagan (Tom Selleck), and Paula Hill (Bonnie Sommerville). Paula never told Joe of his true parentage until the truth was uncovered in “Family Secrets.” Joe still became a police officer and is now a detective.

Only the Reagans and Paula knew Joe’s true lineage until the shocking end of “In The Name of the Father.” In the episode, Joe became the center of media attention for an act of bravery. Frank and Paula agreed to try to keep Joe’s secret safe, but in the end, Frank learned that a journalist found Joe’s birth certificate, which listed Joe Reagan as his father. As “Atonement” revealed, Joe was not prepared to be a cop with a famous lineage.

“It’s very different in our fictional world to be a cop named Joe Hill than it is to be a cop named Joe Reagan,” showrunner Kevin Wade told Deadline. “Because the first question to that guy is, oh, wait, is your old man the police commissioner? In which case, this guy would answer, no, but my grandfather is and my uncle is this guy and my other uncle is that guy and my aunt is the ADA.”

Joe’s status as a Reagan has already made him a new regular at the family dinner table. Paula even joined in the tradition in “In The Name of the Father.” “It was really a special room to find myself in,” Hochman told TVInsider about sitting in the Reagan dining room. “It was quite the departure from the most recent thing I’d done, which was a two-person show on Broadway!”

Joe has also already had a powerful story with Jamie (Will Estes), who looks at Joe as a lost connection to his late older brother. Joe is “obviously his nephew, but I think he sees his brother in him and… this family member they didn’t know,” Estes told PopCulture. “It’s just been a new cool thing on a show that’s run so long to have a new character come in like that… is really a cool bit of oxygen for all of it,” Estes added.