In this recap of Wednesday’s Chicago Fire episode “A Couple Hundred Degrees” Kelly Severide (Taylor Kinney) is teaching a course at the fire academy, and begins a drill where the recruits have to climb up several flights of stairs, pick up a human sized mannequin, and carry it back down the stairs.
A recruit named Mercer goes down the stairs too fast and drops his mannequin from several stories high which would have definitely killed whomever he was carrying if they were real.
The next scene shows Sylvie Brett (Kara Killmer) and Greg Grainger (Jon-Michael Ecker) discussing Brett’s issues with Veronicat scratching her in his car as he drives her to work.
Stella Kidd (Miranda Rae Mayo) and Violet Mikami (Hanako Greensmith) are right outside the firehouse and make comments about them having a sleepover. Brett assures them that it was just breakfast. Brett insists that things are “really good”, but she’s just “not quite there yet”.
Brett walks in the common room just in time to overhear Matthew Casey (Jesse Spencer) reassuring Blake Gallo (Alberto Rosende) that he’s totally fine now. She questions what she heard and Casey explains that he was having headaches.
While sitting around the table, Darren Ritter (Daniel Kyri) reveals he and his boyfriend broke up after quarantine put too much stress on their relationship. After Violet begins to explain the chemistry involved in breadmaking, They are interrupted by an alarm.
The call is to rescue a man who has fallen down a delivery roller conveyor and his arm is wedged painfully between two rollers as he precariously hangs almost completely upside down. Before they’re able to rescue Ronnie, a creepy dude asks if the victim is “badly hurt”. Ronnie has been freed and they use the very same conveyor to pull him out.
Back at Firehouse 51, Now that he knows Ritter is single, Christopher Herrmann (David Eigenberg) wants to set him up with his only other gay friend Andy. Ritter isn’t too thrilled at the prospect.
Casey asks Severide how his class is going. Severide admits Mercer “scares the hell out of me” and Casey advises his friend to cut him immediately, using the example of someone else who screwed up after barely getting through the academy and sending one of his team members to the hospital. Stella disagrees saying that in her experience, there’s a lot of raw talent and with encouragement and a little support, some people can rise to the occasion.
Kylie appears to tell Severide that Boden wants a meeting with Boden and Mercer’s father who happens to be a chief and an old friend of Boden’s. While Mercer Sr. is thrilled to meet “the man who’s shaping his son’s future”, Severide has issues coming up with a compliment for his son so he awkwardly comments about Mercer being a “hard worker” and exits Boden’s office as quickly as possible.
Joe Cruz (Joe Minoso) walks up to Violet and hands her an anonymous letter addressed to her. The handwritten letter says, “That fall wasn’t an accident.” They question Joe about the letter, asking him if he knew where it came from. Violet and Brett deduce that the letter MUST have something to do with Ronnie, but Violet questions why the letter was addressed to her personally. They decide to go to Chicago Med to talk to Ronnie. Before they leave, Violet asks her ex-boyfriend Gallo to take care of baking her bread.
When Gallo goes to put the bread in the oven, he finds a wrench! Stella swoops in to take it because she’s hiding it for Severide’s recruits to find. Mercer is first to find it but carelessly grabs the metal, which is a couple hundred degrees, with his bare hand and Stella admits that he didn’t exhibit the best instincts.
Brett learns from Will Halstead (Nick Gehlfuss from Chicago Med) that Ronnie has already been discharged. He noticed her cat scratches and offered to write her a prescription if it swells up and she joked that he was the official 51 doctor. She inadvertently blurts out to him that Casey’s the “friend” he was talking about, which leads to Will telling her that he told Casey that his “friend” should see a doctor right away.
Herrmann is excited to give Ritter Andy’s number and Ritter says he never agreed to anything. Eventually Ritter takes the phone number and agrees to meet the guy for coffee. As soon as Herrmann walks away, Gallo realizes he’s burned the bread.
The paramedics take their suspicions to Boden and he agrees that they should go back to the Deli. Before they leave Gallo apologizes profusely about the bread to a speechless Violet.
Ronnie is already back at work and is glad to see the paramedics when they return to the deli. However, he’s still not sure how he fell in the first place. The same creepy guy who asked if he was “badly hurt” is there chatting him up and he gives Ronnie a cupcake before he leaves. Ronnie explains that he’s a phony who just wants to buy him out so he can expand his cafe and is always giving him free muffins to try and butter him up.
Severide explains to Boden his misgivings about Mercer, Boden tells Mercer that it’s his job to train him, but he will back him up either way. Severide then tells Stella he’s decided to try and stick with the kid because he doesn’t want to make trouble for Boden with Mercer’s dad.
Brett decides to confront Casey now that she knows what’s actually going on with him but he keeps insisting that he’s fine.
Ritter arrives for his date with Andy who immediately displays that he’s a total jerk who was rude to every staff member they encounter. Andy says something that makes Ritter realize that he’s also Ritter’s ex-boyfriend’s previous ex-boyfriend. Andy insults Eric but Ritter shoots him down and defends him before walking out.
Adam Ruzek (Patrick John Flueger) from Chicago PD. is at Molly’s with our paramedics and they are asking for his input regarding the Ronnie situation. Ruzek is skeptical about their theory.
Brett moves on to talk to Grainger about going on a ski trip together, which would also be the first time they’ve spent the night together. She says it sounds perfect.
Severide is back with his recruits and discovers that Mercer has accidentally filled all of his team’s oxygen tanks with carbon monoxide before entering a smokey building. The first recruit who makes it out collapses.
Severide instructs the remaining recruits to help and Mercer freezes on the spot and doesn’t do what is asked of him. Severide explains this whole disaster to Boden and says they’re lucky he didn’t kill anyone.
Casey and Stella discuss it amongst themselves as well and they know that Severide blames himself for not cutting Mercer sooner. Brett is motivated to tell Casey that he needs to do something about his own issue before it’s too late. She tells him that a head injury is serious and he should get it checked out.
As Ritter tells Herrmann how horrible the date went his ex-boyfriend Eric turns up at the firehouse after hearing about what happened with Andy. Eric thanks Ritter for standing up for him and admits that he misses him. Ritter suggests they do something about that.
Gallo offers Violet a peace offering of replacement dough and more apologies for burning her bread.
Mercer’s dad storms in and berates Severide in front of everyone for getting his son kicked out of the academy after the carbon monoxide snafu. Before anyone can process what they’ve witnessed, they’re called back to Ronnie’s deli.
Ronnie has collapsed again and Violet convinces Brett to administer some Narcan. It works and Violet deduces that Ronnie’s being poisoned, and she assumes it was the muffin.
The cafe owner arrives and Brett convinces him to drive Ronnie’s wife to Chicago Med to preserve the evidence at the scene
Boden tells Severide that Chief Mercer’s behaviour was unacceptable and that he has decided to make Severide’s problem his problem. “He crossed the line. He’s going to pay for it,” Boden insists but Severide wants to handle it himself.
We then segue back to the deli story, as Ruzek is at Chicago Med taking the situation much more seriously now. When the cafe owner gets to the hospital, Ruzek confronts him. He speaks directly to Violet and she realizes he’s the letter writer. He turns on Ronnie’s wife, saying she wanted to sell the deli, that he thinks she’s trying to kill Ronnie, and she’s the one that’s been poisoning her husband.
Severide confronts Chief Mercer with the facts of his son’s shortcomings, and an admission that his mistake was that he gave the kid way too many chances and he should have cut him sooner.
At Molly’s, Violet tells Gallo, “The prognosis on Ronnie’s marriage isn’t so good,” implying that Ronnie’s wife is indeed the culprit. Ritter and Eric appear to be getting along well and Herrmann tries to take credit for it in his own warped way, and Severide tells Stella that he’s not losing his academy position after all.
Casey pulls Brett aside to thank her for giving him the advice. He admits to her that he’s worried about his career; she assures him that he’s getting ahead of himself, and offers to go with him to his doctor’s appointment. Casey agrees, but he suggests Friday, which is the same day Brett had those plans with Grainger. She decides that she can reschedule her weekend getaway.
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In addition to Dick Wolf, Chicago Fire executive producers include Derek Haas, Todd Arnow, Andrea Newman, Michael Gilvary, Michael Brandt, Reza Tabrizi, Arthur W. Forney, Peter Jankowski.
Chicago Fire is produced by Universal Television, a division of Universal Studio Group, in association with Wolf Entertainment.
