[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 15 “Lab Rats.”]
9-1-1 places its firefighters in life and dying conditions on a regular basis they usually’ve made it even when it’s appeared like they shouldn’t. Chimney (Kenneth Choi) survived rebar by his head. Buck (Oliver Stark) was capable of return to work after getting his leg pinned below a truck. Eddie (Ryan Guzman) was buried alive and rescued himself. Bobby (Peter Krause) in all probability ought to have been pancaked within the pile-up of storage containers, vans, and even the 118’s ambulance. So, after they’re going through a brilliant pressure of CCHF (Crimean–Congo hemorrhagic fever), and even whereas Chimney’s reached out the bleeding out stage, why ought to we predict that this time received’t be similar to each different? As a result of it wasn’t.
9-1-1 simply killed off its first main character, and it did so in probably the most completely devastating, sob-inducing, hard-to-process means. This can be a present that had the identical forged in place since Season 2. Connie Britton left on the first season, however she’s nonetheless alive on the market; she even returned as Abby in Season 3, to shock Buck in the midst of an emergency, throughout which he needed to rescue her fiancé. However as soon as Guzman and Jennifer Love Hewitt (Maddie) joined Krause, Angela Bassett (Athena), Stark, Aisha Hinds (Hen), and Choi within the Season 2 premiere, that was it. These characters grew to become like a household, and actually, it was lately that I stated to a fellow 9-1-1 fan that it’s exhausting to think about the present killing off anybody due to that, as a result of if that occurred, these characters would all want months to grieve. And due to that, had been it to occur, it could have to be a season finale, to offer them the time bounce to maneuver previous it sufficient to operate as they would wish to on the present. Properly, 9-1-1 is about to show that I used to be apparently fallacious.
What the drama has regularly excelled at, each throughout its Fox and ABC runs, is the emergency, particularly the multi-part emergency. It’s kicked off a number of seasons with one stretching throughout three episodes. It’s gone huge each time. In some way, with its newest two-parter, with three episodes nonetheless to go within the season, even whereas set in a lab below quarantine, it did so once more. The stakes had by no means been larger, the implications by no means extra severe, and the loss by no means higher. 9-1-1 has simply been modified essentially with the dying of Bobby Nash, and it’ll by no means be the identical.
Disney / Christopher Willard
Heading into the second half, it was Chimney whose life was hanging within the steadiness, following his publicity to CCHF, however what nobody knew till it was too late was he was not the one one who had been through the explosion that despatched the members of the 118 within the lab flying. But it surely was Chimney whom we watched slowly dying, getting into every stage, and getting ready to say goodbye to his cherished one. It was Chimney who made Bobby promise that he’d watch over his household for him, the second that showrunner Tim Minear instructed TV Insider the captain knew if there was a option to be made, the opposite man would stroll out of the lab, not him. Bobby sacrificing himself for another person, particularly somebody near him like Chimney? It is sensible.
9-1-1 has, fairly just a few occasions through the years, taken a second to return to an earlier level within the episode to disclose what we didn’t see. And it did so once more with the stunning flip of occasions as everybody was rescued: the second that Bobby was fixing everybody’s oxygen issues, he regarded down at one thing on his gear. Watching it, I had a sense that was foreshadowing one thing to return, and I used to be proper: His oxygen line tore through the explosion, and so he skilled signs for hours with out telling anybody, realizing he was going to die as a result of there was just one dose of the anti-viral and there was no query it could go to Chimney.
A significant dying on a TV present (or film) must do just a few issues to be efficient: have a terrific influence on the present and the remainder of its characters going ahead, make the viewers really feel one thing, and be executed properly. 9-1-1‘s of Bobby Nash checked all three packing containers.
There’s no different character’s dying on the present that may have an effect on every individual like Bobby’s. He’s Athena’s husband. He’s captain to Buck, Hen, Chimney, Eddie (regardless that he’s in Texas proper now), and Ravi (Anirudh Pisharody). He’s a surrogate father to Buck. Bobby and Athena have been there for Maddie and Chimney time and time once more, and now there’s the added survivor’s guilt that Chimney might be feeling, regardless that he didn’t know and it wasn’t his selection. When Ravi goes to Karen (Tracie Thoms) and we see their reactions with out him ever saying Bobby’s identify, we perceive. When Buck collapses within the corridor, sobbing, we care. When Hen cries upon listening to the information, we care. When Chimney reacts, in isolation, then talks to Maddie about it, we care.
Disney / Christopher Willard
I dare you to say that you just watched Bobby saying goodbye to Buck, then Athena, with dry eyes. The way in which Buck pounded on the door after Bobby closed it? Bobby’s goodbye to Buck — “You’re going to be okay, Buck. Do not forget that. They’re going to want you. I really like you, child.” — acknowledging that bond and the way it has grown through the years (keep in mind them in Season 1?!)? Then Bobby and Athena, having to say goodbye separated by glass and her refusing to depart? Cue each character’s response upon realizing Bobby was dying (besides perhaps Tommy’s, however extra on that in a bit).
“I’m sorry, this isn’t how I needed to depart you. I’m not selecting to depart you. I selected to avoid wasting my group as a result of it was the best factor to do. It was by no means as a result of I needed to go,” Bobby instructed his spouse. “I don’t wish to go. If I might select, I’d stick with you all the time.” It was due to her that Los Angeles, which was alleged to be his penance, grew to become his residence, “and I began to reside once more,” he stated. Then Athena’s “I’m right here for all of the elements that we have now left” was the, pardon me, nail within the coffin. How might you not really feel one thing watching this, Bobby then kneeling in prayer (Peter Krause’s thought!), and the episode ending on his helmet?
It’s exhausting to say goodbye to a personality. It’s exhausting to take action in a means that feels proper, particularly when it’s somebody who has already suffered a lot, greater than anyone character ought to, it could possibly be argued. Bobby got here to Los Angeles after dropping his household in a fireplace that he by chance triggered in Minnesota. (I’m not even detailing his alcoholic father’s dying, and the way Bobby discovered him the subsequent morning.) Due to the present’s “Begins” episodes (in his case, “Begins Once more”), we watched his journey. We noticed Bobby and Athena fall in love. We noticed him make the 118 a household and his household. We’ve seen him lead his firefighters in the best means, even after they didn’t agree together with his choices.
What makes it much more painful is it performs out like some other episode the place the 118 would get the win. They snuck Athena again to the lab with the anti-viral. They labored collectively to avoid wasting one in all their very own (Chimney). They stood defiant towards the FBI and army. For the 118 to lose? There’s one thing off about that. Why couldn’t this simply be like each different time?
And, frankly, some elements of it simply didn’t work now that we all know it was Bobby’s dying episode. (Minear has instructed us that Peter Krause might be again in Season 8.) The helicopter chase to lure the FBI and army away? Positive, I can see the place that was useful, however it might’ve been only a bit shorter (to offer extra time with the 118 within the lab, to offer Buck only a bit extra time with Bobby, since he’d been separated from him since Episode 14) and having Tommy (Lou Ferrigno Jr.) there — and the reminder of his relationship with Buck, contemplating they simply had an episode the place it was laid out that they might not be getting again collectively — felt pointless. And the minimize to Tommy grieving amidst everybody else? It took me out of the second. Bobby didn’t imply almost what he did to the others to him. And it’s particularly notable since Eddie, in Texas, doesn’t but know (and we now know we received’t see that onscreen). What particularly hurts? The group being separated on the finish, unable to grieve collectively, and Buck being separated from everybody for many of the two-parter. What makes the present stand out is how a lot the 118 is sort of a household, and that was lacking in the important thing second.
An enormous dying like this alerts a shift. However did 9-1-1 want one? It’s inconceivable to say with out seeing the episodes that comply with, each this season and subsequent, and it’s a tall mountain to climb to offer one thing that offers a definitive reply of sure. For now, it feels a bit fallacious to consider the present and the 118 persevering with with out Bobby.
And with out Bobby and Athena’s relationship! They’ve been simply among the finest romances on TV in recent times, and it’s been refreshing to see a pair in love and as passionate as they’re about one another (will Might ever get better?) and nonetheless struggle, nonetheless stand their floor, and nonetheless stroll by hearth (actually) to avoid wasting each other. Watching Athena grieve goes to be robust.
What this episode makes clear is that it’s a disgrace that the Emmys not often acknowledge broadcast TV lately; Abbott Elementary has gotten love in recent times, and it’d be shocking if Matlock and Kathy Bates aren’t nominated this 12 months. However Peter Krause deserves the nomination for his work on this episode, taking part in a captain apprehensive about his group, not himself, till he’s alone, and taking part in his personal grief in addition to that for his spouse in his last moments. The way in which he appears to be like at his group for the final time as Hen and Chimney are taken out? Then at Buck of their last moments and Athena all through their goodbye? The way in which he performs Bobby’s dying within the final 10 minutes is a efficiency that deserves to be acknowledged on a bigger scale. With the face masks on for a big a part of it, he has to say a lot with simply his eyes, and Krause does.
For eight seasons, we’ve seen Captain Bobby Nash be the character the present can’t reside with out, and but, in some way, it’s about to. It’s robust to wrap my head round, to be trustworthy.
9-1-1, Thursdays, 8/7c, ABC