Season 8 of 9-1-1 premiered with a fantastic disaster episode, proving a signature win for the series. A mix of horror, hyperbole, and a whole lot of bees, the season kicks off with a killer episode that sees the city of Los Angeles brought to its knees when a swarm of angry bees is released into the streets. As the combined emergency services (fire, dispatch, and the police) try to tame a disaster of epic proportions again, the series proves it’s at its best diving into the wild and unpredictable.

Starring Angela Bassett (Black Panther), Peter Krause (Parenthood), and Jennifer Love Hewitt (The Ghost Whisperer), 9-1-1 follows the lives of a group of Los Angeles first responders. In the season premiere episode “Buzzkill,” a tractor-trailer hauling 22 million bees is upturned on the highway. And as 22 million stinging assassins take over the streets, the teams must frantically work to save the innocent, the guilty, and themselves from the untamed fury of a hive mind. For a series that excels in both action and drama, the outrageous plots of episodes like a million killer bees keep the series fresh and interesting.

The Well-Steeped Disaster in 9-1-1

9-1-1 is no stranger to disaster. In fact, over its eight seasons (so far), the series has often shown the extreme real-life situations that emergency personnel must face and manage in the public. Series creator Ryan Murphy has previously admitted that some episodes are based on real-life emergency service calls. Fans of the show have already seen these scenes play out across the series. From the episode where a baby was stuck in a pipe (Season 1, “Pilot”) to a dance floor collapse (Season 1, “Point of Origin”) and the story of a woman who left a man in her windshield (Season 3, “Monsters”), the trauma of real-life catastrophes enlivens the series with gravitas, drama, and action. This works well to serve the series’ fans by providing engaging moments to carry the viewer along.

9-1-1 has used this plot device of large-scale tragedies for the premiere of several seasons. There was the pirate hijacking and shipwreck at the beginning of the seventh season, which carried on throughout three more episodes. In the Season 2 opener, an earthquake rocks Los Angeles, followed by a series of shock waves that send a series of emergencies reverberating across the city. 9-1-1 has utilized this three-part premiere several times, and it is an effective strategy to keep viewers hooked across multiple weeks of viewing. The eighth season’s bee-tormented premiere also runs for three episodes. Like the seasons before, the opener has offered a relatively restrained, more localized danger before building up to outright pandemonium.

A Fitting Bee-tastrophe in the 9-1-1 Season 8 Premiere

Among 9-1-1’s other disasters, the Bee-nado is suitably ridiculous. However, far from being a disadvantage, it’s the series’ dive into seemingly outlandish plot lines that infuse the show with much-valued levity in the face of harsher moments. The shock of introduction as the bees swarm a plane and potentially initiate a collision is almost cartoonish in the best way. The concept is both serious, with life-and-death stakes on a massive scale, and completely ludicrous.

Throughout the episode, the writers add to the stakes, with the localized danger building up to become a foreshadowed threat of catastrophe so that the tension is stretched throughout the episode and then left to dangle with the lure of a follow-up. The plot line offers viewers an enjoyable thriller with outrageous moments without sacrificing the high-stakes nature of the episodes. It is an effective strategy, and fans across the internet have expressed delight in the episode.

The pacing of the plot, while at the same time advancing the individual storylines of the characters, was marked as a notable plus. The first two episodes of the premiere, “Buzzkill” and “When the Boeing Gets Tough,” have already aired, and fans will have to wait until next week to see how the army of 22 million strong bees will be resolved. But until then, the season has gotten off to a fantastic start.

9-1-1 was created by Brad Falchuk, Ryan Murphy, and Tim Minear. Collectively, the three worked on the FX series American Horror Story, while both Falchuk and Murphy have previously collaborated on the Fox series Glee and Scream Queens. Other stars of 9-1-1 include Ryan Guzman (The Boy Next Door), Alisha Hinds (Assault on Precinct 13), Oliver Stark (Into the Badlands), and Kenneth Choi (Sons of Anarchy).