Here's why Rachael (Parminder Nagra) was written off Psych at the end of season 7 and didn’t return for its final season. Rachael was the only character on the show to serve as Gus’ love interest for more than one episode, so to see her leave was unsurprisingly something of a shock.

After several seasons of Gus flirting with multiple female characters, Psych decided to give Gus (Dulé Hill) a girlfriend by introducing him to Rachael. After a few dates, Gus was shocked to discover that Rachael had kept it a secret from him that she was a single mother. However, Gus accepted it, and the relationship endured for several episodes, even when Shawn’s antics threatened to destroy it. Gus also spent some time getting to know Rachael’s son, Maximus (Mateen Devji). Shawn, who was concerned that Rachael’s presence in Gus’ life would affect their friendship, was initially displeased with the idea of Gus dating her. Later, Rachael told Gus that she was going to spend six months in England, but the expectation was that she would return.

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In the penultimate episode of season 7, Gus received a letter and a basket of cookies from Rachael, which tipped him off that she wanted to break up. Of course, Gus was devastated by the news and Rachael never returned to Psych, and the series ended in season 8 with Gus single. Nagra’s move to The Blacklist could have had something to do with it, but Psych creator and showrunner Steve Franks has offered a different reason. Apparently, part of what Psych wanted to do with Rachael was to have Gus take a father-like role in Maximus’ life, but this didn’t work as well as the writers had hoped it would [via Give Me My Remote].

Shawn Spencer, Burton Guster, and Rachael mini golfing in Psych

Rachael’s time on Psych tested of Shawn and Gus’ friendship and allowed viewers a chance to see him in a long-term relationship. It also forced Psych to take a break from one of the more humorous elements of Gus’ character, which is his belief that he was a “player”. But it would seem that what Rachael brought to the show wasn’t quite what the writers were going for when they had him date a single mother.

It was ultimately decided that Gus’ relationship with Maximus would have been much more interesting if he was Gus’ actual son. According to Franks, this led directly to the big reveal in Psych 2: Lassie Come Home. A pregnancy test found in Juliet’s car made Shawn (James Roday Rodriguez) believe that she was pregnant for most of the movie, but it was actually Gus’ current girlfriend, Selena (Jazmyn Simon), who was with child. The implication here is that depending on how big the time skip is, Psych 3 may be able to show how Gus would be as a father. Gus, who had no experience with fatherhood, struggled to develop a strong bond with this child that he barely knew in season 7. But given the space afforded by a time jump, the third Psych movie, on the other hand, would be able to go in a fundamentally different direction.

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