When it comes to villains, Chicago Fire has had its fair share of memorable antagonists over the years. Among the more recent antagonists who stirred up trouble for Firehouse 51 before being sent packing was paramedic Jared Lennox.
After Sylvie Brett left 51, Violet was promoted to Paramedic in Charge and the search began for a new partner to join her on Ambulance 61. Enter Lennox, who proved to be nothing but trouble from the moment he arrived at 51.
Right out of the gate, Lennox showed a blatant disregard for Violet’s leadership, undermining and questioning her orders at every turn. Things went from bad to worse when he made a mistake on a call that nearly killed the patient he was treating in the field due to a failure on his part to check their oxygen levels before administering medication. After the gravity of the situation set in, he attempted to get Violet fired and even lodged a complaint against Severide, making quick enemies of everyone at 51. This was by design, as we’d come to learn that Lennox had been placed at 51 by Chief Robinson, intending to try to bring down 51.
Lennox’s time at 51 would thankfully prove short-lived as Boden would eventually kick him back to the floater pool, but his guest stint felt like an eternity due to the villainous nature of his arc. We’d later see Lennox return to seek help from Violet in proving his innocence when he was accused of negligent homicide while on duty at a private ambulance company. While he might have turned over a new leaf, it wasn’t enough in the eyes of fans, and understandably so.
Fans never got to see Lennox get his comeuppance for his devious behavior and his attempt to ruin the careers of Violet and Severide, which is perhaps why it’s so ironic that The Rookie delivered a bit of narrative symmetry Chicago Fire never explored.
In The Rookie season 8, episode 6, “Burn 4 You,” Wesam Keesh, who played the role of Lennox on Chicago Fire, made an unexpected appearance in a guest role that ended with quite a twist. When we first met Keesh’s character at the top of the episode, he was shouting at a crystal shop owner about how he paid $500 for love spells that didn’t work. When the shop owner refused to refund him, he threatened to slap the taste out of her mouth. The shop owner responded by putting a curse on him, before Officer Miles showed him to the door after he and Celina had witnessed the exchange off-duty.
The character was giving serious Lennox energy, which we know was a total coincidence as this was a different character entirely and The Rookie is in no way connected to the One Chicago universe. However, the character’s problematic personality immediately had us getting flashbacks to Lennox and the way in which he undermined Violet.
Later in the episode while on patrol, Celina encountered the man when returning to the LAPD office. He was in bad shape and went on about how a witch put a curse on him and suddenly nothing was going right. He slipped in the shower and chipped a tooth; he took a ceiling fan to the head when it spun off the mount; he was chased three blocks by a pack of stray dogs; and he lost his phone and wallet.
Celina suggested he go to the shop owner and beg for forgiveness and offer her any amount of money to reverse the curse. He thanked her for the recommendation and ran off, which was when the unexpected happened and the man was struck by a truck in traffic.
The final moment of the arc may have pushed things a bit too far, but before that moment, there was an undeniable irony in watching a character who mirrored Lennox’s abrasive traits experience a string of chaotic mishaps after antagonizing the wrong person.