RECAP: ‘9-1-1’ Season 8 Episode 17 — “Don’t Drink The Water”

Bobby continues to haunt the narrative in 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 17, titled “Don’t Drink the Water.” As each character gets their own grieving time, the 118 continue their work in a fantastic episode written by Molly Green and James Leffler, and directed by Jonathan Lawrence.

9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 17 opens on a flashback to better days. The 118 gathers around for a meal with Bobby coming in to explain why family meals are important. It’s a warm scene, in tone and lighting. A hard cut to the present day shows Buck (Oliver Stark) seated all alone at the table, awash in dull colors. After following Bobby’s (Peter Krause) words to take care of the rest of the 118, it’s Buck’s turn in the grieving seat.

But he doesn’t turn to any of the other members of the 118. Instead, he goes to Bobby. And where best to find Bobby? A confessional booth. Buck stumbles through all the steps of giving confession, but Father Brian allows him time alone to speak to Bobby. Stark is great here, letting a lot of Buck’s grief pour out of him in a rambling vent to a deceased person.

Buck explains that he isn’t okay, that he’s failing in trying to be there for everyone, how the 118 is falling apart, and how they don’t even eat together anymore. He asks for a sign from Bobby, and that’s when an earthquake hits. Buck believes it’s a sign, but a sign of what, he doesn’t really say.

While Bobby’s loss still cuts deep, there’s a freshness to the show that appears in the character dynamics. 9-1-1 is known for its dynamic duos, but it often leans too heavily on those dynamics. In the wake of Bobby’s death, characters that usually don’t interact much are coming face-to-face. Eddie (Ryan Guzman) visits with Hen (Aisha Hinds) and Karen (Tracie Thoms), a dynamic never once explored on this show. These characters obviously have history with each other, but on screen, there’s an untapped potential that oozes from the screen. It’s almost uncanny seeing Eddie interact with characters that aren’t Buck, Chris, or Bobby, but that proves just how much of a shake-up this show needed. It’s nice.

9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 17 puts the grief spotlight on Buck.

Hen, Karen, and Eddie discuss Buck’s attentiveness to their grief, although they don’t seem to understand his motivations, shrugging it off as just another Buck-ism. It’s a little frustrating that Buck’s efforts to make sure his team is okay are going unnoticed, and that no one seems to have asked him if he’s alright, instead opting to discuss him behind his back. Buck has matured a lot this season, especially from that earlier arc about Eddie leaving for Texas. And Bobby told him that the 118 was going to need him for a reason.

But Buck isn’t all they discuss. Eddie mentions that the El Paso firehouse has offered him a position. It’s unclear if he’s taking the offer yet, but Hen and Karen mention that Eddie still refers to LA as his home, so another move might be in the future for Eddie.

More fresh character dynamics appear in 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 17 on the Athena (Angela Bassett) and Chimney (Kenneth Choi) side of things. Bobby’s death has connected them in the worst way imaginable. Athena continues working on her and Bobby’s house while officially returning to the job. And in these scenes, she seems alright. But her grief and anger return when Chimney appears at Hen and Karen’s house for a kid drop-off.

Bassett’s change in demeanor once she hears Chimney’s voice is so subtle but so wonderfully done. She can talk about Bobby with Hen when discussing Hen’s potential promotion to captain just fine, but as soon as the walking reminder of who Bobby sacrificed himself for walks into the room, the mask drops away.

This is the only interaction Athena and Chimney have in 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 17, but it’s also a reminder of how little they usually interact. It’s such great tension, and leads to two wonderful scenes later between Chimney and Maddie, and Athena and Karen as they each talk about their anger and guilt about the other. The Chimney and Maddie scene builds off Chimney’s guilt. He tells Maddie he thinks it’s his fault Bobby made the decision he did, since Chimney asked him to look after his family once he was gone. Maddie expresses gratitude to Bobby, but there’s guilt there as well.

Athena and Karen share the best 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 17 scene.

The best scene in 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 17 goes to Athena and Karen, another dynamic not often seen on 9-1-1. While the obvious choice would be for Hen to come find Athena, I love that it’s Karen. Karen can offer a perspective that Hen can’t as a spouse of a 118 member, just like Athena. She also gifts Athena with a 118 group photo from Hen and Karen’s vow renewal. The 118 is a family, she reminds Athena. And that includes Chimney. Athena’s acknowledgement that her anger at Chimney is irrational and unfair is a raw expression of the realities of grief. Karen validates those feelings because, in grief, fairness goes out the window.

It’s unclear how much time has passed in 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 17 since Bobby’s funeral. Eddie is still around, but he has had time to spend with his Aunt Pepa. However, he’s staying with Buck at his old house. This dynamic is an old one, and one that has gotten a bit tired. Despite being concerned about Buck’s grief earlier in 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 17 , Eddie confronts Buck in the kitchen about how he makes everything about himself.

9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 17 isn’t the first time Eddie has accused Buck of this, and while there may be some truth to it—the moving arc from earlier in the season is the most recent evidence—it doesn’t mean it’s true now. And the accusation and subsequent fight undermine Buck’s maturity over the past eight episodes.

This fight is ugly and wholly unfounded. It has a confusing lead-up—Eddie’s concern about Buck at the beginning of 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 17 doesn’t seem to follow him to this kitchen scene. Buck’s annoyed at having to learn about Eddie’s new job from other people. While that sounds a bit like he’s heading toward another spiral about Eddie leaving, it has more to do with Buck being mad that everyone’s tiptoeing around him and deciding when he gets to know things.

And then, for some reason, this jumps to Eddie accusing Buck of spiraling since the funeral (who isn’t?) and how no one knows how to help him. Even though there’s barely any evidence of this spiral, and in fact, Buck just seems to be on a relatively normal path of the stages of grief, Eddie’s quick anger is hard to track in the scene.

9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 17 proves the 118 can work without Bobby.

Despite accusing Buck of making everything about him, Eddie goes on a monologue about his own grief after shoving Buck back and waving a finger in his face. He tells Buck what it was like to receive the phone call about Bobby, and a quick flashback shows Eddie receiving that news and how he then had to deliver the news about Bobby to his son Chris.

The weird escalation in this scene aside, it’s also outsized by the fact that Eddie and Bobby don’t actually have a lot of one-on-one history with each other. Not like Bobby and Buck do. The performances and the directing of this scene really sell it, but it’s hard to ignore how unbalanced it is when it comes to allowing both characters time to grieve Bobby. Buck still hasn’t really opened up to anyone about Bobby, and the one time he does, he’s shut down.

While Eddie’s grief is absolutely valid and necessary to explore, especially as the one character who wasn’t there for Bobby’s death, this didn’t feel like the right execution of that exploration. These guys are supposed to be friends, right? It would be nice to see some actual friendship happening here. It feels like a disservice to both characters and their friendship when the show opts for the easy route.

What’s even worse is that there’s no actual resolution here. Eddie leaves a note the next morning that he’s gone to the airport, which Buck rightfully takes as Eddie heading back to El Paso. But Eddie returns with Chris in tow as some sort of apology to Buck. And while it’s nice to see Chris and Buck reunite since the 9-1-1 Season 7 finale, all it is is a band-aid.

There’s no real acknowledgement of their fight, or why it happened, or any follow-up to Buck’s “spiral.” This is a larger issue with 9-1-1. Sometimes, they drop any of the real conflict and choose the easier path of reconciliation. It’s never narratively satisfying, and in this case, it’s a frustrating and disappointing conclusion. But that’s been pretty par for the course when it comes to how Eddie’s been handled this season.

It’s Aunt Pepa, and not Eddie, who talks to Buck about Bobby. She tells Buck that he needs to embrace change and own it. While it’s a nice and warm scene, it’s definitely a bit random and doesn’t specifically touch on Buck’s grief for Bobby.

Part of that embracing change comes on the work side of things. The 118 is still going out on calls. They run into familiar faces on their rescues, almost like they’re revisiting the past to show they can work without Bobby. And I’ll be honest—I see the vision. Buck, Chimney, Hen, and Ravi (Anirudh Pisharody) work so well together. The question of captaincy is still up in the air, with Hen not sure she wants to take it, but the 118 without Bobby can work, and 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 17 proves that.

9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 17 continues to shake things up in the wake of Bobby’s death in really wonderful ways, but some of the old ways have grown stale.

9-1-1 airs new episodes every Thursday on ABC and Hulu.

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