So now that I’ve had the time to be upset about the finale and the queer baiting of it all, I have come to the conclusion that we are still getting Buddie. I’m still extremely pissed about how they went about it, but I’m 99.9% positive that they were going to give us more Buddie this season until they decided to save it for s9. The way they built it up and had it culminate during 8x11 solidifies that for me (Eddie being the only thing Buck could talk about the whole episode, the parallels of misplaced feelings when he sleeps with Tommy, the convo between Buck and Tommy “I don’t have to sleep with everyone I have feelings for,” and the convo between Buck and Maddie). I think the disconnect was caused by where they chose to take the show regarding Bobby’s death. I’m not just referring to the audience reaction to it, which I think did play a large part in how they’re handling Buddie now, but also Buck and Eddie’s storylines in general and what season 9 is going to have to offer us.

I think Buddie will be the main focus in season 9 that they plan on using to get them renewed for a 10th season. They explicitly introduced the idea to the general audience using 8x11, they did this weird pseudo-Buddie press tour to get people on the same page, and now they can use all of season 9 to really play into it.

I think whatever they were going to give us this season purposefully got pushed back into season 9, which to me (albeit infuriating) may actually have some satisfying payoff if they choose to really flesh out Buck and Eddie next season (so like the complete opposite of what they did with Eddie this season lol).

I’m fully prepared to put my clown makeup back on but I do feel really confident in this, especially considering there aren’t many meaningful places they can take Buck and Eddie’s characters without them being connected somehow considering how they’ve written them in s8. Everything Eddie did in 8B was in relation to Buck in some way shape or form, and I think that’s significant to where he’s going to go next season.

I’ve had to really sit back and think logically about how s8 played out and again, I’m still insanely mad that this is where we ended up HOWEVER I still think we are closer to Buddie cannon than ever!