Top 5 Moments of Goodness from Chicago Fire “Nazdarovya!” 

Last week’s episode ended with Dawson’s (Monica Raymund) brother being shot, leaving us not knowing if he was going to pull through or not.  Tonight’s episode picks up right where we left off, while spinning several other plots like most Chicago Fire episodes do.  There were several to choose from, but here’s our top 5 moments:

5.  Severide Finding His Former Fiancee, Renee

We had always known there was another Renee in Severide’s (Taylor Kinney) life, especially after his girlfriend, Renee Royce (Sarah Shahi), asked, “Who was the Renee that ruined my name for you?”  Last week, we discover that Severide was engaged to a Renee Whaley, but calls off the wedding at the last minute after he finds out that she was cheating on him.  Ever since then, Renee has had no contact with her family, won’t return their calls, and out of desperation, her brother, Eric, reaches out to Severide for help.  Maybe, since Renee once loved Severide, if she heard his voice, she might open up, and they can be a family again.  Maybe out of guilt, maybe out of pity, Severide does succeed in finding Renee, but it’s not pretty.  Renee seems OK, but working as a stripper, she’s not exactly living the life her family had hoped for her.  Severide assures Eric that Renee is OK and that she seems happy, but that backfires when Eric is called to the hospital after Renee overdoses on prescription drugs.  Oops!  Did seeing Severide again cause the overdose, and if so, will Eric blame Severide (even though Eric asked him to contact Renee in the first place)?

4.  Hoarder’s House Collapsing

I had to laugh out loud at this scene, as I suspect most viewers did.  I’ve watch Hoaders: Buried Alive many times, but I have never seen anything like this.  This particular hoarder had collected so many papers, magazines and other junk, that his home began to collapse.  The 1^st floor had collapsed into the basement, and the 2^nd floor had partially collapsed into the 1^st.  Not only was this particular scene hilarious, it put some things into perspective for Herrmann (David Eigenberg) and helps him make a critical decision by the end of the episode.

3.  Ms. Casey’s Confession To Her Son

With Ms. Casey going on dates with her pen pals from prison, things are getting a little rocky with her son.  And, after she returns home late after one of these dates, Casey puts his foot down and demands that she has to be out of the house in 2 weeks, even though his Mom has absolutely no place to go.  In the heat of that argument, she does finally confess to Casey what he’s wanted to know all along – why did she kill his father.  There was no physical abuse, alcoholism, or anything obvious like that.  Instead, she was a victim of severe emotional abuse by her husband, and then, he began transferring that same abuse to her son.  On the night of the murder, Mr. Casey called her and said the “most cruel thing that a father could say to his son”, and with that, she snapped.  The moral of the story is that Ms. Casey more or less killed her husband to save her son in the end.

Wow.  At that point, you can see the guilt on Lt. Casey’s face, and I’m hoping he’ll change his tune and allow his mother to stay.

2.  Dawson’s Creepy Conversation With Voight

When it comes to family, people do some pretty desperate things to protect the ones they love.  Dawson’s brother, Antonio (Jon Seda), is shot last week because of his involvement in an investigation about bad heroine being sold to prostitutes.  After discovering it’s all tied back to gangs and remembering our old pal, Detective Voight (Jason Beghe), had connections to gangs while on the police force, Dawon decides to make a deal with the devil.

After visiting Voight in prison and after a good deal of negotiation, she does finally get the information she needs to track down her brother’s shooter.  “You help me, I’ll help you” Dawson promises Voight.  She had assumed that meant her trying to get Voight some additional privileges in prison, but Antonio is hysterical and promises her that Voight is going to expect a lot more.  Not to mention, after she confesses to Casey (Jesse Spencer) what she had done, he is less than thrilled and storms out of the room.  Can you blame him considering that Voight tried to have him killed?  If sending the wrong text message last week to Casey left their friendship hanging by a thread, I think her deal with Voight may have cut that thread altogether.

1.  Herrmann’s Ballsy Showdown With His “Silent Partner”

Up until the end with this scene, I would this episode of Chicago Fire fair to mediocre.  For the most part, it was slow-moving and didn’t have a lot of substance, but Herrmann’s standoff with his bar’s “silent partner”, Arthur, was so hilarious that I would now call it a good episode.  Without putting in a dime to the bar, Arthur wants 25% of profits.  But, after the health inspector shows up limping and agrees to sign off on the health inspection after previously having a long list of violations, Herrmann decides he has had enough.  He goes to the bar, hands Arthur a tire-iron, and basically tells him that he can go on and bang up his legs like he did that health inspector.  But, regardless of what he does, there was no way he was going to get 25% — he can take 1%, walk away now, and that’s it.

        Some people hoard broken junk.  I hoard broken business deals – Herrmann

Damn, Herrmann, when did you become a man and grow some brass balls! Herrmann had made so many bad business investments and now that his wife was pregnant again, he was going to make sure it wasn’t going to happen again, even if it meant getting beat up by a thug.  The good news is that it worked!  The thug backs off, and Herrmann now has himself a bar.  You go, Herrmann!  Everyone may have though of you as a weakling and someone with no business sense, but this ending sure changed that perception.  Regardless, I think Otis (Yuri Sardarov) can now bring out that vodka again, shout “Nazdarovya!” and really mean it.

There you have it! Did your favorite moment of the episode not make our list?  If so, chime in below in the Comments section and list it! We’d love to hear what you think!

Chicago Fire airs on Wednesday nights at 10 p.m. EST on NBC.