Chicago Fire Season Seven Premiere | Review

Welcome back to The nerd shelf!

Today's post is finally going to be on the season seven premiere of Chicago fire. If you've never seen the show it's about the lives, both professional and personal, of the firefighters and paramedics of the Chicago fire department at Firehouse 51. I would say that if you like a cop procedural show but want something different that maybe focus more on the characters this is a show for you. It's not your regular procedural, and it's not a cop show. It's a show that will keep you on your toes and probably teach you something about the fire department (I don't know how accurate the show is to real life but it feels like it is).

I started to watch this show earlier this year, and I watched all six seasons in two weeks. I couldn't stop. I fell in love with the characters and the way these writers write and leave you on a cliffhanger after every episode is so brilliant. It made me feel like I had to watch the next episode.
Now mind you I'm not caught up on Chicago P.D. or Chicago med. With those two shows I could stop myself from binging (I don't like binging shows) and I haven't been able to catch up yet. So please no spoilers.

SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

So going into this season I knew, along with probably everyone else, that Monica Raymund that plays Gabbie had exited the show. Even as a new fan of the show I was really sad when I heard this. It also felt kind of unfinished from the season six finale, so I loved that they brought her back for this episode to give her a proper exit.

One thing that I loved that they did in this episode was talking about Connie. As you probably know, DuShon Brown who played Connie died in March this year. In this season premiere (Eamonn Walker) said that she had gotten another job and that he didn't want to stop her. The sad part was when Herrmann (David Eigenberg) said "I didn't get a chance to say goodbye. None of us did.". That got me hard. DuShon died suddenly and they weren't able to say goodbye to her in real life, so them putting that in there struck me in the feels.

So the whole commisoner Grissom (Gary Cole) thing did not end last season. Boden ran for commissioner against him and I don't think he liked that. Last season Otis (Yuri Sardarov) found evidence of Grissom changing the numbers so that he would look better. Boden didn't want to report it because he didn't want to piss Grissom off even more. But I don't think that helped. Grissom sends his assistant deputy commissioner, Jerry Gorsch (Steven Boyer), to keep a closer eye on 51. Boden and Jerry has a past. This did not surprise me. If you look at all the past seasons there is always someone against 51 or Boden. I feel like Grissom picked Jerry because he has a past with Boden. When Boden was captain at a different firehouse Jerry was a candidate. Boden didn't think Jerry was a good firefighter, and I believe him, so he let his bosses know. They placed Jerry in an office instead and Boden let him know why. So Jerry has a grudge towards him. I mean if someone took away my dream job then I would be pissed to but I'm also open for criticism. If I never hear what I'm bad at then I will never grow and get better. I can already tell that Jerry is going to be an annoyance.
Boden does too and asks Otis for the files. He gives it to the mayor's office. It looks like they might be able to beat Grissom right away but Jerry saves him. He makes the mayor's office believe that it was an error that they didn't have anything to do with. He gets to keep his job and make Bodens a living hell. I do not like this guy.

Okay so Casey (Jesse Spencer) is having a hard time with Gabbie leaving for Puerto Rico. The first scene with Casey looking at her jacket and the flashback got me right in the feels. I teared up right away. I loved those characters together, as I'm sure a lot of the fans did. Their ups and downs were sometimes very frustrating and I found that Gabbie could be very impulsive and selfish, but I still loved them together. I loved how they shot this opening scene too.
They get a call from a building where a guy is stuck under an elevator and they can't get the elevator to stop. Casey decides to do something really stupid. He jumps in under the elevator car without warning anyone. He gets lucky and doesn't get crushed but that was a fucking dumb move. I think he is acting impulsively because he's sad about Gabbie but you can't just go on a suicide mission. You can't help someone if you are also in danger. It's like they say on planes, help yourself first before you help others.
  Casey is angry and frustrated because Gabbie just decided to extend her mission in Puerto rico without talking to him. They had a fight and now they don't talk as often. Severide (Taylor Kinney) points out that it's not just on her to make their relationship work, it's on Casey too. I agree with him. A relationship is a twoway street. If only one of them is doing the work it's never going to work out. He decides to call her and I think he realizes that she is so happy there. She gets interrupted and has to go. I think he's frustrated because he wanted her to be as happy and fulfilled as she is there in Chicago. I understand that. What can you do if you'r significant other isn't happy at the place you live but you are? Do you go with them when they want to get up and leave? Do you stay back? It's such a hard question, and especially in this case. Casey's career has grown a lot since the first season, he loves being a firefighter and he doesn't want to give that up. But Gabbie wanted to go help out in Puerto rico and that was not for him. And also if you think that it's only going to be for a couple of weeks or a month you might just let them go on their own.
Casey takes Severides advice and decides that he might go to Puerto rico to visit Gabbie. But he comes home to Gabbie in their apartment. He thinks she's back for a second but then it becomes clear that she just came back for some stuff. She was offered a permanent position and she took it. What I loved about this scene is that they didn't end their relationship with a fight. Casey told her that he's not going with her but that he's proud of her and that he feels lucky that he got to spend the time with her that he has. This scene had me crying, just tears rolling down my face. It was really beautiful, and I think that almost all of season soix lead up to this. They went through so much last season and now they have finally come to the fact that maybe they shouldn't be together even though they love ech other. I'm sad to see Gabbie go but I'm happy to see that they gave her such a good exit.

Let's talk Severide for a bit. He just seems to be happy for once. His realtionship with Stella (Miranda Rae Mayo) is going great. He is worried about Casey though but at least they talk now and sort things out.
Squad 3 goes to fill up their truck with gas they meet another squad. They talk for a bit when a man from a construction site starts screaming for help. A guy hit a power line with a jackhammer and is being electrocuted. Severide runs at him and pushes him out of the way. When they come back to the house Cruz (Joe Minoso) gets a bit too excited and tells Jerry what happened. You can see that Jerry wants to take everybody down and he asks Severide if he forgot his training. He's trying to get anything that can ruin this house. And Severide points out that it was Grissom who trained him. Grissom, however, is not that happy with Severide from what happened last season. I don't like what Jerry is doing. Severide is someone who does anything to save someone's life and he is great at his job. Every season I'm asking myself why the fuck everyone wants to take down 51. They are all great at their jobs, so why would you want to take that away from the city. I don't get it.

A side plot that I absolutely loved is the chess game situation with Otis. He thinks he's playing a guy from a different shift. Everyone starts messing with him, and then he finds out that the guy that he thinks he's been playing hasn't been working at 51 for seven months. Otis, of course, starts going crazy trying to figure out who he's been playing and it turns out it's Stella. I love this. They are always really funny when they are against each other. They are such good comic relief.

Okay, the last thing I want to talk about is the paramedics. Sylvie (Kara Killmer) is having trouble with Gabbie being gone. I think she feels bad with how everything ended between them in season six. They had a fallout, Sylvie stood up for herself. I don't think she should feel guilty for that. I think she was right in that situation. But when you don't get a chance to say goodbye those feelings can probably come up. Boden talks to Sylvie because apparently, she has dinged every new partner she has had since Gabbie left. A new girl is going to come in and he wants her to give her a chance, no he demands in a very nice way. The new girl, Emily Foster (Annie Ilonzeh), is late to the morning meeting. She seems nice though. I think that Sylvie's problem is that she feels guilty about what happened with Gabbie so she doesn't want to get another partner in case Gabbie wants to come back. But Gabbie isn't coming back.
Sylvie and Emily get a call to a residence where a guy has been in a fight. He has pressure around his eye and if they don't get him to a hospital or do something soon he will lose his eye. He doesn't want them to move him, he has an ankle monitor and if he leaves, even for the hospital, he's afraid that he will go back to jail. A police officer is on the phone trying to get it turned off but it's taking to long. Emily convinces Sylvie that she can help him. By helping him she has to cut his skin around his eye to relieve the pressure. She does it and it works out. This was fucking terrifying. I hate when they have to shit around eyes. It makes my skin crawl.
When they are at the hospital Emily apologizes to Sylvie for taken over the call, and Sylvie forgives her. If it hadn't gone well maybe it would be a different story. A doctor that works at the hospital comes up to Sylvie and talks about Emily. When he finds out that she's a paramedic he says "oh how the mighty have fallen". That makes me think that maybe she was a surgeon before and something happened. I want to know more about her, but so far I really like her.

So those are my thoughts on the premiere. I love this show so much and I'm so glad that it's back. I loved how they handled DuShon Brown's death and Monica Raymund leaving. I'm really excited for this season!

/Johanna