[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Chicago Fire Season 13 Episode 20 “Cut Me Open.”]
It wasn’t a happy day for anyone, on or off shift, during the Wednesday, May 7, episode of Chicago Fire. First, Kelly Severide (Taylor Kinney) and Stella Kidd (Miranda Rae Mayo) thought they were going to be adopting a baby and spent the day at the hospital, only for the mother to change her mind. Meanwhile, at the firehouse, Christopher Herrmann (David Eigenberg) and Randy “Mouch” McHolland (Christian Stolte) got some troubling news about the state of the CFD that could reveal how Darren Ritter and Sam Carver will be written out with Daniel Kyri and Jake Lockett both leaving at the end of Season 13.
An efficiency expert, Ambrose Sterling, was sent to audit 51; he was evaluating the operational efficiencies of all houses in the Chicago Fire Department. The department was going through changes, he warned Herrmann and Mouch (the two officers at the house at the time), with purse strings tightening. That meant he followed them around, took notes, even shared what he thought about their work on calls. Jack Damon (Michael Bradway) revealed that he was called “the padlock,” and after he spent one day at 28, their Truck had been decommissioned and bunch of guys sent to the floater pool.
The firefighters ended up saving Ambrose when he passed out due to heat exhaustion, and after, he told them that while they did pass the audit, there was something they needed to know. “The CFD is going to be announcing big cuts soon, including layoffs and forced retirements. Probationary and older firefighters are going to be the first to go. This isn’t bad news. With all your years on the job, the buyout could be pretty sweet,” he said. “These cuts are inevitable. That’s the future of the CFD.”
Mouch disagreed. “That’s a future battalion chief you’re talking to, Ambrose. One of the best out there,” he said, pointing to Herrmann. “And I got the highest score on the lieutenant’s test. I got news for you: Us old timers, we’re not going anywhere.” It seems like he could very well be right, especially when it comes to 51, and it’s the younger firefighters (hence Kyri and Lockett’s exits) they’ll be losing. After all, both David Eigenberg and Christian Stolte have been part of the show since the very beginning (the former a series regular, the latter recurring in Season 1) and if either was going to be leaving, a big sendoff would be warranted, like Jesse Spencer (Matt Casey) and Eamonn Walker (Wallace Boden) got, not a surprise at the end of a finale.
Could Ritter or Carver (or both) end up as floaters? Could they be part of the layoffs? Could Ritter, since he was there for the conversation in which Mouch remarked that the efficiency experts should know something about the firefighting world before tearing apart, be in for a job change? Could he be one of the layoffs then think he could make a difference for the CFD to prevent what happens from happening again without someone who knows what they do and what they need weighing in?
How do you think Chicago Fire will write out Daniel Kyri’s Darren Ritter and Jake Lockett’s Sam Carver? Let us know in the comments section below.
Chicago Fire, Wednesdays, 9/8c, NBC