Margherita Erdman

Agree completely that this Will Halstead is very different from the Will Halstead who was introduced and appeared in multiple episodes last seasons of both of the other Chicago shows. I didn't love that character, but I understood him, and he seemed like a good fit as Det. Halstead's brother and as a character that could help jumpstart a new series as a distinctive type within an ensemble cast — he was arrogant but with the skills and experience to back it up, and the arrogance was tempered with healthy dashes of warmth and humor. Another way of saying it, I guess, is that I thought the pre-series Dr. Halstead was decently written and played with the kind of arrogance borne of being both talented & hard-working, and having achieved a certain level of success through being both of those things and knowing it. He was working class, got himself through Northwestern, and was enjoying the fruits of his ambition and natural ability. He bragged that whatever trouble he got himself into by being a jerk in his personal life, he was such a good doctor and so focused as a professional that he could walk into Chicago Med off the street and get an immediate job offer — or merely get on the phone with his former practice in NYC and ask to get them to ask him back. I found it credible in the backdoor pilot episode when his first day at Chicago Med (which was supposed to be his one and only day working there since he had decided to return to NYC) persuaded him that he should stay in Chicago and that he should be in emergency medicine. Best of all, he didn't have the distracting orange Oompa-Loompa hair. This new character, I am tempted to mute every time he is on the screen. [And I do squint or avert my eyes to avoid the full visual insult of the Hair — do you think it is a wig? Dyed using Carrot Top's shade? Some kind of color saturation added post-production? I can only surmise that TPTB feel the need to distinguish visually between two hard-charging brunette male docs and Halstead lost the round of Rock Paper Scissors.] He has an enormous chip on his shoulder, hasn't shown himself to be a very good doctor, and isn't especially smooth with women or have much of a social life at all. He seems like a prickly geek. How did he even end up as Chief Resident? Who is he teaching — seems like he'd be a terrible leader anyway.

Please, please let Voigt take this over and use whatever distasteful methods he needs in order to make this go away, preferably offscreen or as a subplot on PD (I bet Mouse could dig up whatever is shady about the lying lady, incl what her specific motivation is here).Then we won't have to watch this silly subplot — supremely offensive silliness at that. As someone above pointed out, it relies on the nasty trope of the false sexual assault claim used to destroy a good man. I would argue further it is deeply offensive at another level, since it simultaneously evokes the all-too-familiar story from our fraught U.S. history of the big strong black man unjustly accused of sexual violence against, if not a "white" woman, then someone much lighter-skinned, and treated with a presumption of guilt by law enforcement. Lazy, socially tone-deaf storytelling and writing, too bad since it is at odds with this show's unusually (for TV) diverse cast and a good number of storylines (even if they are mostly B plots) that reflect the ethnic, racial, and class diversity of Chicago. Boden needs to get back to his lovely wife and adorable baby in their cute house and back to the legitimate issues of his job like overseeing actual fires and other emergency call outs, as well as helping to resolve the substantive tensions between Severide & Patterson (not the Riddle bullshit, but the much more interesting dynamic that could develop out of what happens with the grudging respect and honesty that began last night with Severide deciding against smearing Patterson's reputation and Patterson taking the stick out of his ass for a minute). As others have said here repeatedly, I find it SO VERY tiresome and so discordant with the overall thrust & tone of the show for every single season to have some bureaucrat, politico, criminal, and/or business leader (who may or may not be also politically and/or criminally connected) to specifically target 51 and Boden for persecution. The characters are interesting enough, and there is plenty of conflict and material for both story and character development in the day to day of doing their jobs and living their lives in the community, that there is no need to constantly nail this particular shift* of this particular firehouse up on one cross after another to illustrate their unity, caring for one another, and commitment to lives of public service. Also❗️ Connie is awesome. I have noticed that she is getting incrementally more visibility and speaks at least one line more frequently than in past seasons (like every other episode or so). More please. * Isn't there at least one other shift that works 51? Where do they stand with "saving" the house whenever it is "under attack"? Does/do the other shift commander or commanders support Boden? So weird that there is never any reference to or sighting of these invisible colleagues except for the locked cage of food with the signage about X shift keeping out or whatever.

Yes, the Brazilian American portrayed as a native speaker of Spanish, rather than Portuguese, really bugged. It's possible to fanwank that the languages are similar so she easily became fluent in Spanish out of necessity in her nursing career, but that's not what's implied — what's implied onscreen is BS ignorance on the part of the writers. Plus, when we first met this character (over several episodes) on Fire and maybe PD too, as Severide's long lost childhood friend, wasn't she a doctor, not a nurse? I don't actually care enough to go back and check, but I was really surprised when someone called her a nurse so it must have gotten fixed in my mind somehow that she was a doctor. I'm with you guys. He came into the Chicago Wolfiverse as an affluent, successful, fully trained, write his own ticket private practice physician, with the implication that his weaknesses had to do with fast living and loose morals. Very confusing that he's now a resident, ready to get into a pissing contest with the new trauma fellow. Two highly distracting questions kept coming up for me, related to Dr. Halsted, and not to the show's credit, IMO: (1) Where are the senior physicians in emergency medicine/trauma? I guess we saw some here & there, but they were definitely taking a back seat to the resident, fellow, and student. (2) WTF is up with the orange hair? That is new right? It's like the younger, lusher version of the mess on Donald Trump's head. A few other thoughts — I love Oliver Platt & S. Epatha Merkerson and will keep watching, after this highly mediocre pilot, only to see what they end up bringing to the party. I wonder if Merkerson wouldn't be better used and get better storylines if her character were also an M.D. — perhaps as a senior, teaching type physician? [see above] And when, on any of the Chicago shows, might we see Dr. Charles actually behaving like the head of a Dept of Psychiatry at a major urban hospital? or even just an actual psychiatrist? rather than popping up here and there to serve as a booze-swilling Buddha who listens to whichever character needs to spell out their issues and then offers no real help.

William Faulkner is supposed to have told his daughter once, when she asked him to get sober and pay more attention to his family, that "no one cares about Shakespeare's daughter"Lisa & Philip — "exquisitely tacky" is just the right way to describe that truly gross, sterile apartment, aside from the fantasy that Noah & Allison could afford something like that, which has been well covered by other posters. Even a hedge fund king like Max couldn't swing that, I don't think — that seems like the kind of generic apt in the luxury high-rise bldgs that are being built for overseas billionaires & corporations to buy so they'll have somewhere to stay for the few days or weeks a year they are in NYC. Also find it hilarious that as Lisa & Philip talk it out, "Lockhart" morphs into "Lockwood" — for those of a lit crit or psychoanalytic bent, it definitely tracks with the deterioration of that family's characterization from salt of the earth, warm, loving — albeit locked together in dysfunctional ways too — to a new state of desperation, cold, brittle, libidinous instead of compassionate...

I don't think I've ever posted in this forum, but I have been moved out of lurkdom just to post the exact opposite opinion. I can't stand ragey, angsty, self-righteous, explosive, but don't expect any kind of explanation Owen Hunt. It's unprofessional, unattractive, and, because he is such an imposing and strong physical presence, and seems so out of control, actually pretty threatening. IRL he'd be removed from a workplace to protect himself and his co-workers and minimize hospital liability (not that these things have ever factored into GA reality, but still)I hope whatever this is evaporates quickly and in a minimal amount of screen time. I find Owen a barely tolerable character most of the time anyway (at his best when his storylines have tracked closely with with Cristina and Kepner, IMO, minus all the multiple Cristina breakup angsty arcs). To me, this is when he is at his least appealing, and he makes the show almost unwatchable. Playing armchair shrink for a moment—Shonda is currently on a book tour promoting her memoir ("A Year of Yes" or something like that)—and every interview I've seen or read, she mentions her 3 kids ("you know, I have three kids!") as well as how little time she has to spend with them (so she really makes it count!) and how much she relies on paid caregivers and how grateful she is for that help and how she considers all of that a feminist accomplishment.Now I will defend to the end the rights and choices of working mothers (and fathers), the need for more & better & affordable child care options in this country, and workplace support for family life in general, but Shonda's spiel seems to me like a weird mishmash of projection, deflection, and wishful thinking, and I wonder how much of that comes out in Meredith's three perfect, happy, but invisible children who apparently never interfere in her work or social obligations. Nannies, babysitters, and daycare—also invisible. It's too bad, really, if you think about it, a missed opportunity to explore how even wealthy, privileged women have to struggle to juggle career & family—just as white privilege & microaggression are explored in this episode. How long have you been watching this show? And are you sure it is this show? We are going on 12 seasons of girl talk & sex scenes

I noticed that David Henry Hwang had the writing credit on this episode right up front, and I thought it showed (in a good way). Has he written any of the other episodes? I hope he stays involved, because I thought he did wonders giving deeper dimension to the characters without changing who they are. I thought the eggplant thing was because in lieu of anatomically correct emoji, folks have taken to improvising with fruits, veggies, legumes etc.—

Now you mention it, telescope the plot into a couple of hours, resolving issues crucial to the plot (while leaving enough mystery open in the characters and premise itself for sequels or a return to series), give it a budget sufficient for quality action and supporting actors, and it you'd have a pretty decent popcorn movie.

I almost couldn't bring myself to watch this episode knowing the series was canceled already. But then I did, and really enjoyed it — I agree with those who think it gets better with each episode and RR ups the game (pun intended) several notches. The ambiguities I initially disliked, feeling everyone was against our hero, have grown on me as it seems that loyalties are more mixed than that and that some are trying to help but at some risk to themselves. I wish we would get more. It isn't high art but it is so much better than so much getting long production orders and it fills a niche that is open right now, the one left by the ends of Burn Notice, Leverage, etc. Ginny, eh, whatever, kill her off and create more avenging intensity in our Player, but unspooling the mystery of her faked death and seeing who helps and who hinders the solving of that mystery, that would interest me. The games of the week could use some work, but that could come with time. The characterization so have gotten more solid with each episode IMO edited to correct autocorrect

I thought it was a nicely done, not overly obvious collection of the "Zebras" of the title — all the cases they showed us in this episode were zebras of one stripe or another, not the horses that doctors in training are told to assume (at least, in the world of TV & movies). He OD'd on anti-depressants, which caused some kind of double life threatening set of symptoms involving his heart and something else, couldn't quite follow, and also was just giving it a hand wave because Dr. Rorish saying Eureka! anti-depressants! is pretty ridiculous when there are so many different kinds these days.I guess that patient earned his zebra stripes because the lone-wolf-jerk-chip-on-his-shoulder resident who was supposed to be treating him (can't remember their names yet) just assumed he was a no-good partier, treated him with contempt (the way he had that mask/bag thing put on him! that was horrifying — what *was* that?) and it turned out he was an attempted suicide... Just a guess edited to add... I just had to go find what that hood thing was that the nurses and orderlies forced over the kid's head, and here it is, called a SpitSock (unsurprisingly marketed for prison use also :p https://www.boundtree.com/spit-sock-hood-1033-15311-product-2645-273.aspx?search=1033-15311

I love Marcia Gay Harden and Luis Guzmán, think they are wonderful actors who can develop characters with souls that will anchor the show if it is given time to develop. And I've had a crazy crush on Raza Jaffrey ever since he was on MI5, a crush reignited with his turn as the hot Pakistani intelligence officer with a conscience on Homeland. Drs. Dunn & Guthrie are terrifically conceived characters and the actors do a lot with the little they are given just because the cast and scripts are so crowded. The residents are OK, nothing super special so far, though I do feel a personal sympathy and connection with the Krista character as the mom of a special needs child from birth, and while thank god my son is physically healthy, I relate very strongly to the wholly transformative effect that she experienced in being the mother to a special needs child. Motherhood is fundamentally different when your child is different, and it can make you stronger, or it can break you, or it can do a little of both. I think the show and the actress are showing this very well, and I don't think I've seen this on TV or film before. This is the kind of show I would like to settle in with and spend several seasons with, so I am pretty forgiving of the uneven initial episodes and the shifting character beats while the show finds its footing (did her personal tragedy turn Dr. Rorish turn into a hardass cowboy doctor ready to take wild risks for her patients, make tough decisions in triage for the greatest good, and cut residents at the first sign of weakness — the person we saw in the pilot? or is she an empathetic teacher ready to make allowances when a resident is unable to perform due to unresolved personal issues, and a highly trained trauma expert who spends waaaay too much time with patients who have sentimental resonance for her (the person she's been increasingly in every episode since)? Anyway, it doesn't feel like it's going to be groundbreaking, Emmy-sweeping TV to me, but These are characters and stories I'd like to spend a lot more time with, and I hope that TPTB will invest whatever time and other resources are needed for it to find its audience... Probably there are a lot of halfway intelligent folks like me who enjoy soapy medical drama and hung in with ER, Chicago Hope, House, and the like until all of their bitter ends, and would do the same here. Please, no snow globe ending though! The cross-section population of St. Elsewhere fans who are also family members/parents of people with autism have such tortured feelings about that!

I was confused by the brief exchange at the end between Mouse & Olinsky — was there something about fingerprints not matching that would indicate that delinquent boxer girl isn't actually his daughter, or what? Because I get that he hadn't decided to do the DNA test yet, since that was the incredibly boring agonized will he won't he scene at the mailbox at the very end...

No kidding. Someone ought to track down that criminal, pronto. They managed to be extra-extra-high waisted, dropped crotch, and tapered at the ankle all at the same time, something I didn't even realize was possible — I kept thinking it must be a bad camera angle but no, they were just that awful. Would have loved to hear Nina Garcia or Michael Kors vilify those pants before auf'ing their designer.

I'm enjoying this show well enough (or maybe it's just doing a better job than Blindspot of filling the Strike Back shaped hole on my DVR, and I've always known I'd choose Winchester over Sully if I could have only one :p) ... but I'm getting tired of the "everyone has a secret from and no one can be trusted by" the hero trope — even the dead-not dead wife apparently was hiding from someone or something that she never revealed to her beloved whose soul she saved. IMO this kind of caper show — whether the tone is light like Leverage or darker like The Blacklist — begins to lose its fun & luster when the hero/ine has no reliable allies or buddies who aren't compromised in some way. And this is beginning to lean that way, getting a little mired in lonely existential angst and self-doubt. Not so fun.

I kinda hope that Blindspot gets canceled and Sully gets brought in to rebalance this show — which I agree is by far the more entertaining of the two — give The Player a partner who is unambiguously on his side, maybe. But mostly both these shows make me miss Strike Back, which had great bromance chemistry AND badass women characters. Cassandra reminds me of the Jodhi May character from Season 0 of Strike Back, come to think of it.

I thought it was dumb & disrespectful to his wife to make the announcement at the dinner table like some vaguely interesting piece of family news. Why wouldn't he have a private conversation with his wife first and then figure out how to talk to their daughter together (which by that time would also presumably include a decision whether he was to be banished to the garage again)?

Am I the only one who thought that Quinn's latest victim recognized him? I thought she said "Peter," not "bitte."

^^^ This. I thoroughly enjoyed the first two episodes because despite the high silliness quotient, it still felt like there was some storytelling going on and I was 100% on board for the ride. But with this 3rd episode it feels like whatever interesting storyline or mystery might remain is getting buried under the detritus of too many characters, rapidly proliferating tossed off allusions to dark secrets, time shifts, etc. I did not like this last episode. Spent more time answering email on my iPad than watching the TV screen, despite all the pretty pretty people.

I know it seems weird, and the show keeps using the terms emergency medicine and trauma medicine like they are the same thing (not), but it's absolutely, horribly true that the best training hospitals for trauma medicine are the ones located where there are the most opportunities to practice it — the inner city, with its steady stream of life threatening injuries due to violence, unsafe housing conditions, etc., and where hospitals are also likely to be underfunded and be deficient in other services... Not sure if it's still true (haven't seen the doc that inspired this series) but it used to be that not just aspiring trauma specialists in the typical intern-resident track but doctors from around the world would come to LA County for training because the only other way to get as much experience and education in treating gunshot and stabbing injuries was in a war zone.

Daniel as Sweeney Todd was *everything*, from his intimate, sensual relationship with his straight razors to his obsession with the chairs being just right. For a moment I thought perhaps the showrunners had just decided fuck it, let's do a bottle episode in which we stage The Demon Barber of Boyle Heights, a reinterpretation of Sweeney Todd in which the resentment/revenge story is fed by hatred of American imperialism, fear of discovery as a former death squad member, and disgust that his pure daughter is being courted by an American soldier... I half expected Ruben Blades to begin singing "Mis Amigos" as he laid out his tools of torture. That would have been awesome. I don't want to be a party-pooper or a scold, but can I ask again that this be respected? I haven't started watching TWD original recipe yet, thought I would start with this instead, and these episode threads are FULL of allusions to the firebombing of Atlanta, characters who are named as dead or killed or having specific plot arcs, etc. etc. Please be aware that even that something said in passing that seems like a generic reference to TWD universe is a spoiler for those of us that would like to go to the other series without knowing major plot points or who dies or when or hooks up with whom etc. I don't think I'm the only one. Thanks!

Much as I love seeing Hank Azaria slither back into this show, I hate that they seem to have dumbed Ray & team waaay down in order to leave a big obvious bread crumb trail for Cochran to follow. The Ray, Avi, and Lena we know & love (in their professional capacities & competencies anyway) would never keep a storage unit in their real name, rented on a real credit card, with shelves full of murder weapons/blackmail items/crucial client leverage, just sitting there in plain sight in jumbo Ziploc bags. Nor would they be fucking around a private investigation/security firm that must have cameras everywhere and unzipping for a dick pic, instead of say, browsing the workstation to see that Cochran has discovered the fake border crossing by Avi and the break-in to the storage unit... So much stupid! And then it looks like next week the burial site is given away because Ray doesn't think enough to either disable the GPS on his fancy car or use a different car for the body dump. The setup for Cochran's vendetta just depends on Ray-Avi-Lena having a collective attack of incompetence, IMO

So much this. Especially since that German shepherd, true to its breed, was trying to warn them that something baaaad is happening and maybe coming for them, so lock the doors and windows, and lock and load whatever weapons you have. Also that dog looks a lot like *my* dog...so it was really hard to watch.

I have watched every episode of this series right from the beginning but I feel like I have completely lost the plot for this season, literally. Is there anyone on here who can summarize for me? [Not the Jakes/Charlie apparently standalone plot, that one seems clear enough, though why they have to have Jakes go dark just when he finally gets his own storyline is beyond irritating, and what they are doing in Florida is mystifying.] Does anyone else feel like Briggs has been a totally different character each season? Aside from the continuity of the secret agent superpowers, that is. Edited to clarify that it is this season that has me totally confused.

What the hell was up with this episode? When did the plotting become so byzantine, and why can't they seem to make up their mind whether Briggs is a good guy who will do questionable things for essentially good motives, or just a real bad guy involved in a seemingly impenetrable web of manipulation & deception.

Oh paigow of course you're right! I feel terrible to have forgotten Major Sinclair so completely when I adored that character just as completely when he was part of the show. And poor hapless Baxter who should never have been in the field... Still, I think the point remains that the dynamic of Strike Back is to be lethal to its women... and the more badass the woman, or the more serious her relationship with one of the male leads, the more surely she is going to die. Richmond should have stayed behind a computer screen and out of love with Scott. I don't necessarily see this as misogynistic or sexist or whatever, just worth noting. I do like that the women have always fought and commanded shoulder to shoulder with the men.

Yikes, I didn't mean to read the spoiler (or at least highly suggestive comment) about the end-of-series fate of Scott & Stonebridge. Didn't realize this aired earlier elsewhere in the world. Anyway, I tracked down this forum to kvetch that every.single main character (by which I mean, recurring cast, member of Section 20) killed off in this show is a woman. Am I missing anyone? aside from John Porter who popped off on his Dwarven quest to regain ancestral lands and treasure, I mean. Edited to add: also whatsisname, Porter's nemesis, who died in the desert as a cover for relocating to the States to fight zombies. But since he also was from Season 0 (as it is numbered here in the U.S. by Cinemax) I don't really count him either.