Heading into the Chicago Fire season 13 finale, there were a lot of hopes from fans over what the final episode of the season would bring. Chief among them was a hope that the show would address or, at least, lay the groundwork for the previously announced departures of Daniel Kyri and Jake Lockett as Darren Ritter and Sam Carver, respectively.
In the finale, the Chicago Fire writers began to lay the groundwork for Carver’s exit. As we learned in the episode, Carver made the difficult decision to leave Chicago and applied for a position in Denver in realizing that he needed a change of scenery in order to maintain his sobriety. Disappointing as it was to learn that Carver was leaving Chicago (especially after he and Violet professed their love for one another), his forthcoming exit was at least addressed.
The same, sadly, cannot be said for Ritter. Throughout the episode, there was not a single hint of Ritter leaving 51, with no groundwork laid to help explain his forthcoming exit. This left fans with a fear that his exit would occur off-screen, rather than the character being given a well-earned on-screen exit to address his departure.
While this could still become the case, it seems the Chicago Fire creative team is optimistic that they’ll be able to bring Kyri back in some capacity for season 14 to give Ritter a proper exit storyline. In fact, showrunner Andrea Newman hinted directly to TVLine that they are hoping to bring Kyri back next season.
“We’re still working on all of that because we’re not even back for next season, and all this, a lot of it was surprises. We’re going to play with all this and see what we get and how much time we get with Daniel [Kyri], who we love, and the character, who we love. There’s lots of possibilities there.”
Newman echoed this sentiment when speaking to Cinema Blend following the season 13 finale as well, further elaborating that the hope is that they’ll be able to give both Ritter and Carver the ending they deserve.
“There's so many mysteries to be played out with both those characters. How they're going to leave, and for how long, and are these things permanent? Are they temporary? Are they explosive-type endings, as we've tended to do? Or are they more emotionally centered endings? So those are all the questions, and we love these actors. We love Jake and Daniel with a passion, so we will do whatever we can to see them as often as we can, and to give them the big endings they deserve.”
Things could absolutely change during the offseason, and it seems that the storylines for the season will be dictated by the ability to bring Lockett and Kyri. However, it’s a positive sign that the hope seems to be for the actors to return. This is an approach we have seen the show take in the past as well, most recently with Kara Killmer.
Killmer’s exit was announced ahead of season 12, leading to an expectation that her exit would come immediately at the top of the season. Instead, she ended up appearing in the first six episodes of the season, which gave the writers the chance to give the character a proper goodbye that came with her wedding to Casey (Jesse Spencer). This helped to soften the blow of her departure by giving the character a proper multi-episode sendoff, and we’re hoping that might be the plan for both Carver and Ritter in season 14!
Ritter has been a part of the show since season 7 and deserves to be given a proper sendoff of some kind. We might not like how the story is crafted, but we don't want this to be an exit that unfolds off-screen with a small one-off line explaining what happened to Ritter. Both Kyri and his character deserve so much more than that.
Chicago Fire season 14 premieres this fall on NBC.