The 2019 One Chicago crossover finally felt like a real three-hour event

Most One Chicago crossovers follow a formula that keeps the three shows separate. That wasn’t the case with the 2019 One Chicago crossover.

What a One Chicago crossover! “Infection” delivered in each hour, drawing you in immediately from Chicago Fire and keeping you hooked until the end of the Chicago PD episode. However, one thing you may have felt was that this was more of a real three-hour event.

We’ve had the three-hour events before. Sometimes they’ve been across three nights and starting last year they were just over three hours on one night. It all depended on scheduling. But there one was thing they all had in common. Each episode had its main focus and you could feel the tonal shift between each hour of the crossover.

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That wasn’t the case for the 2019 One Chicago crossover. From the start, there were feelings of Med and PD within the Fire storyline. Those tones were kept throughout, with feelings of Fire in Med and PD‘s storylines and tones of PD in Fire and Med‘s storylines. In fact, I commented to my husband during the first hour saying that I felt like I was watching PD and Med at times, because of how well the three hours gelled together.

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The whole crossover was gripping from start to finish. The usual formula of starting the situation in the first hour, getting a suspect in the second hour, and catching that suspect in the third hour didn’t quite happen this time. Throughout the first two hours, the characters spent a lot of time believing that this was just some superstrain of a virus.

It wasn’t until towards the end of the first hour that there was even a hint of this being bigger. Had it not been for the trailers, I don’t think any of us would have considered this to be biological terrorism.

CHICAGO FIRE — “Infection, Part I” Episode 805 — Pictured: (l-r) Taylor Kinney as Lt. Kelly Severide, Jesse Spencer as Matthew Casey, Kara Killmer as Sylvie Brett — (Photo by: Matt Dinerstein/NBC) /

The second hour couldn’t be focused on the “who,” either. The focus was on containing the spread of the problem and finding a treatment for those who had been infected.

As someone who no longer really watched Chicago PD, the One Chicago crossovers usually start to get a little dull in the third hour. It’s formulaic and focused too much on personal storylines within—something that won’t really appeal to the Fire and Med fans.

This time was different. While we got some sprinkling of personal storylines, they didn’t take over. You didn’t feel like you were missing out on too much by not following all three shows. It was a real three-hour event focused on the bigger picture. And that’s the way a big crossover needs to work.

My only complaint in the whole crossover was the lack of focus on Atwater. I may not watch PD that much anymore, but a problem for me for years was that he was just on the side. Atwater needs to be a bigger part of things.

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What did you think of the One Chicago crossover? Had you guessed the ending by the first hour? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

One Chicago returns to normal programming on Wednesday, Oct. 23 with Chicago Med starting at 8/7c on NBC.

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