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Bobby Is Gone and No One Is Ready To Face It On 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 16
The death of Bobby Nash during 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 15 was controversial at best.
There have been many reactions to his untimely death, which left the audience feeling very off-kilter. Bobby was the series constant and, for many, the very heartbeat of the series.
What does 9-1-1 look like without its leader? How do these characters whose lives were all intertwined with him move forward? Those were the questions the show was left to answer, and we saw the very start of those answers during 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 16.
9-1-1 has always delivered when it comes to the overly emotional hours.
Whereas they could easily veer into the after-school special territory, 9-1-1 has a cavalcade of veteran actors who lend credence to everything asked of them, no matter how silly or intense.
And what you get in return are incredibly nuanced and emotionally rich hours like this one, even though it’s also one you don’t want to experience because it means fully digesting the fact Bobby is gone.
Grief is not one-size-fits-all. It’s layered, unique, and personal to every individual, and this hour served as the first step in seeing that process through the eyes of the people whose lives were permanently changed by Bobby Nash’s death.
Whether you’ve sworn off 9-1-1 now or you’re still willing to engage, this was a riveting hour of television exploring the early stages of grief and loss that will probably leave fans even more divided than they were coming in.
Two weeks have passed since Bobby’s death, and when we saw Athena again, she wasn’t hiding. She was out and about and not holed up sitting in her pain, but that pain was still palpable, even when she wasn’t soaking in it.
As she and the kids looked for Bobby’s final resting place, she was disengaged, and you could have mistaken it for sadness, but it seemed more rooted in uncertainty, which can be a very common emotion in the aftermath of loss.
It’s not until she got that call and confronted Chimney at the firehouse that we got the first glimpses of what was really going on with her behind that uncertainty.
Athena was pissed off, frankly, and when she took her anger out on Chimney, you could tell that she’d been holding that back since Bobby’s death.
She seemed to harbor a lot of pent-up resentment toward Chimney, but perhaps more than that, the longer Bobby’s funeral lingered in the background, the more she could hide from her pain.
But when it was dropped in her lap, it left her even more off-balance and unmoored.
When she ran into Gary on the way out of the station, she found herself the perfect distraction.
I don’t know about you guys, but I already miss the hell out of Peter Krause.
While it was so good to see him in those flashbacks, it also felt like an icepick to the heart because we won’t see Bobby Nash in the present day anymore, commanding a scene and leading his team.
The baby lost in the fire was awful, and I’m a little surprised we never heard about this emergency before (unless I don’t remember, and if so, 9-1-1 historians enlighten me!) because it feels like it would be a rather defining call, especially for Bobby.
It was so sad to hear Gary recount how Leah brought herself back from the brink after such an otherworldly loss, and then everything changed when she met a little boy who brought every single sensation back to her.
Not that it ever left her, but she learned to exist with it.
If you’ve ever seen The Deep End of the Ocean, this story had all the makings of a copycat, with the impossible happening and a woman reuniting with a son she thought she’d lost but had really been living miles away the whole time.
But it didn’t go like that.
Considering Bobby’s involvement in the original fire, there was no way she wouldn’t get involved. And as we’ve seen throughout the entirety of 9-1-1, when Athena puts her mind to something, that’s it.
It will consume her, and she will do everything within her power to solve a case or help someone if she feels she has the means to do so.
It helped that this was something she could throw herself into and maintain that it was what Bobby would have done or wanted for her when it was truly about her finding a way to push her anguish to the back.
Even if just for one more day.
I had such warring feelings watching Athena configure her home into an investigation room because I love it when she gets in that mode, but it was all at the expense of the love of her life being dead!
And then, because 9-1-1 wanted to mock by pain, they had Ghost Bobby show up for one final (?) team-up with his wife.
Bobby appeared up in lockstep with Athena, teasing her lightly but allowing her to see other angles and showing her what she was running from. It was such a Bobby thing to do, even in death.
Their bond was always rooted in their respect for one another. Bobby loved her so much that it felt like he appeared to her to remind her that he was not there physically, but also always there.
My heart, guys! I am writing this through tears right now.
Leah’s case went off the rails when they exhumed the coffin, and there was no body inside. From there, it was apparent that Leah wanted Cameron to be her son so badly, but ultimately, it wasn’t a reality.
No matter how much time had passed, she was still hoping for a miracle, and doesn’t that break your soul?
Especially considering this is 9-1-1, hope central, and the epicenter of miracles.
They employed the flashbacks marvelously in this hour. However, it was slightly diabolical that Bobby’s face was one of the first we saw before finding out we were being dropped into an emergency from EIGHT YEARS AGO.
Bobby’s talk with Leah, in which he related to her in the most heartbreaking of ways, was something that Leah held onto for so many years. She could tell by her fleeting moments with him just what kind of honest and decent man he was.
I was unsure about incorporating a case into the hour post the most significant death the show had ever tackled, but it worked, if solely because of that connection to Bobby.
It was entirely in character for Athena to distract herself, but to have the case so intrinsically tied to who Bobby was at his core? That was the only way they could make this work because no one was asking for a case of the week, considering BOBBY DIED in the previous hour.
While Athena was working the case, though, she ignored everyone checking up on her, including the kids.
Angela Bassett put on an absolute acting clinic when Athena broke down in Hen’s arms and lamented the fact that Bobby left her in that big old house all alone.
For as much sadness as there is when you lose someone, for many, there’s also so much rage, justified or not in some cases.
Athena let herself fully feel that anger in those moments, every single last bit of it, and often, that’s a part of grieving. It’s letting out every emotion, good or bad, and not bottling it inside to fester and rot until it comes pouring out of you in the most destructive of ways.
But it’s so much easier said than done.
From that moment with Hen, she was a slightly different woman, and when the kids came by to lend their support, there was no pushing them away or acting like she didn’t need their platitudes.
It was also through her unleashing those feelings and the resolution of Leah’s case that she was able to accept Bobby’s final resting place.
I did SO well through the previous hour in not crying until I had to write it all down. But I was a blubbering mess throughout the funeral, and then most of all, watching Athena, May, and Harry reunite Bobby with his family in Minnesota.
Bobby reuniting with his family, but leaving another family who loved him dearly behind felt incredibly bittersweet and deeply upsetting.
Emphasizing Athena was a given, considering Bobby was her life partner. Still, Bobby’s death impacted his team as well, and while the show didn’t dive too deeply into how each member was affected here, there’s still time for that over the final two hours this season.
And we still have 9-1-1 Season 9 as well.
But we did get to see how the two weeks treated the team, in particular Chimney, who was tormented in his way by survivor’s guilt and a sense of frustration sprinkled with a lack of control.
Imagine almost dying, and then you’re saved, but your survival meant that someone else wasn’t able to live.
Chimney’s emotions had to be all over the place in the subsequent days following Bobby’s death, and Chimney was running from it all, both figuratively and literally, because it’s hard to know what to do with all of it.
It’s hard to sit with feelings of guilt and feelings of anger, especially when it relates to someone you had a deep affection for. How can you be mad at someone who’s no longer here? Does that seem fair?
Those are the kind of questions that will plague a person as they try to make sense of how they move forward with their own life when they’re wound up so tightly by pain.
Maddie was doing everything she could to give Chimney space and not trying to crowd him because she didn’t want to push him away further if what he needed was just some time to himself.
But Chimney wasn’t coping well, and when Athena confronted him, you could see how he shrank in on himself and let all of his fury build, especially when Gerrard was in front of him and the easiest of punching bags.
I have talked ad nauseum about my disdain for how they chose to rehabilitate Gerrard earlier in 9-1-1 Season 8, to the point where he was used for comic relief more than anything else and was an instrumental piece in Hen’s custody battle for Mara.
I hated it then, and I still hate it now. But I appreciated that he wasn’t brought in here to take Bobby’s place permanently and that he took Chimney’s indignation for what it was and didn’t push back.
If you ask me, Gerrard deserves all the lashings, but was it the most appropriate of times to yell at him in the middle of the scene? Probably not.
Buck and Hen looking at Chimney forlornly during the hour was heartbreaking, but again, I appreciated that they had everyone just trying to survive. None of them know the “right” way to react in this situation because the “right” way doesn’t exist.
They were just trying to get from one day to the next.
Maddie reaching out to Buck to help Chimney was reminiscent of what Bobby told Buck in their final goodbye about the team needing him. And while I hope we’re allowed to see more of how Buck’s handling things, I loved him stepping in to be there for Chimney.
Buck has actually been a beacon of hope over the back half of this season, giving Eddie much-needed advice while he’s been in Texas, and then here with Chimney being a shoulder while also validating his feelings, pushing back slightly, and allowing him to see a different perspective.
Their rooftop scene was perfect, and Kenneth Choi and Oliver Stark were perfect.
You could see Chimney’s journey of feelings written across his face and in his eyes, which held so much sorrow. And the way Buck approached him and stood idly by with the perfect cadence to push but also hear, acknowledge, and help gently was beautiful.
We don’t get nearly enough of the brother-in-laws one-on-one like this.
Chimney may have sobered up enough to get himself to the funeral, but just like Athena, this is only the beginning of their grief and loss. I pray the show allows us to see more of the 118, Athena, and their families continuing to grieve because you can’t put this back in a bottle.
Bobby’s death will undoubtedly be the biggest thing to ever happen to the show, and it should be treated as such. The decision was made, the consequences must be dealt with, and as the audience, we need to see every of how these characters deal with everything.
I want to see Eddie’s reaction, specifically as the one member of the 118 who wasn’t there in the moments leading up to Bobby’s death. I wonder what that kind of guilt will do to someone like Eddie, who must feel like he let Bobby and the rest of his former team down.
My frustrations with how Eddie’s storyline has been treated could encapsulate a whole book. Still, they have the opportunity now to dive into Eddie’s guilt differently from the others since he wasn’t there to experience the lab disaster with them.
Plus, we have the whole ‘When will Eddie and Christopher move back to Los Angeles?’ thing to contend with, which should be put into greater focus now as we approach the end of the season.
Loose Ends
- There’s been a lot of talk about realism in the 9-1-1 world lately, and it was NOT realistic for Chimney’s organs to have been failing two weeks prior and for him not only to be back to work but also to become a runner and drink vodka straight from the bottle with no repercussions.
- I’m glad everyone got their little check-in moments, like Buck with Maddie, Hen with Karen, Eddie with Ravi, but I need so much more before the season wraps. I sound like a broken record saying that, but I’m okay with it.
- How far along is Maddie now? She looks pretty far along, but I have no concept of time regarding this show.
- I have a weird feeling about the search for a captain. It should be Hen, but I believe they’re going to go away from that after 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 5 specifically had the Henren storyline with Hen missing out on the family’s big moments.
I’m still a mess over this one because what do you mean Bobby Nash is gone? My brain still struggles to comprehend it, even after an hour that served as a goodbye to one of the most beloved TV characters on television.
Can time travel become a thing so we can go back in time and not live in a world without more Bobby Nash?
What about you guys? How are you feeling now that you’ve seen the first step in the post-Bobby Nash world?
Do you still have hope that maybe, just MAYBE, things may not be as they seem?
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You can watch 9-1-1 on ABC at 8/7c on Thursdays.
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