“All the accidents are holiday related as is Winterfest with the microbrew contest where our millennial trio is going to get to try and establish their beer brand,” executive producer/showrunner Derek Haas tells Parade.com. “Then we’re also like, ‘Do we do a giant cliffhanger?’ ‘No, we just did one [for the 200th episode].’ ‘Well, let’s do a personal cliffhanger.’ That was the thought process that went into making this episode.” The personal cliffhanger is a big one involving Severide (Taylor Kinney) and his relationship with Stella Kidd (Miranda Rae Mayo), which is on the skids because he hasn’t heard from her in weeks. Now, it isn’t just Chief Boden (Eamonn Walker) that she is ghosting in the episode, but also her fiancé, so the wedding could be off! “She has been gone a lot longer than she let anyone, including those closest to her, know,” Haas teased. “And then she goes even a little bit more silent on the two people who mean the most to her: Boden and Severide. So, this is a lot of problems for her that she’s going to come back to.” That is, if she comes back. But it looks to be January before we actually find out what, if anything, has been up with Stella. Haas talks more about the microbrewery, the pending love triangle between Blake, Violet and Chief Hawkins (Jimmy Nicholas), what to look forward to with Sylvie Brett (Kara Killmer) and more. Read on! The microbrewery is a big part of this episode. Blake reminds me a little bit of Herrmann (David Eigenberg) when the show first began, who kept trying to find a successful business. Like Herrmann, Blake makes a lot of mistakes. Do you think the two have something in common? Yes, for sure. Gallo, he definitely merits the Herrmann-it’s-not-going-so-well vibe of season 1. The get rich quick vibe. But it’s also his own undoing is usually how it happens. Things that start off as good ideas, don’t always become good ideas. And so, when these three—I call them the Brew Crew—when they decided they were going to make their microbrewery, it was already funny to me because putting Violet, Gallo and Ritter in scenes is funny to me. Especially because Gallo and Violet have this on again, off again, unrequited love thing, and Ritter is stuck in the middle of it and is trying to start a business. All of those things just sounded like fun, and then to make them all come to a head at Winterfest, I always love those kind of things. This time, it’s not just Blake that messes up, it’s also Ritter. Ritter, his head is so all over the place because of what’s going on between Violet and Gallo that you almost can’t blame him. Speaking of Violet, it seems like there may be something sparking between her and Chief Hawkins (Jimmy Nicholas), who stayed in her hospital room when she had her appendix out, and then he came to 51 to see her. So, could Violet move on since Blake is involved with Kara? So, the problem there is Gallo was going to admit to Violet that he still had feelings for her, but she was on medication because of her appendix so she didn’t get to hear that. So, he wants to do that. That’s where we left him in the last episode going into this one. And then on top of that, you’ve got Hawkins, who’s her boss, who we initially weren’t sure if we liked him or no, but now it looks like he goes the extra mile for his paramedics and might be worthy of her affection, so that makes for a fun triangle. And you know that’s our favorite shape on Chicago Fire, we like triangles. I think Mouch (Christian Stolte) had a little bit to do with Hawkins stepping up to the plate. Yes, that’s true. Speaking of do we like somebody or not, I’m not sure I like Jason Pelham (Brett Dalton). He seems to be a good guy, but maybe he’s too pretty. I’m not quite sure what it is. Do I want to like him? I think he’s just been caught between a rock and a hard place. For the right reasons, he went up against some senior people at the CFD and it hurt him, and he’s taking his lumps and he’s sort of been a journeyman. To me, he just reminds me of that perennial minor leaguer in baseball that never got his shot at the majors. Well, now he’s got his shot at 51 and he wants to make the most of it. It’s not his fault that Stella didn’t come and claim this spot or hasn’t yet come and claimed the spot. I think he’s very dedicated, very good at his job, a professional firefighter who has some baggage. But 51 doesn’t mind baggage. They’ve helped other people overcome baggage. I didn’t realize until I was watching this episode that we don’t see a lot of downtown Chicago on the series. But the shots in this episode of the skyline, they’re just gorgeous. Is it hard to film downtown? Is that why you don’t do more of it? It’s not close to our stages, so you’re already moving the whole company over there. It always adds extra complications. You have to get more permits, you have to have more extras to fill out the streets, those kinds of things, but we try to get there as much as we can. Definitely, in the summer it’s easier, but once you hit the winter and everything gets cold and traffic gets worse, it gets harder. But I think over the course of 10 years, we’ve done a pretty good job of showing some real iconic downtown stuff. We have a big one coming up in the next episode where there’s a call to Lower Wacker. There’s Upper Wacker and Lower Wacker, the Lower Wacker is the tunnels that go underneath downtown. And there’s a HAZMAT situation coming up on Lower Wacker, so you’ll see some more downtown. How is Sylvie filling her days now that Casey’s gone? Is her program taking up all her time and energy? I think she misses Casey. The paramedicine program has certainly been a hole-filler for her. Certainly, she’s going to go see him at some point this year. We’re not putting a kibosh on that. She’s also going to see her half-sister Amelia and stepdad Scott. Her birth mother’s husband that we haven’t seen in a while is also coming up. Then she’s got some fun storylines coming, too, because we like to see Brett smiling. Chicago Fire airs Wednesday nights at 9 p.m. ET/PT on NBC. Next,Herrmann, Mouch and Joe Get Emotional! The Cast Picks the Most Touching Storylines From 200 Episodes of Chicago Fire
