Chicago Fire - Carry A Torch - Review : The Stellaride Talk Finally Happened

Jan 22, 2026 - 21:00

I can say that this episode was definitely my favourite so far this season, I was hooked from start to finish. This episode was everything that I have been waiting to see since the first scene of this season.

I am still unsure on how I feel about the whole Novak/Violet/Vasquez situation, because even though Novak and Frost have this thing going on I still don’t know if she is fully into Frost. Even Stella said she thought that Novak and Vasquez had a thing going on.

I also genuinely can’t tell if Vasquez is into Violet, the promo for next episode leads me to think that maybe he does but as for this episode and the last it didn’t feel like he wanted to be with her. Although that may just be because he is guarded at the moment.

The scenes for Stella and Kelly both individually and together were exactly what I had been wanting to see since we found out that they had lost the baby. Neither of them had any time to grieve before they jumped right into fostering Isaiah. I am glad that Stella was able to recognise that she had tried to avoid dealing with their loss by fostering so quickly. I am definitely looking forward to watching them finally be there for each other and not dealing with it on their own. You could tell that the comment from Van Meter’s daughter about working 24/7 caused a wedge in Van Meter’s marriage that it struck a chord with Kelly, he does not want to lose Stella ever.

I liked seeing Vasquez get on with his dad more this episode, although it did feel like his dad had a personality transplant but if it means that Vasquez gets some more stability in his life then I am here for it.

It is worth mentioning the return of Carver next episode because I am one thousand percent looking forward to seeing him back again. I have wanted a proper ending for his story since he left, and even if it means that we don’t get Carver and Violet being endgame I do want to see how he has been doing.