The Chicago Code: "Wild Onions"

Season 1, Episode 8

A tired framing device surrounds some slow building stories in a relatively light episode

“As the mercury rises, so do the tempers”

-Teresa Colvin

Framing devices can be a crapshoot when it comes to television. While their overall effect – bringing a bunch of disparate stories together under one thematic umbrella – usually is a plus for any episode, shows either find the most trite theme to frame an episode, and/or they attempt to link stories that really have zero thematic relevance with one another. This is how I feel about last night’s episode.

I understand and appreciate why TCC would want to use framing devices. On a show with a cast this large, it’s almost required in order to make it seem as if the character all work within the same plane of existence. But tonight’s theme – that heat makes people do crazy things – is a bit of a non-starter for me. I have never been one to buy into the myth that heat makes people act irrationally, mostly because temperature has never affected me in that way, and whenever I see this myth perpetuated by a TV show/movie, it just becomes all the more unrealistic, which means I have to suspend a lot of belief for the first half of this episode.

But just the first half. As some of these stories progressed, they began to move past the episode’s premise and evolve into something greater. And while I appreciate this, it just ends up making me resent the framing device even more now that it seems highly irrelevant.

“Do I look like I want to stay in the car?”

-Teresa

One of the two strongest stories involved Teresa “breaking in” her new driver, even if – like most of the stories tonight – it had very little to do with the overall narrative, at least Gibbons-wise. It’s a positive sign on a show like this that just hanging out with the characters can be a fairly entertaining experience, even if very little happens.

We have often seen Teresa struggling to hold onto her top-tier position, but tonight the show reversed all of that by showing that she is also having problems letting go of her former, “lower status” duties. Though it has been made clear prior to this that Teresa hates staying the office all day, it’s always been implied that she hates distancing herself from her fellow officers. Here however, it was made clear that she thrives on the danger/excitement/thrill of busting bad guys, safety be damned. (Just look at the fact that she actually drove her own car, when she would have been far more safe in the back seat.) Odds are her love for action will land her in deep shit one day, and that’s not something she needs going up against Gibbons.

Yet despite her resistance to change, the position has changed her. More than ever, she seems concerned with the loss of life – not hers but those of the people she works with. She choose Bidwell – who is himself a great character, someone who bounces off of Teresa to great effect, so I hope he stays around for a while – not because of seniority (though Jarek’s recommendation means he is a good cop), but because he doesn’t have a family that will miss him, like Antonio did. Antonio’s ghost now seems to haunt a lot of what Teresa does; the only question now is how many more regrets she’ll rack up in her time as superintendent.

“Just the way you care. I got no one else like that, so thanks.”

-Isaac

An equally strong plot saw the show finally giving significant amount of screen time to Isaac and Vonda, who have often been relegated to the sidelines, sentenced to playing out simple and/or clichéd plots. The first half of their storyline reminded a good deal of the Ben/John plots from Southland – a few simple, sometimes humorous cases carried out each week that adequately reflect the individual lives of beat cops.

And as happy as I would have been with their storyline being just these simple cases, the show stepped it up in a big way by delivering a tense, well-paced, well-shot scene wherein Vonda went chasing after Isaac, unsure of the fate of her partner. The power from this scene laid in its ability to put us in Vonda’s shoes, to adequately reflect the fear and isolation she felt while looking for Isaac in a dark, strange place.

I was less enthused about the ramifications of this scene. Admittedly, I was under the impression that these two were already sleeping with one another, given how they act around one another. And my distaste for romantic-cop-relationship plots aside, it speaks ill of Vonda as a woman that all of the unprofessional actions that Jarek (and the audience) mistook for true romantic feelings between the two of them to be one-sided crush from Vonda. What’s she going to be like now that she has actually slept with him? Will misogynistic undertones of her character become even more apparent?

“We’re not gonna get locked up, we work for Gibbons.”

-Liam

I was initially worried about the Liam/Gibbons plot, at least when I thought that the focus was going to be mostly on Gibbons. The show has already proven enough times that Gibbons really does care for his constituents, that this power struggles between him and Teresa isn’t as black-and-white as everybody might hope. So when I thought it was just going to be about showing that yes, Gibbons really does helped people, I groaned a little bit.

But as the focus began to shift more towards Liam, even when he was just delivering water to crotchety seniors, I was more on board. But then the show really delivered the sucker-punch with him saving the old woman’s life. Sure, someone might finger him for a cop after his almost reflexive actions to save her life, but that’s not the biggest issue here. After doing something valiant, something truly good, Liam is being afforded an opportunity to do something illegal. Is this how it works in Gibbons crazed little world? Are the rewards for his actions – be they good or bad – always going to suck him deeper into Gibbons orbit? And will Liam be able to shake off the respect that he seem to be gaining for this man when it comes time to put him in jail?

“Normally I would not make the kind of promise, but you’re special.”

-Caleb Evers

It’s a good thing that the other three plots were so strong, because the Evers/Jarek plot, even though it was structured as the meat of the episode, was a bit of a mess. The problem here wasn’t that it was a standalone story – I liked this one a bit more than the last few – but rather everything that they tried to do with. By having it reflect both on Jarek’s alienating actions towards other cops AND Evers emotional connection to the case, the show ended up taking the focus away from both sides, thus negating their emotional impact.

That said, there were a few things that I liked – “Big Sexy” was good for a few laughs, and I always appreciate seeing the give-and-take between the two partners – but there wasn’t enough here to elevate this plot to anything higher than “alright.” I don’t mind if Jarek and Evers take a back seat every few episodes – in fact, such action will only increase the ensemble nature of the cast – but during those times the show needs to reflect such action by toning down the serious nature of their scenes.

What did everybody else think?

Additional Thoughts:

“Stay sexy.” “I will”

“I gotta be honest. I get the superintendent killed first day, that could go on my permanent record or something.”

“His ma probably wrote him name on his underwear. Want me to check?”

What do they say about girls who drink cherry slushies?

“I do love the both of ya’ll…just, different.”

“You urinate in this car, I will ruin you.”