‘S.W.A.T.’ Hasn’t Forgotten About Chris & Street’s Kiss
[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Season 3, Episode 17 of S.W.A.T., “Hotel L.A.”]
Remember when Chris (Lina Esco) and Street (Alex Russell) kissed? It’s been almost a year, but S.W.A.T. revisited that moment in Wednesday’s episode.
And fans were alerted that something was coming up related to it when the “Previously On” showed that and their subsequent conversation. In Season 2, Episode 20, as Chris struggled with Kira and Ty’s request to move in with them — she said yes immediately following the kiss — she and Street kissed. When she pulled away, she blamed it on the alcohol and took the blame.
“You and me, we’re teammates,” she told him later. “I’m always going to have your back on the job, but that’s where it ends from now on.”
And in “Hotel L.A.,” she reiterated that it was “a mini-drunken moment” and “a bad idea” when Street expressed surprise about her encouraging his new girlfriend, Molly. “So fixing me up was, what, you making amends?” he asked. She said she just wanted them to be happy. As for her, she was happy to be home with her aunt and uncle, but she didn’t think it was a good idea for him to ask about her love life.
After SWAT managed to salvage a joint task force with the LAPD Gang Division, Street checked in with Chris and wanted to finish their earlier conversation. “You always want to over-talk everything,” she complained. “And you don’t talk enough,” he replied, which was why it was “a perfect fit.”
So how was she really doing? “Finally getting settled in my own skin again, figuring out what’s next,” Chris told him. He said he missed her and their conversations since they “drifted apart lately.” He also admitted that he didn’t tell Molly about their kiss, but she didn’t see anything wrong with that. “That was before her,” Chris said. “That’s between us, so there’s no point.”
But that’s pretty much confirmation that it’ll come up again at some point, whether between Chris and Street or Street and Molly. Chris likes the “quiet waters” as of late, and Street is ostensibly happy with Molly.
Plus, Russell said he suspects it’ll come up again. “If I was a betting man, I think that that was left unresolved for a reason,” he told TVLine in January. “Whether it ends up being a romantic thing in the long run or not, you can’t deny the special connection that Street and Chris have, and I think that I would be surprised if something didn’t come up in a romantic sense at some point.”
The conversations in this episode didn’t feel like resolution, so the only question may be whether or not the kiss is mentioned this season. Production was shut down before the season finale due to the coronavirus pandemic, and it’s always possible that “Hotel L.A.” was foreshadowing it being revisited then.
S.W.A.T., Wednesdays, 9/8c, CBS