# Er - 04/08 **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 9, 2004, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/er-04-08/239105 "2004-04-09T03:05:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 3\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![edwino](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/35a633/32.png) [@edwino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/edwino)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2004, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/er-04-08/239105/41 "2004-04-09T22:35:14Z")
> [@Tiramisu](#): > > Didn’t ER used to be more of a medical drama than a soap opera? > > I may be remembering incorrectly but it seemed to me that we rarely ever saw the cast outside of work. Mark Greene was my favorite and I started getting pretty pissed when they started having all kinds of shit happen to him but it seemed most of it actually happened in the hospital. Like the episode where the pregnant woman Dr. Greene had discharged as just a UTI came back in seizuring (from hypocalcemia?), went into labor, then developed DIC and bled out. That was some pretty heavy medical drama and one of the best episodes they have ever had. It seems like they just don’t follow the medical cases as much as they used to. > > It’s not that I mind personal stuff on the characters, it’s just too much. It’s like you said, if a workplace had that much tragedy happen they’d have had someone in to exorcize the place a long time ago. That was preeclampsia which he missed, which eventually developed into eclampsia and seizures. Bad news in any pregnancy, and it is a big medical mistake to miss it. I concur that it used to be really medically based. When I started medical school in 1997, most of the class got together in groups and watched it, if only to scoff at the diagnoses, which tend to favor the “sexy” conditions and things in the news. You know, someone came in with anxiety and you just _knew_ it was going to be a pheochromocytoma. But it was very medical, they didn’t pull punches (like much of the eclampsia stuff IIRC was pretty unexplained) and this made it different. They have always killed characters off (Omar Epps IIRC was a resident and he committed suicide), but mostly the principals just moved off the show (Sherry Stringfield, then George Clooney and Juliana Margolies, many other residents like Maria Bello) as is wont to happen in real medicine. People graduate, enter new residencies, get faculty positions at other institutions, get cushier jobs than that of a high throughput, high demand, probably relatively low paying public hospital. It is OK to involve more of the characters private lives, and I didn’t mind that at first. But there are absolutely no happy story lines anymore, and for the past three seasons they have had no qualms about killing principals off right and left. I watched a few episodes earlier this season, and it seemed to be getting better. But this is honestly ridiculous. There is not a more miserable collection of individuals anywhere on the planet with the most miserable patient load. Any bright spots are crushed with near glee. After reading the spoilers about Kem and Carter, I can’t say that I’m surprised. He is the happiest right now, so of course he must be thrown into an abyss of misery. With this last episode, I must say I’m through watching it. I know any interesting character or interesting plotline is only going to devolve into crap. Luka and the squirrel-looking nurse are getting into a relationship. She has a wild kid. This looks like the next happy plotline, so necessarily next season’s sweeps will deal with the kid or one of them in a horrific accident or perhaps they will just have a messy protracted ugly splitup. ---
**Author:** ![TeaElle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8491ac/32.png) [@TeaElle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TeaElle)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2004, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/er-04-08/239105/42 "2004-04-10T02:46:07Z")
> [@yellowval](#): > > **TeaElle** , you didn’t mention anything about Susan. Eh, never mind. I can see that one coming a mile away … since no one in the ER is allowed to be happy, there will be some big childbirth crisis in which Susan’s and/or the baby’s lives will be in danger. Truth be told, I have **no** spoilers for Susan except that she will be at the med school graduation for Abby and Neela (that’s not a spoiler) so presumably yes, _someone_ IS allowed to be happy, however briefly, in the ER. I forgot about Susan. > [@BiblioCat](#): > > And we already saw this storyline with Peter Benton and Reese, when Carla died and her new husband tried to get custody. Well not exactly. We know that ER often parrots John Wells’s liberal political views with regard to the state of health care in our nation (see the Gulf War vet dealing for money for Imitrex) but now we’re gonna get John Wells’s views about gay parents/families, too. 🙂 **jeevwoman** , your Carter/Kem spoiler gives too much away, and simultaneously too little. Suffice to say that it’s going to be harrowing and ugly. But to answer your spoiled question, no, Noah Wyle is signed for limited episodes through next season. He ain’t going nowhere. Reading back, no, Kerry did not donate her egg. Henry is Sandi’s biologically, she was artifically inseminated with donor sperm. Kerry has no blood ties to lean on in this custody battle. > [@amarinth](#): > > I am still annoyed with Abby going from being second in her class to Abby having really great clinical skills, but no academic skills whatsoever. What happened to them? Did they just disappear? Does nursing remove your academic ability? No, her ability to concentrate was sapped by the forced withdrawal from medical school thanks to skeevy ex-husband, two serious relationships gone very, very bad, the return of bipolar mom, the drama of newly bipolar beloved brother, a physical assault, a long monkeypox quarantine, being made charge nurse against her will _plus_ the re-emergence of alcohol in her life. The girl has been through some shtuff. I’m willing to cut her (and the writers) slack. She’s clearly disgusted with herself, she knows that she could do better than she’s been doing. > [@DoctorJ](#): > > She can take the test again pretty much immediately. And she will, before the season ends. Abby’s going to be okay. (I hope that wasn’t _too_ spoilerish.) I don’t mind the storylines. Things have been ebbing, they’ll swing back up. It can’t rain all the time and I think Wells & Co. know that. I did, however, forget one spoiler which does, unfortunately, go along the way of “no one can be happy.” Pratt will be accused of improper conduct after performing a breast exam on a patient. No word in my spoilers about how this resolves. I should also note that I have spoilers for what may be the season ender, but may also be the first episode of next season, and man, what I’ve read, that episode is gonna be a humdinger. I’ll save it, though, in case it does turn out to be next season’s opener. ---
**Author:** ![BiblioCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed8c4c/32.png) [@BiblioCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BiblioCat)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2004, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/er-04-08/239105/43 "2004-04-10T15:02:36Z")
Regarding the custody plotline echoing Benton’s previous plotline, it just seems familiar to me because Reese wasn’t Peter’s biological son, either, remember? I can’t remember the circumstances of how and why he found out, but Reese was not Peter’s biological son, and that came out at the custody hearing between Peter and Roger (Carla’s husband), after Carla died. I really liked the bit with the Gulf War Vet trying to get the Vicodan, to sell it and get the Imitrex, and he was actually clean. That was a good twist. I use Imitrex for migraines, and there was a long period when our health insurance refused to cover the injectible form of it (which is what I use), only the pills and nasal spray. I vomit when I have migraines, so the pills are a waste, and the nasal spray makes me vomit , too. It has a really nasty metallic taste and just makes me heave. We went through a long process of letter-writing, with my neurologist badgering the health insurance company, trying to get them to cover it. I had paid for three refills on my own ($140 each time) before they relented, and I even got them to pay me back for the ones I paid for out-of-pocket. I really feel sorry for people who don’t have Rx plans. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/er-04-08/239105.md?page=2)