The first look at season 4 of Fire Country teased Stephanie Arcila and Billy Burke‘s respective exits — and confirmed an offscreen death.
CBS released stills from the show, which returns on October 17, with Max Thieriot, Kevin Alejandro, Jordan Calloway, Arcila and Jules Latimer back on set as their characters. Bode (Thieriot) and Jake (Calloway) are joined by Eve (Latimer), Manny (Alejandro) and Gabriela (Arcila) on an emergency — but two characters are noticeably missing.
Burke’s Vince isn’t on site after the season 4 trailer confirmed he died in a fire. His wife, Sharon (Diane Farr), is also nowhere to be seen after scenes from the first look showed her grieving the shocking loss.
The season 3 finale, which aired in April, ended on a cliffhanger with Vince, Sharon and Walter’s (Jeff Fahey) lives left in the balance. News broke hours later that budget cuts led to Burke, 58, and Arcila’s upcoming exits. (Burke has yet to address his departure.)
“The minute that they told me [Gabriela wouldn’t return as a main character], I accepted it. I was like, ‘OK, I’m going to put Gabriela in this beautiful little drawer of fulfilled dreams and let the universe take over,’” Arcila, 35, exclusively told Us Weekly in April. “I respect every department in our industry, and I know that we all know what we’re doing and have a way with storytelling. It’s a collaborative process. I have no idea [where Gabriela’s story] would go from here, but you never know [about coming back].”
Arcila said she was in “complete shock” about her departure. “I had no idea ever. But at the same time, I know that this is the nature of the industry that I’m in, and I have accepted the flow of release and acceptance throughout my journey and knowing that when one door closes, another one always opens,” she added. “We have this beautiful eternal door of revolving desires in what we love in life. I believe that if we put resistance towards that, sometimes it stops us from fulfilling other things that we love.”
Arcila, who played Gabriela since Fire Country premiered, went on to address the overwhelming response to her and Burke’s futures.
“We watch these shows and we grow with them. We grow these attachments as well and we look forward to watching them. So it’s shocking,” she continued. “I have received all those messages. People have so much love for Gabriela — and I didn’t realize it. We’re in such a bubble sometimes when we’re working nine months out of the year. So you don’t realize that.”
She concluded: “Then when we get back, we try to pour into ourselves because we pour so much into these characters. So to have this big reaction and this amount of mourning that the fans are having — it’s like a big hug. It warms my heart so much.”
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Creators Tony Phelan and Joan Rater broke down the changes to Us ahead of the season 4 premiere. According to Phelan, there was “a real desire” to “not only shake things up” but also “to be true to” the reality of writing a show about firefighters in the line of duty. Rater, meanwhile, teased how the “huge loss” would affect everyone in season 4.
While Vince has been killed off, Gabriela could still return.
“For Gabriela, it was very difficult in the second half of the season for her to be around and see Bode. They just haven’t been able to make that connection,” Phelan explained in September about Gabriela leaving the show for now. “To give those two characters a pause — a break from that dynamic — and if and when they come back together again, they will be different people.”
Rater agreed that it was for the best, adding, “This is the season about letting our people grow up. Growing up isn’t easy and the difficult part about Bode and Gabriela is they realize they need to grow up and they can’t do it together right now.”
Fire Country returns to CBS Friday, October 17, at 8 p.m. ET before streaming on Paramount+.
