#OneChicago Team Previews Most ‘Cinematic’ Crossover Yet and the Danger for Three Couples
It’s been five years since the last #OneChicago crossover, but that doesn’t mean the franchise’s producers went easy on themselves or their characters for the return of the three-show event (kicking off with Chicago Fire this Wednesday at 8/7c on NBC).
The Windy City’s first responders are brought together by a gas explosion that compromises the foundation of a building, as well as the train tunnel below. As seen in the promo, Chicago Fire’s Stella Kidd and Chicago P.D.’s Adam Ruzek find themselves trapped underground with dozens of passengers and a dwindling air supply, not to mention several other dangers. Meanwhile, the Chicago Med doctors work to treat victims above ground, including P.D.‘s Trudy Platt, and the Intelligence unit races to catch the offenders to help save their friends and colleagues.
More from TVLine
It’s certainly not the first time that the three shows have teamed up for a crisis, but this crossover “really is different. It doesn’t feel like three episodes,” Fire showrunner Andrea Newman tells TVLine. “It’s immersive. You wouldn’t know which episode you’re in, hour to hour, because it’s all the characters together, all pursuing the same goals of rescuing the people in danger and getting out of there alive… This one really is cinematic in a way that we haven’t done. It’s like a movie, partly because of that immersive nature of it where all the characters [are] together throughout.”
P.D. showrunner Gwen Sigan echoes the sentiment: “This one feels the most interwoven of any one that we’ve done in the past… You’ll see scenes in the third hour where there aren’t any P.D. characters in the scene, and it’s all Fire characters in the scene, or it’s all Med.”
As the teams work together, the ordeal will be particularly harrowing for three central pairings who form the heart of the #OneChicago franchise.
“The theme of the [crossover] is the couples and what they go through, the challenges that three of the couples [face], and how they’re kind of pulled apart by this explosion,” Newman previews, referring to Fire’s Severide and Kidd, P.D.’s Ruzek and Burgess, and Fire/P.D.’s Mouch and Trudy Platt. “Kidd ends up trapped, and Severide’s got to get to her and to the victims, and she’s with Ruzek. So the two of them have to figure out if they’re going to be able to get out of there, and Severide can’t even talk to her at a certain point, they can’t even be in touch, so they just have to kind of go on blind faith that they’ll get back together in the end. It’s very emotional because of that. It’s a lot of characters kind of being ripped apart.”
Ruzek and Burgess are also torn apart by the scary circumstances, which pierce their tough facades. “We do get to see some vulnerable cracks in both of them as they’re trying to navigate what they’re going through in the moment and also the fact that they’re not going through it side-by-side,” Sigan says.
Crossover couple Mouch and Trudy are put through the wringer when she “ends up in dire straits” after being one of the first officers on the scene, Sigan shares, while keeping mum on why Trudy lands in the hospital. Dr. Ripley and Dr. Lenox are then under “a lot of pressure” to save the beloved sergeant in a high-intensity situation for the doctors that is complicated by Intelligence’s investigation, Med showrunner Allen MacDonald says.
“The P.D. characters are in the Med hour, trying to see if this gasoline explosion was an actual accident or if it was intentional,” MacDonald describes, “and they are putting pressure on the Med characters to get information from some of the patients. Lenox, at one point, has a very tense moment with Voight.”
Speaking of unexpected scene partners, several new cast members have joined the three dramas since the last crossover in 2019, meaning viewers will see a lot of character combos interacting for the first time.
“I, personally, like in the crossover watching the dynamic between Ripley and Mouch,” MacDonald says. “They have some pretty intense moments together, especially in the Med hour. I love all the characters in One Chicago, but…I really like Mouch, and I like him so much that I asked Andrea Newman if I could use him in Episode 15 of Chicago Med, and she said yes. So there’s a little bit of an element of tension between Ripley and Mouch that will continue on in that episode.”
For Newman, “one of the real treats” was getting to see the new chief, Dom Pascal, interact with Sergeant Voight, who are both “strong, tough leaders who have to make big decisions in this [crossover], and to see them together in a room, it almost feels like the walls should start melting or something,” the EP says with a laugh.
Elsewhere, Med’s Dr. Frost joins Fire paramedics Violet and Novak for a ride-along when they’re called to the explosion and set up a triage area.
“I love seeing Dr. Frost with our medics because there’s always a little tension between the doctors doing their docsplaining, as Violet calls it, and the power struggle between them,” Newman shares. “He’s new, and Novak is new since we last did a crossover. To see those guys together was really fun.”
For Jocelyn Hudon, who joined Fire last season as Novak, her first crossover experience was bigger than she could have ever imagined.
“I watched a bunch of the crossovers before doing this one to mentally prepare myself, but nothing could really mentally prepare me for what I experienced,” Hudon says. “It was crazy. It was really cool having all three shows together. Our incidents are huge to begin with. I remember the first time we did an incident, I was like, ‘Oh, my God!’ But the scale of this incident and the amount of people involved, I’ve never experienced something like that.”
“The special effects are a normal episode times a thousand,” Hudon continues. “I’ve never seen a fire so big in my life, and they, like, cracked open the earth. I was like, ‘I can’t tell where the real road is and where the special effect starts. It just looks like the earth has actually been cracked open.'”
So what advice did Hudon’s co-stars, who’ve shot three-show crossovers in the past, have for the actress ahead of filming on such a huge undertaking?
“They said to sleep,” the actress says with a laugh. “So there was kind of like a calm before the storm for probably a month before the crossover started, and I was just, like, resting.”
#OneChicago fans, are you excited for the crossover? Hit the comments!
#OneChicago Crossover: Behind-the-Scenes Photos
Best of TVLine
Sign up for TVLine's Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Solve the daily Crossword
