SPOILER ALERT: The following contains spoilers for Chicago Med Season 11, Episode 11.
Chicago Med Season 11, Episode 11 is almost a fantastic episode. It’s another outing that has some wonderful highs and some disappointing lows. “Our So-Called Lives” is slightly reminiscent of the Claire Danes show of the same name, given all of the personal angst involved, but when it’s great, it’s really great.
Let’s start with the positives: the return of Hope Lauren as Lynne and the idea to mark the one-year anniversary of Sully’s death. It’s a really lovely thought to revisit the Sully plotline, since that was so formative for Dr. Mitch Ripley. The standard practice in TV shows is to forget a lot of these big character moments after they’ve run their initial course.
Yet “Our So-Called Lives” wonderfully illustrates how Sully’s passing continues to affect both Lynne and Ripley. In addition to that, it’s just a pleasure to see Lauren and Luke Mitchell working together again. The fact that they shared so many scenes in The Republic of Sarah makes the dynamic between Lynne and Ripley so much more engaging and natural, and this is a friendship that’s worth keeping as part of the show (that one brief attempt at pairing them up aside).
This episode of the NBC show is also bolstered by some wonderful guest casting. That’s Brenda Strong (Sports Night, Desperate Housewives) as the one-time girlfriend of Dr. Daniel Charles, and Mark Linn-Baker (Perfect Strangers) as her husband. The “loved one of a main character ends up in the ED” plotline has been done a lot, not just here but on every medical drama, but it works this time because of the casting.
Strong and Linn-Baker are perfectly matched with Oliver Platt, which makes all the history between Charles, Suzie, and Howie believable. Unfortunately, it also means that Chicago Med fans know Suzie won’t survive her surgery. The show has a tendency to choose the bad ending if it can get an emotional reaction out of it. (The mention of Charles’ wife CeCe dying of cancer is a reminder that Paula Newsome’s character was another example of this.) Linn-Baker is great in the scene where Howie melts down over Suzie’s death, but it’s a shame that she had to go.
And there are several issues with “Our So-Called Lives” that have to be acknowledged. Most notably, there’s an obvious attempt throughout to retroactively convince viewers that the Ripley and Dr. Caitlin Lenox hookup makes sense—and not only that, but that it’s suddenly serious. From Lynne declaring that Ripley must “really like” Lenox, to Suzie talking to Lenox about “inevitable” attraction, it all feels like Chicago Med trying to get viewers to buy into Ripley and Lenox. And it doesn’t work.
The final scene of Ripley asking Lenox to give their relationship a real shot fails for multiple reasons: it’s something that would work if they’d been together for more than two sex scenes, and more than that, if Lenox’s reaction conveyed any genuine interest. Ripley has earned better than how his love life has been handled so far.
One of these criticisms can also be applied to the love triangle that now officially exists between Hannah, Dr. Dean Archer and Dr. Jennifer Kingston. The professional plotline between Hannah and Jennifer is aces; it’s fantastic that the two women aren’t pitted against one another just because they have the same romantic interest. Yes, they disagree, but they’re also able to make up.
However, it’s likewise hard to buy into Archer now calling Kingston his “girlfriend.” There’s a clear time skip that has taken place between this and the prior episode, between that dialogue and the fact that Charles is back from his leave. But that doesn’t help plotlines like this; it actually undercuts them, because the viewers are asked to just accept big leaps forward. A time skip works between a date or two, but not from one date (or closet hookup) to two serious relationships.
It’s more interesting to hear Dean and Hannah banter about shopping at Costco than it is to see Archer and Kingston. (If it made any sense at all, a subplot about Dean and Hannah in a Costco would be absolutely gold.) And it’s hard not to feel like Charles got shortchanged, too; he’s having this major crisis, but then he’s back two episodes later saying he’s totally fine.
Maybe that’s because everyone loves Oliver Platt, and the writers didn’t want to be without him. But given how the One Chicago shows use cast rotations for budget purposes, the series could have capitalized on that instead. How did Med function without Charles, both professionally and personally? And having Charles’ growth happen off-screen makes everything that came before feel like it wasn’t that serious, since it’s already over.
“Our So-Called Lives” could have been one of the best episodes of Chicago Med Season 11. If the Lynne and Ripley storyline had been able to stand on its own, and not be partly in service of Ripley and Lenox, that would have been even better. The heart-to-heart scene between Lynne and Ripley at Wrigley Field is an example of how much that storyline had to offer. The Charles storyline could have been even stronger with a different ending and a change like Howie helping Daniel in some way, instead of just hearing about his problems after the fact. Even Asher working with Kingston has its strong points. But Chicago Med again lets its romance subplots drive the storylines too much, and so this one comes up short.
Chicago Med airs Wednesdays at 8:00 p.m. ET/PT on NBC. Photo Credit: Courtesy of NBC.
