"Officer Down"
Tensions were running high tonight as our favorite doctors, distracted by their own personal problems and agendas, dealt with the shootings of two police auxiliary officers.
Morris internalized his grief over the loss of his father but externalized his frustration as he doggedly fought to save the lives of the victims and vented his anger on a veteran officer (
Mimi Kennedy) assigned to oversee their training. I simply can't say enough about the fine work that
Scott Grimes continues to turn in as a former slacker who has emerged as a talented doctor, mostly in spite of himself. When he opened up to Abby about his loss, it clarified a lot about his motivation to be a better doctor.
Morris' colleagues had their own share of drama to contend with as well. While trying to sort out his relationship with Bettina, Pratt treated a high-school wrestler secretly battling bulimia. Gates pulled strings with Dubenko to get his unwilling young ICU prodigy into a clinical trial just as runaway Sarah showed up on his doorstep. A flustered Abby took out her domestic frustrations on her smitten intern while her recuperating roommate Neela received an unexpected visit from Dubenko in the midst of her babysitting duties for Joe.
While I've enjoyed the first three episodes of this season, I do not feel completely satisfied that the writers have established an overall tone or theme for this season. The stories feel somewhat disjointed to me and lacking in cohesion. I'm hoping that in the coming weeks, we will start to see some of these plot lines intersect and fill in some of the blanks. Meanwhile, I am enjoying Sam's romance with the hunky police officer (though I am pretty much waiting for the other shoe to drop because it usually does where Sam is concerned) and I still really enjoy
Leland Orser as Dubenko, a character who has been quietly developed over several seasons and still continues to surprise both with his confident gravitas as a doctor and his all-too-real humanity as a guy struggling with his somewhat inappropriate romantic yearnings. Here's hoping that all these developing stories are leading somewhere interesting and fresh.
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