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At this point, Dick Wolf has created dramas for every type of first responder in the Windy City. However, there was a time when the “One Chicago” franchise was only supposed to be about firefighters. Still, not even the heroes on “Chicago Fire” could stop the show from getting so hot that its proverbial flames kept spreading.
“I’ll just say that the concept wasn’t sold as a three shows within one city, as you might imagine,” showrunner Matt Olmstead recalled in a conversation with Observer. “The first thing is that the first show has to work and as you well know, there’s so many hurdles you have to clear to be a successful television show that it doesn’t happen that often. Once ‘Fire’ got its feet on the ground, it opened things up for us to launch ‘P.D.'”
After “Chicago P.D.” took off, the franchise expanded with “Chicago Med” and “Chicago Justice.” Wolf is hardly a stranger to building television franchises. As the mastermind behind the “Law & Order” franchise, Wolf understands the blueprint for launching shared television universes. Even so, the super producer believes “One Chicago” differs from his crime saga in other ways.
Why the One Chicago universe works as a franchise, according to Dick Wolf
“Chicago Fire” was originally envisioned as a standalone series, but its franchise potential was quickly realized. After the spin-offs took shape, Dick Wolf and co. specifically designed each series to be naturally linked, allowing characters from each series to cross paths seamlessly. The police procedural dramas that make up the “Law & Order” universe, meanwhile, are trickier to bring together.
“They augment each other as opposed to making it very difficult to cross over,” Wolf told TV Guide about the “One Chicago” universe. “Which is how it was with the ‘Law & Order’ mother ship and ‘SVU.’ Those shows were not structured for crossovers. [The ‘Chicago’ shows] are structured to exist literally a block and a half away from each other.”
Earlier in 2026, NBC renewed three “One Chicago” series for more seasons, so Wolf’s methods are clearly working. As such, viewers can expect to see the Windy City’s heroes remain on NBC’s schedule for the foreseeable future.
