Sandman

Does anyone else find the direction the show is taking the Sarah Reese character just sad? I was really hoping the show wouldn’t just reprise the ugly way they wrote Reese out of the show. ETA: I think it makes sense for Goodwin to have a completely different look from Lt. Van Buren. She’s in a (very likely) higher paid position, in a charge of a bigger chunk of a different institution; her position is also more overtly social, at least partly about making donors and board members feel looked after. It seems likely that her style would be a little more polished, her competence packaged in a way that’s a little more soignée.

Someone please make Pascal and his wife stop being so creepy. Something about their interactions is wrong, like “I’m taking up firearms so I can learn how to shoot you in the crotch” level of wrong.

Co-signed. I found Gloria’s insistence to the last that she and Dante were the same felt almost like a curse, in the end. I don’t really believe they are the same, but I have no doubt it’ll mess with Torres’s head for some time. (I keep hoping someone will take him aside and say “Dude, she never even liked you!”) I don’t know exactly how Deputy Chief Villain got the goods on Intelligence, but all I could think, as the Deputy Chief sat back on the couch, with his snake-like stare trained on Voight, was “Well, the fat’s in the fire now.” (How are the upper ranks of CPD so stuffed with corrupt maniacs?)

Only on a slow Wednesday in the middle of the afternoon?

THIS. This whole plot line makes Torres look like an idiot. It doesn’t help that (in my opinion) the performers have no chemistry. Gloria seemed from the beginning like she was using him. Does Father Confessor actually have to say, in so many words, “Say the Act of Contrition, and stay away from your duplicitous girlfriend, ya big knucklehead!”

Wishful thinking about the non-date? Hee.

So now Severide’s gone from being a part-time Fire Cop to Cop-Cop? Undercover, at that. Pascal needs to communicate more clearly with his lieutenants, but that would play hell with the suspicion and cheap dramatic tension, I suppose.

But Maggie answered a direct question honestly by saying she sometimes regretted giving up her baby; that’s not advocating for keeping her. I think Maggie did a pretty good job of not trying to influence Sylvie’s decision.

Maybe it’s immature to wonder whether the show intends me to root for either Dr Archer or Dr Lenox in this endless, draggy-ass conflict, but they’re both behaving so unprofessionally I just end up wanting to give both of them a slap upside the head. Repeat after me, children: “It’s. Not. About. Me.” If you’re co-managers of the ED, that means you have to work together, as grownups are so often required to do. Yeesh.

Not just you — that’s who Dr. Ericka With a C and a K reminds me of! Thank you. Downing the amnesiac bride’s mystery pill doesn’t so much read “fearless commitment to patient care and advocacy” so much as “staggering lack of judgment and impulse control,” but that scene was almost worth it for Dr. Ericka’s look of goggle-eyed “Did you just take drugs?!” horror. Almost. Fun fact: Rachel Sutherland, listed as producer for this episode (why didn’t I notice earlier?), is the twin sister of Kiefer.

I know it’s not a date, or whatever, but, cookie, that ain’t a square jaw. Kind eyes, sure. So far Dr. Empath — “mirror-touch synesthesia,” sure, fine, whatever — is the most interesting character to me. But Dr. Spiky Future Love Interest has potential, as does Dr. Anxiety. ETA: He brought you bagels, man. Come on!

So it would seem. The path from Can’t Stand Each Other to UST to Can’t Keep Their Hands Off Each Other is a well worn one.

I think when Hermann pointed to his ear in highlighting “state of the art noise cancellation” (or whatever that feature of the new radios was) was the show’s implicit acknowledgement of that plot point, which I’m prepared to give some credit for; but I’m also losing patience with the whole “Oh, Hermann’s so adorably wacky!” pattern. No. The devotion Ritter and the other younger members are required to express begins to look untenable — you’d follow him anywhere, but just to pull his cranky ass out of disaster, maybe.

Aaaaand I’m back to yelling at the pretend people. Meaning Sam. Again. ETA: @anna0852, I believe the correct answers to your (clearly rhetorical, ahem) questions are Yes and Yes.

Looked like they were appalled into speechlessness.