Oliver Stark Reveals Why ‘9-1-1’ Held Off On Exploring Buck’s Bisexuality

Evan Buckley (Oliver Stark) is canonically bisexual now, and while 9-1-1 fans are glad it happened, the question of why it took so long has lingered. From as early as the first season, viewers thought that Buck was queer, and when Eddie (Ryan Guzman) entered the picture, there was no doubt. A lot goes into creative decisions that affect a show, and something as significant as Buck’s storyline would need to be signed off by several parties. In an interview with Gay Times Magazine, Stark revealed that there had been plans to explore this arc in the show’s early seasons, but unfortunately, it was shut down. See what he said below.

“It [bisexual Buck] was brought to me a couple years ago as a possibility and I had said yes, and then it was shut down from somewhere else above. So, I had known that this was a possible storyline that we might, one day, be able to lean back into.”

Stark was unsure who vetoed the idea or why, but he was glad that the show got to explore the arc in Season 7.

“Honestly, at the beginning of this season… I see what everybody else sees. Like, I watch the same show. I don’t think that the Buddie fans are wrong. So, I decided this year that I wanted to possibly lean into some kind of sexual awakening for Buck, anyway. When the storyline was brought to me by Tim Minear , who writes the show, it was like, ‘Great! I was gonna do that anyway. Good to know we’re all on the same page.’”

Tim Minear Made Bisexual Buck Happen

9-1-1 Season 7 sees several behind-the-scenes changes as the show moves from Fox to ABC and returns to Minear’s control as the sole showrunner. Stark also appeared on The Zach Sang Show and discussed how these changes might have affected the ability to explore the arc. Stark was unsure if the network had anything to do with holding back the storyline. However, he was sure the storyline would not have happened had Minear not been at the helm. Minear had pivoted to focus on 9-1-1: Lone Star when the spinoff launched. Here is what Stark had to say about that.

“A bit sort of big change from Season 6 moving into Season 7 was when this man, Tim Minear, came back to write the show who was the showrunner from Season 1 until 4 and then he went over to the spin-off show for five and six and then he came back. So I don’t know if it was it was a network thing as much as, he basically said ‘I want to write the show I want to write’ right? And he’s very much a man who is not going to write a thing that one, he doesn’t want to write, but he’s also not going to write it for anybody else uh because anybody else wants him to. He’s very sure that he’s going to make thing he wants to make and he believed that this was the most authentic and honest way to continue to tell the story. Um, so yeah I don’t know if it was as much ABC as it was just him coming back to the show and him saying ‘this is my vision; what do you think’ and I totally agreed.”

The Big Picture Bisexual Buck was a possibility from the start in 9-1-1 , but finally explored in Season 7 due to creative changes. Tim Minear’s return as showrunner allowed for the authentic exploration of Buck’s storyline that fans had anticipated. Oliver Stark, who portrays Buck, had always thought Buck might have a sexual awakening, making the…