We open on a hospital bed as Captain Race Banner slowly regains consciousness. “You were hit by a bowling ball going 40 miles per hour,” the doctor explains — but that’s not Race’s biggest concern. Yes, he’s assured, all the orphans at the bowling alley were saved.
Wait, sorry, scratch that, I’m describing an episode of Hotshots and not the midseason finale of 9-1-1, a very Brad Torrance–centric installment that does culminate in the filming of his show. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. “Wannabes” starts with a different Hotshots scene, in which Brad’s Captain Banner helps a woman trapped in a burning car. “You don’t need to burn, too,” she tells him. He assures her, “Hotshots don’t get burned; we just get a little toasted.” Honestly, this is the kind of entertainment I’m looking for, not the very mid episode of 9-1-1 we get instead. I’m not sure if it’s just my distaste for the character of Brad after last week, but I feel like the show could have gone out on a higher note before a four-month hiatus.
Brad is screening the latest episode of Hotshots for his captive audience at the firehouse, and he’s not thrilled with their lukewarm responses — especially after he prods them to start pulling apart the inaccuracies. Bobby notes that the show is not meant to be a documentary (preempting my complaints about aspects of this 9-1-1 episode being unrealistic), and Buck points out that “real life is boring.” I don’t think you can say that when your real life is a soap opera with weekly life-or-death stakes, but I take his point. Brad is not satisfied: He doesn’t want to be on a fake show; he wants to be a real firefighter.
The first call of the episode doesn’t require firefighters, though. There’s a riot at Fields Market, inadvertently instigated by — you guessed it — a YouTuber. Graham, a.k.a. the Cart Cop, spends his free time filming people who don’t return their shopping carts to the proper cart corral at the grocery store. He tries to leave one of his shame-y magnetic bumper stickers (“I GOT CART NARCED”) on a woman’s car, which leads to a rapidly escalating incident: a fender bender, a jammed-up parking lot, ample yelling. Athena arrives, manages to defuse the situation, and finally gets the woman to return her cart. She does, however, call Graham a busybody, warning, “Stop all this Cart Cop nonsense before you busy the wrong body.” Foreshadowing!
The next emergency is far more disgusting, as a sewer line explodes and causes multiple car accidents while raining down 5,000 gallons of wastewater on everyone below. When the 118 arrives, only Brad is excited (“Thar she blows!”), but the rest of the team pushes through the stench and gets to work. Eddie is tasked with rescuing a young couple from a flooding SUV, and I did gag when they kissed because those two are neck-deep in poo water. “I know it smells crazy in there” does not begin to cover it. Brad is supposed to stand by and take notes, but of course he decides to rescue a woman instead, carrying her out of her car in his arms like he’s the real Captain Race Banner. Bobby is appropriately horrified — Brad did not check her vitals or check for a head injury — and it’s here where I wonder why Brad is allowed on calls at all. He is an actor with zero training!
Back at the firehouse, it’s time for showers and decontamination. (Buck describes the smell as like “sour milk and old fish guts had a baby.” Evocative!) Brad is riding high from his rescue — and from the applause he got from the bystanders who recognized him — but Bobby is ready to set him straight. The captain once again drags Brad to hell, letting him know how reckless and dangerous his behavior was. “You’re not a real firefighter, and no matter what notes you put down in that journal of yours, nothing is gonna change that,” Bobby snaps. As Bart Simpson once said, you can actually pinpoint the second when his heart rips in half.
A dejected Brad channels his feelings into doing a really good job at polishing the fire truck per Bobby’s orders. Eddie comes over to get an autograph for Christopher (timing, bro) and quickly realizes that Brad is in a bad place. He’s 47 without anything real in his life, he says — except, I guess, for the seemingly very successful TV show that he stars on. Look, I fully understand that people can be rich and famous but still miserable (stream “Lucky” by Britney Spears). I just resent the way Brad is suddenly being treated like a main character. He and Eddie have a heartfelt conversation, with Eddie sharing his distance from Christopher, revealing that he left his kid behind to do a CW pilot (dark!). Brad urges Eddie to not let that distance from Christopher grow any larger.
The episode’s next 9-1-1 call brings us back to Fields Market: “I think Cart Cop’s dead!” He isn’t, but he’s badly beaten and pretty close to death when he’s found. Chimney and Hen are able to get his heart started again, while Athena begins her investigation. The only clue is the boot print on Graham’s head and a whole lot of motives. At the hospital, Graham doesn’t remember anything about the attack — pretty normal when you’ve gotten your head stomped — but he does give Athena and Detective Romero a link to his YouTube channel. No surprise here: The Cart Cop has multiple enemies, all of whom Athena and Romero bring in for interviews. They each have different reasons to hate Graham and different boot sizes, but before Athena can Cinderella’s prince her way into an arrest, the whole thing becomes a debate on whether or not you need to return your shopping cart. (Of course you do; were you raised in a barn?)
Elsewhere, the 118 is dealing with a potential jumper on a freeway overpass. Buck and Eddie do their best to talk Craig down, but he seems more interested in Brad — and that gives Bobby an idea. “Wanna be a hero?” he tells the actor. “Now’s your chance.” Brad is finally ready to step up and save the day, and Craig is genuinely starstruck. When Craig’s wife left, he binged three seasons of Hotshots. He calls Brad his “comfort captain,” and for those of us who have turned to 9-1-1 to get us through breakups, layoffs, and global pandemics, the moment does resonate.
But Brad is feeling too down on himself to acknowledge what Hotshots means to people. Besides, he tells Craig, his character isn’t waking up from the coma they wrote him into. “You can’t kill off Captain Banner,” Craig pleads. “He’s what keeps the 119 fire family together!” It’s very me when it looked like they were going to kill off Bobby at the end of last season. Brad realizes what he has to do to keep Craig from jumping — he promises that if Craig gets down, Race Banner will wake up from his coma. It’s a victory on two fronts: Craig is safe, and Brad will be returning to Hotshots and leaving the 118 behind. No disrespect to Callum Blue, who I like a lot as an actor, but … it’s time.
It’s also case closed for the assault of the Cart Cop, who was head-stomped by Ira, the kindly older man responsible for returning the carts. Graham was stealing his job, he tells Athena, so “I had to put my foot down” (on his head). Also, “Ira” turns out to be an alias for a two-time convicted criminal with a history of violent assault. Looks can be deceiving! Athena tells Graham that it’s time for him to go pro, and he asks if that means she thinks he’s ready to be a cop. Angela Bassett’s delivery of “Baby, I say this with all the love in the world … no” is an all-timer. What she really means is that he should take Ira’s old job, which, sure, that’s a happy enough ending.
Things are a little more unsettled for the 118, especially when Buck discovers that Eddie is looking at houses in El Paso so he can be with Christopher again. I’m choosing not to let myself get worked up about this, as 9-1-1 has repeatedly made it seem like Ryan Guzman is leaving the show. To paraphrase Craig, you can’t write off Eddie Diaz — he’s what keeps the 118 fire family together! Speaking of Hotshots, “Wannabes” ends with the filming of Race Banner waking up from his coma, and Chimney, Buck, and Eddie have all gotten roles on the show. Try not to think too much about the logistics of these very busy people suddenly breaking into acting. Even though Hen gives some notes on the medical accuracy of the scene, Hotshots is a show built on suspension of disbelief, and so, ultimately, is 9-1-1.
Call Log
• I’m worried I came down too hard on Brad in these recaps, but very little about the character has made sense from the jump, and it’s frankly bizarre how much screen time he’s taken up this season. I don’t like that I’ve seen far more of him than of Karen, for example!
• The moment when Brad and Craig jointly recite a big speech from the season-two finale of Hotshots did work for me, though. It’s nice to see 9-1-1 have some self-awareness about its status as a true comfort watch, despite all the blood and explosions.
• I once again have to give kudos to Angela Bassett for nailing some cringey dialogue. When Graham says, “It’s not really about the carts,” Athena answers, “It’s about what the carts bring out in us.” And you know what? I believe her.
• I’m not doing a Buddy watch, but if I were doing a Buddy watch, I’d point to the scene where Buck comes over and thinks he’s interrupted Eddie looking at porn. (He’s really looking at houses in El Paso, which is less erotic.)
• This mid-season finale feels so sudden — I thought we’d at least get a Christmas episode next month — and the hiatus is a long one. See you all back here in March!
