'9-1-1' Season 4 Premiere Date on Fox Revealed

On Tuesday, Fox revealed the premiere dates for several of its upcoming shows. In addition to sharing when shows such as Last Man Standing and Hell's Kitchen will premiere, the network also shared the premiere date for Season 4 of 9-1-1. As TVLine noted, 9-1-1, and its spin-off series 9-1-1: Lone Star, will premiere in mid-January.

The publication shared that both 9-1-1 and 9-1-1: Lone Star will premiere back-to-back on Monday, Jan. 18. Like many other television shows, 9-1-1 was forced to head back into production later than usual due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result, their premiere date was subsequently pushed back. 9-1-1 reportedly went back into production at the beginning of October, with new safety guidelines in place. In July, Tim Minear, who serves as the showrunner for 9-1-1 and 9-1-1: Lone Star, told TV Insider that the Fox series would not shy away from the pandemic. He told the publication that fans can expect the characters on 9-1-1 to be going through many of the COVID-19-related challenges that viewers have been going through for months. However, Minear did caution that he doesn't want the show to specifically focus on the pandemic either.

"What I don't want to do is ignore it, but I also don't want the show to become about that," Minear said. "Probably what you'll find is when we come back, our characters will have been through what our audience has been through. They will have been through this period of quarantine." He continued, "They will have learned what the protocols are to get by in day-to-day life," including those for first responders. These new protocols will undoubtedly shape the way that the team goes about answering their calls.

Despite the fact that the show is working amidst the health crisis, Minear said that there still may be crossovers between 9-1-1 and 9-1-1: Lone Star in the upcoming future. The showrunner said, "There will definitely be crossovers. We're kicking around some ideas now about how to accomplish that. It's time now that we can cross-pollinate those worlds a little bit." He continued, "I actually have a couple of ideas that are traditional crossover ideas and then ways to have stories cross over between episodes that aren't necessarily one cast guesting on the other episode."