Chicago Fire teases major character death in season 12 premiere

Something big is going down in the season 12 premiere of Chicago Fire. Well, perhaps that's an understatement. There's a lot going down, as anyone who watched the season 11 finale can imagine. There's the return of Kelly Severide (Taylor Kinney), the next chapter in the Brettsey saga, but the real story has been confirmed in the synopsis for the premiere episode.

According to TV Line, the synopsis for the episode "Barely Gone" reads as follows:

""Firehouse 51 is forced to share its space with Firehouse 17. Kidd and Herrmann fight over Ritter. An arson case tests Kidd and Severide’s relationship. Firehouse 51 says goodbye to one of its own.""

The last line is what really stuck us: "Firehouse 51 says goodbye to one of its own." This comes less than a week after the initial promo photos for season 12 were released by NBC, which showed the 51 team rushing to the aid of what looked to be a horribly burned firefighter.

Chicago Fire will say 'goodbye' to veteran character

The burns are so bad, and the angle is far enough away, that it's impossible to tell who the firefighter is, but the clues we have are causing some concern. We know that Blake Gallo (Alberto Rosende) is set to leave the show in the season 12 premiere, which means he is undoubtedly the person who is being referred to in the synopsis.

Related: Chicago Fire photos reveal outcome of Brettsey proposal

The thing that remains unclear, though, is whether Gallo is the person who appears badly burned in the promo photos. Would the show actually release photos of such a shocking and brutal moment weeks ahead of time? It would be like putting out photos of Otis (Yuri Sardarov) or Hawkins (Jimmy Nicholas) before it was revealed that they died.

Gallo is confirmed to leave in season 12 premiere

Conversely, it would be a lot for Chicago Fire viewers to be hit with the death of a 51 member AND Gallo's departure, so we're genuinely stumped as to what will go down here. Some fans have claimed that the burnt firefighter in the promo photos looks like Tony Ferraris (Anthony Ferraris), but given that the show will already be saying goodbye to two central cast members in season 12, we find it hard to believe that the writers would get rid of another for no good reason.

It's telling that the description text for the much-analyzed photo of the burnt firefighter includes the names of Kelly Severide and Sylvie Brett (Kara Killmer) but not the name of the character on the stretcher. We will have to wait until the episode airs to find out who it really is.