Ive been hearing some good things about The Pitt over the last couple of years, I just haven’t had access to any of the services showing it in the UK.
But then I cancelled Paramount+ after the last episode of Strange New Worlds S4 (I must write about that some time), and picked up a 6 month deal on NowTV with HBO Max, which meant that not only can we carry on with The Rookie (Disney+ only goes up to S4), but we can finally watch The Pitt, as well as some other shows (Lanterns, I’m looking at you, in particular!)
Anyhoo, Noah Wyle stars as a Doctor in a busy, city centre ER department – now why does that sound like a sequel to something i can’t quite put my finger on?
(It’s also the reason Noah Wyle was sporting an impressive beard in Leverage:Redemption S2, which was filmed around the same time.)
But, no, it’s not a sequel, although there are some similarities, but also mixed with some of 24’s DNA – this is 15 episodes taking place over a single shift in a hospital.
This is hard-hitting, harrowing stuff, and while a normal, episodic show would feature many of the same stories, the episodes would each take place over 1 or 2 days, rather than just an hour of a single day.
I mean, in most cases, a 15 episode season takes place over weeks or months, in this case it’s a single day!
But what happens, exactly?
Just a small selection of storylines, particularly those that hit me the hardest.
There are 2 very similar stories, happening more or less concurrently –
- The parents of a teenage boy who accidentally took an overdose of fentanyl (he thought they were sleeping pills) who is essentially brain-dead, hooked up to a series of machines that are keeping his body alive, and whose parents, especially his mum, can’t bear to see the machines switched off.
- The middle-aged children of an elderly man with Alzheimer’s, whose body was failing, and who had been intubated and hooked up to a breathing machine very much against his wishes but at the request of his daughter.
A bit of personal back-story…
25 years ago, maybe even 30, there was a big story in the UK press about a young lad who, for whatever reason, ended up in a coma, with all signs pointing to brain death, and doctors were advising the parents to switch off the machines keeping him alive, while the parents were taking the hospital to court to prevent this.
I ended up talking to my parents about this, saying that that is nonlife, and the only thing the patient experiences would be pain (if even that), and I would rather they turned the machines off and let me slip away if I was in that situation.
My Mum wasn’t happy about this – “I wouldn’t want to let you go!” she said, but then my Dad chimed in.
“Yes”, he said, “make me comfortable and let me go.”
Many years later, when my Dad was dying from Alzheimer’s and was admitted to hospital for a chest infection, we asked for a “No Heroic Measures” note to be attached to his chart – the American DNR (Do Not Resuscitate order) does not exist here, but No Heroic Measures requests that a patient be made comfortable (i.e., doped up to the eyeballs) and left to gently go, rather than prolong their suffering by trying everything possible, even if it just causes suffering, the biggest difference with a DNR is that this is not legally enforceable.
Having this big, strong, kind, and gentle man, whom you love dearly, just slip away is hard, but forcing him to stay and prolonging his suffering… that is unthinkable, although I understand why some people would do it.
So, every time the story went back to these siblings and their dying father, my wife would reach over and squeeze my hand, because she could see I was getting upset just thinking about this storyline.
The other story was a young girl, the eldest of a pair of young sisters, who was found floating in a family swimming pool, non-responsive and cold, and was brought in by their grandmother, who was looking after them.
I hate tv shows where young kids get hurt, but there was hope that she would pull through once they got her warmed up.
But it wasn’t to be, and one of the junior Doctors was dispatched to tell the younger sister that big sister didn’t survive.
She didn’t tell the young girl at first, instead asking her to write something to tell her big sister, and it came out that it was her that fell into the pool, and her big sister jumped in to push her out, but then couldn’t get out herself.
Which was the point where I started feeling a bit emotional, but then she wrote and read out a heart-felt letter to her sister.
My wife knew it was coming.
“Oh, FUCK!” I quietly muttered under my breath, trying (and not entirely succeeding) not to sob, as my wife tried comforting me.
There are plenty of other stories running throughout the show – there is the running gag about one medical student who keeps having to change his scrubs after having various bodily fluids cover him, the nurse who is violently assaulted by an irate patient sick of waiting to be seen, the Doctor who has a series of flashbacks that lead to a full-on melt-down, the junior Doctor more concerned with putting the medical students down than doing her job, the senior Doctor caught writing prescriptions for patients but not actually giving them the drugs, the staff taking bets on when the Police would recover a stolen ambulance, a Doctor with an ankle monitor to check she doesn’t breach bail conditions, the administrator who demands better customer satisfaction results but refuses to pay for more doctors and nurses to see patients faster, and much, much more.
There is enough here for a full season of a tv show that takes place over a period of months, but this is over a single shift.
And then you have the last 4 episodes, where the medical staff are put through the absolute wringer, as a mass shooting event takes place nearby, and well over one hundred casualties are sent to the hospital, and stacked 4 to a room in the ER until they can be sent off to any available operating theatres.
By the end, the viewer is an absolute mess of emotions, and can only imagine what the characters have gone through.
It all comes to the point at the end of the final episode, where, after being told in no uncertain terms to “GO! HOME!” after 15 gruelling hours at work, several doctors, nurses, and one of the medical students meet up in a park opposite the hospital to share a cooler of beer, reflecting on them days events, and the senior Doctor cracks up laughing – when the student asks what is so funny, he gasps “This is your first shift!”
And what a baptism of fire it is.
I turned off the final episode of this first season, and told Louise “Right, we’re not starting Season 2 yet!”, while putting on an episode of The Rookie, for something moderately light and fluffy.
Given a chance, she would binge S2 overnight, then do S3 tomorrow, if it was available (which it won’t be until some time next year!), but I’m traumatised, and need some time to recover (and get this thing written!).
I’d heard this show was good, but this was outrageously good, and I’m looking forward to S2 – but not yet.
Patients need time to heal, and so do the viewers of this show.
