Miranda Rae Mayo is back in action as Stella Kidd in Chicago Fire for the second half of Season 10, after being missing for several episodes at the end of 2021. Stella made an appearance at the end of the midseason finale, surprising Severide with a reunion after spending days not answering his calls and texts during her Girls on Fire trip. Mayo spoke with CinemaBlend and broke down Stella’s decision to return home and reunite with Severide rather than just pick up the phone, and what she’s excited to see in Season 10.
Severide was more than a little worried about Stella after she went silent on him just when a prime opportunity had opened up for her at Firehouse 51 with the lieutenant vacancy on Truck 81, but he didn’t jump for joy when she surprised him by showing up in the loft for a midseason finale cliffhanger. When I asked Miranda Rae Mayo what she could share about why Stella went silent on him before just showing up again, the actress shared:
I think honestly, he was talking about how the lieutenant's position was open, and she was like, 'Oh my god, okay. I have to choose right now.' And she froze. She didn't have an answer, and rather than communicating to him, like 'This is what's going on.' All the while, she's in the midst of running the [Girls on Fire] program, and her days are packed. I think she just wasn't sure. She wasn't sure what she was going to do and she just needed to take a step back and really look at everything before moving forward. And then it's just – have you ever had it where it's like, you haven't texted someone back but you know that everything's okay, even though they don't, and then it gets to the point where it's like, 'Oh, shit, it's been so long and now it's rude, even though I wasn't trying to be rude'? And so I think that rather than texting him back or calling him back at this point, she was just like, 'I gotta get home. I gotta get home. And I got to talk to him face to face.'
Stella missed a whole lot at Firehouse 51 during her absence, starting with the departure of Casey and snowballing from there with the open spot for an officer on Truck 81. Both Severide and Boden were trying to get through to her as she slowly but surely ran out of time to come back and claim the spot before Pelham got it, and she may have cost herself an ideal opportunity.
Showrunner Derek Haas previously shared that there won’t be a time jump from the midseason finale to the January 5 return for Season 10, so fans will get to see Stella talking to Severide face to face after coming home again. Miranda Rae Mayo made it clear that Stella wasn’t ignoring Severide’s calls out of any kind of anger or hurt or forgetfulness about her fiancé, saying:
It's not that it's accidental as much as it is, like, procrastinating. You know what I'm saying? It's not like he's an afterthought. It's like she just doesn't know what exactly to say yet.
We’ve all been there when it comes to not answering texts as quickly as we should sometimes, right? It should be interesting to see what Severide thinks of her procrastination. The promo for the first Chicago Fire episode of Season 10 suggests that he has something far worse on his mind as a possible reason for her radio silence, but fans will have to wait to see the episode to get all the answers. Perhaps the situation is even more complicated than it seems!
The very good news is that Stella is back for good for the rest of Season 10, so even if she continues her work with Girls on Fire, that work won’t require her to leave for more episodes at a time. Miranda Rae Mayo shared what she’s excited for fans to get to see for her storyline now that she’s back:
Season 10, I'm very excited to see Stella's journey in agreeing and saying 'Yes, I do want to show up fully as a leader in my community,' and trusting that she can. I just look forward to watching Stella let herself win. I think that she is a character who as a firefighter, as a woman, she has experienced so much resistance and so much adversity on her way up. Even in her previous relationship with her ex husband, everything was very challenging. It was a struggle, and even with Severide things have been hard. Their relationship has been so up and down, and back and forth. So I look forward to her just like letting it all be okay.
“Letting it all be okay” sounds like something that Chicago Fire’s longest-running major couple could use at this point, so hopefully the good ship Stellaride will keep on sailing despite the latest miscommunication. Seager was back in the mix in the midseason finale back in December, but Severide’s eye wasn’t wandering, and now Stella is back.
See what Chicago Fire has in store for Stella Kidd now that she’s back in the Windy City and reunited with Severide with the midseason premiere on Wednesday, January 5 at 9 p.m. ET on NBC, between Chicago Med at 8 p.m. ET and Chicago P.D. at 10 p.m. ET in the 2022 winter and spring premiere schedule.
