Few shows have stood the test of time as well as S.W.A.T., and although the gripping police procedural has only been on the air for eight years, it has already produced eight seasons. The show was created for television by Shawn Ryan and Aaron Rahsaan Thomas, and it’s based on the original S.W.A.T. series from Robert Hammer and Rick Husky. The series has seen plenty of stars come and go over the years, but one actor who just recently joined the cast is Annie Ilonzeh, who portrays Devin Gamble. Collider’s Michael Zimmerman recently caught up with Ilonzeh to talk about Season 8 of the show, and she spoke about how Devin is constantly being pulled between her work and her family, caught in the middle of her duty to catch the bad guys who also happen to be her family:
“She’s wrapped up in her family, and for Gamble, at this point in her life, family is just blood, and she has nothing to do with it. But people say that you are the company that you keep, and, unfortunately, her family is her blood, so she’s wrapped up in the mayhem and some of the crime that they’re involved in. But that’s a weird juxtaposition because she’s a good guy, and she gets the bad guys. If we were to define or quantify what they are, they are the bad guys, but they’re also her blood. So, she kind of walks a tightrope, and she stays on the straight and narrow.
She certainly stays in her good guy mode, but she is associated with some bad guys. But how do you fully just throw your family away or just discard them? That’s a really tough position to be in, and I think a lot of people can relate to that. In times where just you don’t agree with something, whether it’s friend or family, how do you navigate through that conflict? There’s a lot of gray matter going on.”
S.W.A.T. creator Shawn Ryan has also worked on other shows over the years. He’s also famous for his work on The Night Agent, the popular Netflix series starring Gabriel Basso and Luciane Buchanan that recently aired its second season and has already been renewed for Season 3. He also created the TV series Timeless, which ran for two seasons between 2016 and 2018 and stars Abigail Spencer alongside Matt Lanter and Malcolm Barrett. As for his co-creator, Aaron Rahsaan Thomas, S.W.A.T. is the first TV show he’s created, but he has served as a writer on other projects such as The Get Down, the Netflix teen drama starring Shameik Moore and Justice Smith, and Southland, the police procedural starring Michael Cudlitz and Regina King. He made his screenwriting debut in 2007 on Cover, a gritty crime thriller starring Vivica A. Fox and Louis Gossett Jr. that’s currently not streaming anywhere.
What Are the Best Shows To Watch if You Like ‘S.W.A.T.’?
If you’ve watched S.W.A.T. and are wondering what else you can check out while you eagerly await the next episode, look no further than NCIS, which has been on the air for more than 20 years and even spawned several spin-offs set in cities like Los Angeles and New Orleans. The Blacklist, which features James Spader, is another interesting procedural with a premise more unique than most, as well as Criminal Minds, which went off the air in 2020 but was revived in 2022 and brought back as Criminal Minds: Evolution.
