Spoilers for the Season 1 finale of Fire Country are ahead. If you aren’t caught up on the CBS drama, you can stream every episode with a Paramount+ subscription.
Ever since Fire Country got renewed for Season 2, I’ve been wondering if Max Thieriot’s Bode would be freed, at fire camp or back in prison when the show returns on the 2023 TV schedule next fall. Well, with the Season 1 finale, we got that answer…and it was shocking. It was revealed in the final minutes of the episode that Bode would be going back to prison after he took the blame for a drug problem at camp that he had nothing to do with. So, in response, Diane Farr and Billy Burke, who play the fire camp inmate’s parents weighed in on how their characters felt about what happened, alluding to what might happen between the family members in Season 2. However, I think there’s more to consider as what happened to Bode is bound to impact every single character on this show.
What Diane Farr And Billy Burke Thought About What Happened To Max Thieriot’s Character
While the audience knows that Bode’s drug test in the penultimate episode was falsified, the crew is in the dark on the matter. To Sharon and Manny, they think he’s relapsed, when in reality Sleeper likely messed with the tests. To Vince and Gabriela, they want to believe that their loved one is innocent in all of this, creating a very interesting dynamic going into Season 2.
Billy Burke noted that Vince seems to have had a change of heart, and just wants his son back, as he told TV Insider:
I don’t think it matters to [Vince] whether Bode was lying or not. He wants his son back.
He also added, that without hope you have nothing, and that is especially true for the Leones who have lost so much, the actor said:
Life’s fucking hard, but you got no hope, you got nothing.
As for Sharon, she also had a change of heart, but in the opposite direction. While she had been trying to get Bode out this whole season, this news in the finale felt like the final nail in the coffin, and she lost hope, which shocked Diane Farr, who plays her. She explained:
It was a pretty abrupt turn even to me when I first read it that she just said no, she was just done. She’s run out of denial.
She continued saying that Sharon is at a point where this news caused her to “shut off for the moment.”
So, as we move into Season 2 of Fire Country it seems like the parents are divided in their beliefs, and as Max Thieriot explained, his character’s parole is deeply impacting his relationships with the rest of the Fire Country cast.
Why What Happened To Bode Is Going To Impact Everything
While Farr and Burke have made it clear how their characters feel about what happened to Bode, his prison sentence is bound to impact literally everything on this show.
For Bode personally, his being back in prison is a major setback, and there’s no guarantee that he’ll be sent back to Three Rock if he’s allowed to return to a fire camp. I’d imagine that will seriously impact his own mental health and personal growth, causing him to backtrack a bit from the fairly healthy place he was at toward the end of Season 1.
As for Gabriela, while she knows Bode didn’t do anything wrong, and something bigger is going on, I’d imagine it will be hard for her to stay with him. Even though he didn’t do anything -- actually he did a very heroic thing by taking the blame for the Sleeper/drug situation so Freddy could be freed -- their relationship has always been strained due to the barrier fire camp built, and it’s only going to get harder now that he’s back in prison.
When it comes to Freddy, I think he’ll be the guy spearheading the investigation to prove Bode’s innocence, and I think he’ll get Jake and Eve involved. All three of them were in shock when they found out their friend had been sent back to prison, so I’d imagine they’ll do everything in their power to prove his innocence.
Overall, the ending of Fire Country’s first season was intense, and definitely set up a rocky start for Bode and his crew come Season 2. Will he stay in prison? Will he go back to Three Rock? Will his mother forgive him? And can his friends and family help prove his innocence? I guess we'll just have to wait and find out.
