Chicago Fire - Take A Knee - Review

“We lost our child, Mr. Casey. We had her in our arms and something snatched her away.”

On their way to the house, Casey and Gabby spot a potential new crack house. Knowing Casey, he’s not about to let that go. He stops by again later and finds a toddler in a car by himself. The baby’s mom—well-dressed, lucid, wealthy-looking—quickly appears, chastises Casey, and jumps in her car to speed away. Of course, that launches an investigation for Casey.

With the help of Stella’s picture-taking and Chicago PD’s Detective Olinsky, Casey tracks down the mysterious woman. She and her husband aren’t drug users, but their daughter Chelsea is. Her parents, taking advice from psychiatrists, cut Chelsea off. They regret their decision, and have been desperately trying to get her back. The man who runs the crack house isn’t about to let Chelsea out, so Casey works a bit of his magic to make a rescue possible.

Thanks to Olinsky, Casey learns that narcotics is planning a raid on the house. So Casey and the rest of Truck orchestrate a reason to be at the house and force their way in, claiming a fire. Chelsea’s parents enter the house once the crack house owner is neutralized and convince their daughter to leave with them. All’s well that ends well.

“I think we’re wrong for each other, Kelly. And I think we’ve been idiots not to see it.”

Things seem to be going well for Severide and Anna—they’re planning a getaway! She’s meeting Benny! Oh, yikes. On second thought, perhaps things aren’t going so well. Benny doesn’t exactly inspire hope and success in a relationship with Severide, as he’s pretty much the worst. It’s been a while since we’ve seen Benny and I can honestly say I didn’t miss him a bit. The house treats Benny as an old friend, which makes no sense—I feel like his every appearance causes drama in the house. Why are they so happy to see him?

Anyway, Anna is all about learning everything there is to know about Severide. She’s excited to meet Benny, so Severide clearly hasn’t talked much about him. She’s late to dinner thanks to work, but something’s immediately off. She’s distant, terse, and ends up running out on the dinner and breaking things off with Severide in the process. To quote the hilarious Andrew Wells, “What the bananas?!” Seriously, what on earth just happened? Anna might speed off into the night, but there’s no way we don’t get some sort of resolution to this, right? If we went through all this drama to get these two “soul mates” together only to break them up a few weeks later, I will be furious (yes, even my Severide/Sylvie shipping heart).

“What part of observe only did you not understand?”

For whatever reason, Gabby and Sylvie are entrusted with a trainee for a shift. Sure, there’s no one I’d rather learn from, but that’s not a view Chief Hatcher has ever shared. The trainee, Harris, seems to be a young, impressionable type—poor guy. He has no idea what he’s in for with these two!

Thing start of strong—the first call goes well and the girls let Harris in on the first rule, junk food after a call. They bond over lady fingers and Harris shares how his parents think he’ll fail as a paramedic. There’s not too much time for family discussions—the team is called to a restaurant where Harris discovers several people have cyanide poisoning. We all knew the “here only to observe” rule would be broken as soon as it was mentioned, right? Duh. With multiple victims down, Harris can’t help himself—he begins chest compressions on a victim and cracks a rib in the process.

It’s hard to be mad at Harris—he was just trying to save a life! Dawson and Sylvie aren’t too mad, as they both admit they would have done the same thing. So when Chief Hatcher arrives, frustrated (does he ever arrive at 51 not frustrated?), the girls cover for Harris. Chief Hatcher is no dummy, though—covering for Harris costs them a bit. The girls are mandated to report to training class. The incredulity on their faces was priceless!

“You are a Herrmann before you are an American which means I tell you what your rights are! Herrmanns do not defile the sacred things which I hold most dear in my heart like love of country, love of freedom, and love of all the things in history books which tell us this is the greatest country on earth!”

It’s always a treat to see Cindy, even when she comes in very upset. Herrmann’s son, Lee Henry, is suspended for not saying the Pledge of Allegiance, and Herrmann is livid. Oh Lee Henry, you are in for quite the tongue-lashing. And it is quite the lashing—it’s funny, but everything he said is also a hot-button issue in this country right now. Lee-Henry was upset over vending machine prices, which makes his taking a knee and refusal to say the Pledge a bit ridiculous. I won’t get into the politics of it all, because that’s not what we are here for. I will say that I was in complete agreement with Herrmann throughout the whole story—his reaming of Lee Henry initially and then his support when the vice principal insisted Lee Henry’s actions were a result of poor leadership at home.

The highlight of the hour was the trip to the Marine veteran’s breakfast. Whatever your opinions on the Pledge, National Anthem, are, you can’t deny the incredible sacrifice so many men and women have made to give us the freedoms we have. The men and women there clearly made an impression on Lee Henry, who removes his hat and gets a bit emotional as they all say the Pledge together. My sincerest gratitude to the men and women of our military—you are all heroes.


What did you think of the episode? What will the fallout be from Anna’s departure? Share your thoughts below!