9-1-1 Lone Star: Pilot Episode
After months of anticipation, it’s finally here, the premiere of 9-1-1 Lone Star, and it did not disappoint. The 2-night premiere was everything 9-1-1 and Texas wrapped into one. While it definitely holds true to the themes of its parent show 9-1-1, it didn’t take long to realize Lone Star is unique and will be carving its own path.
Then: Ladder 126
Our first shots of Lone Star is of Ladder 126, responding to a fire at a feed plant. As the men quickly rush to try and contain the massive blaze, the 9-1-1 operator receives urgent information that the facility also store fertilizer. Moments later the buildings explode, and Ladder 126 is left in a pile of rubble. We later learn only one man survived that explosion, losing the rest of the company, his brothers, in the carnage.
We are then introduced to Owen Strand (Rob Lowe), a firefighter in New York and his son, T.K. (Ronen Rubenstein), who is also a firefighter in his dad’s company. Owen, dealing with an obnoxious cough goes to his doctor only to learn he has 2 tumors in his lungs. As a firefighter at ground zero, he has developed a cancer that is common to those first responders and people who helped with the cleanup. Instead of telling T.K. he keeps this information to himself.
Beth Healy with the Department of Justice and Deputy Fire Chief Alden Radford with the Austin fire department and a show up at the firehouse asking Owen to take a position as the Captain of 126. Their reasoning was he is the only person they knew to build an entire company from the ground up, indicating he took over his current company after the crew was lost in the rescue efforts of 9/11. Owen denies the job stating New York is his home and his son is here.
Moving to Austin
Later that night T.K. is out with his boyfriend and is going to propose. We can see something bad is about to happen in their conversation before the scene fades to black. The next morning T.K. doesn’t show up to his shift and Owen heads to his house. When he doesn’t receive an answer at the door, he calls for backup and a battery ram.
T.K. is found unconscious on the floor with a bottle of pills next to him. After being hit with Narcan, T.K. finally regains consciousness and vomits all over the floor. T.K. tells Owen his boyfriend is in love with someone else. It is revealed T.K. has dealt with substance abuse in the past. Owen advised he can write the report as an accidental overdose so T.K. doesn’t lose his job but that isn’t going to be enough for him. At this moment Owen decides it’s time they move to Austin.
The firehouse of 126 is a shrine to the fallen firefighters with a makeshift memorial out front. The flowers have all died and shriveled. The inside of the house is full of cobwebs and missing firetrucks, a reminder of what happened to the 126.
Shake Things Up
Captain Strand wants a diverse crew who can come in and shake things up. He decides to cast a wide net for firefighters that will meet his needs. During the interview process we meet Marjan Marwani (Natacha Karam) a Miami firefighter who went viral for diving off a bridge to save 3 people trapped in a vehicle overboard. She is a Muslim firefighter who has a bit of sass and is a daredevil. Paul Strickland (Brian Michael Smith) is a trans firefighter from Chicago who has an intuition about people and was able to catch an arsonist from basically zero clues. He attributes it to having to always watch out for himself and developing an intuition for danger before it gets him.
Mateo Chavez (Julian Works) has flunked out of the firefighter academy 4 times. Captain Strand is interested in him joining his crew because of his attention to detail and perseverance to never give up. After he has interviewed these candidates, he meets with the lone survivor of 126, Judd Ryder (Jim Parrack), to check on his mental status and advised he doesn’t believe he is ready to come back to work yet. Judd flips out on Owen stating it’s his house and they were his brothers. His state of mind reinforces the fact that he knows Judd isn’t ready to return to duty.
Neighborhood Disturbance
Our first glimpse of Michelle Blake (Liv Tyler) is of her banging on a guy’s door claiming she needs to know where her sister is. Her sister was last seen at his house 3 years again and Michelle just wants her body back. The scene she is causing has the entire neighborhood looking at her and we can gather this isn’t the first time this has happened. Dustin says she isn’t supposed to be there and we gather he has a restraining order against her.
Michelle meets a neighbor boy struggling to breathe as she backs away from the house. She asks if he has an inhaler and he shakes his head no. His dad arrives on the scene regretfully informing Michelle they don’t have the money to take him to the doctor. She shares her contact information with him as a police officer, Carlos Reyes (Rafael Silva), shows up. He is there to arrest Michelle as she has broken the restraining order. Without a fight, she is willingly handcuffed and led to the back of his police car.
Michelle and the officer Carlos chat in the police vehicle as he drives her away from the scene. He warns her she needs to stop going to Dustin‘s house. Michelle asks if he could just drop her off at work as her shift is about to begin.
First Call
Our first case comes after a guy decides to get even with his friend for putting hair remover in his shampoo bottle. He picks a California Reaper, the hottest pepper on the planet, and puts it inside his friend’s taco. His friend, however, was suspicious and swapped plates when he wasn’t looking. The guy took one bite of his taco and things went south fast. He wasn’t able to breathe and 9-1-1 was called. Ladder 126 was the first on scene followed shortly by EMS.
As Captain Stand is giving orders Michelle walks up to the scene stating the scene belongs to her crew since she is the paramedic captain. She informs Captain Strand in Texas the chief paramedic is the commander of the scene in medical emergencies, not the firefighter captain. Owen relinquishes control to Michelle, slightly perplexed by this very different hierarchy than New York. Michelle assesses the man has a ruptured esophagus and his chest cavity is filling with fluid. After inserting a chest tube and draining the fluid, the man regains consciousness and starts breathing again.
Don’t Give Up
Our first real glimpse of Grace Ryder (Sierra McClain) is when she arrives home to find her husband, Judd Ryder, sitting on the couch watching TV. She asks him how the talk with Captain Strand went. When he informs her, he isn’t allowed to return to the 126, she pushes him on what he’s going to do next. You can tell she is the strength and wisdom behind their marriage right now. After pushing him to not give up, you can see Judd contemplating his next move.
A Little Fluff
With so much intensity so far, it was nice to get a little fluff. Apparently, Captain Strand is a minor expert in all these facial and hair care. We see a fun moment when he shares his facial care routine with Paul. Paul is taken aback by how nonchalant Captain Stand is with the fact Paul is trans, but Captain Strand doesn’t see him as being different than any of the other men.
Ladder 126 is called out on a call involving a vehicle rollover. The driver is unconscious and visibly pregnant. After using the jaws of life to remove the windshield and pull her out, she is strapped on a gurney and Captain Strand hands over the scene to Michelle and the EMS team. Scent salt is used to wake the woman. She immediately panics about her baby and rips off her neck brace. Michelle tries to advise her the baby will be checked out at the hospital. This is where the mom drops the bombshell that she is talking about her 10-month-old.
All Eyes on Them
The search is immediately on for the infant After discovering he wasn’t in the car. Paul, with his intuition, follows the rollover scene to where it started and searches from there. A baby’s cry up in the tree soon opens their eyes to his location. After grabbing the ladder truck, Captain Strand is precariously reaching into the tree to safely pull the child to safety. As the car seat falls several stories to the ground you can see the mom and the rescue crew waiting below in horror. It’s soon revealed Captain Strand has the baby safely in his arms and the crowd erupts in cheers.
Is this scene medically inaccurate?
I personally have a lot of issues with this scene, mainly from the medical aspect. The woman was in a rollover crash and there is no way any paramedic would let her rip of a neck brace. The woman clearly has a head injury and there is a high possibility of unknown damage. They also have her laying on a gurney below the scene of the infant rescue. Once again, this wouldn’t be allowed. She would have been away from the scene, most likely already in an ambulance. Besides the medical flaws, this accident scene and rescue were pretty great.
We end the night with the entire crew at bar decompressing after their shift. T.K. and Carlos hit it off and Owen and Michelle get into a little banter. When Owen leaves the bar, Grace finds him and tells him she was the 9-1-1 dispatcher on the line when the explosion happened. She asks Owen to do what he does best, save people, and save her husband. Owen advises her to have Judd come to the station in the morning.
While Captain Strand and Judd are talking in the morning, Judd notices the dead flowers and picture frames in the trash. He loses it at the thought of Captain Strand throwing his brothers away.
“Well when you threw them out you threw out me. When you threw out every picture, and every card, every memory of those men, those incredible men, you just—you trashed it all.”
A Fresh Start
Captain Strand clarified that he brought the house into the 21st Century. He knows that after a tragedy people need a fresh start. He then adds that he has cancer and Judd was the first person he told. Judd admits he’s afraid if he let’s the monster out he doesn’t think he can get it back in his cage. Judd advises Captain Strand that things will never work out and he walks out of the room. While he is walking out of the ladder house, Judd sees a giant plaque on the wall with photos of every man and woman lost in the explosion, and the dam breaks.
While he is on the floor in the truck bay sobbing, Captain Strand advises him this was the first thing he did after his crew in Manhattan died. It was a way to remember them every time they went out on a call. He tells Judd that his brothers will never be forgotten.
Thoughts
We end the episode with a montage of the crew in the stations and then boarding the trucks to attend a call. We see Judd climbing into the back of the truck as they head to the call. He has found his way back to the 126.
So much happened in the first hour of 9-1-1 Lone Star, it’s hard to unpack it all. I loved how we were introduced to each character and really got a feel for what makes them tick. With such a diverse crew, there is a lot of room for some unique storylines. I can’t wait to discover more of Michelle’s storyline and see how Owen handles his cancer diagnosis and running Ladder 126. This season is going to be full of twists and turns and of course my favorite, crazy medical storylines.
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