i think i have finally vaguely synthesized my thoughts on season 2 and want to store them here
To whom it may concern: THIS IS REALLY OPINIONATED. this is just my experience. You don't need to share my opinion! In fact I am genuinely really happy if you don't because difference of thought is what makes the world and the tumblr tag go round! But if you can get somewhat upset by heavy criticism of something important to you, this might not be the post for you. Peace and love.
This is the visual that keeps coming to my head and it represents everything I have to say below. Season 1 was incredibly "choreographed". Tight story beats, a sense of overlap in that people worked on cases together and brushed by each other but were also kept to having major story beats with only 1-3 other people in most ways. Pacing was fast but to emphasize the urgentness and lack of rest on this job. They used time incredibly effectively. You barely felt an episode go by.
I think the biggest word I'd use to describe season 2's pacing is "disorganized". The first half of this season was pretty great and matched a lot of season's 1 strong points! Picking up on plot points from last season, building lots of tension, introducing some long form cases. There were some weak spots sure, just like are strong spots in the later half, but man that later half was a lot more disorienting. We spend entire episodes lurching forward and then are thrown to standstill in the next. Within the episodes themselves they were cutting scenes way too short but then choosing conversations to extend that felt like a waste of time. And that's kind of what they were doing in the back half of the season, wasting time - the same amount of episodes as last time, but none of the precision of execution.
I know that this season is guaranteed a follow up, and not everything needed to get wrapped up or end with a big bang! I don't want that. But like. They're asking us to get invested in what they are choosing to show us as the big storylines (robby, langdon), but often letting other characters or storylines peter out in the meantime (samira, mckay, a lot of the topics brought up by patient cases) or making them feel often sort of pointless or flat (whitaker, a bit mel and santos to me), and then it feels like there was little progress. Or they jumped from point a to point z without letting us enjoy or see anything in the middle (javadi). I just feel like there wasn't a lot of reward or stuff to chew on by the time we got to the finale. I was mostly just tired.
We spent way, way too long on some storylines and scenes. There was a lot of pure comedy scenes which I don't think are the strong suit of this show at all and sometimes veered into feeling mean or uncharacteristic. Especially pissing-me-off-ening when screentime we could be using for other things is devoted to one-off jokes. Episodes could go by with essentially nothing at all changing, no new information gleaned. Season 1 did have the benefit to this big, suspenseful arc for the last few eps withe MCI which naturally keeps people hooked and gives you a chance to focus on the characters as the medicine becomes more repetitive/understood. I can see why they wouldnt just want to pull the some thing again on Season 2's final few eps, some big accident or event keeping everyone at the hospital, otherwise it starts to feel Grey's-ish which is not good for this show. But man. We didn't really have much of an anchor this time.
Which is another thing - Robby's mental health is supposed to sort of be our "anchor" or big overarch of the season. But it's tough to pin that all on one character, and then to also not actually do much with that plot beat? Talking about suicidal ideation is incredibly important and I commend them for taking a stab at it. Its triggered a lot of very interesting conversation about how depression presents externally, how it effects this specific demographic, the signs that we ignore or miss that people are hurting. That is done fine. But to me it was not used an interesting throughline for this series! I stopped being interested in what he was going to do next, or how other people were going to react because none of it had any weight. What are the consequences - people get annoyed at each other for a bit and then it kind of washes away? Robby has vague threatening conversations with people, when we don't get to see a lot of some of them outside of those, and then... we do that ad nauseum. There was tension and momentum building somewhat but it didn't go places that felt like it was worth the season.
A lot of it was just that they were taking swings that weren't connecting with the ball, you know. There was a lot of really interesting stuff going on, but we lost a lot of consistency in the fundamentals - realistic dialogue, rhythmic pacing, editing things down. Intention or the beginnings of it is cool and it makes people think about stuff then write really awesome tumblr posts, but I do realize a lot of what I enjoyed thematically and narratively was just ideas and interpretation. When I look at what this season is actually serving me and emphasizing, I feel a lot worse about it.
Some specific things I was less than happy with just to get it all out there:
I won't pretend I'm extremely eloquent when I talk about this show, so I won't try to fully retype what people have been saying already with better words, but the treatment of characters of color and female characters this season was pretty bad at times. Screentime and narrative importance were extremely disproportionate, I also feel like we didn't get as many scenes of these women supporting each other or having big conversations with other women in general. Someone on here mentioned how much the women's plot lines and scenes had to involve one of the white men, or that besides Samira and Joy the WOC did not get a lot of beats together, and it really sticks out. Big example with, Samira's departure being incredibly strange and the reasoning they're giving for it is weak - they did the same to Heather last season but that was apparently because the actress left the show of her own volition so it was a supposedly necessary move, Supriya did not. Javadi had some more time but it felt very unmoored. Yes, this show has some great conversations about a lot of things but they dropped the ball with this and it definitely sours the view going forward.
The medicine in this season didn't feel as integrated into the plot and kind of lost focus a lot. To me the cases aren't as memorable. We did have some multi-episode patients like Louie, Roxie, Orlando, Harlow, but to varying degrees of lasting impact even if there were some good scenes around them or I see the medical topic they were trying to bring up. The focus on interpersonal relationships was dragging us away from patients as opposed to happening above, around, and because of them. I think the effects continue to be amazing, I always love the realism of their procedures and the fact that they force you to pay attention by not always spelling out what they're doing. But the weaving of those strong action scenes into what is happening outside of them was on average weak to me.
I have been saying it but the cast was reallllly getting stretched wide this season in terms of adding on characters which doesn't help with the whole time allotment issue. The night shift additions would be cool if they weren't adding in entirely new personalities to the mix at the last few hours when we are already struggling to get our main cast to the finish line! Emma, Joy, and Ogilivie I thought were all pretty interesting additions in terms of personality and what kind of discussions they bring up, but it did add to the chaos as well to have all three of them there. Duke :/. Lots of side characters that again, maybe could've added some flavor if we were already in a good place with pacing but were mostly just blah. I think if we just saved some of the character plotlines for later it would be fine, but I don't know. There was also a lot more characters crossing paths frequently this season - what I mean is that in S1, there were character "groupings" that kept people pretty central to plots with just a few other characters; think javadi and mckay, santos with langdon / whitaker, dana with robby and the other nurses. Obviously they didn't only interact with those people, but we had A, B, and C plots each ep that got passed off to each other in a nice relay race. It kept things from feeling too overwhelming, and spent time honing in on just a few especially strong dynamics rather than everyone everywhere all at once. I don't know if that makes a ton of sense but its how I feel about it and a lot of what makes me picture the diagrams above.
That being said! I was still here for the whole things for a reason. Stand out scenes or elements to me:
I think the SANE case was the perfect balance of "teaching people about issues in medicine" that this show likes to do and admittedly has the expection to do from the public, without being so incredibly on the nose to the point of feeling awkward (this season there was a lot of "oh coworker, did you know about this tangentially related issue?..." with unnatural diaglogue.) Its something that people will not experience until they have to in a very traumatic way so gives everyone some understanding of what they or people around them might be going through someday. It was excellently and emotionally delivered by all three of the actresses as well. Dana and Emma in general were a pretty awesome duo this season and I am hoping season 3 opens up more of Emma's character to us.
The technical production of this show remains stellar. HBO gives them lots of money I'm sure but they are putting it where it needs to be - killer special effects, great visual continuity, dedication to building a realistic and distinctive environment. I loved that we got to see more natural lighting conditions in this season, it was a fabulous contrast that really drives home how dehumanizing it is to be in that sterile, bright environment for so long. I am always so happy with the sound design and the use of foley over soundtrack. It is certainly a glossy show and must be incredibly difficulty to coordinate behind the scenes so the crew gets a big tip of the hat from me.
There were a few really awesome episodes especially in the beginning. Kept up the pace we're used to, lots of rich starts to tension-builds and intrigue. I think Joy and Ogilvie were interesting even if they contributed to the bloated cast, catching up on all the time skip stuff sort of en media res was great. Again, I feel like they know how to do it, they just didn't follow through with what they started.
I do think this a very strong cast, and the characters they are working with are or have the potential to be incredible. There aren't really any major characters I dislike or would want to see gone, because they all bring (or i see they have the potential to bring) something and make the show feel like a real workplace. It's sad that many of them were not given the time, role, or dialogue necessary to build upon the intrigue built over the last season we got to know them. Some of them got too much time but still didn't have much leg to stand on. I understand its hard to be a writer in that situation; you have a very large cast, people are now attached to them or have expectations on how they will behave or progress. However, most of the characters just ended up felt very ungrounded and/or fighting for space. But I still really enjoyed getting to see them interact, we had some funny, impressive, and/or interesting scenes for basically everyone which is an impressive feat to pull off. I think the physicality of this show is really superb with the mix of actors that are embodying the person they're supposed to be and the training they've been given in executing these really precise action shots with the various procedures. I continue to feel blessed that they took a chance on a great mix of new and relatively unknowns, the big reason I watched and am still watching this show is for the character work. I just really wish it wasn't so stifled but other elements of the production. Which leads me to...
What do I want to see out of Season 3?
Let's narrow our scope please. Edit edit edit. There are lots of good conversations that cliffhangered or didn't get a fair shot, let's follow those through without piling too much on top of them. This is a really popular show, you will have time to get to stuff but also what are the big takeaways going to be for each season? It's realistic to leave everything up in the air sure (which is an explanation that does not really excuse a lot of things in general...), but you're making a TV show and I guess to me there is supposed to be some impact. Something to chew on. We have a lot of open ends that could be really interesting but not a lot of ones that weren't already kind of present in S1 I guess? They have rich narrative starts, imagery, strong acting and interpersonal dynamics, production - just let the final cut and story work with those things.
On that beat, tightening up dialogue and being intentional with scenes. Things are snappy but are they useful? Do these characters need to be getting into these hijinks? Is it taking away time from the more successful narratives, are they making the characters start to feel more samey?
This may just be me but I would love to let the medicine shine more. Integrate cases into the story past just hammering home "this job is hard and is weighing on them and shit is fucked" in the same manner. This is a workplace drama, I want to see the drama in and around the work! I don't think we were fully lacking in this this season, but it did feel like a step down from S1.
And that's what I got. It's a lot. And I know there are very mixed opinions going around; this season clearly made me feel very complicated. The sophomore slump is real for media, it's hard to follow up a record-breaking Season 1, but a lot of the stuff I have gripes with is because they were sometimes writing meh dialogue, making the characters less productive or interesting by continually pulling focus to this one man and his repeated aggressions, and producing edits that feel choppy - and I don't want to minimize that just because on the whole I enjoy this show and I feel a great deal for the characters.
I am cautiously optimistic about season 3. I think a lot of people haven't been shy about sharing their disappointment with certain aspects of this season and I hope they can find their footing again instead of doubling down. Maybe a bit of shake up in the producing staff or something. Thank you for taking this ride with me viewers n general pitt taggers who I shared space with this season, and I am always open for constructive conversation if any of this sparked thought in you!