Buck, Bothered And Bewildered: Not In Fact A Bi Awakening But Rather The 118 Finding Out Buck's Bi And

Buck, bothered and bewildered: not in fact a bi awakening but rather the 118 finding out Buck's bi and Buck being so BEWILDERED at the fact they don't know that it BOTHERS him to the point of him trying to act gay with every remotely attractive man he and the 118 come across because look, i am engaging with the same sex in a flirtatious manner, because I am bi, I like women but I also like men, have done this whole time, it's actually baffling how you don't know considering my past and how I am obviously in love with my very male best frie-

Norman: I think I'm gonna puke 🤢

Everyone underneath him: 🏃🏃🏃

Chimney: What did you do Buck?!

Buck: I threw water on him...

Chimney:

Buck:

Buck: I didn't expect him to melt...

If we're operating under the assumption that the suits Ryan and Oliver wore to the 100th episode party were their costumes from the Madney wedding, then we're all wondering what the hell Buck and Eddie go through, because they're an absolute state!

Sorry if it's already been said by someone else and I just haven't seen but, one possible explanation is purely that Buck is wearing white under that blazer.

Everyone knows you DO NOT wear white to a wedding. It's just a big no no. So I now have a couple theories/headcanons around how this could play out:

1. Eddie deliberately ruined Buck's suit with the wine(?) so he'd have to change, because Buck could be the sort of person that might not care about/believe in that rule, but Eddie, who has been through the wedding process before, is INTIMATELY aware of how much strife white can cause. This could then lead to a less than subtle skirmish, which would, in turn, explain the dirt on Eddie's suit too.

2. Someone offhandedly comments on it like, "It's bad luck to wear white to a wedding.", which then leads to Buck ending up 'cursed', with a load of minor things happening to ruin the suit over the course of the day, culminating with him catching on fire (like what the actual hell!?). I like to think this scenario would lead to a similar structure and vibe to 'Jinx', at least for Buck and Eddie.

Anyway, those are my thoughts :)

This episode was absolute perfection! The writers are geniuses, the actors are geniuses, the directors, camera people, lighting, editors, everyone who worked on this episode are all geniuses and they deserve a MASSIVE round of applause.

There's so much to talk about but I wanna start by talking about the staging of the scenes where Buck is feeling jealous, because ugh it was so well done.

It's so simple but they just isolated him. And it's not that noticeable in some of the smaller scenes but I know many people noticed it with the teaser and stills at the airfield. It became obvious to me after Eddie gets injured, but here are some examples:

In all these scenes Buck is obviously in his feels (but when wasn't he tbf) and he's stood by himself, opposite to everyone else.

I found this really clever, because yeah, Buck does express that he feels like he's being left behind, but he's done that before so what's new? What's new is the very confusing feelings of romantic jealousy being thrown in the mix. But romantic jealousy over a MAN. This has never happened before.

Finding out you're queer can be so scary and isolating because your entire view of yourself is changing and if that's changing how are you supposed to be yourself around others who've only known you as heterosexual up until this point? Add in the fact that Buck is somewhat oblivious to why he is acting the way he is towards Eddie (his bestfriend who's done nothing wrong) for a time and he's going to feel even more isolated. It gets to a point where he's lashing out because he doesn't know why he's feeling like this. And even when he's hurt Eddie he doesn't even ATTEMPT to move towards him, he's just stuck where he is.

By isolating Buck at all these moments, both the initial problem that sparks the jealousy and Buck's subsequent internal struggle are portrayed to the audience in a such a simple way. Doing this allows the audience to truly understand what's happening. Queer audiences will recognise themselves in Buck's isolation and heterosexual audiences will gain a further understanding of how troubling a queer realisation can be, allowing them to empathise more.

Even when Tommy comes to the loft Buck still starts out isolated:

They move to either side of the kitchen and put two (2) tables in between themselves. Then as they work through their issues and Buck starts to realise just WHY he's been so standoffish about Eddie and Tommy hanging out they get closer. Then they start to connect over how cool they thought the other was and how annoying that was and end up toe to toe:

Buck's finally accepting what he's feeling and then BAM! They kiss and everyone screams with joy!

I don't know, l just loved all the little nuances they put into this episode that were subtle indicators of their endgame (bi Buck), and it made it feel like the creators really cared about this storyline and wanted to do it properly for the fans but more importantly for THEMSELVES, and not just randomly giving Buck a throwaway line of 'yeah I've slept with guys before' to establish his bisexuality purely for fan appeasement. So, to that I want to say a massive THANK YOU to everyone involved with creating this episode because I was sobbing for 10 minutes straight after it aired from being handed bisexual representation in such a loving but also unfussy way and seeing myself reflected in my favourite character. So on the off chance someone involved does see this, THANK YOU!

Buck and Eddie in a secret relationship getting caught by a member of the firefam and getting them to promise not to tell the others…

Buck and Eddie in a secret relationship getting caught by another member of the firefam and getting them to promise not to tell the others…

Buck and Eddie in a secret relationship getting caught by a third member of the firefam and getting them to promise not to tell the others…

Buck and Eddie in a secret relationship getting caught etc etc…

Buck and Eddie in a secret relationship being so insatiable that every member of the firefam has caught them separately and promised not to tell the others…

Buck and Eddie realising their secret relationship is not so secret but finding it hilarious that no one has worked out everyone knows and just deciding to wait it out and see who realises (or breaks) first.