9-1-1 Season 10 Episode 4, “Imposter Syndrome,” gets Buck and Eddie talking again just in time for Buck to say the thing he’s been afraid to admit: he doesn’t think he can be Theo’s dad. After three episodes of volcanic disaster, a quiet conversation over beer gives the season one of its toughest moments. The volcano emergency is over, but Buck is still trying to understand what Theo remembers about the separate crash that killed his parents.
Oliver Stark and Ryan Guzman play the tension between Buck and Eddie for laughs before the hour earns that quieter ending. At the same time, a man who claims to be a doctor shakes Maddie’s confidence, leaving Jennifer Love Hewitt to play a dispatcher second-guessing skills she’s already proven she has.
Buck Can’t Fix Theo’s Grief by Himself
The quieter follow-up to the volcano gives Buck and Eddie a reconciliation that opens a more difficult conversation about Theo.
Theo’s toy cars give Buck a new way to see the crash.
Oliver Stark lets Buck’s certainty give way to fear in the final conversation.
The station’s coffee standoff and the quiet apology over beer.
Buck’s arrest and Maddie’s sudden doubts both push a little too hard.
Buck and Eddie Take Their Fight to Work
The episode starts with Theo tearing through Buck’s house and Buck struggling to set limits. The injuries Buck keeps picking up are serious enough that hospital staff worry someone at home is hurting him. When he takes Theo to therapy, the boy’s therapist, Dr. Murphy, has a referral for Buck himself. It’s a funny reversal with a point: Buck has taken the sensible step of getting Theo help, and there’s no reason he has to work out his own side of this alone.
At the station, Buck and Eddie manage to make a coffee refill feel like a negotiation. Hen (Aisha Hinds) and Chimney (Kenneth Choi) are taking bets on when they’ll make up. The gag lands because everyone else knows how the argument will end. Getting either man to go first is the problem.
A conversation in the engine about a grown man who passed himself off as a high school student gives the two another opening to pick at each other. Eddie hears Buck’s nostalgia for school as a longing for a life without responsibility; Buck hears Eddie’s criticism as proof his friend can’t let anything go without making a rule about it. An emergency call cuts them off before either can get the last word.
A Good Samaritan Shakes Maddie’s Confidence
The 118 responds to a multi-vehicle crash where a bystander is already tending to the injured. He tells Maddie he’s a doctor, so she treats his reports as coming from someone with medical training. His attempts to help make some of the injuries worse. Athena (Angela Bassett) initially considers whether he’s relapsed, but Hen hears that his hands were shaking and raises the possibility of a memory disorder. The man comes from a family of doctors and, because of a neurological disorder, believes he’s one too.
The man turns up at May’s hospital and pressures May (Corinne Massiah) to help him perform an unnecessary appendectomy. As TVLine’s recap notes, she realizes what he’s doing and sedates him before he can operate. Early on, a doctor criticizes how she stocked a cart; now she has to trust her own judgment enough to stop someone who appears to outrank her. Her uncertainty makes sense in a new job, and the hour gives her a specific reason to push through it.
Maddie, meanwhile, wonders whether she should still be on the phones. That’s a steep turn after the opening disaster arc, and the episode could have spent longer with the doubt before she starts considering leaving. It finds a better answer in her next call: the caller can’t speak, so Maddie uses keypad responses to work out that she’s dealing with carbon monoxide poisoning. The woman later comes by to thank her. Chimney tells Maddie that what she’s lost is confidence; the call gives her a chance to recognize the difference for herself.
Why Buck Is Arrested at the Playground
When Theo refuses to leave the playground, Buck picks him up and carries him toward the car. Theo protests that Buck is taking him and says Buck isn’t his dad. Concerned parents call 9-1-1, and Buck ends up in handcuffs at the station before the misunderstanding is cleared up. The scene pushes hard to make its point, but the moment afterward is more revealing.
At home, Buck sees Theo playing with toy cars and a fire truck. The scene Theo has made resembles the crash on the bridge that killed Connor and Kameron. Buck realizes the last time Theo saw the parents who raised him, Buck was carrying him away. A trip to the car can mean something very different to Theo than it does to Buck. The toy scene gives Buck a reason to revisit his assumptions without asking a four-year-old to explain a loss he’s still trying to understand.
9-1-1 Season 10 Episode 4 Ending Explained: Is Theo Leaving?
There’s no custody change in the episode. Buck and Eddie make peace over a beer: Buck acknowledges that Eddie had a point about setting boundaries, and Eddie admits he overstepped. Then Buck tells him why the arrest shook him. He took Theo in because other relatives weren’t stepping up and he didn’t want the boy placed in a group home. Now he fears Theo sees him as the person who took him away from his parents.
Eddie reminds Buck that Theo is his son. Buck says he doesn’t think he can be Theo’s dad. As the TV Insider recap makes clear, that’s where the hour leaves the conversation. Buck hasn’t given Theo up, and the episode doesn’t establish that Theo blames him for the crash. Buck has worked out one possible reason Theo resists being picked up, then turned that insight into a verdict on himself. The reunion with Eddie matters because it gives him someone who can challenge that verdict.
See the “Imposter Syndrome” Photos
Browse the 9-1-1 Season 10 Episode 4 photo gallery on Seat42F.
Where to Watch 9-1-1
“Imposter Syndrome” premiered Thursday, November 5, 2026, on ABC and streams Friday, November 6, on Hulu. New episodes premiere Thursdays at 8/7c on ABC. Visit the official 9-1-1 series page for viewing options.
9-1-1 Season 10 Episode 4 FAQ
Do Buck and Eddie make up?
Yes. They talk over a beer, acknowledge their mistakes and put the argument behind them.
Does Buck give Theo up?
No. Buck voices doubts about being Theo’s dad, but no change in Theo’s living situation is shown.
Does Maddie quit dispatch?
No. A call involving carbon monoxide poisoning helps her regain confidence, and she returns to the phones.
Thomas Miller is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Seat42F, covering television, movies and streaming entertainment. He launched Seat42F in 2007 and has spent nearly two decades covering the entertainment industry.
