9 Burning Questions for One Chicago in 2023
As 2022 ends, quite a bit has been left up in the air in the world of One Chicago, though only one of the shows has lives hanging in the balance.
Chicago Med bid adieu to one of its original stars, though fortunately, the door has been left open for Dr. Ethan Choi (Brian Tee) to return, and shook things up at the hospital in the final moments of the fall finale. Over on Fire, we can’t help but wonder if 51 is about to lose another one of its own following an explosive cliffhanger and the return of a nemesis. And on P.D., Intelligence finally got the sex trafficker they’d been after, only for a twist when they went to arrest him.
Scroll down as we take a look at the questions we need answered when the three One Chicago shows return in 2023.
One Chicago, Winter Premieres, Wednesday, January 4, 8/7c, NBC
Chicago Med: Is Jack being in charge a good or bad thing?
After the doctors saw Ethan and April (Yaya DaCosta) off at the church following their wedding, Peter (Marc Grapey) revealed that entrepreneur Jack (Sasha Roiz) bought a controlling interest in Gaffney Medical Group, putting him in charge. And sure, he has done some good for the hospital already (including the very impressive, advanced tech-filled OR 2.0), but he’s all about the splash rather than caring for patients because he’s not a doctor.
“Jack brings good, and he brings not-so-good,” co-showrunner Diane Frolov told TV Insider. “He will solve the supply shortage issue. But he’ll also raise other challenges.” Expect to see him clash more with Dr. Crockett Marcel (Dominic Rains) as well as problems with Sharon Goodwin (S. Epatha Merkerson), with co-showrunner Andrew Schneider adding, “She’ll be caught between her own needs and his and between the doctors and him, where there’ll also be some conflict.”
But will the benefits of what Jack brings ultimately outweigh the costs, even if he might not be the right person to be in charge?
Chicago Med: How worried should we be about Dean’s health?
Med has said goodbye to a fair number of doctors in recent years, and might Dr. Dean Archer (Steven Weber) be the next — and not of his own volition? Following a recent incident in the ED, Dr. Hannah Asher (Jessy Schram) has been the one keeping an eye on him, and after asking if he’s seen a nephrologist in the fall finale, the only one to know that he has a kidney disorder, interstitial nephritis. Dialysis is a possibility. He’s asked her to keep it to herself.
“His health will continue to be an issue, but he’s dealing with it,” Frolov said, teasing it will affect his relationships on Hannah and his son. “That will be a continuing storyline, his trying to resurrect his relationship with his son in the midst of having these health issues,” added Schneider.
But when will the rest of the staff find out? And how will not only his health but the fact he’s asked her to keep it secret affect Dean and Hannah’s relationship?
Chicago Med: Will Ethan and/or April return this season?
Ethan left the ED to open up a mobile clinic with April to bring healthcare to underserved communities. “We decided that they were not gonna leave Chicago. Which also gives us, of course, the possibility of bringing them back with patients,” explained Schneider. Does that mean we’ll see either of them again in Season 8? “There’s a real possibility of that, and we would like to do that,” Frolov said, but it is a matter of scheduling.
Chicago Fire: Will everyone survive the explosion?
Lieutenant Kelly Severide (Taylor Kinney) could only watch as his wife, Lieutenant Stella Kidd (Miranda Rae Mayo) and Carver (Jake Lockett) entered a house to help S.W.A.T. with a potentially deadly situation: Detective Pryma (Troy Winbush) had a grenade in his leg, and the wrong move could arm it. Well, that wrong move came after it was removed, and the grenade went off as Kidd, Carver, and Pryma took as much cover as they could. We couldn’t help but notice Kidd was the closest to the explosion.
The winter premiere is picking up “one second later and back outside with Severide as he sees what happened with this explosion,” co-showrunner Derek Haas told TV Insider. “Firefighters don’t run away when bad things happen. They run towards it. And this is Severide — even though there could be other live explosives still inside the building, he just runs straight into the fog of war and that’s where we pick up and it’s gonna be harrowing.”
While we don’t see Fire killing off Kidd, seeing how this affects her and Severide — could it become a question of the spouses working in the same firehouse if anyone deems his actions as reckless? — and if Carver, who is just starting to fit in 51, survives should be interesting.
Chicago Fire: How big of a problem will Emma be for 51, especially Violet?
In Season 10, while paramedic Sylvie Brett (Kara Killmer) was off visiting long-distance boyfriend (at the time) Matt Casey (Jesse Spencer), Emma (Caitlin Carver) filled in and made it clear she wanted Violet’s (Hanako Greensmith) permanent spot at 51. She was her own downfall, however, but to everyone’s surprise, when Carver faced questions from IAD about his actions during a call, Emma showed up. She cleared him, but in a subsequent conversation with Violet said it might come in handy to have a friend in IAD. That can only mean trouble.
“This is not ending anytime soon. She’s in a position now where she can do some damage to anybody who decides to run against her, and she’s going to wield that power,” Haas warned. Added co-showrunner Andrea Newman, “at the end of the day, what’s fun about Emma is all she really wants is to be a part of 51. So her goals are mixed, and she considers herself in some ways part of the family and then she finds herself at odds with it time and time again.”
Violet “can’t help” but “poke the bear,” the showrunners said, with Newman teasing, “There’s surprising repercussions to that. Who it ends up falling on the hardest is a surprise.” Uh-oh.
Chicago Fire: Is Brett going to truly move on with Dylan?
It wasn’t until after Chief Evan Hawkins’ (Jimmy Nicholas) death that Brett met the friend he’d wanted to introduce her to: Dylan (Christopher Allen). They did get coffee, and she agreed to go with him to a concert in the fall finale, though she insisted to Violet that was still keeping things in the “slow lane.” But will things work out with him? Or might he just be the one to help her realize she is ready to see other people after breaking up with Casey?
“Brett is gonna have a lot of fun dating going forward,” Newman previewed. “She’s gonna have some magical times dating, but there’s always the looming question of, was Casey the love of her life? And will that make it impossible to find that level of love again?”
While just as Brett is dating might seem like the perfect time for Casey to show up in her life again to make her question if she’s truly ready for that, there don’t seem to be any plans for that at the moment. Still, “we’ll have him back anytime,” Newman said.
Chicago P.D.: How worried should everyone be about Upton?
Ever since her husband and partner Jay Halstead (Jesse Lee Soffer) left, Detective Hailey Upton (Tracy Spiridakos) has thrown herself into her work, specifically building a case against sex trafficker Sean O’Neal (Jefferson White). But with that at least on the backburner for a bit (see next question), what will that mean for her now that she won’t have something immediate to keep her from facing the fact that Jay did leave?
“Once the distraction is gone, you have to go back home, and what is that gonna do to her? We’ll see the fallout of that and see the reality that she’s pushed away everything, and she’s had this great distraction and this thing she could just throw herself into,” showrunner Gwen Sigan told TV Insider.
“But now it’s gone, and the reality of her situation has not changed. Her husband, her partner, is gone. She does not know if he’s coming back, and she’s still married to him, and she’s living in the house that they got together,” she continued. “She’s gonna have to look at it now; she’s going to have to deal with it and find out what it means for her that he’s not here.”
What we do know: The rest of Intelligence is going to need to keep an eye on her, especially as we hear more about what’s going on with Jay — and with him not returning onscreen, that can’t be good for Upstead’s relationship.
Chicago P.D.: How will Sean come back?
When Upton and Sergeant Hank Voight (Jason Beghe) went to arrest Sean, they heard gunshots from inside his father Chief O’Neal’s (Michael Gaston) house. Once inside, they found the chief dead but Sean alive and, after a moment of hesitation on Upton’s part, ultimately saved his life.
“We loved the idea that at the end of the day, we would save the monster,” Sigan explained. “Now, this man is still alive, and he’s exactly who he was before this happened. He says to them, ‘You can’t fix me. I won’t change.’ And he won’t. And so we are going to see him come back. Sean O’Neal will be back this season. It’s not over yet.”
White will return in Episode 12 “for another episode with Tracy,” she added. But what will bring him back? And how will that affect Upton? After all, this is the case she threw herself into in order to avoid what’s going on in her personal life and he saw that she hasn’t been doing well.
Chicago P.D.: Will Burzek ever be anything but "complicated"?
It doesn’t seem like it, especially with Officers Kim Burgess (Marina Squerciati) and Adam Ruzek (Patrick John Flueger) co-parenting and living together. That being said, “they’re in a great place,” according to Sigan. “They have this unique thing that is so messy and weird but also just kind of works for them.”
That being said, it does sound like the two might take another step forward sooner rather than later. “There’s certainly a lot of fallout after Episode 8. That story continues for Burgess of what she’s been struggling with mentally, some things coming back up, some unprocessed trauma coming back up,” the showrunner revealed. “We will see Ruzek be there for her in a very real way and how that strengthens her relationship, and I think will give her some revelations of things that she might have been pushing away for certain reasons. We’ll kind of delve into the psychology behind that, and it might make her see Ruzek a bit differently than she’s been seeing him the past couple of seasons.”
So might Burzek getting back together officially not be completely off the table for the more immediate (say this season or next) future?
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