'This is no good. The camera didn't catch my good side. We'll have to shock him again.' — Photos: Handout
Is this the season for ER veterans to pop up in our living rooms again?
While Eriq LaSalle traded his scrubs for police blues in Prime Video's On Call, his Cook County General Hospital screen colleague Noah Wyle is back in the emergency room in The Pitt.
The ER DNA is strong in this one. Wyle not only stars in it but he's also listed as an executive producer alongside that series' showrunner John Wells and The Pitt creator R. Scott Gemmill (also an ER vet, with JAG and NCIS: Los Angeles on his resume too).
Set in the fictional Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Hospital, this new show fits the bill of "must-see TV" as much as its spiritual antecedent did.
Each of its debut season's 15 episodes (a renewal order has already been given) takes place over one hour of a single shift at The Pitt.
This real-time unfolding of events (missing only a Kiefer Sutherland voiceover to introduce each episode) covers what we are told is a typically chaotic day at the ER, its staff dynamic "complicated" by the presence of medical students and interns eager to prove themselves.
Heading the team is Wyle's Dr Michael "Robby" Robinavitch as the shift's senior attending physician, a picture of calm professionalism and compassion when handling the myriad patients and families that come through the doors.
Yet Robby is also dealing with a bunch of stuff, including an anniversary he would rather not be observing, and that puts him on edge around his subordinates – with the strain showing as the hours wear on.
As grouchy and snappish as he gets, though, Robby mostly comes across as a guy trying to do the right thing (reinforced by his snarky attitude towards the hospital administrator and her budget cuts) and we couldn't ask for a more sympathetic anchor in this roiling sea of humanity.
'Since everyone figures I'm clueless, I might as well hold this pose for the rest of the shift.'
The Pitt is something you can easily fall into, with its sharp writing and an amazing ensemble cast – feel free to add more superlatives after seeing them at work – serving up liberal doses of triumph and tragedy in each instalment.
It doesn't always escape the 24 trap of having a mini-crisis break out exactly on the hour to end each episode on a cliffhanger, however. Still, halfway into its run, it has done a bang-up job of maintaining continuity – not only with its plotting but the very environment of The Pitt – within its focused yet limiting structure.
The grumpy and impatient guy in the waiting room gets noticeably more agitated and entitled each time we revisit him and could be heading for a meltdown further along. You can't help but feel for the dependent senior citizen seemingly abandoned in the ER by her long-suffering sole caregiver, the siblings reluctant to say goodbye to an aged parent, or the parents devastated by the idea of losing a child.
The grieving folk or people in distress don't abruptly move on by the very next episode, either. Personality clashes and differences of opinion thicken the atmosphere and linger, as the currents of ill temper and resentment (the writers credit us with enough viewing hours under our belts to figure it out) ebb and flow.
'So, it looks like you need a posterior capsulotomy. Which, despite what it sounds like, does not involve suppositories.'
A running gag about a medical student's need to keep changing his scrubs (for a creative variety of calamities) is finely balanced with the self-doubt (exacerbated by losing a patient early in the shift) that remains evident in all his actions.
This is a show that excels in letting the humanity of its characters, whether leading, supporting, recurring, or guests, shine through at every turn, both the good and bad.
It taps into the impulses that draw us to medical dramas like this. Dismiss them as glorified soaps, potboilers, melodramas, or even voyeurism if you wish; but the best of these reaffirm our (often failing) belief in humanity at a time when the physical, emotional and mental aspects of that nature break down for reasons unknown or beyond our control.
New episodes of The Pitt arrive weekly on Max.
Summary:
Plunge into this Pitt
