Chicago Fire Season 13, Episode 21 ‘The Bad Guy‘ is a pretty good setup episode for the finale, with the focus on Stella and Severide giving the hour weight, even as much of the mystery is Pascal-related.
However, let us be clear, this is still a setup episode. One with good Stella and Severide is always better than one without, but this hour doesn’t do much to resolve any of the big storylines of the season.
It does, however, deepen the relationship between Severide and Pascal and between Stella and Natalie—a storyline that seems designed to put into focus what Stella wants for her life, and what she’s good at. In a way, it should not be surprising. Stella as a role model? Stella as a mentor? That’s what Girls on Fire has been about since the beginning. That’s what has us convinced that Stella would be a great mom, way before she saw it herself.
The rest is, hopefully, about a finale that will not just set up Season 14, but that will give us concrete solutions for all these dangling plot threads the show has been leaving throughout every episode of Chicago Fire Season 13.
MORE: We don’t want to say goodbye to Carver and Ritter. And right now, we don’t trust that they’ll make it out alive.
YOU GOT THIS, STELLA KIDD
The Natalie storyline has been kinda weird so far, because it’s hard to really predict where it’s going or where the show wants it to go. But Chicago Fire Season 13, Episode 21 ‘The Bad Guy’ re-establishes that Stella sees a lot of herself in Natalie, and she just wants to help. And yes, maybe her mom instincts are coming out a little bit, but that might not necessarily be about Natalie. She doesn’t have to be Natalie’s mom because Natalie has family already. But Stella can be a friend. And a mentor. We never have enough of those.
Especially ones that go above and beyond, like a 4-hour road trip to St. Louis above and beyond!
For Stella, though, this all goes back to what she said at the beginning of the episode. The things she wanted. The ones she didn’t think she was meant for. Life starts to look a little different when what you were dreaming about is in your hands, and then it slips away. Priorities get clearer. This franchise has already made us and female characters suffer enough with pregnancy/adoption storylines. Let this one be a win. Just one more episode to go. Please.
WELL, IF SEVERIDE IS ON YOUR SIDE
If we feel any conflict during Chicago Fire Season 13, Episode 21 ‘The Bad Guy’, it’s all because of Severide. Ironically, though Pascal has managed to more or less make a place for himself at Firehouse 51—one that’s very different from Boden, but a place nonetheless—the one person he’s actually bonded with is Severide. And the fact that Severide is on his side in this episode is the one thing that makes us, if not be on his side, at least consider the possibility of being on his side.
Pascal feels like the obvious answer here. In fact, Pascal is such an obvious answer that it almost seems like it would be too obvious. He wanted to do it. We know he even went to the guy’s house. Severide knows, too, as Severide was the one who warned him not to go there. Not to let anger take over. And it seemed like Pascal had listened, it really did. That’s why Kelly goes on a limb and doesn’t mention the driver’s history with Pascal to Van Meter. And that’s why, later, as he’s talking shop with Stella, he seems to come out on the side that this wasn’t Pascal.
And if Severide is on his side, we might as well be too. Alibis, like Severide said, are for Van Meter and the cops. We don’t really care about that. We care about what it means that Pascal did or didn’t do it for the show going forward. If he did, that means he’s out of the show. If he didn’t… well, it’s never seemed like Herrmann really wanted to take that test, right? Could Pascal really be sticking around for Season 14? And what does that mean for Herrmann and Mouch?
