S01.E01: It's Time To Get Out Of Town

[formerlyfreedom]

Quote

Nearly 20 years ago, Owen Strand was the lone survivor of his Manhattan firehouse on 9/11. In the wake of the attack, Owen had the unenviable task of rebuilding his station. After a similar tragedy happens to a firehouse in Austin, Owen, along with his troubled firefighter son, T.K., takes his progressive philosophies of life and firefighting down to Texas, where he helps them start anew. On the surface, Owen is all about big-city style and swagger, but underneath he struggles with a secret he hides from the world - one that could very well end his life. Once in Austin, Owen meets the brilliant and wry chief paramedic Michelle Blake, as well as police officer Carlos Reyes. He then begins to assemble his new team of diverse and qualified candidates for Firehouse 126.

Season premiere on Fox on Sunday, January 19, 2020.

[anna0852]

Not bad. Series premieres are always a little rough but this one did alright. I'll watch the next ep tomorrow 

[stonehaven]

I'll watch it tomorrow night too but I found myself snarking on it a lot. It felt like a Rob Lowe vehicle with a focus group cast, stereotyped Texans and a predictible plot...plus, an ongoing mystery....

[Lady Calypso]

I'm not so sure if I liked the pilot or not. Most of the characters were fine. Liv Tyler's character was downright irritating, though. Sorry, show. I'm not into her character. Maybe because I wasn't a fan of Liv Tyler's acting? And the lack of chemistry that they seemed to be hinting toward with her character and Owen?

Every other character was alright. TK's new coworker/love interest was....not great, to be honest. Sorry, show. I ALSO don't see the chemistry between them, if they're supposed to be getting together. I don't mind TK, and I do like the other firefighters, for the most part. 

But yeah, not quite sure how I feel overall. I'll watch tomorrow's episode, and I'll likely record the season and watch at a later time. But...that's about it. I don't know if it'll be a great 9-1-1 replacement....even as its spinoff. But we'll see; it definitely takes on some of its original's traits and tropes. And I see that, in true Ryan Murphy fashion, he does at least try to mix up the tropes...kinda. I expect Owen to be completely cured of his cancer by season's end, if not sooner. Yes, cured, not in remission, because we've seen Ryan Murphy do weirder things (such as Chimney from the original completely healing from a ROD THAT WENT THROUGH HIS BRAIN WITH NO BRAIN INJURY).

[Bulldog]

I'm a huge fan of original recipe, but man, this was rough.

I like shows being diverse, but do it with some subtlety.  Original recipe manages to pull this off very well.  This felt like there should have been a running checklist on the side of the screen.  Diversity apparently doesn't extend to good acting in the supporting roles (not that Lowe or Tyler were exactly setting the world on fire).

And don't spoon feed us that Texas and New York are actually . . . different.  Was there a cliché left untouched?  Peppers? Check.  Line dancing?  Check.  "We brought ya'll some cookies?"  Check.  I suppose they showed amazing restraint in not having a mechanical bull.  I'm betting one shows up by episode three.  

[Xantar]

I like Rob Lowe and I’ve been a fan of Natacha Karam since the late lamented The Brave. That and screwy rescue scenes are enough to keep me watching. 

It really irritated me when Firefighter Hoyt kept talking about his “men” and his “brothers” though. There was clearly a woman on his team. 

On another note, the car accident victim had a 10-month old and also was visibly pregnant. She didn’t waste any time!

[rhys]

Awfully lot going on in one episode. Liv's acting is terrible. Oy!

[Danielg342]

For "dull".

Well, OK, Rob Lowe brought his usual charm, and, though I think the show tried really too hard to check its "diversity boxes", it does seem like the show will treat these characters as normal people, i.e., not making their identity everything about their character.

I also think there may be something interesting with the lone survivor who has PTSD (though newsflash show- "PTSD" is now "PTSS", not "PTSI"). He and Rob Lowe's character actually seem to have chemistry...more chemistry than Lowe did with the actor tasked to play his son.

That's really all the good I can say about this. Yeah, it's a procedural so I can't expect characters to be well developed, but, other than the man with PTSD, Lowe's character and his gay son going through heartbreak, the show didn't really establish anything about the characters except their base identities, and, worse, they didn't do enough with the characters they did flesh out to really get me intrigued about them.

I mean, am I supposed to think Natacha Karam's character is some kind of a "super cool badass" because her rescues go viral and she has a long history of insubordination?

Please. Credit to Karam for bringing the character to life, but it's not enough to make her interesting.

In short- these guys showed some flashes of an interesting show but they never delivered something that was truly interesting. It's just another generic procedural, and I'm not sure it will develop into anything but that.

[anna0852]

The previews make it at least *appear* that Liv will losen up a bit. She really wooden tonight, at least until the line dancing. 

I'm guessing the cancer is the Rob Lowe exit strategy. No half-competant showrunner is going to cast RL without one of those.

I'll give them a pass on team chemistry for now, since the team is just being built. The Orginal recipe was pretty uneven their first season too but got much better as they found their groove.

[Raja]

I know they left New York  but FDNY is an iconic symbol by now to give us NYFD was like the bizarro world turn around of Into the Spiderverse.

With the reveal of the husband/wife team reminded me of the real life North Hollywood bank shootout TV movie 44 Minutes were the dispatcher was trying to help her fiance played by Mario Peoples as he keep crying for help on the radio as he almost bled out

[Raiderred]

As a Texan, I thought I'd give it a chance.  It was pure Hollywood's idea of Texas. I was out within ten mins! It was so corny and oh so preachy. Hollywood, you portray Texas like we are all back woods born and breed. Give it a rest! Move on there's noyhing to see here folks. And of all places to portray-AUSTIN, KEEP AUSTIN WEIRD-AUSTIN? GET THE HELL OUT OF TEXAS!

[Raja]

The cast was mostly the national dream team. With a few Texans

[thewhiteowl]

I liked it. Sure it was bumpy in spots but overall I was engaged. I think it's no better or worse than the original. 

[HunterHunted]

As I'm sitting in my bedroom in Austin, I keep wondering why they made the very strange choice to make Austin seem like a strange amalgamation of east and west Texas, but nothing really like Austin. Austin is pretty proud of not being anything like the rest of Texas and the stereotypes of Texas. Although when I moved here from Pennsylvania, all of my friends in Pennsylvania were freaked out because they only knew the stereotypes. So it was believable that the firefighter from Chicago, who is trans, might have some serious apprehensions.

Where on earth is their fire station? If Owen and TK's house has Hill Country views it's got to be on the west side of town. This town has such a shitty highway and road system that I would never live that far away from my station because you're likely to get stuck in a bunch of traffic just getting to your firehouse.

I've only liked Liv in Harlots. Her breathy whispering made sense. Where she was an aristocrat trapped by the rules of society in the Georgian era and by her sadistic psychopath of a brother. Here, breathy whispering doesn't work.

I'm surprised they resisted the urge to have the inciting incident play out like the West Fertilizer Explosion where the damage was so much worse because a lack of zoning restrictions allowed a fertilizer plant to be located near a middle school, nursing home, apartment complex, dozens of homes, a convent, a woman walking her new puppy and pushing a baby carriage, and the firehouse. No, but seriously there were an unbelievable number of action movie trope victims. 

[Raja]

10 minutes ago, HunterHunted said:

As I'm sitting in my bedroom in Austin, I keep wondering why they made the very strange choice to make Austin seem like a strange amalgamation of east and west Texas, but nothing really like Austin. Austin is pretty proud of not being anything like the rest of Texas and the stereotypes of Texas. Although when I moved here from Pennsylvania, all of my friends in Pennsylvania were freaked out because they only knew the stereotypes. So it was believable that the firefighter from Chicago, who is trans, might have some serious apprehensionsWhere on earth is their fire station? If Owen and TK's house has Hill Country views it's got to be on the west side of town. This town has such a shitty highway and road system that I would never live that far away from my station because you're likely to get stuck in a bunch of traffic just getting to your firehouse.

I've only liked Liv in Harlots. Her breathy whispering made sense. Where she was an aristocrat trapped by the rules of society in the Georgian era and by her sadistic psychopath of a brother. Here, breathy whispering doesn't work.

I'm surprised they resisted the urge to have the inciting incident play out like the West Fertilizer Explosion where the damage was so much worse because a lack of zoning restrictions allowed a fertilizer plant to be located near a middle school, nursing home, apartment complex, dozens of homes, a convent, a woman walking her new puppy and pushing a baby carriage, and the firehouse. No, but seriously there were an unbelievable number of action movie trope victims. 

As an Angeleno who saw the same geographical anomalies with Emergency and Station 51 as a child and 9-1-1 as a grandfather. I know how you feel. Even with Jack Webb using parallel streets as cross streets in the script location. While the oil the refineries across the street actually placed the station so many rescues would be nowhere near where they started

The 9-1-1 pilot did place them in North Hollywood in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles, but before long the station is one of the first crews on scene when a crash happens off of LAX in the LA basin, maybe an 30 minutes  away at midnight but hours away anytime most of the people are wake, even with sirens and lights.

[chlban]

Not sure how I feel yet. Not a big Rob Lowe fan and, as others have mentioned, I am all for diversity but I don't need it quite so heavy handed. Figures the plot can be slow, getting everyone introduced and in place, so I will give it a chance. On the plus side, no JLH. 

[HunterHunted]

2 hours ago, Raja said:

As an Angeleno who saw the same geographical anomalies with Emergency and Station 51 as a child and 9-1-1 as a grandfather. I know how you feel. Even with Jack Webb using parallel streets as cross streets in the script location. While the oil the refineries across the street actually placed the station so many rescues would be nowhere near where they started

The 9-1-1 pilot did place them in North Hollywood in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles, but before long the station is one of the first crews on scene when a crash happens off of LAX in the LA basin, maybe an 30 minutes  away at midnight but hours away anytime most of the people are wake, even with sirens and lights.

I sort clocked that with 9-1-1 too. They seemed to be pretty good about their geography for 3 or 4 episodes or at least offered excuses why they were answering calls outside of their area like the other company was dealing with a big fire somewhere else. Now, they don't even bother.

I was born and raised in Pittsburgh, which has its own natural pretzel geography to begin with. There are actual streets that cross themselves. "The incident is at 2000 Beechwood Blvd. The nearest cross streets are Beechwood Blvd and Beechwood Blvd." No one in their right mind would set a tv show that's as geographically  dependent as 9-1-1 is in Pittsburgh. It a really weirdly laid out city and nothing else looks like it. Though nothing is funnier than action movies filmed in Pittsburgh because the roads aren't straight, which makes it really hard to film car chases. If you've seen the Dark Knight Rises, the car chases are just them driving back and forth on the same 6 blocks of downtown Pittsburgh.

I'm hoping episode 2 will be a lot less heavy-handed now that they've introduced the audience to the main cast.

Edit: True Story. I recently found out that 2 of my coworkers didn't know that you shouldn't put metal in the microwave. They both thought microwaves just spontaneously blew up once or twice a year. One co-worker is 40. The other is in her 60s.

Edited January 20, 2020 by HunterHunted

[meatball77]

Liv was terrible.

People who live in Austin don't have southern accents.  They do say Yall but not with that twang. 

[preeya]

Rent $4500.?? They thought that was a bargain. . . . .

 

[Moose135]

11 hours ago, Raja said:

I know they left New York  but FDNY is an iconic symbol by now to give us NYFD was like the bizarro world turn around of Into the Spiderverse.

As a New York native, seeing "NYFD" on Lowe's uniform almost made me turn this off 5 minutes in. If you can't get something like that correct, what hope is there for the rest of the show?

The basic premise of the show confuses me - I understand the whole house (save the one guy) was killed in the explosion, but they have to go to NY to find the "one guy who ever built a house from scratch"? Really? They didn't have experienced firefighters in Austin they could have transferred in to rebuild the unit? FFs who know the city, may have worked together already, and can quickly come together as a new team.

I also suspect the Austin Fire Department is a civil service job, probably unionized, so I don't know how he could simply go find candidates from other departments across the country and have them hired and assigned to the house without dealing with that.

And while I don't know the rules of the FDNY or Austin FD, I find it suspect that his son would be assigned to his company in both NY and Austin. Usually you wouldn't find close relatives working in a situation where one supervises the other.

I'll probably watch tonight - well, at least record it and watch at some point - but I'm not sure I'm sticking around long.

[The Ringo Kidd]

Wow!

This the wokest show that there ever was!

[Raja]

44 minutes ago, Moose135 said:

As a New York native, seeing "NYFD" on Lowe's uniform almost made me turn this off 5 minutes in. If you can't get something like that correct, what hope is there for the rest of the show?

The basic premise of the show confuses me - I understand the whole house (save the one guy) was killed in the explosion, but they have to go to NY to find the "one guy who ever built a house from scratch"? Really? They didn't have experienced firefighters in Austin they could have transferred in to rebuild the unit? FFs who know the city, may have worked together already, and can quickly come together as a new team.

I also suspect the Austin Fire Department is a civil service job, probably unionized, so I don't know how he could simply go find candidates from other departments across the country and have them hired and assigned to the house without dealing with that.

And while I don't know the rules of the FDNY or Austin FD, I find it suspect that his son would be assigned to his company in both NY and Austin. Usually you wouldn't find close relatives working in a situation where one supervises the other.

I'll probably watch tonight - well, at least record it and watch at some point - but I'm not sure I'm sticking around long.

I think that is why the Justice department lady was there. Texan's were presumably judged racist in action so the Feds took over and approves the Fire Department hiring. So the imported Captain was given carte blanche to build the woke Dream Team, even pushing aside all the applications from Texas firefighters.  I guess like some states approve all the police officers no matter what local police or Sheriff's department wants to hire so it is with Texas firefighters?

[preeya]

58 minutes ago, The Ringo Kidd said:

Wow!

This the wokest show that there ever was!

Also in the running for the WORST show ever.

I started watching The Deputy and thought that was bad but this one is really unwatchable.

[rhys]

1 hour ago, preeya said:

Rent $4500.?? They thought that was a bargain. . . . .

 

I was wondering the same. Maybe the Austin poster will chime in & confirm.

[Moose135]

1 hour ago, preeya said:

Rent $4500.?? They thought that was a bargain. . . . .

 

Compared to something like in Manhattan or a fashionable part of Brooklyn, yes.

[slasherboy]

I have a minor nit to pick .  TK od'd on opiods.  Rob told him to go to an AA meeting.  Why not an NA meeting?  Little things bug me.

The skin care products Rob showed the trans guy in the shower looked like his own actual line, Cobalt.  I noticed he was drinking a green smoothie and he said he was keto.  I know he follows Atkins.  They're bringing a lot of the real RL into this show.

Which, as others have attested to, has WAY TOO MANY "diverse" people.  Good for them but gee whiz golly gee folks, maybe not so much so fast.

Can't stand Liv.  Everybody else seems ok.  I like TK a lot ... we have a lot in common.

I love that father and son are living together and Rob is bossing him around.  Heh.

$4,500?  How much do firefighters in Texas make?  Of course, he's a Captain, but still.

Never thought I'd see the day RL would dance on TV after that white-boy debacle on "The West Wing" during The Jackel.

All in all, I'll be back.  If it was anybody but Rob Lowe, no way, but he and I have a history so there's that.

(Old Town Road!)

 

[The Ringo Kidd]

I am quite upset that the handicapped are not represented.

I look forward to the recruitment of a quadriplegic firefighter.

[MissLucas]

Reading through this thread gives me hopes for a season 2 of 'Wild Bill' (I know it's cancelled but damn I loved that show in all its weirdness).

[DB in CMH]

Exactly what route did they take from NYC to Austin?!? East Texas looks nothing like the desert they drove through.

[Raja]

7 minutes ago, DB in CMH said:

Exactly what route did they take from NYC to Austin?!? East Texas looks nothing like the desert they drove through.

Maybe Captain made a side trip to Santa Monica CA?

[Bulldog]

3 hours ago, The Ringo Kidd said:

I look forward to the recruitment of a quadriplegic firefighter.

Preferably blind as well.

 

5 hours ago, Moose135 said:

The basic premise of the show confuses me - I understand the whole house (save the one guy) was killed in the explosion, but they have to go to NY to find the "one guy who ever built a house from scratch"? Really? They didn't have experienced firefighters in Austin they could have transferred in to rebuild the unit? FFs who know the city, may have worked together already, and can quickly come together as a new team.

THIS!  Apparently there not only isn't anyone qualified in Austin to lead the house, there isn't anyone in Austin qualified to work in the house.  If I were a firefighter from Austin, I would be quite insulted.

 

5 hours ago, The Ringo Kidd said:

This the wokest show that there ever was!

The thing is, the show doesn't even have the courage to go all the way with their wokeness.  Gay son? Check.  Muslim woman? Check.  Black trans guy? Check.  Hispanic guy? Check.  Throw in wise black woman and annoying white woman (not technically house members, I know).  Yet, they still need an old, straight, white guy to be their leader.  Sounds like the writers need to check their privilege. 

[iLoveNny]

Let’s speculate on Michelle's (Liv Tyler) sister. 

* Is she actually dead? 

        She says, she wants to give her a                        proper burial. Leads one to think perhaps no body.
 

*Is Michelle forgetting how her sister died? Or in denial?

       OD ( could provide bonding fodder for her and TK as well as with the chief) 

Suicide, blames her brother in law for not taking care of the sister/doesn't believe her sister was depressed.
 

 

Shrug let me know what you guys think 

[Bulldog]

6 minutes ago, iLoveNny said:

Let’s speculate on Michelle's (Liv Tyler) sister. 

I would guess that she is very much alive, but left town to get away from Michelle.  I mean, I wanted to do that after about three scenes with her.  Could you imagine growing up with her?  

[iLoveNny]

28 minutes ago, Bulldog said:

Yet, they still need an old, straight, white guy to be their leader.  Sounds like the writers need to check their privilege. 

They weakly addressed that with the whole 9-11 thing. That he had to rebuild his firehouse. 

 

That said why not get more woke points and have cast an Asian chief. (Daniel Dae Kim or B.D. Wong) types.

[Chaos Theory]

I wanted to make sure nostalgia didn't make me believe I liked the beginning of a show when I didn't but this was my original post for the 9-1-1 OG

On 1/3/2018 at 10:46 PM, Chaos Theory said:

I actually thought this was pretty good.  It’s a bit predictable and procedural but it is also enjoyable.  Then again Ryan Murphy tends to get me in a way I can’t quite explain.

The young fire fighter guy who got fired then rehired is going to annoy me though.  

So when I say I mostly liked the original from the start I am not lying.    This I found boring and I was hoping I would like it.  I don't care about sterotypes and tropes at all especially in pilots.  I figure they will be polished later.  "The young firefighter" on the original is now my favorite character so character traits do in fact change.  It is also possible that what doesn't work will get dropped and yes the cancer plot might stick around like Bobby's dead family plot has stuck around but only occasional become a full blown plot point.  I can see the cancer diagnosis (which as someone who lives on Long Island) As a very important story about ground zero workers who get cancer years after 9/11.

Liv Taylor doesn't bother me but I am not sure what to think of her character as of yet.  I will give the show a couple episodes to impress me mostly because Ryan Murphy is my guy and has earned it.

I am hoping for a lot of country songs.  

 

 

Edited January 21, 2020 by Chaos Theory

[Danielg342]

45 minutes ago, Bulldog said:

The thing is, the show doesn't even have the courage to go all the way with their wokeness.  Gay son? Check.  Muslim woman? Check.  Black trans guy? Check.  Hispanic guy? Check.  Throw in wise black woman and annoying white woman (not technically house members, I know).  Yet, they still need an old, straight, white guy to be their leader.  Sounds like the writers need to check their privilege. 

My guess is that the show figured they had four "two-for-one token minorities" (counting the interracial marriage- with it being a white, fat guy with a black woman, no less- and, judging on the promo clips, the Hispanic guy is going to be the gay son's love interest) as well as a fifth token (who was going to get engaged to a black gay guy), that they could justify having the white male lead in Rob Lowe, whose character, to be fair, seemed to notice oddity.

[AheadofStraight]

I felt like Rob was channeling Chris Traeger when explaining his skin care routine, especially his cadence when he said, “Are you insane? That is the worst thing you can do.” I’m disappointed they didn’t have him throw a literally in there!

[giovannif7]

I'm not sure how 'woke' I'd label a show that trots out the ancient trope of "gay man can't handle rejection, so tries to off himself with a bottle of pills." I thought that one was retired decades ago...

[meira.hand]

14 hours ago, MissLucas said:

Reading through this thread gives me hopes for a season 2 of 'Wild Bill' (I know it's cancelled but damn I loved that show in all its weirdness).

I loved 'Wild Bill' as well and really hoped for a second series, but reading the premise of this show I had to laugh. It almost looked like Wild Bill was either the inspiration for this one or a test run to show that Rob Lowe can do this kind of character (police/fireman). Fish out of water, baggage form previous place, daughter/son relationship and he is an executive producer on both series.

[Kel Varnsen]

This show is a bit weird. I don't think I can recall seeing a spin off that had zero connection to the main show. At minimum I would have expected a scene or something where the Austin chief goes to LA and asks Bobby Nash to move but he turns it down and recommends his old friend Rob Lowe.

Also of course we get that annoying trope where Rob Lowe is of course the best of the best and the only guy who could take over the house, but at the same time only ever made it to the rank of Captain in FDNY.

Lastly when they do find Liv Tyler's sister I really hope she is played by Alicia Silverstone.

[Whimsy]

19 hours ago, Moose135 said:

As a New York native, seeing "NYFD" on Lowe's uniform almost made me turn this off 5 minutes in. If you can't get something like that correct, what hope is there for the rest of the show?

The basic premise of the show confuses me - I understand the whole house (save the one guy) was killed in the explosion, but they have to go to NY to find the "one guy who ever built a house from scratch"? Really? They didn't have experienced firefighters in Austin they could have transferred in to rebuild the unit? FFs who know the city, may have worked together already, and can quickly come together as a new team.

I also suspect the Austin Fire Department is a civil service job, probably unionized, so I don't know how he could simply go find candidates from other departments across the country and have them hired and assigned to the house without dealing with that.

And while I don't know the rules of the FDNY or Austin FD, I find it suspect that his son would be assigned to his company in both NY and Austin. Usually you wouldn't find close relatives working in a situation where one supervises the other.

I'll probably watch tonight - well, at least record it and watch at some point - but I'm not sure I'm sticking around long.

I think it was intentional to switch up the letters.  Maybe FDNY didn't give them permission. 

As far as the moving firefighters from all over the country, this really bothered me.  My husband has been a firefighter for almost 30 years and is a Captain so I asked him about it.  He actually said it's not that hard.  I asked him if he would have to take the civil service test again and he said no.  BUT- it IS unionized, so the Captain offering double the salary made me side-eye.  Unless Austin FD is just already double the salary of wherever that guy came from (I forget), he can't promise that.  And, if the salary WAS double, that would most likely mean that the cost of living is double as well, so that wouldn't really help out. 

8 hours ago, giovannif7 said:

I'm not sure how 'woke' I'd label a show that trots out the ancient trope of "gay man can't handle rejection, so tries to off himself with a bottle of pills." I thought that one was retired decades ago...

Well, in all fairness, he was an opioid addict who said he wasn't trying to kill himself, so he just fell off the bandwagon. 

25 minutes ago, Kel Varnsen said:

This show is a bit weird. I don't think I can recall seeing a spin off that had zero connection to the main show. At minimum I would have expected a scene or something where the Austin chief goes to LA and asks Bobby Nash to move but he turns it down and recommends his old friend Rob Lowe.

Also of course we get that annoying trope where Rob Lowe is of course the best of the best and the only guy who could take over the house, but at the same time only ever made it to the rank of Captain in FDNY.

Lastly when they do find Liv Tyler's sister I really hope she is played by Alicia Silverstone.

I think RM is just trying to make a franchise like Law & Order.  I don't know if L&O's had all these connections when they did spin-offs as I don't watch those, but we don't really need it.  We know what the 9-1-1 premise is (crazy shit), so just putting it in another state works for me.  Let's see how many we can get!!  

Re: only making it to Captain- some guys don't want the administrative responsibilities.  My husband waited for a long time before taking the Captain's exam because he likes being in the field.  As a Captain, he is still out there some but not as much as he was (and not like these guys are depicted on the show) and he misses it.  He says he'll never go for Deputy Chief or Chief because it's ALL administrative and he's not interested. 

[Raja]

4 minutes ago, Whimsy said:

 

I think RM is just trying to make a franchise like Law & Order.  I don't know if L&O's had all these connections when they did spin-offs as I don't watch those, but we don't really need it.  We know what the 9-1-1 premise is (crazy shit), so just putting it in another state works for me.  Let's see how many we can get!!  

For the record even if it wasn't in the pilot episode and reused actors in different roles since I can't remember Criminal Intent's pilot the L&O franchise was linked. Sometimes a character transferred to the new show or the police units consulting each other all the way to L&O LA also handling special victims before the last mother-ship ADA moved to LA to become a Deputy DA in their soft reboot halfway through.

I would bet that some sort of crossover between LA and Austin will occur, soon

[MissLucas]

2 hours ago, meira.hand said:

I loved 'Wild Bill' as well and really hoped for a second series, but reading the premise of this show I had to laugh. It almost looked like Wild Bill was either the inspiration for this one or a test run to show that Rob Lowe can do this kind of character (police/fireman). Fish out of water, baggage form previous place, daughter/son relationship and he is an executive producer on both series.

Ditto! That's why I was wondering whether I should give it a try - not sold yet 😁

[Chaos Theory]

I don’t think they wanted to use the words but they wanted an outsider and someone who had been there during 9/11 would get past all the carpetbagger bad feelings.   Plus the higher ups wanted to make sure the whole “more diverse” wasn’t just lip service where one black guy and one woman got hired and they figured a New Yorker with a gay son could do that.   All without saying the actual words  “we need to be less racist but we also want to put in someone without a dog to run in the political landscape and won’t offend too many people as Captain”. 

Edited January 21, 2020 by Chaos Theory

[Neurochick]

On 1/20/2020 at 12:05 PM, preeya said:

Rent $4500.?? They thought that was a bargain. . . . .

 

Coming from NYC it IS a bargain.

I thought the show was okay.  I don't mind the "heavy handed" diversity because I'll take diversity any way it comes.

I think the show was trying to say that Austin and NYC aren't that very different from each other.

[sempervivum]

Haven't bothered watching episode 2 yet, although I probably will.

I thought it was kind of funny that in the firehouse bathroom scene, Rob Lowe's tan body was as dark skinned as the Hispanic guy's, and not much lighter than the black guy's.

Also, did he mention sunscreen as part of his skincare regimen ? Because, really, Rob is cute, but he has a LOT of fine lines for his age.

[Kel Varnsen]

9 hours ago, Whimsy said:

Re: only making it to Captain- some guys don't want the administrative responsibilities.  My husband waited for a long time before taking the Captain's exam because he likes being in the field.  As a Captain, he is still out there some but not as much as he was (and not like these guys are depicted on the show) and he misses it.  He says he'll never go for Deputy Chief or Chief because it's ALL administrative and he's not interested. 

No disrespect to actual fire Captains who do actual work, it just seems like on shows like this the guy who is the best of the best is always some mid level supervisor type guy.

9 hours ago, Raja said:

For the record even if it wasn't in the pilot episode and reused actors in different roles since I can't remember Criminal Intent's pilot the L&O franchise was linked. Sometimes a character transferred to the new show or the police units consulting each other all the way to L&O LA also handling special victims before the last mother-ship ADA moved to LA to become a Deputy DA in their soft reboot halfway through

SVU had Craven (and Munch) to make it a spinoff plus Briscoe showed up in a bunch of 1st season episodes. I am pretty sure the CSI spin offs were done as backdoor pilots in other existing show and even characters in the "Chicago" shows were introduced in existing shows.

[oceanview]

23 hours ago, iLoveNny said:

They weakly addressed that with the whole 9-11 thing. That he had to rebuild his firehouse. 

 

That said why not get more woke points and have cast an Asian chief. (Daniel Dae Kim or B.D. Wong) types.

Fond fan of  BD Wong.  Wolud love to see him on a new series

[DearEvette]

I finally watched this.  It is on par with a lot of pilots... a little rough and it needs to find its groove.  Either it will or it won't.

Since it is nice to see all kinds of diversity on screen,  I am not gonna complain too much with how clumsy it was to get there.  And all the actors are pretty good. 

Well, except Liv Tyler.  Was she really the best person to audition for the role?  Because she is ...not great.  I don't remember her being this bad. But then again, the only role I can really remember her in was Arwen in Lord of the Rings.  I thought she was fine in that, but maybe being an Elf simple worked well with her particular acting abilities.  I just found her sex-phone voice delivery really distracting.

I do like them setting up Rob Lowe as a metrosexual.  I got a bit of a chuckle out of his pride in his skin care regimen.

[Kel Varnsen]

2 hours ago, DearEvette said:

It is on par with a lot of pilots... a little rough and it needs to find its groove.  Either it will or it won't.

I was thinking about it since I watched it yesterday and it is crazy how often in the pilot for some action type procedural show someone dies in the line of duty. Off the top of my head before this show there was Chicago Fire, Chicago PD, SEAL team, Hawaii 5-0 and even the original CSI so as soon as those guys went to that first call I knew someone was getting killed.