Chicago Med Season 10 Episode 9 arrived with both dread and excitement.
Everyone involved with Med was so careful not to leak Sharon’s fate that I was sure we were in for something painful — or else an awful arc like the one on The Good Doctor after a similar stabbing.
I should have had more faith in Chicago Med. The only thing I was right about was that it would be emotional, and it was, but in a good way.
I’m Usually An Optimist, But I Was Waiting For The Other Shoe To Drop
One of the best things about “No Love Lost” is that Sharon’s rescue sequence was finished quickly, but I spent the rest of the episode expecting bad news.
Nothing dragged in this storyline.
Archer got one thrilling scene where he had to break the glass on a stairwell door so he could help subdue Sharon’s attacker, but after that, she quickly got to the hospital and into surgery.
Still, every time she wasn’t in a scene, I was expecting terrible news, and it didn’t help that there were still 15 minutes to go after Archer told Tara that Sharon was in recovery.
She had just had a huge scare before the commercial break, making it look like the chances of her survival were slim to none, and with so much time left, I was primed for a tragic twist in which she developed a nasty complication and died just when everyone thought she was out of the woods.
Daniel: You scared the crap out of me today, you know that?
Sharon: You are not getting rid of me for a very long time.
Sharon’s survival was even more emotional than her death would have been.
The steady stream of visitors coming to see her without that unnecessary complication brought tears to my eyes.
And best of all, Sharon insisted that Archer tear up that resignation letter. It didn’t seem like he was 100% sold on staying at Gaffney yet, but he’ll get there. (Check out Steven Weber’s thoughts about that right here on TV Fanatic!)
Archer Used His Stubbornness For Good To Save Sharon’s Life (And Its Quality)
When Archer first joined Gaffney in Chicago Med Season 6, I had little use for him, especially when he deliberately allowed a patient to lapse into a coma so that he could override their lack of consent to a procedure he believed they needed.
This time, though, he made the right call.
I don’t know if his claim that consent was covered because he discovered more damage mid-procedure would hold water at a meeting like the one Dr. Charles was forced to sit through.
But it doesn’t matter. Ultimately, Sharon is alive and recovering and thanked Archer for protecting the quality of life she wanted to preserve.
That’s excellent news. It means we won’t have to sit through a tedious storyline about Sharon being angry about the lifesaving procedure she received like we did with Lim on The Good Doctor.
It also hopefully means that Archer finally felt validated. When he asked Maggie why no one would listen to him, he wasn’t just talking about Sharon’s family.
The reason he wants to resign is that he feels his demotion is symbolic of how everyone has decided his ideas are antiquated and has discarded him in favor of the younger, more forward-thinking Lenox.
But Sharon knew that Archer had made the right decision and that he understood her wishes better than her family had.
That has to mean something to him, especially since she followed that up by telling him how much she wants him to stay at Gaffney.
Reese Finally Got A Proper Ending To Her Conflict WIth Charles
I figured there would be some fallout from Charles’ latest fight with Reese, but I didn’t expect her to try to threaten his job so soon.
I spent the first half of the episode being annoyed with her. She seemed determined to mess with Charles’ career, and it seemed over the top.
Peter should have seen the proceedings as tit-for-tat nonsense. Reese was angry that Charles revoked her privileges. Charles was angry that Reese was wasting his time.
Sharon’s precarious situation cast a shadow over the whole proceedings, too. Reese seemed more like herself when she told Charles she filed her complaint before knowing that Sharon had been seriously hurt than she did when she was acting out her anger.
Still, that set-up led to her and Charles finally clearing the air about a lot of unexpressed hurt and resentment.
Surprisingly, the issue with her father’s death never came up.
In Chicago Med Season 4 Episode 1, Reese left Gaffney because she believed Charles’ hesitation before starting chest compressions led to her father’s death, yet in this episode, she had a laundry list of issues that didn’t include that.
I could see both sides of their old conflicts. As Reese’s supervisor, Charles had a duty to encourage her to correct course when he thought she was making a serious error, especially one that hurt a patient.
However, Charles is overly passionate about protecting his patients’ mental health, and it can come off as self-righteousness to students who are trying to learn how to be better doctors.
Ironically, Cuevas has had some of the same issues with him despite Reese’s insistence that Cuevas was biased toward Charles because she worked for him.
The two should compare notes sometime!
I liked the two calling a semi-truce to figure out what was causing their patient’s memory loss and Sarah’s ultimate admission that she was anxious around Charles because she second-guessed herself for years after working with him.
I’m surprised I didn’t realize the reason she gave the patient placebos.
When Charles was interviewing the woman, I remembered from my clinical social work training that SSRIs can cause suicidal ideation in some patients, but never made the connection between that and why Sarah made the choice she did.
Additionally, when she mentioned consulting with her colleagues, I realized a fatal flaw in Charles’ approach.
It was silly to assume that Sarah while working wherever it is she works now, went completely rogue and made this placebo decision on her own without looking at studies or talking to other psychiatrists about what she should do.
It’s great that the two of them finally cleared the air, though, and that they can be colleagues and friends now. This was the ending Reese never got when she left so abruptly the first time.
Abrams Finally Met His Match
No one has ever put a dent in that big ego Abrams has before, and it was hilarious that a middle-school girl was able to do so.
Allie’s story was serious, but her interactions with Abrams were the comic relief I needed after all those heavy Sharon scenes.
Abrams was befuddled by this girl who had as much self-confidence as he did, at least when it came to telling off adults who are used to getting more respect than they give.
Allie: You braided my hair? Do you have a daughter?
Abrams: Yes, and I have two older sisters who made me braid their hair constantly when I was growing up.
Allie: Do you ever think they wish they were related to the #1 neurosurgeon in the country instead of you?
Allie’s refusal to consent to a procedure that required her hair to be cut was understandable. Her illness got her unwanted attention, teasing, and bullying — things that need to be taken far more seriously than they are in most schools.
She also had never had a stable family situation and didn’t trust that her current foster mom would want to keep her for more than a few months, so she wanted to control what she could.
I didn’t understand why they couldn’t at least give her a realistic-looking wig so that the other kids wouldn’t realize she had no hair.
Frost’s solution was even better, though.
Abrams might have thought it was ridiculous to braid her hair around the top of her head so that he could do the surgery without shaving her head, but I thought it was brilliant.
Over to you, Chicago Med fanatics.
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