By Michelle Gonzaba
The winter finale opens on a flight attendant who has reached the end of her rope. Her plane is still waiting for a gate to open and the passengers are incredibly annoying. In fact, they are so annoying, the flight attendant starts chugging mini liquor bottles. When she finally has had enough, she grabs a bottle of champagne, opens the door, and slides down the emergency slide. Fortunately for her, a baggage handler tries to help by standing in front of the slide and breaks her fall. Unfortunately for the baggage handler, the cork from the champagne bottle pops off and impales itself in his throat. Luckily, Hen and Chim are able to remove the cork. The baggage handler, like the flight attendant, has reached his breaking point and quits. Oh yeah, did I forget to mention Station 118 had previously saved this same guy from an airplane engine? I can’t really blame him for wanting to find a different career path.
Eddie and Buck, while not as painful, have their own issues to deal with. Eddie is hesitant to tell Christopher about his new girlfriend and Buck is still annoyed with Albert and Veronica’s budding relationship. Why is Buck so upset? It’s clear they didn’t get along, so why can’t she date Albert? Nevertheless, Buck is clearly uncomfortable seeing them together.
Station 118 isn’t done dealing with people reaching their breaking points. The crew is called to a scene where a nervous gunman won’t surrender himself and refuses to leave the roof of a house. The LAPD and LAFD become more and more bored with the situation, and after five hours, it looks like nothing will get the man down. Eventually, the homeowner reaches his breaking point and pushes the guy off of the roof. I know the guy had a gun, but falling off of a roof is still pretty rough.
Albert and Veronica invite Buck to dinner so they can learn to get along. Buck, frightened of having to spend time with them, calls his news anchor friend Taylor to come with him. Mistakenly, Taylor thinks Buck is asking her on a real date. Before the food is even served, she angrily leaves. I like Buck, but he did Taylor dirty.
Eddie finally works up the courage to tell Christopher about his new girlfriend, aka Christopher’s old teacher. Eddie’s son is instantly upset at the news and storms to his room. Eddie gives him some space before trying to talk to him, but when he opens his bedroom door, Christopher is nowhere to be found. He rightfully starts to panic but gets a call from Buck; he lets him know Christopher took an Uber to his apartment. How did Christopher order an Uber and leave the house without Eddie hearing/seeing him? And what kind of Uber driver picks up a kid and drops him off at a random apartment building without asking some questions? That is easily a one-star review.
While they wait for Eddie to pick him up, Christopher talks to Buck about his anger towards his dad. He’s not upset about him dating, he’s just scared of losing more people. Buck is able to comfort him and Christopher eventually greets his dad’s new girlfriend with open arms.
After talking to their OB/GYN, Maddie becomes nervous about her birth plan. She becomes so nervous, she decides to have a home birth instead of going to the hospital. Understandably, Chim is not on board with that plan. He knows how much can go wrong and wants Maddie to be somewhere where she and the baby can be safe. Luckily, Maddie doesn’t want to add any more stress to Chim’s life and agrees to ditch the home birth idea.
After the arrival of her mother last week, Hen’s life has finally started to calm down. However, the calm doesn’t last for very long. A social worker informs Hen and Karen that their foster daughter’s biological mother wants her back. Just when Hen has found some stable ground to stand on, she gets knocked to the ground again.
Buck is finally able to apologize to Taylor after Station 118 and the LAPD assist in giving out vaccinations. While they part as friends, it’s obvious their relationship will grow throughout the rest of the episodes.
While the winter finale was somewhat subdued, it sets up many dramatic storylines for the back half of the season. What will happen to Hen’s daughter? Will Maddie have a safe and normal birth? (Probably not.) And will Buck finally have a stable romantic relationship? (Again, probably not.) We’ll have to wait until April 19th to find out.
