Reviewer Rating: 3/5.0
3
What is it, Chicago Med?
The fall finale of Chicago Med Season 10 Episode 8 felt like a regular episode, nothing special.
The suspense was more cliffhanger than exciting, and I think it suited the final episode we’ll see in almost two months better than the rest of the show.
Dr. Archer’s potential resignation should be a bigger issue at the end of Chicago Med Season 10 Episode 8
Archer spent most of his time pretending he was happy to no longer be the emergency department director.
He said he was grateful for the extra free time, told Lenox he had no hard feelings and offered to help her see patients.
If he had a secret plan to take the position back from Lennox, his actions in Chicago Med Season 10 Episode 8 would make sense.
This would be a classic move from Archer, which is why I was skeptical about how relaxed he looked after the decision was made.
However, after the Thanksgiving party, Archer told Hannah he was quitting because he was unhappy in a lower position and didn’t have much reason to stay.
Not only is this not who Archer is, but it’s a plot point designed to have him arrive at Sharon’s office at just the right time to learn that she’s being held hostage and stabbed. ah!
Archer was right to feel about his demotion, but the way his resignation was handled was not.
I don’t like it when characters do something just because they need to be in a certain place at a certain time. It felt very manipulated.
Archer’s struggle with the question of whether to stay or go should be more prominent. It should not appear out of thin air but should be a true story.
Plus, Hannah won the wishbone pull, which meant Archer had to wait 24 hours before submitting his resignation letter. So, aside from plot requirements, why is he offering it now?
Archer has never been my favorite character and I’m not sure how I’ll feel about him leaving.
Anyway, I don’t think that’s going to happen. When Med returns in January, he’ll have to help save Sharon, which may make him decide to stay put.
That’s all well and good, but is it too much to ask for a story that isn’t filled with predictable tropes?
Sharon’s stalker reveal incredibly disappointing
Anyone who knows me knows how much I love a good mystery novel. I write them, read them, and watch them on TV.
But this stalker storyline was problematic from the start, and the reveal in Chicago Med Season 10 Episode 8 wasn’t much better.
Why did Atwater and other members of the Chicago Police Department think they had caught the stalker and thought he was a white man named Paul Dunn who was fired, when in fact it was a black woman who had an affair with Sarah Lun’s dispute and employment?
This shoddy police work belongs on Days of Our Lives, not One Chicago.
I’m not sure if this stalker appeared in Chicago Med Season 10 Episode 1 or if she was newly created for this story.
I guess her motives were legitimate, although I don’t recall any clues that the stalker was the dead patient’s complaining ex-wife.
It feels like the writers decided on this solution at the last minute and came up with something semi-reasonable, but it could have been better.
Many fans thought Reese would be the stalker, which turned out to be a red herring, but there’s another idea that would be more interesting.
Why Zach Hudgens would be the perfect stalker for ‘Chicago Med’ Season 10 Episode 8
Zach, a quiet and earnest resident, was abruptly fired at the end of the Season 10 premiere.
He froze during a mass casualty incident, leaving Sharon to care for the patient alone. Lenox fired him for his failure, and Sharon signed on.
Therefore, Zack has every reason to cause trouble for Sharon. She was involved in every aspect of his dismissal.
Unlike Cassidy, the real stalker, Zach will be well-known to viewers, and in retrospect, his actions may have been justified.
Instead, we get a random stalker and a trope-laden conversation in which Sharon tries to talk the woman down, but the criminal loses his temper and stabs her, then feels guilty about it for half an episode.
The ending of Chicago Med Season 10 Episode 8 was a little confusing. If Sharon was allegedly unconscious from blood loss, why did Cassidy have to cover her mouth to stop her from calling for help?
Sharon was pretending, but despite having just been stabbed, still had the strength to run to the hall door and bang on it to get Archer’s attention.
If this makes sense to you, please explain it in the comments. To me this seems like a case of injuries that randomly disappear.
It was great to see Rhys again, but her visit didn’t solve anything
Six years later, Reese and Charles met again when Reese’s patient was in the emergency room.
In Chicago Med Season 10 Episode 8, she had a strange interaction with Charles. I could have understood if they were embarrassed considering why Reese left in the first place, but that’s not the issue.
It’s like they’re determined not to discuss the elephant in the room.
Reese initially left because she believed Dr. Charles allowed her father to die while treating him for a heart attack. She spent much of Chicago Med’s fourth season determined to give the sadistic psychopath another chance, only to have him crumble after Charles presented him with evidence that he was a serial killer.
Instead of congratulating himself on dodging a bullet, Reese focused on the fact that Charles hesitated before starting chest compressions. In her mind, he allowed her father to die, and she couldn’t accept that Charles had betrayed her beliefs.
(Rhys was also flippant, jumping from pathology to nothing to psychiatry, and Charles’s high praise for her didn’t include that.)
If Rhys is to come back, she and Charles should clear up that old conflict. Instead, they act like they’re old friends, until Charles disagrees with Reese’s questionable methods.
Sometimes, unorthodox methods work – ask Oliver Wolf of Brilliant Minds about this.
However, I can’t blame Charles for suspecting Reese was secretly giving a placebo to a suicidal patient so she would know she didn’t need medication to control her depression.
Antidepressants are controversial because some people think they are just a crutch. They are also necessary for some people or in certain situations.
I would not be uncomfortable with a psychiatrist who thinks all or nothing about psychiatric medications, especially if she is lying about the medications she is giving her patients.
In addition, don’t patients have to fill their prescriptions at the pharmacy? How exactly does this technique work?
Regardless, when Charles refuses to go ahead with this ridiculous plan simply because the patient is once again suicidal, Rhys accuses him of thinking he’s always right.
She comes off as emotional and incompetent, which is not what Rhys is supposed to do.
Charles is right, no one accidentally swallows 12 pills. Sheesh.
Some quick thoughts on the rest of Chicago Med Season 10 Episode 8
- Yes, there’s this week’s patient, a goofy guy who wants to marry his girlfriend but is in danger of dying from injuries sustained in a car accident. The case wasn’t particularly memorable, although I liked Archer’s cavalier attitude towards the appointment over the line.
- Lennox has a brother with an alcohol problem and two deceased parents. Did they die in an alcohol-related car crash?
- I could have stopped watching Sully dramas. The story is over, can it end here?
Over to you, Chicago Med fanatics. What did you think of Chicago Med Season 10 Episode 8?
Am I being too harsh on this fall finale, or did you feel like it was lacking, too?
Vote in our poll to rank the episodes, and hit the comments to let us know.
Chicago Med airs Thursdays at 8/7c on NBC and Fridays on Peacock. The next episode will air on January 8, 2025.
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