9-1-1: Season 4/ Episode 1 “The New Abnormal” – Recap/ Review (with Spoilers)

9-1-1, as tradition, returns with a dramatic natural event, which this time is a dam breaking, thanks to earthquakes and a landslide!

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Director(s)	David Grossman
Writer(s)	Juan Carlos Coto
Aired (Fox)	1/18/2021

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Recap

It’s Worrisome, But We Have Jobs To Do – May, Athena, Bobby, Maddie, Chim, Albert

With it being September 2020 on the show, the height of the COVID-19 pandemic is over, but that doesn’t mean people aren’t still overtly cautious. For example, Chim, due to his line of work, has Albert helping Maddie to keep her from getting infected. Also, rather than be at college, doing online classes, May has joined Maddie at the call center to Athena’s ire.

Yet, for Bobby, May working with Maddie is fine. What he is worried about is Athena back out there, even if her focus is going to be a desk job and doing paperwork. For even if it has been 6 months she has been away, and her body is healed, the question is, is she healed in ways the eye can’t see?

A Direct Line To Your Office – Bobby, Chim, Buck, Eddie

Thanks to a series of minor but still powerful earthquakes, a dam’s infrastructure gets compromised, which causes massive flooding and later landslide. One of the rescues include saving people from a bus that went from an over the street highway into a nearby office building. In said rescue, Bobby ends up challenged by someone of the office being under the bus while handling someone with Asperger’s inside who refuses to leave the bus.

Luckily, between Chim, Buck, and Eddie, they rock the bus and get the young man from the underside. However, in rocking the bus, a crack is made, and we see an explosion! One that pushes you to wonder if they just killed off Bobby due to how notable the flames are. But, ultimately, he is fine, the kid with Asperger’s is okay, and it’s another successful rescue.

I Should Have Stayed At Home – Athena

There are rather diverse sets of rescues as a woman is saved from a pipe, alongside what we see above. But for Athena, when forced back on patrol due to needing her no-nonsense way of handling things, her rescue deals with just getting someone out of a house. Mind you, not an old woman, someone disabled, or someone trapped by a physical object. Instead, she is tasked with dealing with someone who has had a fear of going outside for 7 years.

And just as Athena breaks through, that woman’s house descends down a hill thanks to all the area’s techtonic plate activity.

Review

On The Fence

How They Play With Us, Yet Everything Always Ends Up Alright

What you can never say about 9-1-1 is that it doesn’t either try to up the ante or explore different ways to keep you excited about what they may do next. But, I’m going to need them to stop teasing characters dying. Mainly because it has gone from presenting shocking moments to just seeming cruel. Be it, Chim, with the rebar, when Bobby was suicidal, Chim getting stabbed by Maddie’s ex, and so many other situations that I know exist but can’t immediately recall.

For with us four seasons in, it feels like we’re at the point that someone dying on the job would be appropriate to remind us that people don’t always get lucky. And being that we’ve seen so many miraculous recoveries, I don’t think any of us would see it coming, and it wouldn’t click until we’re looking at their casket, and the scene is a funeral.

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