The One Chicago crossover might be in the books, and the first responders of the Windy City might have managed to save the day, but don’t expect the events of the crossover to suddenly fade away.
The “Reckoning” crossover was hard on the characters from all three One Chicago shows, but there is absolutely no denying that the Chicago Fire team was put through the worst of things. Three members of the Firehouse 51 family had near-death experiences, Chief Pascal was arrested, Kidd suffered a personal loss with the death of Macy, and Severide witnessed one of the most traumatic scenes in his career.
After everything they went through, it was to be expected that the events of the crossover would impact their character arcs as the season continues. And that will most certainly be the case.
“There’s an aftereffect of this [case] that kind of shifts a little bit [of] the perspective that a lot of these guys have,” Chicago Fire showrunner Andrea Newman warned when speaking with Us Weekly following the crossover.
The crossover will impact a number of characters, but it seems that the crossover will have significant ramifications for Cruz.
“We’re working on an episode now that is where there’s a lot of ramifications for Cruz in particular that he’s dealing with in terms of it. There’s ripples. They just keep going and going,” Newman teased.
Given all that Cruz went through during the crossover, it makes sense that he’s going to carry that trauma with him through the episodes ahead and we’re eager to see just what ramifications might be coming his way.
As fans will recall, Cruz was one of the first to board the passenger jet at the heart of the case, which resulted in Cruz experiencing one of the most traumatic experiences he’s encountered on the job. This also led to him having a near-death experience. Not only did Cruz nearly die due to his exposure to the toxin on the plane, but he also had to witness the death of fellow firefighter Macy, who was being treated in the adjacent room at the hospital.
We saw in the crossover that this near-death experience really shook Cruz, as he admitted to Dean that it opened his eyes as to how his job impacts his kids and wife. This isn’t something that Cruz is likely to get over, nor should he as the show needs to explore the emotional impact working as a firefighter has.
What will be interesting is to see how Cruz will work through his trauma and how the experience will alter his future. There is a very real possibility that we’ll see Cruz questioning whether he should remain within the CFD, and it’ll be exciting to see Joe Minoso get to work with that material for his character. Of course, our hope is that this won’t lead to Minoso exiting the show, but we are excited to see where this storyline will take him as season 14 progresses.