Chicago Fire fans were shocked when Taylor Kinney was unexpectedly MIA in the show’s April 8 episode, and understandably so.
Episode 16 welcomed the introduction of Chief Hopkins, and he quickly singled Severide out. It quickly became apparent that Hopkins had it out for Severide, but it wasn’t at first clear why, as Severide hadn’t given him any direct ammunition against him. Not even Severide’s top scores on the captain’s test or his quick thinking in the field were enough to impress Hopkins, who has demonized Severide due to the fact that he’s Benny Severide’s son.
While the specifics have yet to be revealed as to what went down between Hopkins and Benny back in the day aside from that Benny wrote Hopkins up, and this set back his career somehow, we know that Hopkins has it out for Severide and has made it clear he plans to use his newfound power to push him out of the CFD. Thankfully, Severide isn’t going down without a fight, and he made this crystal clear to Van Meter as the episode came to an end as Van Meter encouraged him to put on his armor and prepare for battle.
We expected that we’d see Severide begin this battle in episode 17, but that proved not to be the case.
Early in the episode as Kidd and Hermann are walking into the firehouse for their shift, Kidd fills Herrmann in on everything that went down while they were out the previous shift. When explaining the situation, Kidd mentions that it’s a good thing Severide is going to the captains’ training for a couple of weeks so that he can cool off.
“So it sounds like the chief had some personal beef with Benny from back in the day and was holding it against Kelly. It’s probably a good thing that Kelly’s going to the captains’ training for a couple weeks; it might give him the chance to cool off because he was on the warpath.”
The conversation was designed to explain why Severide was not present in the episode, but it seems to also hint that we might be without Severide for at least one more episode before season 14 comes to a close on May 13. You’ll notice how Kidd said Severide will be at the training for a couple of weeks, which suggests that unless there is a time jump between episodes 17 and 18, we’re likely not going to see Severide back in action in episode 18 when it airs on April 22.
That’s not to say he definitely won’t be in the episode, but with the writers pointing out that Severide will be at training for a couple of weeks, we have a feeling Severide will be sidelined for at least one more episode. Once Severide does return, it’s clear that he’s going to have an uphill battle to face with Hopkins sticking internal affairs on him and reporting Severide for dereliction of duty. Hopefully, Severide will prevail and end the season by becoming 51’s new captain!