I would be lying so damn hard if I said this episode is bad just because of the BuckTaylor.
We had firefighting moments, comedic moments, family moments, all very well balanced, something the writers seemed like they had lost their touch on it this season.
It finally felt like a 9-1-1 Episode.
Now Idk about whoever was complaining of Krause and Angela's acting here, It felt like they were making up excuses to hate the episode (when BuckTaylor is literally right there LOL). Anyways Bobby and Athena CARRIED this episode. It was nice to see the writers giving them actual romantic scenes. Also this season really needed banter comedic moments after all the melodrama and this episode delivered perfectly with scenes such as the Bathena-May Parental nightmare, the 118th convo in the engine and Ravi with the coffee orders.
I also feel like the scene in the casino where Bobby and Athena were roleplaying the thieves is very much a reference to "The Catch" where Krause played a Conman who had robbery scenes just like the one Bobby and Athena were roleplaying. I thought it was a nice touch.
In the other way it's sad to think this tag team detective dynamic would probably have gone to Michael, if Rockmond didn't leave. At least now the writers have more space to explore Bobby and Athena in these situations.
Now about the BuckTaylor stuff... I must be honest and say I don't know why people acting like Taylor got majority of the screentime in this episode, It isn't the case here. I didn't have to suck up 40 minutes of her annoying personality at all, so I'm glad. Now about her bg story... I won't say we don't need it, because my main issue with Ana was that she didn't have anything other than the relationship with Eddie for her character (plus the lack of chemistry between the actors).
So I must confess as someone who dislikes the ship, It's nice to see the writers are at least trying to make Taylor something other than a character who so far has only bee written to convey Buck's characters inner drama needs. But I think it's kinda late now. They could have done this sooner when the audience antipathy for the character wasn't as strong, now it just feels like they're forcing the character. Also the writers really did just sacrifice Buck's character development in this storyline, really poor decision. Plus the actors have literal zero romantic chemistry at this point, it's worse than Ana and Eddie in this aspect, because the writers are forcing their relationship down our throat.
In conclusion I think it was a great episode, finally one it can really be called an usual 9-1-1 episode, even tho the writers made poor choices in a storyline that nobody is really interested in seeing it.