Chicago Fire Season 13, Episode 11 Review: The Crossover Begins With the Usual Bang

Chicago Fire Season 13, Episode 11, “In the Trenches, Part 1” is the start of the first One Chicago crossover in years. As such, there are sky-high expectations for it. Audiences always want the crossover events to be huge, but particularly after all of that anticipation, this one has to be massive. And it’s up to the original One Chicago series to set the table for that.

“In the Trenches, Part 1” thus feels like the first part of a three-act play, in both great and bad ways. It successfully raises the stakes higher than usual, and wastes no time incorporating characters from Chicago Med and Chicago P.D. Viewers are thrown headfirst into the action. But there is still a need for exposition and setup in order to keep the story going for two more hours, which the script is never quite able to outrun.

Chicago Fire Season 13, Episode 11 Launches the Crossover

The Episode Is as Big as It Needs To Be

Every One Chicago crossover requires a catastrophic event; otherwise, there’s no reason to bring the whole cast together and spend three hours of TV on a story. If anything, the Wolf Entertainment team should be commended for coming up with this many ideas, because there are only so many events that qualify as big enough for a crossover — and they’ve done most of them. Crossovers have included biological threats, serial criminals, and of course, massive fires. This one revolves around a gas explosion, which happens because thieves have tried to cover up stealing a bitcoin-filled hard drive from a government building. That story is a little less straightforward than some of the other crossovers, which is both good and bad.

On one hand, it does make the story feel more fresh than just one Big Bad terrorizing the city of Chicago. On the other hand, it makes the plot a little more difficult to follow, especially once the writers introduce the side effect of a subway train getting stuck underground. Audiences have to listen to varying degrees of explaining about bitcoin, natural gas and subway access, on top of the usual information dump that comes with the firefighters and paramedics dealing with large quantities of people. Most of these characters, of course, are rushed through quickly because the crossover has to go from seeming huge to focusing down on the handful of people who actually affect the plot.

There’s only one name guest star in the whole thing, and that’s Nate Corddry, who portrays Mr. Milken, the executive director of the City Employee Benefits Department. Audiences will recognize Corddry from portraying terrified father Matthew Dodson in the first season of HBO’s Perry Mason or Larry Wilson in For All Mankind. The real reason it’s great to see him as the hapless Milken, though, is because his breakout role was in Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, opposite Chicago Med star Steven Weber. Unfortunately, Corddry and Weber don’t get to have any kind of big scene together — which is one of a few missed opportunities.

Chicago Fire Finds Some Fun Pairings – And Misses Others

Notable Characters Are Missing From the Opening Act

The whole point of doing these crossover events is so that fans of the One Chicago franchise can see characters working together for more than a few moments at a time. “In the Trenches, Part 1” doesn’t keep viewers waiting long before people from Chicago PD and Chicago Med start turning up. It’s not totally believable that Dr. John Frost is doing a ride-along with Ambulance 61, but who really cares, because it gives actor Darren Barnet another opportunity to show Frost’s serious side. It’s also lovely to see more than 30 seconds of Amy Morton as Trudy Platt, even if the plot completely shortchanges her.

Amongst the series regulars, Taylor Kinney always answers the bell when one of these crossovers happens, and he does so again here. But it’s Dermot Mulroney as Chief Dom Pascal who gets the bigger scenes, since Pascal pushes the narrative forward by ordering everyone around — even a few people who don’t work for them. This is another example of how Pascal is not and will never be Chief Wallace Boden. He has no soft touch, and Mulroney makes it feel like the whole thing orbits around him every time he appears on screen. Maybe his experience from working on Marvel’s Secret Invasion came in handy. Chicago Fire even acknowledges the promotion of Christopher Herrmann by giving David Eigenberg something different to do.

But because no TV crossover can accommodate three whole casts, “In the Trenches, Part 1” winds up leaving some characters either on the bench or basically out of the way. For viewers who happen to love those characters, this will be frustrating. Folks like Darren Ritter and both of Firehouse 51’s paramedics pop up just to move things along, and then pretty much disappear. And surprisingly, after Joe Cruz was suspended in Season 13, Episode 10, actor Joe Minoso doesn’t appear in the crossover at all. It’s a bold choice for Chicago Fire to actually honor that suspension…. yet since Minoso is one of the show’s original cast members, it’s also very disappointing.

Season 13, Episode 11 Is Hamstrung by Exposition

The Script Can Only Do So Much Because of the Event

As exciting as it is to have another One Chicago crossover, there’s also no denying that this one is predictable in several ways. Chicago Fire includes a few story beats that will be familiar to longtime viewers. Of course there are main characters whose lives are at risk during the event, and it’s particularly not shocking that one of them is Trudy Platt. Platt was already utilized in this way during the two-part crossover between Fire and Chicago PD that included the latter’s 100th episode. Given how little screen time Amy Morton gets on PD to begin with, it’s a shame that she gets handed this storyline again.

Plus, as soon as the episode opens with Stella and Severide talking about getting away, viewers know that Stella is going to wind up in peril, too. It’s akin to the police officer talking about having one day before retirement. Fans can then clearly see the through-line of Severide being worried about Stella, and then the two having a happy reunion at the end of the crossover. (Although, as much as this plot twist is obvious, at least it’s not another one of the umpteen times Chicago Fire has put Severide in a life-threatening situation. That would have been even more predictable.)

And past that, because this is Part 1 of a three-part event, the episode can’t really resolve anything. It actually has to make things worse, so viewers get a few moments of smart people doing not so smart things in order to keep the plot going. And truly savvy fans will be able to guess who the thieves’ person on the inside is by the end of this opening hour. “In the Trenches” isn’t the most clever or terrifying One Chicago crossover, but it does what it promised: give audiences a lot of action featuring characters who don’t normally share the screen together. And that makes it worth the very long wait.