SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers for the series premiere of “9-1-1: Nashville.”
Following the shocking cancellation of “9-1-1: Lone Star” and the death of Robert “Bobby” Nash (Peter Krause) in the original “9-1-1,” Ryan Murphy, Brad Falchuk and Tim Minear are now expanding their first responder series with a brand new spinoff, “9-1-1: Nashville.” Like its predecessor, the show follows a motley crew of firefighters, paramedics and police officers as they tend to emergencies and navigate the struggles and triumphs of their eclectic personal lives. Like the previous iterations, “9-1-1: Nashville” opens in a swirl of chaos and crisis, proving that, despite being set in a new location and boasting a brand-new cast, the audience can expect the same sort of delicious drama.
“9-1-1: Nashville” begins at a music festival. Fans dressed in Western gear eagerly crowd around a stage as the headliner begins. A producer is uneasy about the pyrotechnics around heavy winds, but everything seems to be going well — until she notices a tornado in the background. Almost as suddenly as the whirlwind appears, the entire platform collapses in a fury of flames and chaos.
As intense as this opening is, the core of the series revolves around Captain Don Hart (Chris O’Donnell), a firehouse chief who shares his love of firefighting and bull riding with his son, Lt. Ryan Hart (Michael Provost). Rounding out the firehouse 113 are Taylor Thompson (Hailey Kilgore), whose true loves are singing and songwriting, and Roxie Alba (Juani Feliz), an adrenaline-obsessed physician who now works as a paramedic. All of the insane cases in Nashville come through 911 dispatcher Cammie Raleigh (Kimberly Williams-Paisley), who also has a significant interest in music.
There are disasters aplenty in the pilot. In addition to the exploding festival stage, there’s a drunken bachelorette wreck, plus a jaw-dropping boy-with-the-red-balloon moment involving a little girl and a kite. But the core of the new show is a significant fracture in the Hart family. A long-held secret comes to light, rattling Ryan and altering his and Don’s close bond. At one point in the episode, Ryan even jokes to his father and mother, Bythe (Jessica Capshaw), saying, “It’s a miracle I’m not in therapy.” This won’t be the case for long. Along with the newfound family drama, Ryan and his ER doctor wife, Samantha (MacKenzie Porter), aren’t exactly on good terms. (In fact, she doesn’t even appear in the pilot.)
Other intriguing characters include Dixie Bennings (LeAnn Rimes), a bitter former singer determined to use her son, Blue (Hunter McVey), to exact revenge on her old lover. While the show’s core narrative isn’t exactly groundbreaking, the exaggerated, intense and fast-paced emergencies, along with the engaging plot turns, will undoubtedly draw in audiences. This new Tennessee-set chapter hits the ground running and will certainly unfold and evolve in unexpected ways.
More than anything, even amid the silliness and absurdities of the medical emergencies, the show’s feel-good moments, which involve people being saved and others working together, depict a deep humanity. However fictitious, these uplifting moments are currently missing from our real-life news cycle. Despite the soapier qualities of “9-1-1: Nashville,” this particular element, along with rather thrilling cliffhangers, is the reason why “9-1-1” viewers have stood by the franchise for nearly a decade.
Overall, “9-1-1: Nashville” delivers exactly what fans of the franchise are looking for, but with a bit of country flair and some new hunky characters. While they may be disappointed that Captain Owen Strand (Rob Lowe) is no longer gracing their screens weekly, given the opportunity, the “Nashville” cast seems more than capable of filling in the gap. It’s going to be interesting to see what kind of unimaginable (and frankly unbelievable) crises this new series will contend with.
“9-1-1: Nashville” premiered Oct. 9 on ABC with new episodes airing weekly on Thursdays.
