"Fire Country," which premieres Friday on CBS, is a soap opera with pyrotechnics, set among firefighters in a fictional Northern California hamlet where trees outnumber people — for now. With the state predicted to face a fourth year of drought, and fires burning hotter and faster with accelerating climate change, and the question raised not for the first time of whether people should be rebuilding towns that burned to nothing or should have been living there in the first place, it's an odd thing to watch. Of course, firefighters always win in the end — or perhaps it's more accurate to say the fires always lose — but the end is sometimes long in coming, with acres, structures and even lives lost.
There are other firehouse shows on the air now — "Chicago Fire," "Station 19" — and, like, "Fire Country," they are essentially ensemble relationship dramas set in a burning frame. The twist here is the rural setting and bringing in Cal Fire's inmate firefighter program, around since World War II, in which, for a little pay and time off their sentence, eligible convicts live in "fire camps" and supplement the pros, clearing brush to keep wildfires from advancing.
More to the point, "Fire Country" sets up the ancient story of a returning prodigal. Here it is Bode Donovan (Max Thieriot), a name that AI could not have created better, who once held up someone at gunpoint but is clearly a good guy now. (All of the convicts seem to be well-behaved, but apart from Bode's comical new friend Freddy, played by W. Tre Davis, none has a name or personality or more than a line or two of dialogue.) Bode also is a bit of an artist, which might become relevant later but for the moment telegraphs a sensitive nature. Unluckily for him, he finds himself sent to a "fire camp" in his old hometown, where there are people he wants to avoid and history he wants to bury.
