Before the Chicago Med season 11 premiere, we were all waiting with bated breath to find out the answer to our most burning question: Who is the father of Asher's baby? The first episode of the new season didn't take long to confirm once and for all who Asher will be co-parenting with. If you haven't watched the episode, look away now because we're revealing the spoiler!
Following the season 10 cliffhanger, which found Asher knocking on Archer's door and telling him that they need to talk, season 11 episode 1 confirms that he is in fact the father of the baby. Their mention of Crunch Berries confirms that they hooked up in season 10 episode 17, "The Book of Archer," when Asher dropped by to cheer him up after his ex-wife passed away.
However, Chicago Med showrunner Allen MacDonald revealed in a new interview that he considered another character to be the father beyond Archer and even Ripley. While some fans were holding out hope that Ripley would be the father (he even had that hope, too), it turns out that a certain fan-favorite character from the show's, and Asher's, past could have been the father.
Chicago Med boss considered making Halstead the father of Asher's baby
Since Nick Gehlfuss left the show as his character Will Halstead after season 8, fans probably didn't even know to theorize that he could have been the father of Asher's baby. But he was one of the three contenders that MacDonald had in mind when mulling over the paternity. As he revealed in an interview with People magazine, fans probably wouldn't have loved that version of the twist.
"Early on, so we knew she was going to be pregnant, and we talked about who the father was going to be, and there were three contestants. The first two are very obvious, it's Ripley and Archer. The other one was going to be Dr. Will Halstead. And that would be the first time you had seen him in several years, was that she would go knock on a door and that he would answer after having not been on the show for two full seasons. But we decided that if we were going to bring Nick Gehlfuss back, we were going to do it in a different way than that," MacDonald explained.
Imagine the collective shock that would have been felt in the One Chicago fandom had the showrunner decided to bring back Gehlfuss as Halstead for a season finale cliffhanger like that! Our jaws would probably still be on the floor after getting not only the surprise of his return to the show but the bombshell that he and Asher secretly got together and conceived a child.
But MacDonald shared that he eventually landed on Archer as the father of the baby and never looked back. As he told People, bringing back Halstead shouldn't come with a huge twist. Instead, he appears in the show's 200th episode, dropping by to visit his old friends and meet the new staff members at the Gaffney ED. MacDonald also teased that he's taking Natalie's son to a Bears game, but it seems as though Halstead will have to do some doctoring with his past co-workers.
Dropping by Gaffney will still have some tension for Halstead when it comes to Asher. Their romantic history together goes back to when they first met in season 5. They had a tumultuous relationship as Asher struggled with her addiction and ultimately parted ways, not getting back together when she returned to the hospital in season 7 sober and back to work.
Surely, it would have been a wild twist for Chicago Med to do something no one was expecting and make Halstead the father of Asher's baby, but it makes much more sense for it to be Archer. Yes, some of us probably would have preferred that Ripley was the father, we'll have to see where this storyline goes and what happens in Asher and Archer's journey to coparenting.
Halstead returns in Chicago Med season 11 episode 2 on Wednesday, Oct. 8 at 8/7c on NBC, streaming next day on Peacock.