The Buddie System: A 9-1-1 Yapathon

Two years ago our timelines were full of a firefighter kissing another man, coming out as bisexual in his 7th season on the show. Our interests were piqued, we binged 6-and-a-half seasons, fell in love with the show and all its characters, then tripped and fell into a podcast. We have no regrets, and we're here to guide you down the 9-1-1 rabbit hole towards the ship of all ships: Buddie.
What's a Buddie? Well, that's what this episode is all about. Our 100th to be exact! And we are called The Buddie System, so naturally, we're celebrating this milestone by talking about our namesake: Buck and Eddie. In the most unhinged season-by-season TLDR (it's still kind of long, but we did the reading for you) breakdown of the biggest and best moments between firefighters and best friends Evan "Buck" Buckley played by Oliver Stark and Eddie Diaz played by Ryan Guzman.
It's more than a little crazy when you put all the events together but it involves several natural disasters, shootings, kidnappings, practically raising a kid together, going through several rather short divorced eras, and having one of their exes call the other "the competition." Yes, really, we can't make this up.
After the highlight reel we hand the mic to the people actually making the show — and what they have to say is kind of wild. The quotes speak for themselves, there's never been a queer fan ship that got treated like this by the actors and showrunner, we're in genuinely unprecedented territory.
What's any present without a bow? We're wrapping yours up with why Buck and Eddie going canon would be one of the most meaningful, groundbreaking love stories ever told — for the characters, for queer representation, and for anyone who has ever had to learn they were allowed to want something. Whether this is your 1st episode with us or your 100th, we'd like to thank you for tuning into our yapathon about these characters, this love story, and being our buddies. The journey is fun with the 3 of us, but with you it's unforgettable.

We are @buddiesystempod everywhere:
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Watch The Buddie System podcast episodes and our live reactions to the most recent 9-1-1 episodes on YouTube!
Support us on Patreon for perks and extra content like access to our exclusive Discord, Early Access to Episode Live Reactions, Behind the Scenes Podcast Content, and more!
The Buddie System is a Nerdvergent Media production.
Music by DIV!NITY

Chapters
(00:00:00) Buddie 101: Orientation Day
(00:01:36) Our 100th Episode! 🥳
(00:04:13) Who Are Buck and Eddie?
(00:05:05) Season 2 – Bickering, Bonding, and “You Can Have My Back”
(00:08:34) Season 3 – Tsunamis, Lawsuits, and Flirting
(00:17:20) Season 4 – Girlfriends, Gunshots, and the Will of It All
(00:23:17) Season 5 – Panicking, Partners, and Processing Trauma
(00:27:20) Season 6 – Lightning Strikes, Counting Seconds, and Counting Cards
(00:29:55) Season 7 – Bisexuality, Bachelor Parties, and Doppelgangers
(00:38:30) Season 8 – Confessions, Awkward Goodbyes, and Kitchen Fights
(00:54:22) Season 9 – Road Trips, Kidnappings, and “Right in Front of You”
(01:10:59) The Cast Said “We Watch the Same Show” 👀
(01:27:29) Why Buddie Hits Different
(01:37:31) Why This Love Story Matters
(01:47:21) Outro and Take a Buddie With You!

📔 Articles & References From This Episode 📔
New here? After this, check out our network special for the full deep dive on why this ship is unlike anything on network TV: Stop Calling Buddie Queerbait: How 9-1-1 & Network TV Actually Work
📰 ‘9-1-1’ Boss Tim Minear Teases Season 10, Talks Buck And Theo, Detective Athena, And More, by Nicole Gallucci for Decider
📰 ‘9-1-1’s Oliver Stark On Buck And Theo, A Potential ADHD Diagnosis, And Season 9’s Finale, by Nicole Gallucci for Decider
📰 9-1-1's Ryan Guzman Has Two Words Of Advice For Eddie's Season 10 Love Interest: 'Good. Luck.' (Watch Video), by Andy Swift for TV Line
📰 ‘9-1-1’ Star Ryan Guzman Has Learned to Roll With the Punches, by Max Gao for The Hollywood Reporter
📰 ‘9-1-1’ Creator Says Buck’s Buddie Denial Is Not the End, but ‘It Doesn’t Mean I’m Making Promises’, by Jose Alejandro Bastidas for The Wrap
📰 ‘9-1-1’ is TV’s most unhinged procedural — and that’s why it works, by Rachel Kurzius
📰 Tim Minear takes over as '9-1-1' season 7 showrunner, teases returns, by Patrick Gomez for Entertainment Weekly
📰 9-1-1 Boss Breaks Down Buddie's Big Roadtrip ('I'm Done Apologizing'), Teases 'Real Fallout' Still To Come, by Andy Swift for TV Line
🎧 Ryan Guzman of 9-1-1 on I’ve Never Said This Before with Tommy DiDario
📰 9-1-1’s Ryan Guzman Breaks Down Eddie's Biggest Season 7 Moments, by Kat Pettibone for Us Weekly
📰 Ryan Guzman and Oliver Stark are no strangers to the #Buddie ship, On the Red Carpet
📽️ 9-1-1’s Ryan Guzman and Oliver Stark REACT to Buddie Shippers | Spilling the E-Tea, Entertainment Tonight
📽️ Oliver Stark and Ryan Guzman Reveal Their Childhood Crushes on Jennifer Love Hewitt, Entertainment Tonight
📰 9-1-1 star Oliver Stark on Buck's bisexuality and why Buddie fans 'aren't wrong', by Sam Damshenas for Gay Times
🎧 Oliver & Aisha on Smith Sisters Live Podcast
📰 Star Oliver Stark Teases "Changes" And "A Lot Of Possibility" For Buck In 9-1-1 Season 8, by Rachel Foertsch for ScreenRant
📰 ‘9-1-1’s Ryan Guzman On Buck And Eddie, His 100th Episode, And “Massive Things That Happen In Eddie’s Life Soon”, by Nicole Gallucci for Decider
📰 9-1-1’s Ryan Guzman Breaks Down Eddie's Biggest Season 7 Moments, by Kat Pettibone for Us Weekly
📰 Ryan Guzman Reacts to the '9-1-1' Season 7 Finale's Biggest Twists, by Therese Lacson for Collider

"Don't make me sad, don't make me cry. Sometimes love is not enough and the road gets tough, I don't know why."
Han, Cil, and Rachel close out Season 9 with episode 18, "Hearts and Flowers" — the finale where the 118 splits off into pairs, Eddie Diaz gets stabbed for talking shit in a hospital chapel (God answered, it wasn't great), and Buck becomes a foster dad after a birthday party where an 18-year-old Harry says something that hits different when you're the only adult in the room without a kid.
We talk about why this season ranks among our favorites — the connective tissue, the found family reestablishment, the writing consistency across 18 episodes that held like it knew exactly where it was going the whole time — and what we wish had landed differently, including one very specific coma dream that should have featured a different white man. They know. We break down the ensemble character moments, celebrate Chimney surviving his first team NDE as captain, and give Ryan Guzman every flower we have for what he brought to that elevator sequence. It has gone quintuple platinum in our heads and we have seen it more times than we've seen our own families.
Then we trace Eddie's religious arc coming full circle — chapel, blade, closet-coded elevator, Pietà — follow the Hays Code queer coding pipeline, and confirm academically that getting stabbed is extremely gay of them. Unrepression checklist items: checked. We revisit the nine o'clock symbolism, map the season parallels, and get into what Tim, Oliver, and Ryan keep saying about season 10 and what it means for the Buckley-Diaz family, version 2.0.
The 118 means family. Family means nobody gets left behind. Not even the guy bleeding out in the elevator.
"The road is long, we carry on, try to have fun in the meantime."
Episode title inspired by “Born to Die” by Lana Del Rey

📔 Articles & References From This Episode 📔
🫂What If Someone Was in the Elevator with Eddie? – Check out this week’s Patreon-exclusive Best Buddies Mini-Segment here!
📰 9x18 Behind the Scenes for "Educational Purposes”, 911onABC on Twitter and Instagram
📰 ‘9-1-1’ Boss Tim Minear Teases Season 10, Talks Buck And Theo, Detective Athena, And More, by Nicole Gallucci with Decider
📰 Interview: Oliver Stark Discusses Season Nine of '9-1-1' and Buck's Life-Changing Storyline, by Sophia Soto with Awards Radar
📰 Eddie’s Through Line Being a Light in the Darkness, _118problems on Twitter

We are @buddiesystempod everywhere:
TikTok
Twitter
Instagram
Facebook
Watch The Buddie System podcast episodes and our live reactions to the most recent 9-1-1 episodes on YouTube!
Support us on Patreon for perks and extra content like access to our exclusive Discord, Early Access to Episode Live Reactions, Behind the Scenes Podcast Content, and more!
The Buddie System is a Nerdvergent Media production.
Music by DIV!NITY

Chapters
(00:00:00) Previously on 9-1-1…
(00:01:00) Welcome to Dispatch 🚨
(00:01:48) 9x18 “Hearts and Flowers” Review
(00:05:55) Three Cheers for Eddie in That Elevator 👏🏼
(00:15:23) What Could Have Worked Differently?
(00:26:52) How Can We Give Eddie Satisfying Season Arcs?
(00:37:35) Reflecting on Season 9 as a Whole
(00:43:59) Athena – Off the Hamster Wheel
(00:46:12) Harry – Feeling Helpless, Taking Action
(00:47:25) May & Ravi – Built for the Pressure
(00:50:12) Maddie & Josh – Crisis Management, Buckley Style
(00:52:14) Hen – Steady Hands, Steady Heart
(00:54:03) Chimney – Holding the Weight of the Team
(00:56:12) Buck – Ready or Not, Here Comes Fatherhood
(00:58:07) Eddie – Looking for God, Finding a Knife
(01:00:55) Queer Eddiemaxxing
(01:04:37) Eddie Can’t Take His Own “Chain of Command” Advice
(01:07:32) The Elevator is a Closet
(01:10:44) The Homoeroticism of Getting Stabbed
(01:12:54) Eddie’s Religious Queer Coding
(01:21:35) Buddiemaxxing
(01:23:54) Red String of Buddie NDEs (Parallels & Symbolism)
(01:29:29) Tia Pepa Said “That’s Family”
(01:33:53) Everything Keeps Coming Full Circle – Season Parallels
(01:36:44) Looking Towards Season 10 – What’s Next 🔮
(01:40:15) Our Wi$h Li$t
(01:43:40) Military Eddie, We’re Looking at You 👀
(01:49:33) Season 10 Character Summoning Circle 🤞🏼
(01:53:37) Will We See an Eddie & Theo Opening Emergency?
(01:56:28) Enter: The Buckley-Diaz Sitcom Era
(02:00:14) Buddie System Community Bulletin Board 📌
(02:02:28) Take a Buddie With You & Outro!

Han was going to drive up to New Jersey RescueVerse con on Saturday, get the Core Four op, hang out, and drive home. That is not what happened. Cil decided to go as well less than a month out and a day turned into a weekend. Then a week before the con when the meet and greet auctions were closing, Rachel's terminal case of FOMO had her buying a plane ticket as well. So there we all were on Saturday morning, and everyone, including Oliver Stark, had some things to say about that.
Since we already did the full how-to in our RescueVerse Con Survival Guide, this one is pure story time. We get into the photo op chaos (the Mother's Boy diner scene recreation, the Silver Star, the Core Four, and yes, the comically large elephant), some loving constructive scheduling feedback for Creation, and what it looks like when Oliver, Ryan, Kenny, and Aisha are having the time of their lives and are very vocal about it.
And remember if you’re going to Nashville RescueVerse, come find us!

📔 Articles & References From This Episode 📔
🫂 Our Autograph Stories From RescueVerse Chicago – Check out our Patreon-exclusive Best Buddies Mini-Segment here!
📰 Creation Entertainment, Official RescueVerse Convention website
📺 RescueVerse NJ 2026: 9-1-1 Panel with Ryan Guzman, Oliver Stark Part 1, ReelTVTalk on YouTube
📺 RescueVerse NJ 2026: 9-1-1 Panel with Ryan Guzman, Oliver Stark Part 2, ReelTVTalk on YouTube

We are @buddiesystempod everywhere:
TikTok
Twitter
Instagram
Facebook
Watch The Buddie System podcast episodes and our live reactions to the most recent 9-1-1 episodes on YouTube!
Support us on Patreon for perks and extra content like access to our exclusive Discord, Early Access to Episode Live Reactions, Behind the Scenes Podcast Content, and more!
The Buddie System is a Nerdvergent Media production.
Music by DIV!NITY

Chapters
(00:00:00) We Weren’t Supposed to Be Here…
(00:03:53) The Saturday Night Stunt Show
(00:05:30) Scheduling ConCrit
(00:11:03) 9-1-1 Cast Were Vibing at RescueVerse NJ 🙌🏼
(00:13:02) Story Time! – Oliver Solo Photo Ops
(00:21:51) A Preview of Our Super Secret Buddie Op 🤫
(00:29:10) “Eddie Has a Silver Star”
(00:32:01) Recreating the “Mother’s Boy” Diner Scene
(00:35:08) The Buddie Elephant Was in the Room with Us
(00:42:23) Rachel is 2 Apples Tall
(00:45:29) Cil’s Squish Hug That Wasn't
(00:49:56) Kenny Choi, the People’s Princess
(00:53:00) Core 4 – That’s Our Family 🥹
(00:57:08) Aisha, Queen of Our Hearts
(01:01:51) But First, Lemme Take a Selfie
(01:03:37) We ❤️ Our Con Buddies
(01:10:39) The Real Reason We Went to NJ
(01:13:41) Outro & Take a Buddie With You (to RescueVerse)!

"Time may change me, but I can't trace time"
Han, Cil, and Rachel do our best Maury impression for Season 9, Episode 17 — "I Got You Babe" — in which one Evan Buckley is confronted with a Disney protagonist origin story, dead parents and all. You are NOT the father! Except, kind of, it's complicated.
We get into the full episode review this week — why the Buck and Theo storyline is earning its place, how Eddie and Hen converging in a hospital hallway to try and keep people from slipping through the cracks is the show at its best, and why Athena's cliffhanger had us rewinding multiple times as we had war flashbacks. We also talk about the Maddie subplot, what it was going for, where it landed on rewatch, and why the Eddie, Hen, and Athena storyline deserved more time and breathing room than it got. And because Han posted a take on Twitter and the discourse found her, we take some time to make the genuine case for why this storyline is worth your patience before you write it off.
Then we get to Eddie, who has been doing something very specific all season. This episode is where Cil's ongoing thread comes together about his frustration with how every institution, every system, every structure fails the people he's made promises to — from Theo and the migrants to Abigail. Last but certainly not least we talk through what Theo's arrival means for the Buckley-Diaz family dynamic this show has never been subtle about constructing since season 2.
Grab your toy robot and take our hand — we're walking you through a world of changes.
"Turn and face the strange — ch-ch-changes — don't tell them to grow up and out of it"
Episode title inspired by "Changes" as performed by David Bowie

Episode title inspired by "Changes" as performed by David Bowie

📔 Articles & References From This Episode 📔

🫂Connor & Kameron Were Always Weird About Buck – Check out this week’s Patreon-exclusive Best Buddies Mini-Segment here!
📰 9-1-1 Cast Talks the End of Season 9 and Wishes for Next Season, Whitney Evans with TV Fanatic
🐤 Cil’s “Eddie Losing His Faith in Institutionalized Systems” Thread, stellar_cil on Twitter
📖 Courtship Behaviors of the Southern Coastal Husbro, by Mad_Lori on Archive of Our Own
🎬 Sign of the Times Buddie edit, by imgonnagetubuck on Twitter
🎞️ Split Screen 9x17 & 2x17 Parallel, by bluegreytan on Twitter
🎧 Oliver Stark of 9-1-1, I’ve Never Said This Before With Tommy DiDario

We are @buddiesystempod everywhere:
TikTok
Twitter
Instagram
Facebook
Watch The Buddie System podcast episodes and our live reactions to the most recent 9-1-1 episodes on YouTube!
Support us on Patreon for perks and extra content like access to our exclusive Discord, Early Access to Episode Live Reactions, Behind the Scenes Podcast Content, and more!
The Buddie System is a Nerdvergent Media production.
Music by DIV!NITY

Chapters
(00:00:00) Previously on 9-1-1…
(00:00:58) Welcome to Dispatch 🚨
(00:01:40) 9x17 “I Got You Babe” Review
(00:26:27) Eddie Wasn’t Supposed to Be Here?!
(00:30:02) Was This the Right Time for Maddie’s Storyline?
(00:38:03) Um, Actually ☝🏼
(00:39:09) Um, Actually “It’s Bioessentialism”
(00:41:51) Um, Actually “It Was Cruel to Kill Connor & Kameron”
(00:48:34) Um, Actually “It Doesn’t Move Buck Forward”
(00:51:29) Um, Actually “It’s Not Realistic”
(00:54:56) Um, Actually “It’s On the Nose or Shoehorned In”
(01:02:59) Supernatural Parallels (Yes, Again 😅)
(01:06:38) Athena – Trusting Crooked Cops and Taking a Bullet for It
(01:08:38) Maddie – Drawing the Line: Boss, Not Peer
(01:10:24) Hen – Fully in Her Advocate Era
(01:11:36) Chimney – The Speech Buck Needed to Hear
(01:13:36) Buck – Confronted With Theo and What He Thought He Couldn’t Be
(01:17:44) Eddie – Showing Up, and Not Leaving Anyone Behind
(01:20:49) Queer Eddiemaxxing
(01:23:21) Eddie Protecting Buck at the Bridge Crash
(01:24:42) Hen Sees Right Through Eddie About Buck
(01:27:01) Buddiemaxxing
(01:29:38) “I Got You Babe” – Buck Hands Theo to Eddie
(01:32:15) Shannon, 2x17, and History Repeating
(01:35:47) Buck Protecting Theo (Tsunami Parallel)
(01:37:02) The White Striped Shirt of Doom Returns
(01:38:57) That 9x07 Call Was Foreshadowing?!
(01:41:36) All Roads Lead Back to “Stuck” (2x04)
(01:52:22) Connor, Kameron… And That Throuple Energy
(01:57:47) Season 9 Finale – Where This is Going 🔮
(02:05:59) Eddie NDE (What We’ve Been Waiting For)
(02:10:40) Buck & Theo – The Start of Something Bigger?
(02:22:25) Our Wi$h Li$t
(02:38:37) Take a Buddie with You & Outro!

A priest watched Eddie Diaz pick up a juice box, put it back down, and said, “My gay brother in Christ.” We have never recovered and neither has Eddie, frankly.
Han, Cil, and Rachel present: a revisit of our completely unserious, extremely serious, Season 8 forensic examination of everything single thing Eddie Diaz has or has not put in his mouth. And we do mean everything. The man sucked on a ring pop right in front of Buck Buckley while maintaining direct eye contact… mind you Buck’s almost ex-boyfriend was watching this happen in 4k. He shoved an entire scone in his mouth to hide his move to El Paso, and get those baked goods while the getting’s good amiright?
There was allegedly a glazed donut in a deleted scene and we definitely have some thoughts about that. Helena Diaz cornered a grown man in a parking lot about his groceries and it somehow explains his entire personality. We picked up every crumb from Season 8 and then Season 9 came out and handed us dozens of cookies and we are choosing to perceive that as a personal gift.
This episode contains: juice, ring pops, scones, crumpets, protein cookies, one glazed donut we'll never fully see, and more repressed yearning per square inch than should be legally allowed in a network procedural.
Bring a cookie with you, you’re going to be hungry.

📔 References Mentioned
🫂Can Buck Actually Bake? – Check out our Patreon-exclusive Best Buddies Mini-Segment here!
🐤 Behind the Scenes Photos On the Set of 8x05 Masks, rguzmanHQ on Twitter

We are @buddiesystempod everywhere:
TikTok
Twitter
Instagram
Facebook
Watch The Buddie System podcast episodes and our live reactions to the most recent 9-1-1 episodes on YouTube!
Support us on Patreon for perks and extra content like access to our exclusive Discord, Early Access to Episode Live Reactions, Behind the Scenes Podcast Content, and more!
The Buddie System is a Nerdvergent Media production.
Music by DIV!NITY

Chapters
(00:00:00) Intro
(00:01:15) Welcome to the Juice Bar
(00:02:05) What’s on the Menu - Juice Theory 101
(00:04:44) Fruit Leather & Cupcakes - 8x01
(00:10:08) Ring Pop & Glazed Donut - 8x05
(00:22:03) Juice, Water, & Joy - 8x06
(00:27:47) Buck’s Baking Spiral Commences - 8x07
(00:31:53) Protein Chocolate Chip Cookies - 8x10
(00:36:17) El Paso Coffee & Energy Drinks - 8x12
(00:40:36) Helena Diaz’s Sugar-Free Groceries - 8x13
(00:47:28) The Last Hurrah’s Crumpet - 8x16
(00:53:09) Avoidance Coffee & Tia Pepa’s Cooking - 8x17
(00:58:12) Just Desserts - Juice Theory Beyond Season 8
(01:02:31) Take a Buddie With You & Outro