October 10, 2012: The "One Chicago" Franchise Begins

October 10, 2012: Chicago Fire premieres on NBC. It begins the One Chicago franchise, created by Derek Haas, Michael Brandt and Dick Wolf. Wolf had previously created the Law & Order franchise.

Chicago Fire, like most workplace dramas, looks at both the professional and personal lives of the workers, in this case those at Firehouse 51, home of the firefighters of Engine 51, Truck 81; the rescue personnel of Rescue Squad 3, and the paramedics of Ambulance 61. It made stars of Jesse Spencer as Captain Matt Casey, Taylor Kinney as Captain Kelly Severide, and Monica Raymund as Paramedic in Charge Gabby Dawson.

Chicago P.D. was created as a spinoff, premiered on January 8, 2014. The show follows the uniformed patrol officers and the Intelligence Unit of the 21st District of the Chicago Police Department, as they pursue the perpetrators of the city's major street offenses.

The main star was Jason Beghe as Sergeant Hank Voight. Introduced in the original series as a dirty cop who was finally caught and sent to prison, he was retconned as having been undercover to expose other dirty cops, giving him something of a redemption, although many other cops still didn't trust him. Jon Seda, Sophia Bush 

Chicago Med, a hospital-based series, premiered on November 17, 2015. It was led by Nick Gehlfuss as emergency room Dr. Will Halstead, brother of Chicago P.D.'s Detective Jay Halstead (Jesse Lee Soffer); and Yaya DaCosta as Senior Nurse April Sexton.

Chicago Justice, focusing on Cook County prosecutors, only ran from March 1 to May 14, 2017. As of October 10, 2022, all of the other series are still running.

All shows' interiors are filmed at Cinespace Chicago Film Studios, at Ogden and Western Avenues, 4 miles west of the Loop. (Ogden was part of the historic U.S. Route 66.)

In 2020, to accommodate the maternity leave of Missy Peregrym, who played Special Agent Maggie Bell, Tracy Spiridakos appeared on FBI, a CBS series created by Wolf and Craig Turk, as her Chicago P.D. character, Detective Hailey Upton. This crossover, despite involving 2 different networks, confirmed that FBI, and its spinoff FBI: Most Wanted, take place in the same universe as the One Chicago shows, which have had a few crossovers. In 2021, FBI: International premiered.

While not yet confirmed, the Chicago P.D./FBI crossover implies that these shows all take place in the same universe as Wolf's Law & Order shows -- which, due to the crossing over of Richard Belzer's Detective John Munch, would also put them in the same universe as Homicide: Life On the Street, The X-Files, The Lone Gunmen, Arrested Development, The Wire and The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.

And the use of the fictional newspaper the New York Ledger on "The FBIs" suggests a link to another series, the ABC police comedy-drama Castle. Never mind "The Tommy Westphall Universe": It's John Munch's world, we're just watching it.

On the same day, The CW Network's Arrowverse began. I have a separate entry for this event. As of 2022, there has been no indication of a crossover between the Wolfverse and the Arrowverse. It's just as well: Given that overhead shots have meant Chicago has stood in for Starling City on Arrow, Gotham City on Batwoman, and Metropolis on Superman & Lois, as it previously had for Metropolis on the 1993-97 series Lois & Clark and Gotham City in the films Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, it might have made things super-awkward.

UPDATE: CBS canceled both FBI: International and FBI: Most Wanted in 2025. The connected series CIA premiered in 2026. And, sadly, Richard Belzer died in 2023.

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October 10, 2012 was a Wednesday. Game 3 of the American League Division Series was played at the new Yankee Stadium. The New York Yankees trailed the Baltimore Orioles, 2-1 in the bottom of the 9th, when Raúl Ibañez hit a home run. He hit another in the 12th, and the Yankees won, 3-2. I have a separate entry for this event.

In Game 4 of the other ALDS, the Oakland Athletics beat the Detroit Tigers, 4-3 at the O.co Coliseum (as the Oakland Coliseum was then officially named). But the next day, the Tigers won Game 5 to eliminate the A's. Then they swept the Yanks in 4 straight to take the AL Pennant.

In the National League Division Series, the St. Louis Cardinals beat the Washington Nationals, 8-0 in Game 3 at Nationals Park in Washington; while the San Francisco Giants beat the Cincinnati Reds, 8-3 at Great American Ball Park in Cincinnati. The Giants went on to beat the Reds, the Cards beat the Nats, the Giants beat the Cards for the Pennant, and the Giants swept the Tigers in the World Series.

Football was in midweek. The NBA season didn't start until October 30. The NHL team owners had locked the players out, so the season was delayed until January 19, 2013.