S01.E01: Derailed

[limecoke]

Well, I need my medical shows so, after recently deciding that I am done with "Grey's Anatomy," I was ready for this one.  Agree that this was reminiscent of ER which isn't a bad thing.  I tried "Code Black" but found it overly intense for my liking but will try it again (yeah, I get that the whole idea of code black is intensity).  I think I'm in for "Chicago Med" and besides, Connor Rhodes is purty.

Edited November 22, 2015 by limecoke

[Lady Calypso]

Well, I liked it a lot more than I thought I would. I gave up on Chicago Fire last season and I refuse to watch Chicago P.D due to my hatred for Voight. I didn't think I'd want to watch this, but...I miss Colin Donnell on my screen. So, I decided to finally watch it and man if I am going to regret this later on. The showrunners' track records don't really bode well for me, since I know their style and can be quite annoyed by it. But the acting was good, the writing was decent and I liked each character individually and with others....except for Redhead Resident (apparently he's P.D's Halstead's brother??). He's a dick, but I don't thoroughly hate him enough to want him off my screen. I just am expecting this whole bad boy vs good boy dynamic with him and Connor, and I predict whoever Connor starts dating, DoucheRes will sweep in and steal the girl.

 

I like Connor, Maggie and April a lot. Natalie and Reese aren't horrible. The others I'll need more time to really like them. And....ok, shipping wise, I ship April and Connor the most. I love the female friendships and it looks like the females are going to be stronger together than the males. 

 

I actually liked a couple of the cases, surprisingly. I have watched a lot of medical shows in my lifetime, and I guess this is one of the strongest pilots I've seen. Now, I predict in about seven episodes, I'm going to be complaining left and right. But for now, I'll enjoy the show for what it is.

[scarynikki12]

I rewatched the episode, because why not, and my love for nurses Maggie and April is even stronger.  I judge medical shows on the nurse cast so I feel this is off to a good start.  Keep Maggie and April in play and I'll enjoy myself a lot.

 

I definitely think that Halstead 2.0 was the Hot New Guy before Connor, complete with the admiring looks and whispered conversations about his skills, and doesn't like being overshadowed.  They both come across as Alpha Males, so I expect lots of conflict before they find common ground and become friends/friendly.  I do wish H2.0 had witnessed Connor doing his own sutures, cause that would have been fun. 

 

As far as H2.0 no longer being in plastics, maybe there weren't any positions available?  Whatever trouble he got into in New York may have left him strapped financially (I don't remember if that was addressed when we first met him) and he took what he could?  Yeah, I don't know.  I hope it gets addressed. 

[Ariah]

I had two m isconceptions about this show:

1. I thought, with all the back pilots and characters being present at the other Chicago shows, that Med started a few weeks ago and that I have a few episodes piled up to watch.

2. That Will Halstead will be the main focus character.

 

I'm glad I was wrong on the second one, not so happy i was wrong on the first one.

 

As much as I love Jay, I cannot make myself like his brother. So, I was not at all eager to try this Med series, thinking it'll feature the mighty Halstead-redux taking the lead. But then tumblr gifs arrived, showing Colin O'Donnel in scrubs, Colin O'Donnel sans scrubs... And I was lost. I had to try it.

 

It's true, all Med series are quite alike, once you get to now them. And it's true, there has to be a wunder-surgeon, a real Captain Hospital who is not only handsome, but also brilliant and kind and with a tragic past to boot. But, to be honest, Colin O'Donnel can be my Wonder Doctor anytime.

 

This series will be watched.

[Sandman]

I find the functions played in the story by Rhodes in this pilot episode and Will Halstead in the backdoor pilot oddly identical. Each is not only the compassionate but arrogant Wonder Doc who makes all the ladyparts in range beep, but also the badboy who's also a displaced local, returning home to Chicago to work at the hospital. I think Will Halstead was intended as the focus character, judging by the backdoor pilot -- I'm not sure that counts as a misconception; I think the show's conception of the character changed. I wonder if there's any feeling of displacement on the part of the actors, now that the Captain Hospital! (hee) designation has shifted.

The other odd thing is Rhodes seems like a pretty close copy of The Night Shift's TC Callaghan-- physical similarities between Donnell and Macken, as well as Rhodes's cowboy qualities and potentially tragic backstory. I wouldn't have said that NBC should bother cribbing from itself, and certainly not from a character as Gary-Stu-rrific as Tragic Coincidences. At least Rhodes didn't come roaring into the nurses' station on a Harley.

Edited November 27, 2015 by Sandman

[Margherita Erdman]

I think Will Halstead was intended as the focus character, judging by the backdoor pilot -- I'm not sure that counts as a misconception; I think the show's conception of the character changed. I wonder if there's any feeling of displacement on the part of the actors, now that the Captain Hospital! (hee) designation has shifted.

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.

[starri]

I wouldn't have said that NBC should bother cribbing from itself, and certainly not from a character as Gary-Stu-rrific as Tragic Coincidences. At least Rhodes didn't come roaring into the nurses' station on a Harley.

...yet.

[Sandman]

starri, you optimist, you.

[statsgirl]

 How did he even end up as Chief Resident? Who is he teaching — seems like he'd be a terrible leader anyway.

He should be teaching/supervising the interns and junior residents, of which there appears to be only Reese. It's the Mark Greene role from the first season of ER.

How he got the job is probably that he told them that he was the best.  Bosses tend to believe that sort of thing and medical doctors have next to no administrative skills.  He's not a bad doctor, just a bad personality.

[Password]

Which is odd because I liked him on Chicago PD.

[Jordan27]

I didn't watch ER in its day, but the episode reminded me of the more recent The Night Shift. The doctor who came in with the patients from the track crash was a lot like the hot shot surgeon in The Night Shift who had served in Afghanistan.

I have to agree with you there.  Certainly closer to NS.  It doesn't compare to ER, one of the great shows of all time.  It's not close.

 

I liked it enough to give it another look.

[Raja]

I wondered why Raum Emmanuel would agree to be on a show that started with a major failing of his El train.

 

I liked it more than I thought I would considering I hated the backdoor pilot on Chicago Fire last season.  Bringing on Colin Donnell really helped.

 

It's ER like in that there are a diverse group of people with minimal nurses., and both female  At least ER had more nurses and some of them were male.  So far I like Choi and Connor and can't stand the red haired resident. Sadly medicine is full of people like him.

 

I like that Connor got his degree from Guatemala. Foreign degrees are looked down up (looking at you, ER) but often it's a better education because they have to learn to diagnose without the expensive equipment.

 

I hope they can avoid turning Reese into Carter because Carter quickly became unbearable on ER.

 

Merkerson's character's speech was okay but I would have said "How are you going to tell your child you let her die for him?"  Oliver Platt's psychiatrist didn't have too much of a role so he didn't bug me too much.  It will probably be worse next week.

His honor didn't build that train,

 

Dr Perfect. First a line about a supposedly ritzy Chicago neighborhood followed by medical school in Mexico. So I guess he is not Dr Morison from St Elsewhere but a rich boy who missed his American medical school window due to some misused undergraduate years but something happened to get him to go south and become perfect but not perfect enough to get a spouse, that we know of.

 

I was surprised we didn't have a patient shot by an certain unit's detectives and saved by a certain station's paramedics