Ryan Cortero was born and raised in Toronto, Ontario, the home of Scott Pilgrim vs. the World and The Boys. He’s passionate about all types of movies and shows, especially reality TV, superhero content, and indie dramas. When he travels, it’s mainly to Disney Parks around the world (Tokyo Disneyland Resort is his favourite). He graduated from Carleton University with a postbaccalaureate in Film Studies. He’s been working in the journalism industry since 2022 as a social media director and writer. Ryan has interviewed talents such as Joe Locke, Sean Gunn, Chukwudi Iwuji, Kevin Durand, Owen Teague, and John Paesano.
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9-1-1 Season 8 had one of the strangest emergencies in the series’ history: a tornado of killer bees (colloquially dubbed “bee-nado”). With roughly 14.8 million of them swarming Los Angeles, the first responders get creative as they deal with situations they could’ve never been trained for. Along with this unique premise, the Season 8 premiere also sees Police Sergeant Athena Grant (Angela Bassett) tasked by the FBI to transport an inmate back to Los Angeles to testify in a sex trafficking case. Seems easy enough for her, until it’s revealed that the prisoner she’s escorting is Dennis Jenkins (Glenn Plummer), the man who killed her fiancé, Emmett Washington (Jeff Pierre). What makes matters even worse is that, in exchange for his cooperation, Dennis will be granted early release.
Athena begrudgingly accepts the job because Dennis won’t testify if she doesn’t escort him. Despite the palpable tension from Athena, she protects Dennis from a group of hitmen who want him dead due to some information he has on his Jeffrey Epstein-like former cellmate. When they switch flights to evade these killers, a large swarm of bees causes their plane to collide with a light aircraft, setting up the events of Season 8, Episode 2, “When the Boeing Gets Tough…” Although 9-1-1 Season 8 starts off on a lighter note, writers Tim Minear and Ted Griffin subvert expectations and deliver a stressful but inspiring story in its second episode.
9-1-1 Season 7’s big emergency featured Athena and her husband, Robert “Bobby” Nash (Peter Krause), trapped on a sinking cruise. Despite them having marital issues moments beforehand, this catastrophe brought them closer than ever. But in Season 8, Episode 2, they’re physically thousands of miles away from each other as Athena worries for her life. The collision with the small aircraft knocks out the pilot and co-pilot of the plane Athena is on, leaving her as the only one capable of landing the plane. However, just because she’s a first responder doesn’t automatically mean she’s a pilot all of a sudden. Realizing that she might not make it, she tries to call Bobby, but his new job as a tech advisor on a TV set keeps him occupied. Even with a short voicemail, Bassett’s line delivery is enough to pack in just how much Athena loves Bobby.
Your answers have pointed to one action hero above all others. This is the person built to have your back — for better or considerably, spectacularly worse.
Your partner doesn’t talk much, doesn’t need to, and will have assessed every threat in your immediate environment before you’ve finished your first sentence. John Rambo is not a man of plans or politics — he is a force of nature shaped by survival, loyalty, and a capacity for endurance that goes beyond anything training can produce. He will not leave you behind. He has never left anyone behind who deserved to come home. What you get with Rambo is the most capable, most quietly ferocious partner imaginable — one who has been through things that would have broken anyone else, and who chose to keep going anyway. You’ll never need to ask if he has your back. You’ll just know.
Your partner will arrive perfectly dressed, perfectly briefed, and with a cover story so convincing it’ll take you a moment to remember what’s actually true. James Bond is the most professionally dangerous person in any room he enters — and the most disarmingly charming, which is the point. He operates in a world of layers, where nothing is what it appears and every advantage is used without apology. You’ll never be bored. You’ll occasionally be furious. But when it matters — when the mission is genuinely on the line and the margin for error has collapsed to nothing — Bond is exactly the partner you want. He has survived things that have no business being survivable. He does it with style. That is not nothing.
Your partner will know the history, the language, the cultural context, and exactly why the thing everyone else is ignoring is actually the most important thing in the room. Indiana Jones is brilliant, reckless, and occasionally impossible — but he is also one of the most resourceful, most genuinely knowledgeable partners you could find yourself beside. He approaches every situation with a scholar’s eye and a brawler’s instinct, which is an unusual combination and a remarkably effective one. He hates snakes and gets personally attached to objects of historical significance, both of which will slow you down at least once. It doesn’t matter. What Indy brings is irreplaceable — and the adventures you’ll have together will be the kind people write books about. Assuming you survive them.
Your partner was not supposed to be here. He does not have the right equipment, the right information, or anything approaching the right odds. He has a sarcastic remark and an absolute refusal to accept that the situation is as bad as it looks. John McClane is the greatest accidental hero in the history of action cinema — a man whose superpower is stubbornness, whose contingency plan is improvisation, and whose capacity to absorb punishment and keep moving would be alarming if it weren’t so useful. He will complain the entire time. He will make it significantly more chaotic than it needed to be. And he will absolutely, unconditionally, without question come through when it counts. Yippee-ki-yay.
Your partner has already run seventeen scenarios by the time you’ve finished reading the briefing, and the plan he’s settled on involves at least two things that should be physically impossible. Ethan Hunt operates at the absolute edge of human capability — technically, physically, and intellectually — and he brings the same relentless precision to protecting his partners that he brings to dismantling organisations that shouldn’t exist. He is not easy to know and he will never fully tell you everything. But he will carry the weight of the mission so completely, so absolutely, that your job is simply to trust him — and the remarkable thing is that trusting him always turns out to be the right call. The mission will be impossible. He will complete it anyway.
A flight trainer, Jimmy (Anthony Azizi), gets on the line with Athena to guide her through landing the plane. It’s fine, though; he’s done this many times… with students on flight simulators. Luckily, a young boy, Gem (Carter Young), is a big fan of planes and helps Athena find the right buttons to stabilize the Boeing, even with the gaping holes in it. The tender moments between Gem and Athena provide a much-needed balance through the many wild events of the episode. After finally hearing Athena’s voicemail, Bobby goes full knight-in-shining-armor mode and takes a firetruck with Buck (Oliver Stark) to the airport. It’s unclear what Bobby plans to do, but his heroic drive is in high gear to do whatever he can to help Athena. While Athena and Bobby’s relationship has been through ups and downs, *9-1-1 *Season 8, Episode 2 was a nice reminder of how much they care for one another.
Before attempting to fly the plane, Athena admits to the passengers that she’s afraid and tells them not to panic and help however they can. Thanks to Maddie’s (Jennifer Love Hewitt) help, she connects Eddie (Ryan Guzman), Hen (Aisha Hinds), and Chimney (Kenneth Choi) to the passengers over the phone and guides them through triage. Even with the limited amount of resources, the 118 paramedics rely on their quick thinking to come up with temporary solutions for the injured victims. Even in the face of danger, the passengers are able to step up and be capable first responders. Who would’ve thought a concept as silly as bee-nado would be the cause of one of the best episodes of 9-1-1?
“When the Boeing Gets Tough…” continued the series trend of using multi-episode emergencies to test the characters in uniquely dire situations and showcase what makes each of them special. It remains one of the better disaster episodes of the recent seasons, especially when compared to the cruise ship or Athena and Hen’s trip to space, which felt far more isolated. Although a majority of the characters don’t physically interact with one another, the power of communication is on full display.
