In 2018, FOX began airing 9-1-1, an ensemble show created by Ryan Murphy, Brad Falchuk, and Tim Minear. Though FOX eventually canceled the show due to budgetary issues, 9-1-1 was lucky enough to have been created under an economic model that meant the show was owned by 20th Television, allowing ABC to pick up production. 9-1-1‘s 7th season premiered on ABC in March 2024, and the show immediately saw numbers it hadn’t seen in several years. The Season 8 premiere, which aired September 26th, saw nearly 10 million viewers after seven days of multi-platform viewing, and the show’s numbers have remained steady since.
Though 9-1-1 is an ensemble show, Angela Bassett, who plays police sergeant Athena Grant-Nash, and Peter Krause, who plays fire captain Bobby Nash, sit squarely at the top of the call sheet. It is the stories of Athena and Bobby — initially separate but later intertwined — that guide much of the show’s direction, and nothing has made that more clear than the sequence of events that took place for both Bobby and Athena in Season 7 and thus far in Season 8. Bobby, in particular, has spent most of 9-1-1‘s tenure battling some pretty serious demons, but if the first four episodes of Season 8 are any indication, he might finally be leaving some of those demons behind.
What Was Bobby Nash Carrying?
In 2014, while living in Saint Paul, Minnesota, with his family, Bobby was trying to hide his addiction to alcohol and drugs, in part by keeping an empty apartment in their building where he could drink and do drugs alone. After putting his children, Brook and Robert, Jr., to bed, Bobby told his wife, Marcy, that he would be going for a walk but instead went to the empty apartment, where he woke up several hours later and, in his rush to go home, left a space heater on. Marcy was furious when she discovered he was high and told him that while she would eventually forgive him, she needed him to sleep somewhere else that night. Flustered, he left his keys behind and ended up sleeping on the roof, which is where he was when the sirens woke him. The fire that started in that empty apartment ultimately killed 148 people, including Marcy, Robert, Jr., and Brook.
Viewers learn about Bobby’s past in flashbacks that are included in Season 1, Episode 5, “Point of Origin,” and Season 2, Episode 16, “Bobby Begins Again.”
Though the Saint Paul Fire Department found Bobby not responsible for the fire — had any of the countless code violations been fixed before the space heater lit a sleeping bag on fire, the blaze wouldn’t have been anywhere near as devastating — that didn’t matter to him. He held himself responsible and tried to drink himself to death before the fire chief told him that he should consider living to be his punishment and to make something out of the remainder of his life. Bobby rode the desk at work, got sober, and then he made a deal with God. He would save one life for every life lost in the fire, which he kept track of in a little black book, and then he could join his family in death. After six months of sobriety, Bobby asked to be put back in the field. The fire chief didn’t think his team was ready to serve with him yet, so Bobby requested a transfer. About six months after that, Bobby began working for the Los Angeles Fire Department.
Chimney and Hen Help Bobby Open Up
Like many of the procedural shows centered around firefighters, 9-1-1 has been very clear about the 118 being a family, but they didn’t start that way. In Season 1, Episode 1, “Pilot,” Bobby makes a point of telling Evan “Buck” Buckley (Oliver Stark) that they are not a family, but that begins to change. After a relapse in Season 1, Episode 4, “Worst Day Ever,” requires Bobby to ask for help, Bobby admits to Henrietta “Hen” Wilson (Aisha Hinds) in Season 1, Episode 5, “Point of Origin,” that he promised himself that he wouldn’t ever get close to anyone again so that it didn’t hurt if he lost them, but that the 118 has made keeping that promise impossible. Hen convinces Bobby to open up and let them in, which is just the beginning.
In Season 1, Episode 8, “Karma’s a Bitch,” Howard “Chimney” Han (Kenneth Choi) convinces Bobby to donate blood, which is how they learn that Bobby is one of just two people whose blood can help save the lives of babies with a rare disease. When Chimney realizes that Bobby is handling the news poorly, he thinks it’s because Bobby is afraid of needles, but it’s actually because it ruins his plans. Chimney is the first one Bobby tells — besides his priest — that he plans to kill himself after he’s saved 148 lives, and saying it aloud is a big step in his healing. Chimney takes Bobby to the hospital to meet one of the families whose child was saved by Bobby’s blood and then tells him, “You’re going to see your own kids again. I do believe that. But right now, Asha and a thousand others just like her–they’re your kids, too. That’s your blood in their veins. I think you better either throw that book of yours away or get yourself a bigger one “cause it seems to me like you’re here to stay.”
