Amy Santiago

Amy Santiago
Nickname(s):	Ames Hall Monitor Vanessa Santiago The Finger Queen Turtle Bug
Birthday:	Between 1982 and 1983
Occupation:	Police Sergeant at the 99th Precinct Detective at the 99th Precinct (formerly) Rookie cop at the 64th Precinct (formerly)
Relatives:	Victor Santiago (father) Camila Santiago (mother) Unnamed grandmother Tony Santiago (brother) David Santiago (brother) 5 unnamed brothers Mason Santiago (nephew) Matthew Santiago (nephew) Unnamed niece Unnamed aunt Several brothers-in-law Two sisters-in-law Roger Peralta (father-in-law) Karen Peralta (mother-in-law) Kate Peralta (sister-in-law)
Relationships:	Jake Peralta (husband) Teddy Wells (ex-boyfriend) Gabe (dated) Luke Mueller (dated) Constantine Kane (dated)
Badge No.:	98204 (Detective) 3263 (Sergeant) 2216 (Pilot)
Series Information
First Appearance:	Pilot
No. of Episodes:	All except: The Box
Portrayed by:	Melissa Fumero

Sergeant Amy Santiago is a main character of the show. She is a sergeant and a former detective at the 99th precinct of the NYPD. Always eager to impress, Amy is looking for a mentor to help her achieve her dream of being the youngest person to be promoted to captain.

Personality

Amy is an incredibly ambitious and driven detective who always strives for perfection in nearly everything she does. Like Jake, she is extremely competitive and stubborn, doing whatever it takes to win a bet or competition. 

Amy is utterly obsessed with anything that has to do with organization or rules, with one of her favorite pastimes even being creating binders for any given situation. She is often made fun of by others for being a “goody-two shoes”, as she has shown to be incapable of even breaking the smallest rule. Because of how much she values rules and authority, Amy upholds an unnaturally high amount of respect and reverence towards superior officers, particularly Captain Holt. This causes her to be desperate for her captain’s wisdom and approval, often to the point of coming off as awkward and off-putting. 

Due to her need to plan nearly everything in her life, Amy is easily prone to bouts of anxiety and panic when things don’t go as expected. She developed a smoking habit to help deal with her stress, of which she is deeply ashamed of. Amy’s straight-forward and uptight attitude, along with being overall more sensitive than her colleagues, has caused her to end up as the butt of many jokes, particularly from Gina. 

Nonetheless, Amy will still hold her friends to the same impossible standards she sets for herself, which again leads to her coming off as overbearing. Despite this, Amy is a genuinely kind and caring person who is always looking out for her fellow officers, not hesitating to help them out with their issues. Though generally the one to get pushed around, Amy is not incapable of standing up for herself or her friends when needed, and can become incredibly assertive. Despite frequently being made fun of, Amy is credited as being one of the most talented and competent detectives in the 99th precinct, and has displayed great leadership abilities when required.

Biography

Amy comes from a Cuban-American family. She has seven brothers and at least one niece. She is either her parents' 2nd, 3rd, or 4th favorite child. Her father was a police officer. Her highly competitive trait comes from him.

As a child, Amy excelled enough in school to skip the 4th grade entirely. She attended a magnet school, where she was voted "most likely to befriend a school administrator." In 8th grade, she was given the key to the teacher's lounge, where she stocked the fridge and cleaned up after the teachers. During high school, Amy was voted "Most Appropriate." She was the president of the Stenographer's Club in her school because she was the only member.

In college, Amy studied art history. She went to a weekend-long math conference called "Funky Cats and their Feisty Stats". During her time in the Police Academy, Amy once pooped her pants during a huge exam and later made a joke about it.

Amy has one friend named Kylie who frequently set her up on dates before she started dating Jake Peralta.

In The Puzzle Master, Amy passed the exam required to became a sergeant. She officially becomes a Sergeant in NutriBoom, the first female sergeant in her district's history.

Physical Appearance

Amy has long wavy dark brown hair and dark brown eyes. She is left-handed. Amy typically pulls her hair back in a ponytail, half-ponytail, or bun when on the job. Throughout most of season five, most of her hair was chopped off and she had a bob. In the more recent episodes, she often wears her hair down.

Her eyesight is very poor, so she usually uses contact lenses. When she doesn't have her contact lenses on hand, she sometimes has to wear comically large glasses.

Amy is usually seen wearing a pair of trousers and a blouse or shirt in black color. She wears her police badge on her belt. Starting from NutriBoom, Amy is wearing a standard dark blue police Sergeant uniform.

Jewelry worn by Amy includes: stud earrings, pendant necklaces, a silver watch on her right wrist, sometimes a ring once belonging to her grandmother, from early Season 5 onwards an engagement ring on her left ring finger, and starting from the Season 5 finale, a wedding ring on her left finger.

Relationships

Jake Peralta

Read full article on Jake and Amy's Relationship

Though Jake and Amy are effective partners, they have a very competitive relationship. They often try to one-up each other or participate in bets. Though they often argue and tease each other, it is clear the two have mutual respect and share a close friendship.

As the series progresses their friendship develops into a romantic interest, a major turning point took place in the episode, Johnny and Dora. In the first episode of season 3 both Jake and Amy state they would like to be more than just colleagues. As of New Captain, they are officially dating. As of HalloVeen, they are officially engaged. As of Jake & Amy, they are officially married. In Ding Dong, it is revealed that Amy is pregnant with Jake's child.

David Santiago

David and Amy have a very competitive relationship where no matter how well Amy does in life, her brother seems to do it better. When Amy got a Gold certification in Marksmanship, David was able to get a Platinum certification --by shooting ten times at the shooting range target and all the bullets end up going in in the one same hole.

In The Golden Child, Amy thinks she and Jake have arrived early for dinner with her mother Camila Santiago and her brother, but it turns out that the two have been at the restaurant for an hour already. When Jake tries to talk up Amy's accomplishments in the police workforce to Camila, David has the same accomplishments but only super-annoyingly more successful than her. When Amy became a Police Sergeant, her brother became a Police Lieutenant and got a perfect score on the test.

Ray Holt

Read full article on Holt and Amy's Relationship

Amy considers Captain Holt a great leader. She wants him to be her life mentor and often embarrasses herself in her attempts to follow his orders. At one point, she even bowed at him, much to his annoyance. She was very proud when he happily corrected her Thanksgiving speech.

Rosa Diaz

Rosa and Amy have a very good relationship. She see Rosa as a sister figure. In Sal's Pizza, when Rosa tells Amy how she was offered a job as their new police captain in Ropesburg PD, Amy becomes jealous. At the end of the episode, Rosa tells Amy how the two need to have each other's backs. While Jake is in Florida, in the Witness Protection Program, it is stated that Amy often went to Rosa for support. In Gray Star Mutual, Rosa catches Amy looking up wedding dresses, which Amy is embarrassed about because she thinks her subordinates will see her as weak. Rosa teaches Amy that she can still be a confident sergeant and look for wedding dresses. In Bachelor/ette Party, Rosa repeatedly tells Amy that she has her back, bridesmaids-related and outside of that.

Running Gags

Amy embarrassed in front of Holt

Read full article on Amy embarrassed in front of Holt

One of the running gags affiliated with Amy is that she will constantly try too hard to earn the respect of Holt, but by doing so, she will make a fool of herself or do something wrong, which Holt will call her out on. Embarrassed, Amy will back out of the conversation, responding with a forced positive comment on him.

Santiago Drunkenness Scale

Read full article on Santiago Drunkenness Scale

One of the gags throughout the show is that Amy's personality will change depending on how many drinks she has had. Her drunkenness scale include:

• One Drink: Spacey Amy
• Two Drinks: Loud Amy
• Three Drinks: "Amy Dance Pants"
• Four Drinks: Pervert Amy
• Five Drinks: Confident Amy
• Six Drinks: Lonely and sad Amy
• Seven Drinks: Unknown
• Eight Drinks: Equestrian Amy
• Nine Drinks: Speaks French

Title of Amy's Sextape

Read full article on Title of Amy's Sextape

A recurring joke in the show is Jake using double entendres to insult Amy's sex life. The first occurrence was in M.E. Time, though it was during the Halloween episode that Jake first references the titles of her sex tapes.

Blaming Amy

Read full article on Blaming Amy

Another recurring joke on the show is Jake always trying to push the blame off of himself and onto Amy but it rarely, if ever, works.

Awards and Decoration

Amy in her sergeant uniform, displaying her decorations.

1. Pink-Blue
   • Citation bar for delivering a baby on-duty.
2. American Flag Breast Bar
   • May be worn by any NYPD police officer.     
3. Yellow-White with Blue Stripes.
   • Unidentified
4. NYPD Excellent Police Duty
   • Citation bar for an intelligent act materially contributing to a valuable accomplishment or for submission of a device or method adopted to increase efficiency in an administrative or tactical procedure.

Trivia

• Amy is very skilled at reading lips.
• She plays the French horn.
• She is proven to be a terrible cook, for instance adding baking soda instead of salt to mashed potatoes because they are both white powders.
• Amy goes to an adult puzzle camp every summer.
• She is a Wikipedia editor.
  • She wrote Holt's mother's Wikipedia page.
• She loves Harry Potter and got Jake into the series.
• Her favorite cop movies, in order, are: Training Day, Lethal Weapon, and Fargo.
• She claims she has made it through 20 years of adulthood without scratching her butt in public.
• Amy's panic scale:
  • Level One: Obsessively stress-braiding her hair
  • Level Two: Creepily singing songs from the Great American Songbook
  • Level Three: Taking her anger out on appliances
• She said that she has a cigarette around once a month in her self-evaluation with Captain Holt.
• She over-brushed her teeth; her aggressive brushing technique stripped away much the protective enamel and much of her gum, leaving her with 7 cavities. It is unknown if she still over-brushes although it's very unlikely after the cavity incident .
• She is highly allergic to dogs and being near them for more than few minutes could potentially cause an allergic reaction, to the point that she would need medical attention.
• She is very claustrophobic.
• She is allergic to chia seeds and acai berries.
• Her gun is mostly silver, except for the handle, which is black. This is different from most of the characters, who carry all-black guns.

Quotes

Holt: Something to share with the rest of us, Santiago?

Amy: No, sir. I-I wasn't... Peralta is the one that was talking!

Jake: God, you must've been the worst fourth-grader ever.

Amy: Joke's on you. I skipped fourth grade.

---

Amy: Wait, are we going to be graded, or is this just some pass/fail garbage?

---

Amy: In high school, I was voted most appropriate.

Jake: Ooh, self burn! Those are rare.

---

Jake: That's not Brandon's profile, that's mine.

Amy: I just want a quick peek at your attendance record. Zero absences? Oh mama... printing this for later.

Jake: All right, keep it in your pants, Santiago.

Amy: Oh, that's exactly where it's going.

Gallery

• Amy and Jake get engaged.

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