The Good Doctor – SFAD

By starrymag | November 18, 2019

By: Ujjyani Banerjee

 

 

It’s early in the morning. Shaun (Freddie Highmore) is at the kitchen and his phone dings for the third time. Lea (Paige Spara) comes in and asks who is it. Shaun reveals that Carly (Jasika Nicole) is letting him know that she’s reached the pathology conference. Lea asks him to reply even though it’s not interrogative. He writes, “I received your message.” Over at Neil’s (Nicholas Gonzalez) home we see Lim (Christina Chang) getting him breakfast and asking if he’s fine. He says yes, kisses her and thanks her for the meal.

 

Charlie Dawson (Kiefer O’Reilly) has cancer in his right eye. He lost his left one couple years ago and has a fake one in the socket. He’s in to repeat the same surgery for his right eye. Dr. Andrews (Hill Harper) explains the procedure and Charlie takes it a little too well. He is busy playing games on his iPad. His mom (Kate Isaac) is worried about her son’s overly mature outlook on this which is not normal. The father (Christopher Rosamond) thinks it’s his own way of dealing. Marcus asks Morgan (Fiona Gubelmann) to take Charlie’s bloodwork to the lab and asks Claire (Antonia Thomas) to get him to open up to her.

 

Park (Will Yun Lee), Shaun and Melendez are with Tara (Haley Ramm), a SCID patient who has come in for breathing issues. She’s encased in a sterile enclosure due to lack of natural immunity. Shaun reveals that she’s his oldest SCID patient as most die very young. Melendez reveals they found infected tissue in her right lung which is causing her breathing trouble. He starts to explain the procedure, but Tara interrupts and finishes it off. She needs to know that she won’t succumb to any infection given she’s got no immune system of her own and that the building itself is an incubator of innumerable infections. Shaun lets her know about their precautionary measures in detail. Tara makes it clear that she wants minimum human interactions and wishes to cut short this one, too. The surgeons take leave.

 

Morgan and Claire go to Charlie’s room and find him missing. Claire is clueless, but Morgan gets an idea of his whereabouts from his iPad. After lying to the parents that he’s in imaging both the residents rush to go get him.

 

Shaun receives a text from Carly. It’s just an emoji – the “rolling eyes” one. He is confused and video-calls Lea to know what he should reply. He makes the emoji face, but Lea doesn’t understand and asks him to send it to her. She explains to him that Carly is missing him and that he must text back something flirty. Shaun disconnects as he needs to go.

 

Morgan and Claire find Charlie at a baseball game. Claire wants to get him back to the hospital immediately. Morgan notices that he’s got a crush on a girl selling slushies and nudges him to talk her. He chickens out within fifteen seconds.

 

The surgeons are operating laparoscopically on Tara, who’s in a sterile enclosure. They find stiff necrotic tissue that wouldn’t fit through the ports and Melendez ultimately decides on getting Tara out of her bubble to excise the tissue. They take position to operate on her conventionally without the hood. They need to operate fast and be extremely careful. Melendez hesitates before making the incision. Lim notices this from the viewing panel and later asks him to talk to someone to tackle his grief but he’s in denial.

 

Glassman (Richard Schiff) has a patient who got bit by her pet squirrel. To his surprise she has brought the pet along and it has apparently bitten her before. He wants to explain to her that it’s not normal, but Debbie (Sheila Kelley) interrupts to speed up waiting appointments.

 

Andrews calls Claire and wants to be filled in on Charlie’s whereabouts. She says they’re on their way back and squeals on the phone. Andrews asks what happened. Claire jokes that Morgan is a really bad driver. In reality,Charlie is driving the car in a mad rush and is scaring the life out of the residents.

 

Shaun is collecting Tara’s bloodwork and is in the enclosure with her. His phone is blowing up with Carly’s texts. Tara bets it’s his girlfriend and remembers how she used to annoy her boyfriend just like this until he died. It’s a downside of outliving one’s own prognosis. Shaun lets her know that he is supposed to flirt with Carly but doesn’t know how. Tara offers to help him with phone sex or foreplay, whichever he wants. Shaun asks if she texts her parents. It turns out they live in Denver and are of the outdoorsy kind, unlike her, and they have alienated her. Shaun connects this to his severed relationship with his non-autistic parents. He makes Tara sit upright to listen to her lungs, but she starts to feel dizzy. Her pulse and vitals show signs of infection.

 

Melendez orders Shaun the subsequent steps of action to curb the infection. Park suggests doing a gene replacement therapy to cure her SCID instead of just focusing on this infection. Given there’s a fifty percent chance that her body with have a toxic reaction to the therapy, Melendez decides to stick to the safer conventional course of killing the infections one at a time.

 

Charlie’s parents are worried as he hasn’t returned yet. Andrews asks them to not suffocate his growing years just because he’s living with cancer and thinks that the kid is letting off steam because of this thought. Meanwhile, Charlie is being driven around by Morgan. He recollects the Spontaneous Family Adventure Days (“SFAD”) tradition that they used to have in his family before the cancer. The fun days have now been replaced with endless hospital visits and a depressive home environment. He wants one last stop before returning to the hospital. Morgan allows it, but Claire is getting worried about how late they are getting.

 

Lim approaches Melendez after learning that he dismissed Park’s idea. She lets him know that they can’t dismiss it just because it’s risky and wants Park to take it to Tara. Park explains but she’s afraid that it might not work. Shaun explains her how his single life changed for the better ever since he started socializing and that she has the option of either living an outdoorsy life like her parents or be stuck with phone sex. Tara agrees to have the therapy. Melendez warns Park to supersede him again and asks the team to prep for the gene replacement therapy. Park appreciates Shaun.

 

At his next stop Charlie wants to see a naked woman before he loses sight forever. They visit a strip club and Morgan tries negotiating with the security to let Charlie in but her efforts go in vain. After the failed attempt Charlie is thinking of some other place to visit, but Claire has had enough. She shouts at him saying that he cannot pack a lifetime of adventures in a few hours and that, yes, life sucks but he’s got to suck it up. Hurt, Charlie refuses to have surgery.

 

Lim goes to Glassman for his approval on her budget proposals and reviews on surgical cases before the upcoming board meeting. He asks how Neil is holding up. Debbie pings his office bell. Lim asks if he and Debbie are gelling fine and if he’s got any tips for her and Neil who is seemingly in denial. She hopes that he’ll at least open up to Glassman. Debbie interrupts them and asks Lim to wrap it up as there’s a ear-infection patient waiting. Glassman is appalled at how his wife is treating the Chief of Surgery.

 

The doctors have done the transfusion and are awaiting results. Tara wants Shaun to be by her side and just be there, like any girlfriend would normally want. Shaun reveals that Carly is in good health and unlikely to die soon. Tara sighs at how some girls have all the luck.

 

Aaron is having issues with his software and summons Debbie to call someone from I.T. to get it fixed. She reveals that she upgraded it. Aaron is extremely annoyed at how she’s upgrading the software without intimating him, kicking out Lim and interrupting his appointments. Noticing how hard she’s making his life in spite of trying to help him, Debbie quits while asking him to refill his sutures inventory. Glassman goes to stack up on the sutures and meets Melendez there. He asks him to talk to someone as it’s impossible to remain unaffected by a patient’s death, especially when he/she should have lived.

 

Claire apologizes to Charlie. She admits to be dealing with loss herself and that she let it out on him. She makes him understand that not having this operation will deprive him of the great things in life that he would’ve had in his future. Morgan notices how gently Claire got Charlie back up and ready for the surgery. They get him back to his parents and his father promises Charlie to resume the legacy of SFADs. Charlie is prepped for surgery. He takes a long look at his weeping parents for one last time. Just before he’s rolled in to the OR Morgan asks Dr. Andrews to carry on as she forgot to check Charlie’s vitals. She pulls up the curtains and flashes her bra to the teen. Now he is elated, content and ready for surgery!

 

Melendez approaches Lim and discloses what’s been bothering him. He feels that even though she should’ve stopped him from pursuing that complex surgery on the pregnant lady that got her killed she still felt obligated to let him pursue it as they are seeing each other. He hates that their relationship is the reason why the woman died. Lim is devastated by his line of thinking and how she somehow became responsible for his patient’s demise.

 

After the surgery even though Charlie’s not happy he is okay. He thanks Morgan for everything and asks for Claire. She’s not around. Tara has responded well, too. After the surgeons inform her of the possible post-therapy complications along with the positive prognosis, she waits for them to leave her alone and for the first time she steps out of her bubble and looks over at the cityscape from her room window.

 

At home Glassman gets nurse shoes for Debbie and asks her to get back to the hospital. He agrees to have freaked out multiple times ever since he proposed to her, but promises to make some changes as his smart wife/office manager suggests to him in the future. Debbie agrees to rejoin his office.

 

Morgan meets Claire at a bar. She tells that she saw glimpses of the old Claire with Charlie. Claire smirks at her old self as she was too giving but she knows better now. Morgan hopes that Claire deals with her crap before she loses her original self permanently.

 

Neil is back home with microwaved food waiting at the kitchen, but Lim is nowhere to be seen. He gives her a call, but it goes straight to voicemail. He misses her.

 

Shaun sifts through Carly’s texts. In her most recent messages she is asking if he’s there. He replies that he’s there and smiles.