‘Station 19’: Robert’s a Probie Again, & COVID Hits Home (RECAP)
Spoiler Alert
[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Season 4, Episode 4 of Station 19, “Don’t Look Back in Anger.”]
It’s Robert’s (Boris Kodjoe) first day as a “probie” in Season 4, Episode 4 of Station 19 — aka December 10’s “Don’t Look Back in Anger.” And at first, his subordinates-turned-superiors aren’t sure how to act around him. The episode isn’t just awkward office politics, though: Marsha, a member of the station’s extended family, comes down with COVID-19.
It doesn’t take long for the other firefighters to start giving their “new recruit” scut work. (Travis [Jay Hayden] doesn’t quite get the hang of it, though, eventually calling Robert “Chief Probie.”) Dean (Okieriete Onaodowan), meanwhile, seems to be holding a grudge against Robert and even tells him that he didn’t miss Robert’s disciplinary hearing last week because of his knee injury.
Early in the episode, Jack (Grey Damon) gets a worrisome call at the station: Marsha, the older woman who’s been housing Inara and Marcus, has collapsed. Jack and Ben (Jason George) take Marsha to Grey Sloan, and Ben asks Owen (Kevin McKidd) to get Marsha, Marcus, and Inara tested. Emmett (Lachlan Buchanan) — who’s been volunteering at the hospital — administers the tests.
Christopher Willard/ABC
Meanwhile, Maya (Danielle Savre), Vic (Barrett Doss), and Travis have their hands full — literally, in Maya’s case. They respond to a call to find a pregnant woman named Gina in full meltdown mode, swinging a bat at her neighbors in her front yard, and surrounded by beer cans and drug paraphernalia. Vic and Travis try to talk Gina down, but she throws her cell phone into Travis’ face and gives him a laceration. Then Gina goes into labor in her garage, and all it takes her is one push for the baby to fall into Maya’s hands.
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Ben, back from the hospital, helps Vic tend to Gina’s injured husband, Eddie — whom Gina hurt with a baseball to the face —but Eddie flies into a panic once he hears Gina giving birth in the garage, and he throws Ben against the sink and punches Vic. (“I knew this job was dangerous,” Travis says later, nursing his wounds. “Getting beat up by a pregnant Christian woman is not what I expected.”)
And while Andy (Jaina Lee Ortiz) and Travis take Gina and the newborn to Seattle Presbyterian, Andy realizes it’s all relative when it comes to parents. “My dad did OK,” she says, gazing down at the newborn. “And I guess my mom kinda did OK, too, because she knew better than to stay.”
Later, back at the station, Travis realizes that Gina and Eddie can access a level of forgiveness the church doesn’t offer Travis or his closeted dad.
“If I went to church and I talked about the deep love I had for my husband and the profound ways that he changed me and my life and my heart. … If I admit that and then I don’t repent, well, then I’m not going to heaven, right?” he says to Vic. “I’m going to hell. I get to go to hell for who and how I love. That’s what my dad’s up against. That’s what he’s buying into.”
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Elsewhere, Dean finally has it out with Robert, scolding him for stealing fentanyl from the Physician Response Team supplies and then lying about his addiction. “You reached a level most Black firefighters will never see, let alone sniff,” Dean says. “And what do you do with all that success? Everything they think we do. We have to work twice as hard just to be considered. … You pushed me to be better, and now you’re just a lying, drug-stealing thief with a free pass to do it again.” (Dean is also angry with Ben, telling him, “We don’t get the luxury of mistakes. Sullivan knew better. So did you.”)
Robert is frustrated, but he tells Andy that Dean is right about everything. But Andy reminds Robert that he’s been doing everything right since coming clean about his misdeeds. They are this close to having sex, but they stick to their separation for the sake of his sobriety.
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Andy also has to give a pep talk to Maya, who worries that she’s reacting badly to cohabitating with Carina (Stefania Spampinato)…and Carina’s cheesemaking and pasta-making. Maya senses herself channeling her father’s hair-trigger temper. “I could feel the rage building inside of me…because I’m so used to having control over every last inch of my space,” she tells Andy.
But Maya gets clarity when she gets home and confronts Carina about the mess. Carina says that her native Italy is doing worse than Seattle is — and that all the food preparation makes her feel closer to her father.
Christopher Willard/ABC
Later, Vic tells Dean to “prove yourself wrong and become the next Black battalion chief.” He asks her come over the next day and help him prepare. (How much you wanna bet that that’s just a pretense?)
In other news, Jack invites Inara and Marcus to move in with him, and Travis tells his dad he knew about his dad’s gay dating profile.
And next week? The winter finale, which will be a crossover event with Grey’s Anatomy. See you then, Station 19 fans!
Station 19, Thursdays, 8/7c, ABC
