Where did summer go? We’re half sad and half happy that it’s over. Sad because everything feels carefree in the summer, and happy because now that it’s over, we’re getting new television. DOC returned tonight, and they did not miss a beat with an action-packed dramatic hour of television. DOC Season 2, Episode 1 was a great episode. If the rest of the season is as good as this, you have our attention.
All of it.
I didn’t realize just how much I missed DOC until the characters that I got to know walked into frame, and I smiled. I missed some, still hate some, and cried over another. DOC has always been complex, filled with heart and a lot of drama. And hey, the season opener of DOC slapped us in the face and said, ‘if you thought the first season was dramatic, hold my remote.’ Well, that and don’t change the channel.
Don’t worry, I am definitely not changing the channel.
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IT WASN’T WHAT YOU SAW
You know it’s an episode of DOC when Amy Larsen is on an apology tour. While I do believe that he has a lot of things to apologize for, I do not believe that Amy even gets the gravity of what she’s done to people. That being said, though, I really don’t think she owes everyone answers. Who gave her answers? No one.
Amy and Jake are my ship, and I love the two of them together. I think that while Michael can help her grow from her past and offer her answers there, Jake is her future. BUT (and it’s a big but) that requires him to be able to wait and realize that she’s not the woman that he fell in love with.
And chances are, she will never be.
It seems as though everyone is avoiding Amy, and I don’t think any of us can judge them for that. A lot of times, we think that the hard time someone is going through, we always have to cut them some slack. And yes, you should give a person grace.
But it doesn’t mean that you have to let them completely off the hook.
Jake has been through a lot. He stormed out of the bar that night, which apparently was just a few days prior. No one knows why Jake did what he did, but we do know that he was there at the moment that Michael and Amy were in the office that night.
Amy wants to explain, but he’s been ignoring her calls. So when she gets to work and he lets her explain – she’s definitely saying it all wrong. She claims the kiss was goodbye, that there was nothing between them, and that it was a matter of just old feelings.
Jake may have felt like a replacement at that moment, and I hate that for him. Relationships evolve and things change, but he didn’t ask for that. Amy’s situation has affected everyone, but the hard part to see is that she just keeps making a lot of excuses.
PAST AMY WASN’T LOOKING OUT
No one expects Amy to have everything figured out, but maybe she needs to figure things out on her own. Every emotion that she should be processing, she’s expecting others to guide her through. Amy is putting a lot on herself, but she’s also putting a lot on others. She needs to figure herself out.
Amy Larsen was once a monster – at least that’s what people make her sound like. I don’t think that she was. I think that she was scared and felt like she had to be strong all the time. Amy thought that she had to be so guarded with her feelings and emotions, but it came across as wrong. Amy did not process her grief at all.
Instead, she became someone that she’s not. She became a shadow of the doctor that she was.
Six years ago, Amy had known that Rosie wouldn’t survive a heart transplant. She was at the top of the list and was healthy enough to get one. Amy spoke from fear because she had just lost her son. The cardiologist on the case spoke to him like a doctor.
I think that past Amy was more emotional than anyone wanted to see. She didn’t want them to see it. For her, comfort was hiding, and for her, hiding was all she knew to do. Dealing with grief is never an easy thing.
It’s just another testament to how one needs to deal with grief, and just pushing it down won’t make it all better. It will come out somehow, someway. This man, Alex, had never forgotten what Amy did – how she told them that she could wait.
Past Amy was a good doctor, but she just didn’t know bedside manner. She still doesn’t, but she does seem a lot better than she once was. She just has to figure out how to make peace with the past and move forward.
A FATHERS LOVE
When Rosie, the heart transplant patient, has a lesion found on her lung, there is a chance that she will not get her heart transplant.
I do not agree with the things that her father did next, but I also don’t think that anyone can judge a father’s love. You see, if we’re putting the fact that he held a floor hostage for a hot minute aside, you see a man who has been broken by grief. You see a man who doesn’t seem to know how to survive without his daughter. He’s already lost his wife.
When he pulls out the gun, TJ and Jake try to take him. What happens is that TJ ends up getting shot. I jumped out of my chair as TJ went down. That man is a saint, and he wants nothing more than to make life better for his patients. I was just thankful that Alex let Jake take TJ out of the floor to get the help that he needed.
You can get rid of a lot of people, but not TJ. TJ is a good soul, and he’s already been through so much. Eventually, what happens is that the floor is evacuated, and the only people left are Rosie, her Dad Alex, Amy, Dr. Maitra, and nurse Julie.
What ensues over the next hour of television isn’t what I expected, but that’s what makes it so great. Amy had to deal with the repercussions of a decision she made in the past and saw what her choices as a doctor did to the people that she treated. I don’t think that there is a better way to learn than seeing what your choices change for other people.
She could make her apologies – that’s true. But sometimes apologies don’t change anything. Instead, they hopefully refocus you. And I do believe that Amy is refocused.
THE HEART ARRIVES
If there is anything that shocks me when it comes to DOC, it is when Michael lies. He lied to UNOS to get the heart, even though everything happening at that hospital was all over the news. TBH, I was just happy that Michael was doing his job and not trying to get to the floor to save Amy.
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But Jake, well, I think we all need to have more respect for him. He’s willing to do whatever it takes to make sure that his patients get the best care and puts that first. However, I do believe that in this situation, he also wanted to make sure that protecting Amy was high on the list.
It’s when he goes to the floor to deliver the heart that you really get to see the type of man that Jake is. He is honest and caring, and he fights for those that he loves.
He does love Amy, but he’s mourning the Amy that he knew as well as coming face to face with the Amy that he knows now. He’s allowed to miss that badass, take-charge, fearless doctor that he once knew.
Seeing him stand up for her made me tear up. It just goes to show that no matter the situation now, he still loves her.
When we know that Rosie won’t make it – even with a transplant – Ryan leaves to get the heart to someone else. Alex won’t hurt Amy or Dr. Maitra. Seeing Alex say goodbye to his daughter was heartbreaking, but I am glad he got the chance to.
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THE BABY IS COMING
Michael has a lot going on, but his wife is at the hospital. She’s gone into labor seven weeks early. One just has to wonder what poor Michael did that it was on the same day as the hostage incident.
I have always felt for his wife because she’s having to compete with a ghost that she thought she had gotten rid of. However, that ghost is there, almost daily, staring her in her face.
What I do love is that when push came to shove and he was asked to deal with the situation at the hospital, he didn’t leave his wife’s side. He was there for his wife and his child. Michael is a good man, but he’s being asked to deal with impossible things.
Amy may still think of him as he was eight years ago, but he’s not that person. I think that he knows where he wants to be, and also knows where he doesn’t belong or need to be.
It’s seeing him cry when he hears Amy’s voice on the floor and over his new child that I wanted to crawl through the television and hug him.
There are a lot of relationship dynamics happening in this hospital, and how they will balance them all – I don’t know. What I do know isthat Season 2 of DOC will leave your jaw on the floor.
What happens next? Guess we’ll have to wait til next week to see.
OTHER THOUGHTS
- I will not accept a Dr. Maitra and Jake relationship – nope
- Jake was so right telling Amy she went to Michael first, and look what happens – she does it again
- Gina and Amy making up – I love
- I wanna know what Dr. Singh told Gina
- Katie is a good kid
- Julie is my favorite nurse now
- Michael having to lie to Katie – you just knew that had to have been hard for him
- What does a girl have to do to get Jake and Amy to work out?
- TJ best be okay
DOC airs Tuesdays on FOX.
