This Is Us Season 5 has been a real tear-jerker with the deepest issues that the kids never talked much about. This season also addresses the pandemic and the BLM. The Pearsons are somewhat on their own with everyone in different cities with their own problems. Before going on a hiatus, at the end of This Is Us Season 5, episode 6 Randall had called Kevin while driving back from his mother’s house and been informed by a flustered Kevin about Madison being in labor. The episode ends with a shot of a car going up in flames and Kevin’s ID lying on the ground by the car. Episode 7, titled “There” starts off with the same visual. The summary says – Kevin Pearson’s (Justin Hartley) “stressful road trip” and a flashback from the past where Jack Pearson (Milo Ventimiglia) and a young Kevin (Parker Bates) go to a football training camp.
The whole episode jumps between Jack’s childhood with his father to Kevin’s childhood with his father and now the present when Kevin is about to become a father. Even though the twins weren’t due for at least 6 weeks, Kevin gets a call on set from his fiance Madison. She tells him that she’s having contractions and that she is leaving for the hospital.
Kevin immediately informed his director, told him that he has to get home to Madison and cannot even wait for Robert De Niro. The Director offers to wrap up the shoot in 6-7 hours and let him leave the next morning but Kevin apologizes and leaves. The director calls him again while he’s driving to the airport from Vancouver, and Kevin loses his temper and quits the film.
The Accident :
In the car, Kevin constantly keeps getting calls, and the roads are rough enough for furious driving at night. His mother Rebecca and Miguel try to book him a flight, and after much confusion, they are able to book him a flight from Seattle in two hours time. Kevin realizes that he can make it in time and also assures a distressed and scared Madison that he’s coming.
Kevin was talking to Rebecca and she was telling him that childbirth is never what one expects it to be. She also talks about Jack, knowing that Kevin must be comparing himself with his father. Right after disconnecting the call, he realizes there has been an accident. He gets out of the car, helps the injured man out of the car, and ties his jacket on the man’s bleeding leg.
In the car, to prevent the man from losing his senses, Kevin starts talking about his life. “I am going to miss my children being born… I am going to miss the most important moment of their life.”, he says. The injured man reassures him that he doesn’t remember anything before kindergarten and that this is not the most important point in life.
It is then when Kevin expresses how badly he wanted to be like his father, reminiscing about that football camp they went to when he was a kid. “My dad was perfect. He was just there, always. My dad was the most there person that ever lived. Everything I do, I do with his voice in my head. He would have saved you, he would have made it to the births, He believes I can be that person too.” After dropping the injured man off at the hospital, Kevin reaches the airport. It is then that he realizes he has lost his ID and starts convincing the TSA officer to let him go through the security gates.
The Plothole:
The question was first opened up on Reddit when a fan posted, “Was Kevin already in the US when he encountered the car crash? I thought he was hovering around the Vancouver airport when he found out that Miguel discovered a flight in Seattle.” Another fan pointed out that Kevin should have been able to use his passport as an ID, even though he lost his Driver’s license. And that no matter which airport he was flying from, he should have had his passport.
Regardless of where the accident happened, whether, in Canada or the USA, he should have had the passport. However, there is a chance that his passport was in the jacket that he gave to the injured man he helped. Even though people fly without IDs all the time, the procedure takes some time. Since time is the only thing that Kevin hasn’t gone for himself, it is for us to see how far his begging to the TSA to get him on that plane gets him. Until then, all we can do is trust the writers to give us the answers to our questions, and not make us wait too long this time.
