9-1-1’s Bobby Nash is gone but far from forgotten. The fire captain died in Season 8 as actor Peter Krause left the cast of the Fox show, but his presence will still be felt in Season 9, according to costar Oliver Stark.

“I think it’s not gonna be a linear path of healing, as I don’t think grief is,” Stark, who plays Evan “Buck” Buckley, explained to Deadline at ABC’s End of Summer Soirée on Friday, September 5. “There are episodes that maybe feel lighter and like we’re moving directly past it and then, as grief does, it sneaks up on you again. So I don’t think it’s an overall down feeling of the show. I think it’s looking to move forward, but in a way that is respectful to the memory of the Bobby Nash character and finding creative ways for him to still haunt the narrative.”

Oliver Stark on the fan response to Bobby’s death on #911onFOX pic.twitter.com/FnjyN88Y74

— Deadline (@DEADLINE) September 6, 2025

As for Buck’s mindset as Season 9 picks up, Stark said, “We definitely come back to a more settled Buck, not looking to leave, and instead — I would say, probably — looking to put down more secure roots, if anything. He was obviously in a dark place at the time, and I think that has washed over him and may well come back again, but, for now, I think he’s finding more and more reasons to want to stay.”

Speaking of the 118’s late captain, Stark told TV Insider in May that Bobby and Buck were nearly pitted against one another in a love triangle with dispatcher Abby Clark (Connie Britton), thanks to the machinations of 9-1-1’s Season 1 writers.

“This is going to be a big throwback,” he said. “Do you remember in Season 1 of the show? I was in a hospital bed. [Abby] was at my bedside. And, R.I.P., Bobby Nash walks in, and the original plan was that there was going to be a little love triangle there. My strong feelings for that were, I remember at the time being like, ‘No, what do you mean? No, that’s Buck and Abby. You can’t.’ I was really, like it was my own relationship, against it, so I’m glad it didn’t work out. I’m glad we never went down that road.”

9-1-1, Season 9 Premiere, Thursday, October 9, 8/7c, ABC