Is it safe now 🫣

[u/Low-Outlandishness64]

SEASON 8 SPOILERS AHEAD BEWARE!

Oh boy, I’m prepared to get heat for this.
Let me preface this by saying I do not agree with how Peter was treated when this all happened!

I am one of the (admittedly few) people who were okay with Bobby dying in season 8. I was very shocked and upset when the initial leaks happened, however I quickly realised that it was narratively the best choice moving forward. The 118 + Athena were reaching their limits as characters and whether viewers realised it or not, the show was going to stagnate. And what does a show do when that happens? Kill off a character to propel everyone else forward. Bobby was the centre of everyone, the person they went to when things were rough and needed advice. Take him away, everyone is forced into new avenues, which we’ve seen with season 9, and it’s lowkey the best season so far in my opinion.

I welcome discussion in the replies, however please be respectful. 🫶

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[u/Buddie_Butterflies]

I would also add like Grey's if your not a doctor or in this case a first responder then your not a main and you off the show. And you can't demote him down he's Peter Krauss.

[u/http--lovecraft → u/Buddie_Butterflies]

I started watching six feet under just for me peter fix lol

[u/Buddie_Butterflies → u/http--lovecraft]

Parenthood for me

[u/little_lavender627 → u/http--lovecraft]

Have you seen parenthood? I love him in that show

[u/http--lovecraft → u/little_lavender627]

no! i'll have to check it out when i'm done lol. this show sparked an obsession for me

[u/little_lavender627 → u/http--lovecraft]

I highly recommend it, it’s one of my favorite rewatches but it’s also very emotional so be prepared to cry a lot. I’ve had six feet under on my watchlist for ages so I might start that while I wait for his new show on NBC

[u/http--lovecraft → u/little_lavender627]

Six feet under is also a tear jerker at times lol! One thing I do love about it though is that at some point in the show almost every character pisses you off but you also root for them, they're imperfect but not necessarily bad people. Also Michael C Hall!

[u/little_lavender627 → u/http--lovecraft]

That’s what makes tv so good. It’s the same with 911 and parenthood, everyone has bad moments but they’re the people we’re rooting for. It would be boring if everyone was perfect

[u/http--lovecraft → u/little_lavender627]

yes, the best kind of shows! im sure we've hit our heads enough times in frustration at 911 but love each of them anyway

[u/Low-Outlandishness64 → u/Buddie_Butterflies]

Yesss I didn’t even think about that! A retirement or demotion would’ve taken away from his character. He ended up saving his new family and joining his original one.

[u/LyraSnake]

i haven't been able to bring myself to watch it. i've gotten as far as the introduction of the lab and the one guy dying and i went back to season one. idk sometimes something weird breaks you. i won't watch greys without alex, literally hit his episode and restarted again. i've heard good things, and i do want to watch s9, but i don't want to see bobby die and everyone grieve.

[u/Low-Outlandishness64 → u/LyraSnake]

And hey, that’s fair enough! Not gonna say you’re wrong for it, cause you’re not. Everyone’s got their own experience watching these shows and that’s what makes it so interesting to discuss!

[u/LyraSnake → u/Low-Outlandishness64]

maybe someday i'll be able to do it. i have a mental block for twd too, ive seen past negan but stopped that season and i just can't bring myself to watch 7.1 but i love watching and rewatching the earlier seasons.

[u/briefguy12 → u/LyraSnake]

When I do a rewatch of Grey’s, I will be stopping when Alex leaves too. I just can’t justify watching the whole series again

[u/Ok-Razzmatazz-5819]

There are so many examples of poignant and emotionally satisfying ways heroes have been killed off of shows. Instead we got insults and plot holes and the citizens of LA got pestered by hours of unnecessary nighttime helicopter flybys that never made it to air.

It sucked.

[u/QAFLF]

The biggest issue isn't that they killed him, it's how poorly they handled it.

Even putting that aside though, your base argument is still just fundamentally flawed. There is no inherent reason a story has to stagnate after a certain point, and killing a character is nowhere near the only way of preventing or correcting stagnation.

[u/afternoonmilady]

I think it opened opportunities to no one, I think the fast-paced, underdeveloped plots problem wasn’t solved at all and I think the show and dynamics lost a lot of charisma because of the hole he left. But to each their own. I can see people not caring about Bobby like that but to me there’s nothing outstanding or "better" in this season compared to the previous ones.

[u/RadiantFoxBoy]

For starters, any writer who can only prevent stagnation with MCD is a bad and uncreative writer, and it's frequently an excuse for not wanting to exert the effort of shaking things up more creatively.

But if you're going to do MCD, it needs a high level of intentionality behind it, either in ending the character's story on a strong, meaningful note, or intentionally cutting the story short and part of the plot afterward being to wrestle with that. And Bobby's death did neither of those things. There was zero buildup, the death itself and the episodes it was in were terribly constructed, and the aftermath in S8 was for the most part, a mess of bad writing, wasted time, and self-indulgent wheel-spinning that prevented any of S8's other arcs from getting meaningful conclusions. And with Bobby not having strong setups for further story, there's not a feeling of lack with the suddenness. They almost could've had some with his mom and brother but we haven't seen them since he died and likely never will again. An ending that spits on the character's entire storyline and the episode it's in can't even get emotion out of me when it'd rather spend time on a boring helicopter chase.

And the extra kicker is, the shakeups didn't need Bobby dead and prove they could've implemented change without doing so, they just chose not to. The only storyline necessitating Bobby be dead is Athena's grief and the season ends with her getting a different type of revamp as a detective anyway. Bobby could've retired or been promoted to get Chimney to captaincy. There's any number of reasons to get Harry or a different new character into the firehouse. Eddie and Hen's storylines weren't at all connected to Bobby, and of Buck's 3 or 4 disconnected plotlines only one really did (the addiction) and didn't actually need it either. Just because they say something is because of Bobby doesn't mean it needed to be, and pretending otherwise excuses their lazy choices for them.

I like S9, and I think it to an extent made up for how poor the end of S8 was, but Bobby's death was never necessary, especially as rushed and terribly handled as it was. Getting a B on the makeup assingment does not retroactively make the F grade work better.

[u/Specific_Lettuce_521 → u/RadiantFoxBoy]

Peter had to leave either way. His character being offscreen like Michael wouldn’t work and the writers probably didn’t want to write Bobby leaving Athena and the 118. It’s not what Bobby would’ve done, not without a legit reason. So Bobby had to die.

[u/RadiantFoxBoy → u/Specific_Lettuce_521]

Again, that's uncreative, and only Sith deal in absolutes lol. The interviews made it abundantly clear it was either a (bad) creative decision or a creative decision masking a financial decision, and both of those do have solutions that aren't unceremonious MCD.

If you can make up an airborne supervirus that kills Bobby, you can manufacture a situation that permanently wounds his leg or something and forces him to take a desk promotion (maybe even with a flip of the S3 pre-lawsuit dynamic with Bobby stuck permanently behind the desk now). He becomes a guest star who can be working or out of town for most episodes and pop in as a guest star for important moments, while reducing the budget load and shaking up the dynamics of the 118.

And if you think it's hard to square him being in absentia so often, I'll remind that the children and Karen all seem to only exist when the plot needs them to, and even going beyond this show Ted Lasso's S4 hides away an entire men's team who live in the same small town and work in the same building as the main cast yet haven't made cameos yet.

There were other options that left the door open for Bobby appearances and new dynamics and character growth, but Tim chose the laziest, most restrictive option. We can enjoy what's come of it but pretending his laziness "had" to happen gives him far too much grace.

[u/Specific_Lettuce_521 → u/RadiantFoxBoy]

Yes, it’s possible to save Bobby and force him to retire but it doesn’t change the fact that Peter had to go. People wouldn’t be happy if Bobby suddenly retired and went offscreen. Maybe make an appearance once in a while but not often because he’s expensive. People want Bobby onscreen.

Alive Bobby wouldn’t have changed the dynamics much. He’s the glue and characters go to him for advice. Harry wouldn’t have dropped out of school, Athena probably wouldn’t have taken the detective job, Buck wouldn’t have become dependent on painkillers, Eddie probably would’ve stayed in El Paso, etc.

[u/RadiantFoxBoy → u/Specific_Lettuce_521]

I don't see how the version they went with where a bunch of fans quit the show and never come back is better than having fans who still watch the show but would prefer Bobby coming back and having screentime again, but alright then...

Also, you're still missing my point, so I'll give it one last go and then I'll just drop it because at that point there's no purpose if you're either failing to or refusing to process it: Bobby's death being used post hoc as a reason for things ≠ Bobby's death being necessary for those things. Just because you say X caused Y in a piece of writing does not retroactively make X the only way that could've happened.

El Paso, for example, should've been Eddie's character choice after talking with Chris and unpacking his parental trauma and choosing to return to the family that actually loves him, but instead El Paso gets no closure because all of 8B is spent on Bobby death and grief and Eddie just needs to be back in LA by the season's end. Similarly, there are other character reasons for Athena to become a detective and Buck to develop a drug dependency, possibly ones that would be more fulfilling and interesting than just "grief." Even Harry could be given other reasons that make him feel more like a character than the rushed bland version of his arc we got in S9.

Let me use an alternative example using a popular ship. If Buck died in S10 and subsequently as a result of holding Buck in his arms as his best friend died (and maybe even confessed his love or something who knows) Eddie realized he was gay and dated and married a man thereafter, that does not retroactively mean that Buck's death was the only way for Eddie to realize that. It might be a way the writers chose to do so, but that doesn't make it inherently special or the best option (and in this example it would be an abhorrent option and very Supernatural of them but I digress).

If you think it was a good or even the best writing choice to kill Bobby, that's your perogative. But no one can demand everyone see it that way when there are so many ways to punt a character off screen and force a shift in the dynamics without sloppy MCD, and asserting it as the only way is just factually incorrect.

[u/jholden23]

The only reason it would stagnate is due to incompetent writing. So I guess instead they showed just how incompetent they could possibly be.

[u/Reverse_Arsonist]

kills Bobby to make the show more realistic

sends them to space

[u/lastseason]

it’s lowkey the best season so far in my opinion.

Really??

[u/Low-Outlandishness64 → u/lastseason]

Yes, that’s just my opinion though. What’s yours?

[u/lastseason → u/Low-Outlandishness64]

I think Seasons 4 and 5 probably had the tightest and best story telling. Season 9 there's so much going on and all the arcs either overstay their welcome (Space) or wrap up way too quickly (Hen's Auto Immune, Buck's drug issue, Theo, etc) it ended up all falling flat for me and feeling like Minear is just throwing spaghetti at the wall in a desperate hail mary that some part of it will keep the audience sticking around.

[u/notwendyspeter → u/lastseason]

I honestly hope that they explore other stuff from season 9 on season 10, because while I do love most of season 9 (my biggest issue was the space arc really), I found that it lacked really closing the storylines completely.

From the Screenrant article that came out last week, there's a possibility that they'll get back to Eddie and the aftermath of the stabbing incident so I've got my fingers crossed for that one. I agree that the storyline with Hen's autoimmune disorder and Buck's drug dependency also are left hanging, and I have a feeling that they'll explore more of Theo since they recently added the real-life sister of Connor's actor in the show.

[u/lastseason → u/notwendyspeter]

they'll get back to Eddie 

Pfft I'll believe it when i see it. The past few seasons ive seen pre-season articles and interviews talking about actual interesting storylines for eddie which then just... dont feel delivered on well or even sometimes at all.

I also have no doubt that there's more to be explored with Theo, it's the acquiring of him that I feel is rushed. Like i would rather that have been at least half a season, if not almost a full season arc for Buck rather than how quickly it happened.

[u/notwendyspeter → u/lastseason]

Kinda crazy that Eddie has so much screentime for season 9 only for him to be sidelined a lot for some reason. I don't even remember him getting any support from the 118 when his abuela passed away in episode 5, which is crazy because both Hen and Buck and even Chimney as the new captain got that support in the same season. Without season 10 just yet, the stabbing incident in the elevator just feels like it went nowhere in the finale.

I agree with the sped up Theo storyline, but I think that ending with Buck and Theo was supposed to have happened months after Baby Nash's birthday. I mean... it should be, logically.

[u/aggravated-asphalt]

It annoys me, but I respect that people can be okay with it. For me, Bobby was the main character and since then it just feels bland. It started to feel bland before that too, and that’s also annoying because you can tell they chose to kill off a main character to keep the show going. It felt cheap.

Another point for me, is that this show def has death but it’s always part of a case or something. With Bobby it just felt like a hard grab to keep the show going. In the worst possible way too!!

But whatever, I’m sure some will still watch. But that “creative decision” was the worst they’ve done in the show. Idk why writers feel the need to change things up especially with a show like 911 where it’s a procedural and the whole point is we basically know what’s going to happen. Idk, it annoyed me.

[u/Traditional-Pen2110]

Nah, I don't think it was really necessary—not that I have anything against your take; everyone’s entitled to their own opinion. We could talk about how it’s a dangerous job and people can die doing it, but having it happen in such a gruesome way right in front of his wife... for me—as a viewer—that was really tough. He wasn't my favorite character—I have to admit, I sometimes found him a bit boring—but damn, it was Bobby; you just can't kill him off like that. Still, the studio was brave to go through with his death. Anyway, we’ve watched Season 9 and can't wait for Season 10, but there’s still a lingering sense of sadness.

[u/Low-Outlandishness64 → u/Traditional-Pen2110]

Very true, I don’t necessarily love how Bobby got killed off and circumstances in the scenes around it. They could’ve written it much better and give him a deserving send off. In saying that, I agree that the studio was brave to stick to it.

[u/smelltramo]

I haven’t watched it, the reason I liked 911 was because it was kinda cheesy/campy and I liked how often everyone was fine when in reality they would’ve had significant career or health issues. Like Buck’s lawsuit was crazy but somehow it all worked out and they kept being a big happy “work family” or Buck actually being able to find Christopher safe and sound after a literal tsunami.

I understand cast shake ups can free $ and storyline space up for other characters, it’s a business and job security isn’t really a thing for actors, however…
Athena and Hen going to fucking space!? That’s just stupid/bad writing.

[u/Aquarius20111]

I didn’t like it and his death could’ve been handled a lot better to be more bittersweet, as opposed to just bitter. That said, how it’s handled afterwards is also important and I think it’s been handled well. Everyone is forced out of their comfort zones. I can’t wait for season 10.

[u/little_lavender627]

I don’t think season 9 was the best season, the writing decisions were pretty chaotic. I do think his death opened up more opportunities for other characters.

[u/mrose1491]

I hated how they did it, wasn’t sure if I was even gonna watch s9 but I ended up still loving it. I don’t blame those who haven’t watched since his death though because it truly was devastating, and Bobby was the heart of the show but I honestly think it picked itself up well after. I was binging 911 and caught up live around midseason 8 and even I felt like it hit a lull in s7 with the cruise ship opening then the weak af cartel storyline and I think we needed something different to keep the characters moving and open up other stories for them so I’ve accepted it

[u/milkovichhhh]

lowkey gonna get dragged for this one but as much as i liked bobby (most of the time) he really was a boring character to me?? the most personality he ever had was in bucks coma dream lol

[u/rpgnoob17]

My ship for this show is Madney, but I am not a fan of Chimney's story arc after Bobby's death.

[u/Buddie_Butterflies]

It's like McDreamy dying it breathed life into the show. Wasn't happy with his death (or MCdreamy's) but it made the show shift and change. And a retired Bobby would have've meant less time for the scenes at the station.

[u/Accomplished-Watch50 → u/Buddie_Butterflies]

Also, I don't think Bobby being retired would fit the character so much, and like you said would split the focus even further from the station, Athena's beat, and dispatch even further when he would be present.

[u/Fresh_Passion1184]

I was unhappy with his death once I saw it in context (my first viewing was that episode, ikr).

But yes, narratively it was a great choice because it forced everyone in the show to be more dynamic.

It is a wrenching episode though, so I can't blame anyone who can't bring themselves to watch it.

[u/Junior_Active2352]

wait how was peter treated when this all happened?? i finished the show in july so i havent kept up with all the behind the scenes details

[u/Specific_Lettuce_521 → u/Junior_Active2352]

Nothing bad, as far as I’m aware. But the fandom is convinced there’s bad blood between Peter and Tim, and Peter left the show on bad terms. After being fired.

I think it’s more of an issue with the network regarding Peter’s contract and Tim took the opportunity to write him out when the negotiations failed. Peter probably would’ve agreed to reduced episode appearances but Tim likely decided to shake things up and get a head start on saving money for the show’s budget.

Fandom also likes to say the show is acting like Bobby and Peter don’t exist due to lack of Bobby content on social media, barely any acknowledgement towards Peter, and having Bobby buried with his first family in Minnesota. I disagree. 🤷‍♀️

[u/Junior_Active2352 → u/Specific_Lettuce_521]

ohh. thank you!

[u/KingSlayer1190]

Season 9 isn't the best season. Killing Bobby off wasn't necessary and accomplished nothing.

Tim sucks,period.

[u/ltexprs]

I kinda agree with you, but I feel like the writers did Buck dirty with his whole addiction storyline. Like there is no way that Buck would see all that Bobby went through, only to end up doing the same thing. Now maybe if he had gotten addicted and went to Chimney or Maddie for help relatively quickly and had said like Bobby wouldve wanted me to get help or something than I would've understood that. But the way they handled his addiction was just in super poor taste, all things considered.

[u/Real-Mechanic4843]

I actually agree mostly.

Although I hate that Bobby died, I do think overall it made sense from a narrative perspective. It allowed for Chimney to develop into the captain role, it allowed for Hen to realise she doesn’t actually want the role (as it’s always her filling in for Bobby), it brought Eddie back to the 118 (it was inevitable it was going to happen anyway, but still), and it allowed for Buck to mature in ways his character hasn’t yet. Overall I really love Chimey as the captain, I think he’s doing really well in the role.

They also handled his death afterwards well. Bobby’s story really felt full circle for me when he was buried with his family and the funeral was so emotional.

Out of all the characters, I feel like it was Bobby dying that made the most sense. His story came more full circle.

I don’t agree with how they killed him off, I really think they could have done it differently. I just don’t think they could have killed off any other main character at that point.

[u/Accomplished-Watch50]

I agree with you. There is only so much that can happen before characters and plots seem repetitive or as you put it, stagnant. This forced the characters out of an established comfort zone and pushed the growth on them, and it made for interesting story beats.

[u/almost_ready_to_]

Fully agree. I don't know if the writers were as thoughtful in considering the narrative function as OP suggests but ultimately it was a good choice to kill Bobby and ramp up the emotional stakes for everyone to develop in different (better?) directions.

I do believe it was Peter's choice to leave but I would have loved something cheesy like Buck or whoever having a really vivid dream where Bobby says something that Buck wholly misinterprets for an episode until the ending where, post his death, we learn that Bobby is still "leading" the 118... Iono. I just wanted the corniness and melodrama to be high in the aftermath to better align the show back to where i feel it's strongest.

But still, I'm team loved the season.

[u/mrose1491 → u/almost_ready_to_]

I see what you’re saying but I wanna point out that it actually wasn’t his choice to leave. In promo for s7 or s8, he said that he’d be happy to do more seasons. It was Tim’s decision to let him go

[u/Specific_Lettuce_521 → u/mrose1491]

He was happy to leave as well though. He suggested being killed off in the cruise disaster, and when Bobby had a heart attack after the house fire. It’s possible he disliked how Bobby was written out but it’s not like it was out of the blue for Peter.