Baby fever has hit #OneChicago!
Chicago Med isn’t the only series in the franchise closing out the season with an unexpected pregnancy. During Wednesday’s Chicago Fire finale, Stella and Severide temporarily took in Natalie, who lied to her school about Stella being her guardian. Natalie’s older sister assumed that Stella was going to fight her for custody, but Stella assured her that wasn’t the case. And after helping to reunite the siblings, Stella took Severide to the bedroom to take a look at something: a positive pregnancy test!
“Kelly, we’re pregnant,” she happily announced as he peppered her with kisses.
Elsewhere in the episode, Violet left the letter she wrote to Carver on his windshield, but he didn’t respond exactly as she hoped he would. Instead, Carver surprised Violet with the news that he applied for a job at the Denver Fire Department to get a fresh start.
“I hope you find what you need there,” a heartbroken Violet told him, and that was that… until Carver showed up at Violet’s home to plant a big kiss on her and tell her that he loves her. She, of course, said it back. But does the couple even have a future, given that Jake Lockett (aka Carver) will not be returning as a series regular?
In other major developments, Pascal was cleared of the murder charges — it was Lieutenant Vale and his obsession with Monica that led to the driver’s death — and Herrmann finally admitted that a desk job is not for him. He stepped down to be a regular firefighter so that his buddy Mouch could take over as Engine’s lieutenant.
Below, showrunner Andrea Newman talks #Stellaride’s pregnancy surprise, Pascal’s future at Firehouse 51, and what’s in store for Carver and Violet. The EP also addresses Ritter’s non-exit in the finale following the news that Daniel Kyri won’t be back full-time next season.
Congrats to Stella, who’s pregnant, but that’s not something she wanted before. So how’s she feeling about it now? Have her thoughts about pregnancy changed?
Yeah, I think she has changed, and we kind of looked at the evolution of the season, the evolution of Kidd as a character, as somebody who starts really talking about things, like when her cousin shows up and she’s talking about things she never talked about before and kind of getting it all out in the open with Severide. They really got close in this season in a way that they hadn’t before, and it came to a head with the hospital storyline with the baby, because they butted heads a bit during that story and they were kind of on other sides, and then they ended up talking that out and coming together. I feel like, at the end of that episode, they were stronger than ever, and how they left that episode, even though it was a beatdown, emotionally, was much stronger as a couple. Between that and trying to take care of Natalie and feeling like she was getting Natalie on the right track, it boosted [Kidd] up to a place where she maybe started thinking, “Maybe I can do all these things that I thought I couldn’t do,” and [pregnancy is] one of them. She’s kind of leaving it to fate a little bit. “If a baby comes from adoption first or if I get pregnant, let’s see. Maybe there’s a reason for all of this, and I believe that I can handle this now, and Severide can, too.” So that’s where she was at. How she reacts, really, on the other side, that’s something else all together that we get to see later.
Why did you decide to go this particular route for Stella and Severide after setting up that they were going to adopt? Was there any concern about maybe it being too similar to Brett’s or Dawson’s storyline in the past?
It wasn’t so much that, because it’s amazing, if you Google “firefighter adoption,” how many firefighters have adopted kids, babies, children they’ve helped in the line of duty, which is amazing to me and always such beautiful stories. So we didn’t worry so much about the repetition of that. It was more about the journey of Kidd’s character, to getting to a place where she decided that both of those things, she was open to, all of a sudden. If that baby had worked out at the hospital, they would have taken it home and been the most loving, wonderful parents to it, and like happens sometimes and happened to one of our writers, they adopted and then surprisingly got pregnant. That’s what happened, by the way, with Cruz. He had a baby and then along came Javi. So sometimes, life just gets messy in that way, and we love living in that space, too. So that could happen with Severide and Kidd. You never know.
We haven’t seen what it is to be a pregnant firefighter on the show before, so that’s an interesting avenue.
Exactly, right.
Does that open up some exciting storylines for you next season?
I think so. The difference between when a male firefighter gets pregnant and when the female firefighter is pregnant, I think, is really interesting to explore and how each are affected, and also being parents at the end of the day and the stakes. When they’re a couple, there’s stakes, for sure, but when they’ve got a baby, the stakes go through the roof. So those are all the things that we can play with going down the line. Exciting.
I think a moment that a lot of fans have been waiting for happened between Carver and Violet in this episode. He kissed her, he told her he loves her, she said it back. But he also told her he’s possibly going to take a job in Denver. So where does that leave the two of them?
Yeah, it’s an almost impossible situation because he sees the only road to getting better and staying sober as getting away from all the things that trigger him and sent him off spiraling. So he has a big decision to make, and if he makes one to stay, does that put this onus suddenly on Violet, like he stayed for her, and if he can’t stay well and stay clean when he’s there, is it her fault? So it’s this beautiful coming together, but it brings up all these questions and impossibilities. So we’ll see how that shakes out, too.
Does that mean that Jake Lockett will be back for at least a little bit next season to wrap up his storyline?
We don’t have anything solidly planned for him. It’s a great thing that we have people come and go on this show. They’ll leave and then we’ll get to see them again. Thirteen seasons [later], we’re bringing back Cruz’s Flaco cousins from Season 1! [Laughs] It’s like you never know what will happen. Anything could happen with those two. We love Jake, we love the character of Carver.
There seems to be sort of an open-door quality to that relationship at this moment. Could it be another Brett and Casey situation, where they’re pursuing a romance off-screen, long distance?
Those are really hard to do. There’s always the possibility they’ll try that, but I don’t know if that helps him, if what he’s really trying to do is get away from the space where he fell apart and started to spiral, if getting in a relationship with somebody who was all part of that is in the cards. I’m not sure.
Similarly, there wasn’t really a goodbye or closure with Ritter’s character. What is that plan for him?
We’re still working on all of that because we’re not even back for next season, and all this, a lot of it was surprises. We’re going to play with all this and see what we get and how much time we get with Daniel [Kyri], who we love, and the character, who we love. There’s lots of possibilities there.
With Mouch stepping up and Herrmann stepping down, and Pascal cleared of the charges, does that make Pascal more permanently a part of 51? Is he definitely sticking around now?
He will stay as battalion chief until the CFD axe starts lurking above his head. Who knows if that will happen. But yeah, he’s a battalion chief, [which] means he’s in charge of a couple of houses in the district. But I think his bonds with 51 have only become stronger over the course of this season.
