Benny Colón left Bull after season 5, and there’s a lot to know about actor Freddy Rodriguez’s departure. The memorable character was an important part of the legal drama since the beginning and worked as a lawyer for Dr. Jason Bull’s (Michael Weatherly) company, Trial Analysis Corporation.
Before playing Benny on Bull, Rodriguez was known for playing Gio on the comedy/drama Ugly Betty, along with Federico Diaz on the beloved HBO prestige drama Six Feet Under. Benny quickly became one of his most popular TV roles.
We might have expected all the main characters to remain on Bull throughout its entire run, including Benny, thanks to his professional and personal relationship with Dr. Bull. Instead, he left fairly abruptly. Was it a creative choice driven by the writers’ feeling that they had done everything they could with Benny, or was there another reason?
Benny’s Bull Season 6 Exit Story Explained
After Benny quit TAC in the Bull season 5 finale, he didn’t actually leave the company, which definitely made his season 6 exit even more perplexing for viewers. In Bull season 6, episode 1, “Gone,” the main characters talk about how Benny fell in love, tied the knot, and is now living in Italy.
It would have been shocking enough to hear about the major life change Benny made, but then Danny (Jaime Lee Kirchner) says they dated for only a month prior to deciding to marry each other, which is pretty intense. Marissa (Geneva Carr) then notes he is “blissfully happy in Rome.”
And that was all the information that viewers got. After watching Benny for five seasons, viewers might have expected to hear a bit more about his new life, or at least see him one more time. And since characters tend to move or die when they leave a show, the storyline could have been much darker.
After all, Bull could have also killed off Benny, since that’s how Cable McCroy (Annabelle Attanasio) left the series in season 3. But the other characters seemed to think he was doing well, so this was a peaceful ending for him.
There’s no denying that his character arc ended in a fairly random way, however. There were so many other story possibilities, including something related to a case that he and his coworkers were focused on.
It also would have made sense if Benny had actually quit at the end of season 5, and that was it for the character. But there was a reason his story didn’t end at that moment.
Why Freddy Rodriguez Was Written Out Of Bull
The Hollywood Reporter shared in May 2021 that Freddy Rodriguez was leaving Bull, along with a few writers and showrunner Glenn Gordon Caron. That announcement came after, according to TV Line, Rodriguez posted on his Instagram account, “Thrilled to announce that we will be returning for a Season 6.”
THR mentioned “a workplace investigation,” but it’s not clear exactly what happened, what it entailed, or who was involved. According to THR and TVLine, CBS didn’t issue any official statement about why Rodriguez left. The actor didn’t talk about it at the time, and since then, he doesn’t appear to have addressed it in any interviews, either.
Perhaps related, the CBS investigation came a few years after Bull star Elisha Dushku wrote an article for The Boston Globe in 2018, claiming that CBS let her go from Bull when she said her co-star and long-time NCIS actor Michael Weatherly harassed her.
What Happened To Benny After Bull
Besides letting us know where Benny went during Bull season 6, the show mentioned him again, though briefly. In season 6, episode 9, “False Positive,” Dr. Bull wants to stop Marissa Morgan from taking a job elsewhere, and he says he was wrong not to say she could work out of the office space Benny had used.
Based on Freddy Rodriguez’s Instagram post, it sounds like he thought he was coming back for the sixth season, and Benny would have continued on the show and worked on more legal cases.
As for Rodriguez, after he left Bull in 2021, the actor played a handful of roles, including Detective Greco on the 2023 TV series Wu-Tang: An American Saga. He also portrayed Detective Wayne Johnson in the 2023 found footage horror movie V/H/S/85.
Although he hasn’t acted as much since departing Bull, Rodriguez has three upcoming movies on his IMDb page: the drama The Tailoress, the horror film You Lose You Die, and Blue Eyed Girl, which also stars Beau Bridges and Marisa Couglan.
- Release Date
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2016 – 2022-00-00
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Michael Weatherly
Jason Bull
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Geneva Carr
Marissa Morgan
Sources: THR.com, TVLine.com, Parade.com, Thebostonglobe.com
