Well, we lasted two minutes into Episode 9 of the The Pitt before we started crying. There we were, tearing up right along with Dr. Robby, as he and his staff sought to manage their raw feelings over losing a nine-year-old patient. But just like them, we had to push those emotions into a corner. Because everyone at the Pitt started punching each other.
“Fauci zombie” is an epithet our society has to deal with now, and two moms in disagreement over masking and vaxxing going Ali-Spinks on each other in the busy, children-packed waiting area of a hospital. Of course it’s Dana Evans who brings order back to chairs – “That’s why I’m here, to be brilliant and bring peace”; fucking hell, we are obsessed with this woman – and Dr. Langdon backs Dana up with a little humble pie for the anti-everything crowd. (Masks are woke until they’re for the surgeons who will fix the aggressor’s infected “fight bite.”) And while in chairs, Dana also has to talk down Doug Driscoll (Drew Powell). It’s true this guy has been waiting for treatment since Episode 1, or eight hours ago on the real-time clock. But that doesn’t give Driscoll the right to be aggressive with the staff, or to make racist comments toward Nurse Mateo (Jalen Thomas Brooks).
“You’ve been here, what, seven hours? Do your job.” That was Dr. Yolanda Garcia in last week’s episode of The Pitt, telling Santos to stop casting about for dirt on Langdon. But here’s Santos this week – or, you know, an hour later – still sniping with her senior resident as they’re part of a group treating a woman who overdosed on MDMA. And it’s uncharacteristic, but Langdon blows his top.
“Doctor Santos. You’ve enjoyed that title for, what, 90 days?” His voice rising, Langdon wonders if it’s “hubris or ignorance” that makes Santos openly question her more experienced colleagues. It’s unprofessional of Langdon to do this, especially at a teaching hospital, especially as their patient remains on the table, and Robby calls him on it. But while Dr. Mohan supports Santos here, the exchange is another throwback to Episode 4, when she also questioned Santos’s aggressive attitude. We’re not taking sides. But our intrigue with what drives Dr. Santos remains.
Pittsburgh Trauma has a street team that performs community outreach for addicts, the unhoused, or confined people who require treatment. Dr. McKay is on it – her and Dana’s attempts to reach Piper, last episode’s human trafficking risk, are unfortunately unsuccessful, even with a pen that lists a secret number to an emergency helpline – and Whitaker is the street team’s newest volunteer. The psych eval guy who pissed on him apologizes; his homelessness complicates treatment for his schizophrenia. When Whitaker promises the man he’ll personally take his prescription to where he’s currently staying, Kiara is impressed. The social worker promises him a cool jacket for joining the street team. And not only that, but in another nice Whitaker moment, he uses his farm boy background to confidently smother the rat that’s been plaguing the corners of the emergency department for hours.More like Team Whitaker!
Is The Pitt gonna win all the Emmys? It’s gotta, right? The gravity with which it deals with emotions, shoving extremes of anger, frustration, profound sadness, and even ecstatic joy toward each other until they merge and form new shapes in the space around the charge nurse desk in the middle of the emergency floor – it sticks with us long after each episode is over, and just keeps inspiring so many incredible performances. Seconds after Robby cuffs his anger toward Santos, a startled Langdon has regained his composure, finds Dr. King in the break room, and reassures her, right when Mel needs it most. The Pitt can be a tough place for sensitive individuals like her, especially with the realities of pediatric patients dying and anti-vax crazies hurling invective through the trauma bays. “But we need them,” Langdon says. “Badly.” And the senior resident also recognizes how the “zen pursuit” of picking specks of gravel out of a road rash wound is the perfect challenge for a skilled doctor of Mel’s temperament. There’s also a gorgeous little terrier in this scene, too, the newly-arrived road rash patient’s dog, in case you needed adorability to match the second-by-second marathon of emotions The Pitt is working with.
After the little girl died, Dr. Robby gathered his staff for the usual debrief. They do them to face their emotions after any difficult case, the attending said. To seek closure, to find meaning, so the personal trauma of working in trauma doesn’t linger. “‘Where do I put this feeling?’” was Robby’s rhetorical as he tearfully related a sad story from his own first day as a resident. His touching recollection and the entire debrief was cut short, of course – car accident victims arriving, overdoses being flown in by medevac chopper, and cops appearing on the trauma floor, who speak with Theresa (Joanna Going). (We’ll have to wait for closure on the latter until next week, but Theresa’s son David, the potential incel, has not returned to pick her up.) As The Pitt began, we goofed a little on what felt like underuse of its real-time format. That was stupid. On the contrary, it’s artful how the series weaves together each occurring instance in a manner so close to the chaos of real life. Doctors, nurses, and medical students losing, treating, and fighting to keep helping their patients. And all of us, doing our best as the seconds tick away.
All Dana Evans ever does is her best, and after breaking up a fight, trying to save a potential victim of human trafficking, and comforting her colleague who lost her pregnancy – all in the course of a few minutes – we’d say she’s earned a moment for a quick cigarette in the loading dock. Doug Driscoll disagrees, and the aggressive racist from chairs cold-cocks her when she isn’t looking. On The Pitt, the punches just keep coming.
Johnny Loftus (@glennganges) is an independent writer and editor living at large in Chicagoland. His work has appeared in The Village Voice, All Music Guide, Pitchfork Media, and Nicki Swift.
