A“bee-nado” may be heading for Los Angeles when 9-1-1 returns to ABC tonight (8/7c), but there’s an even greater force of nature already taking Season 8 by storm.
We’re talking, of course, about Eddie’s mustache, which has developed its own fandom thanks to an abundance of behind-the-scenes content from the 9-1-1 cast and crew on social media.
TVLine has confirmed with Tim Minear that we won’t be getting a traditional “Eddie’s Mustache Begins” episode, but the showrunner was more than happy to share the “serendipitous” origins of Ryan Guzman’s facial hair himself.
“Ryan had a lot of facial hair during the hiatus,” Minear recalls. “He had a beard, too. So we were getting ready to shoot, and he still had the ‘stache. And actually it was Kenny Choi who took a picture and sent it to me. He was like, ‘You have to let him keep this.’ He thought it was great, and I’m a sucker for Kenny Choi.”
At Choi’s behest, Minear gave Eddie’s new look a little more thought, ultimately deciding that “it could be kind of fun,” especially since Gerrard – the new captain of the 118, whether we like it or not – also has a prominent mustache. As the season continues, however, we’ll discover that Eddie’s facial hair is really “a manifestation of something that’s going on within him.” In fact, spoiler alert: “We’re going to actually explicitly state that in an episode where he shaves it off,” Minear reveals.
And Eddie certainly has a lot of introspecting to do, following the damage he inflicted on his little family last season; Eddie had an emotional affair with his late wife’s look-alike, making Christopher so angry that he decided to live with his grandparents in Texas.
“I know for sure that in the first episode [of Season 8], we likely won’t see Eddie and Christopher together,” Guzman told TVLine in May. “My hope is that Eddie has a good portion of time without Christopher, which would allow him the opportunity to find new structure, maybe rework who he is a little bit and find new textures of life for him.”
Then again, Eddie isn’t the only member of the 118 to get a makeover this season. “I think Oliver [Stark]’s hair is a little curlier this year,” Minear says.
