Arson cases keep pulling Lieutenant Kelly Severide (Taylor Kinney) away from his work with Squad at Firehouse 51 on Chicago Fire—and has yet again with the latest episode. And maybe we’re just being too optimistic or naive, but we don’t think this will be a repeat of last season.
To explain Severide’s absence when Kinney took leave in the middle of Season 11, the lieutenant went off to participate in an arson investigation program. But then, without telling anyone back home, including his wife, Lieutenant Stella Kidd (Miranda Rae Mayo), he followed that up with work on an ATF investigation. Kidd finally had enough and went to track him down in the finale, describing it in this season’s premiere as “I basically had to fly to Alabama, put you in handcuffs, and drag you home.” That was why she hesitated when he began looking into an arson case, but with Chicago firefighters being targeted, she couldn’t stop him. Still, arson cases are like a drug to him, she knows.
And that’s demonstrated to be the case when, despite taking his name off a prestigious investigator list, Severide couldn’t help but sit down and read through an ATF file Van Meter (Tim Hopper) had sent his way in the third episode. Severide then did admit to Kidd that he wanted to keep helping out with arson cases, pointing out that it could open doors for him—like OFI—down the road. Not wanting him to feel trapped, she eventually gave him her blessing to leave to look into the case, as long as he came back soon. “That’s the plan,” he promised. “But if you go MIA on me again, if you leave me in the dark,” she warned him.
And sure, Severide saying the plan is to come back soon and both he and Kidd reiterating they wouldn’t be apart long during their goodbyes at the end of the episode does seem to be foreshadowing something potentially keeping him away. But we’re going to believe what executive producer Andrea Newman told us at the beginning of the season when we asked if Kinney is back full time: “Severide is front and center of this season, so I would say yes.” That should mean that there will be plenty more of him still to come, since only three episodes have aired.
Furthermore, according to Newman, Severide and Kidd “have to kind of work through this and get to a different place, maybe a better place.” We’re just starting to see that in the conversations they’ve had thus far, and this latest case taking him out of Chicago seems to just be setting them up to get to that “better place.”
And hey, as we saw when with the steamy shower scene to open the premiere, Stellaride continues to be one of the hottest couples on TV. This trip away just might be setting the stage for things to heat up again when he returns.
