S13.E02: Ride The Blade

[DanaK]

Quote

10/02/2024 (09:00PM - 10:00PM) (Wednesday) : After Damon disobeys Kidd's orders on a call, he turns to Severide to protect him. Herrmann searches for the perfect scent to spice things up with Cindy.

 

[anna0852]

Definitely not a fan of Damon! 

[Dowel Jones]

I got a good laugh out of Cruz spinning on his heels and nope-ing right out of that discussion on the apparatus bay.  Ees not my job!

Already I'm getting tired of Kidd's 'Where does this Battalion Chief get off running a station like a Battalion Chief?' attitude.  

I sure hope CFD has a policy in place allowing medics to forcibly restrain a patient.  If it turns out he wasn't the driver, or wasn't over the legal limit, her action could be a real problem or the Dept.

Hermann, you're such a schmuck.  And you want to be a Battalion Chief?

Just let Damon go to another station or be a floater.  They're bringing in way too much draaaaama.

[FnkyChkn34]

Count me in as no fan of Damon's! For sure. What an entitled brat...

Also, guess I was wrong, Stella was yelling at Kelly. I'm glad he finally came around to doing the right thing regarding them both, but I was mad at him for a bit too. He should NEVER take this stranger who claims to be his brother's side over his wife's. Wife and fellow lieutenant... isn't Damon basically a candidate? He needs to go. 

Nice to see Mouch taking his potential promotion so seriously. Herrmann has issues. 

[iMonrey]

Credit where credit is due: this show still manages to pull off some impressive fire and rescue scenes. When that boat dropped and the propeller nearly sliced into that lady's face I really yelped. The in-between stuff is mediocre at best but the action scenes keep me coming back.

Wasn't Herrmann supposed to be gradually losing his hearing and going to have to retire eventually? Did that go away? Or was it just that David Eigenberg got a hearing aid and they needed to write it into the show?

Is there something wrong with Cyndi? Brain tumor? Ritter made a face when he smelled the psoriasis lotion, and Herrmann said he has no sense of smell.

9 hours ago, Dowel Jones said:

Already I'm getting tired of Kidd's 'Where does this Battalion Chief get off running a station like a Battalion Chief?' attitude.  

And yet, the bylaws of this show state that Stella is always right. Which means there's something seriously wrong with Pascal, most likely he's a jealous hothead who beats people up over perceived slights. I'm guessing he's not going to be around long-term and will eventually be replaced by either Mouch or Herrmann. If they couldn't afford to pay Eamonn Walker anymore, I doubt they have the money to pay a name like Dermot Mulroney for a whole season.

Speaking of Boden, he's just across town at HQ now, right? He didn't die or move away. You'd think he'd pop in just to say "hi" to the new chief and check in on his old crew. 

[anna0852]

3 minutes ago, iMonrey said:

 

Is there something wrong with Cyndi? Brain tumor? Ritter made a face when he smelled the psoriasis lotion, and Herrmann said he has no sense of smell.

Speaking of Boden, he's just across town at HQ now, right? He didn't die or move away. You'd think he'd pop in just to say "hi" to the new chief and check in on his old crew. 

That’s a really interesting theory about Cindy. She did just recently deal with cancer, a brain tumor messing with her sense of smell would actually fit the storyline. And would explain why they went with such a stupid storyline in the first place.
 

I think it was announced last year that we’re going to see Boden occasionally, he’s not gone for good. I imagine he’ll pop up probably during sweep week, just as the new captain does something stupid.

[CoyoteBlue]

I wish Carver's private life wasn't always a hot mess, because I love me a hot, steady, competent guy. I understand the urge to "fix" a guy now.

[Sandman]

The secondhand embarrassment I feel for Dermot Mulroney just keeps growing worse. 

So, Severide finally gets to be a Fire Cop, is what I take away from all the Damon-drama. 

[FnkyChkn34]

On 10/4/2024 at 4:40 PM, Sandman said:

So, Severide finally gets to be a Fire Cop, is what I take away from all the Damon-drama. 

I don't think Pascal will let Damon stay under the command of his sister-in-law though, either.  It makes the most sense to me for Damon to go.  Pascal is reluctantly tolerating Severide and Kidd on the same shift.  

We heard over the summer that Jake Lockett, who plays Carver, was promoted to a regular.  I think we would have heard if the actor who plays Damon was, too.  I know that he wouldn't have to become a regular to stay long-term, but I'm guessing (maybe more just hoping) that he leaves.  

Of course, I could easily be wrong!  So we shall see...

[helpmerhonda]

On 10/3/2024 at 12:39 AM, Dowel Jones said:

 

Already I'm getting tired of Kidd's 'Where does this Battalion Chief get off running a station like a Battalion Chief?' attitude.  

She only feels this way because he actually asks her to explain and justify her decisions and wants to assess her leadership. In her mind, he should already be treating her as God's gift to the CFD.

[Sandman]

To be honest, getting the leadership to file shift reports and then go over them in detail one-on-one does seem like micromanaging to me. (But then the glimpses we've seen so far of Pascal's imploding personal life don't fill me with confidence in his judgment, and Stella doesn't have that kind of information.)

Also, could we dispense with the B-plots where the secondary characters act like sophomoric wiener-heads, please? This show's been on for a billion years, and the antics are getting older than Hermann's kids -- the rank-and-file chuckleheads need to grow up already.

Edited October 8 by Sandman

[anna0852]

1 hour ago, Sandman said:

To be honest, getting the leadership to file shift reports and then go over them in detail one-on-one does seem like micromanaging to me. 

I think that’s what’s been bugging me about the whole new chief storyline so far. I’m assuming he was given at least some background on 51 when he was hired and that he was told it was essentially a well oiled house with good lieutenants in place and teams that work well together. And quite frankly, if I’m a lieutenant who until now has been trusted to handle my s**t and I’m suddenly being micromanaged, I would be ticked.

And I’m not just referring to Stella. Boden trusted all three lieutenants to handle themselves. He oversaw the big picture, he was there for guidance as needed, and he didn’t hesitate to smack somebody down who stepped out of line. He did not feel the need to question their decision-making, to debrief with a critical eye and to act like these professionals don’t know what they’re doing.

This kind of change in management can be a real wrench. And I don’t think it speaks well of the new chief that he seems to think the house needs a lot of correction.

[CoyoteBlue]

I am EpiPen-allergic to micromanagement, but I get the feeling that once Hermann (for example) talked to McNewChief, it wasn't micromanaging so much as wanting to get a sense of their methods and thought processes. The faster he can be in sync with his lieutenants, the faster he can trust leaving things to them.

[Sandman]

No doubt -- but there are clearly records of past performance which Angry McSquickfest-Pascal should have reviewed to some extent to familiarize himself with 51's operating style and outcomes. (The fact that Mouch's hero move involved remembering routine paperwork probably points to the degree of realism :: cough cough :: of this show.)

[NJRadioGuy]

On 10/7/2024 at 11:39 PM, anna0852 said:

...he was told it was essentially a well oiled house with good lieutenants in place and teams that work well together.

...Boden trusted all three lieutenants to handle themselves.

...He did not feel the need to question their decision-making, to debrief with a critical eye and to act like these professionals don’t know what they’re doing.

Boden had a decade-plus of familiarity with them. A tougher, stricter boss who has no knowledge of how they click from right off the hop is right in wanting to know everything. The fire service and EMS aren't office jobs, where micro-managing is nothing but a PITA. When everybody is there to protect life and property, everybody has a hand in shaving seconds, and seeing why things might not have been perfect, or why things worked well when SOP says it should be some other way. A boss like that will learn, after a time, that this LT is fantastic and is six steps ahead of the game, but that LT skates by just by pure luck, a hook into HQ, and maybe one up-and-coming hotshot on his rig.

Debriefings after major incidents are SOP pretty much everywhere IRL. Even routine ones that go by the book. If there is citizen video a good chief will pore over it and find how the incident was handled, who did what, and why, and sit down with the companies to improve, even if it's by only a second here or there. Or to learn that the companies do things differently because it's more efficient for that apparatus or that block or that style of building.

Think of it like a football coach and his players. Everybody wants to win, so they practice every day and watch film to learn how this play or that went sour. Ditto here. Some coaches are pushovers, some are ballbusters, but at the end of the day the owners want someone who'll win more than they lose. Here's the same thing. The community wants fires put out as fast as possible with no loss of life and minimal property damage. Coach, show me how you'll get the players to do that?