9-1-1 Season 8 Finale Repeats A Divisive Trick That Season 9 Needs To Retire

9-1-1 season 8 has aired some of the most infamous moments in the procedural’s history, but the penultimate episode’s cliffhanger highlights a tiresome pattern. 9-1-1 season 8 has continued the series norm of dramatic medical emergencies, emotional narratives, and surprising character development, but some plots were more fleshed out than others. The main cast of characters— now headed by Angela Bassett’s Athena Grant following the death of Peter Krause’s Bobby Nash— is slated to respond to one of 9-1-1’s hallmark intense disasters in the season 8 finale, but the members of LAFD station 118 all have unfinished business.

The main firefighters— Evan “Buck” Buckley (Oliver Stark), Henrietta “Hen” Wilson (Aisha Hinds), Howard “Chimney” Han (Kenneth Choi), Eddie Diaz (Ryan Guzman), and Ravi Panikkar (Anirudh Pisharody)— each have ongoing storylines that the 9-1-1 season 8 finale will hopefully resolve. Yet, how the first-responder drama solves the ensemble cast’s problems is another concern entirely. Season 8 included some of 9-1-1’s most gruesome injuries, not to mention its first main character death. Yet, before the aftermath had even cleared, 9-1-1 continued introducing additional conflicts for the 118 that preemptively set up the season finale’s main objectives.

9-1-1 Season 8’s Finale Will Conclude A Two-Episode Arc

Athena's Cliffhanger Sets Up The Final Emergency Of The Season

The most obvious hints about the 9-1-1 season 8 finale’s plot, however, lie in the penultimate episode itself. 9-1-1 season 8, episode 17 established the most pressing issues for each character, ranging from Athena and Chimney’s strained relationship to Eddie’s potential return. Instead of resolving any of its storylines, however, 9-1-1 season 8, episode 17 sets up the season finale with a cliffhanger ending. After Athena responds to a nuisance call, a sudden explosion threatens to bring down a nearby building. The severity of the emergency is immediately apparent, as Athena urgently tells dispatch to “Send everybody!”

9-1-1 season 8’s finale will directly follow the events of “Don’t Drink the Water,” creating one continuous storyline across the two episodes. Every plot that was integral to 9-1-1 season 8, episode 17 will presumably return in the finale: Athena and Chimney will have to confront their tension head-on, Eddie will have to choose between moving home or pursuing the job in El Paso, and Hen will have to decide once and for all whether she’ll accept the captaincy. Naturally, the building collapse will also take up the bulk of 9-1-1 season 8’s finale.

9-1-1 Included Multiple Other Two-Part Events In Season 8

From The Midseason Return To The Infamous Contagion Saga

The season finale is far from 9-1-1 season 8’s first multi-episode timeline, however. The opening of 9-1-1 season 8 included an exhaustive three-episode storyline following Athena’s journey navigating a plane’s emergency landing. Similarly, the midseason premiere (“Sob Stories”) introduced a two-part story for Maddie Han (Jennifer Love Hewitt) and Abigail Spencer’s 9-1-1 character, Amber Braeburn. While 9-1-1 season 8, episode 9 extensively explored Maddie’s trauma and an anonymous serial killer, the cliffhanger ending of Maddie being abducted by Braeburn set up “Voices” as a direct continuation. Unsurprisingly, 9-1-1 season 8, episode 10 focused on Braeburn’s evil plan and Maddie’s escape.

More recently, 9-1-1 season 8, episodes 14 and 15 were connected under the umbrella name of 9-1-1: Contagion. The first episode in the two-part arc introduced 9-1-1’s evil scientist, Moira Blake (Bridget Regan), and laid the groundwork for the CCHF super-strain to loom overhead as an omnipresent threat after the LAFD is accidentally quarantined in the research lab. The narrative of “Sick Day” continues into “Lab Rats” seamlessly, as Buck and Athena apprehend Moira and deliver the antidote to save Chimney’s life. After the smoke seems to clear, Bobby’s death in 9-1-1 acts as the two-part event’s dramatic twist ending.

Overusing The Two-Part Structure In 9-1-1 Season 8 Made It Less Effective

Cliffhangers Started To Feel Like A Crutch

While each of the aforementioned two-part events were interesting by themselves, the seemingly constant cliffhangers and continuations make 9-1-1 season 8 feel disjointed when considered as one cohesive, linear storyline. Rather than the typical structure of standalone narratives building an overarching story for the season, 9-1-1 season 8 segmented itself with multi-episode arcs. Using the two-part structure once or twice could have been effective without sacrificing the overall plot, but the 9-1-1 season 8 finale will be the fourth multi-episode event in 18 episodes. Statistically, that means 9-1-1 season 8 employed a cliffhanger about once every four episodes.

Breaking the season up into distinct segments overwhelmingly contributed to the biggest concern of 9-1-1's showrunner, Tim Minear: raising the stakes. Whereas near-death experiences in 9-1-1 were previously few and far between, 9-1-1 season 8 overloaded the characters with personal crises. If the procedural had stuck to its formula and balanced character development with wacky medical emergencies, 9-1-1 could have retained its ability to use near-misses and extreme disasters as rare but impactful tools. Instead, 9-1-1 season 8 felt like a never-ending stream of drama and danger— intriguing in small doses, but draining when over-utilized.

What 9-1-1 Season 9 Can Do To Replace Its Two-Part Events

There Are Other Episode Types To Explore

Fortunately, 9-1-1 still has time to tweak its episodic structures. 9-1-1 season 9 has already been confirmed by ABC, meaning the long-running procedural will have another full batch of episodes to prove its merit. If the first-responder drama wants a chance at season 10, though, 9-1-1 will have to stop relying on multi-episode events and excessive cliffhangers. The series must once again prioritize its characters over its disasters; high-octane calls are entertaining, but they’re supplemental to the true selling point of 9-1-1— the 118.