Date of airing: July 19, 2011 (Global)
Audience viewership information: 1.513 million viewers
This was another solid episode, and at this point, I’m wondering if any of the TV critics from 2011 have dared to watch more than the first episode, so they could have seen how COMBAT HOSPITAL either has gone worse in their opinion as an entertainment version of the war in Afghanistan, or if it has gotten better beyond its “GREY’S ANATOMY in Afghanistan and without soap opera storylines” premise. This episode aired at a stage of the show’s short lifetime when I didn’t know whether I would miss the show if it would be suddenly canceled (and ABC’s ratings for the show suggested that they wouldn’t continue to co-finance another season), or if I wouldn’t mind because the show is good enough for about a dozen episodes, to be repeated every once in a while, and no more episodes were needed as it was uncertain if the quality would have continued on this level that I am currently appreciating.
I loved how the show never overdid any of its stories and how the writers were always calm and steady with their stories. Though the latter could have been a fact that could have gone against the premise of the show, since the central premise of COMBAT HOSPITAL still involves a chaotic and deadly war, and depicting that chaos in an orderly fashion as this show does could bring one to tell everybody else that this show is tone-deaf to what was really happening in Afghanistan at the time. COMBAT HOSPITAL is straightforward, organized, not a big ball of absurd chaos, and always knows what it wants to show and tell, albeit suffering from budget constraints.
All the stories were fine. Bobby’s case was dramatic and emotional for a minute or two, but after Farringdon’s death, I would have wished that he talked about it more than just with Xavier and Will. The episode started with him and Rebecca talking about their lives on the base with Major Pedersen’s group – maybe it wouldn’t have been so wrong to end the episode the same way, just to see that not only Rebecca deals with a few issues, but also Bobby. It also would have given the episode a proper closing moment, to throw the characters and the audience back to the beginning and reflect on their work at the base.
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| It's the calm before the storm. |
Anyway, Farringdon’s case was interesting. I could understand his decision of not wanting to have the biopsy and instead go on the reconnaissance tour with his men (I dislike how the term “boys” is used here – could we start seeing men in soldiers and not just 18-year-old teenagers who were suckered into it by pride and patriotism?). With that, the story proved to be engaging, after Farrington was delivered to the hospital again and eventually died on the table. There was the provocative question of whether or not Farringdon knew (and accepted) that he had cancer and therefore decided to let himself be killed during an act of heroism, knowing that he was not ready to go through treatment for multiple years. Sometimes I wish for those questions to be asked more often (not only in scripted television, but also in real life), but there aren’t enough medical dramas on the air that dare to ask those questions. We all don’t know anything about the soldiers who die for our country, and we don’t know what they were thinking seconds before they died. COMBAT HOSPITAL delivered an answer to a theoretical question and I loved the hell out of it. And with it, the show is doing one thing right numerous other shows don’t even think about doing: The writers let the characters ask questions to let them develop answers within the story. Whether or not they are answered by the end, the audience is engaged to think about that subject.
The Taliban-bombed wedding ceremony was well done. First of all, the scene depicting the calm before the storm in the hospital was great and reminded me of the ER episode “Blizzard,” which had a similar moment as the doctors and nurses were waiting for dozens of patients to be delivered through the doors. I would have loved it more if that moment had been a little longer – COMBAT HOSPITAL was already going against the broadcast network TV norm, and this episode could have gone further into breaking the norms by not only proving that you can have a scene in a TV show that just shows the calm, but to also go a little deeper into who the patients were and what kind of wounds they were suffering from.
I also liked that Rebecca wanted to get Khan and Zarmeenah back together, but didn’t do anything until Vans practically forced her to do so – under the mantle of love and to strive for a happy ending. The story was touching, and I admired how it connected with Rebecca’s recent past, bringing a continuation of her back story as delivered during the first episode. Her ex, the $9000-heavy ring she still had in her possession (that was a little eyesroll moment though – why was she hanging onto it when all she wanted was to forget that it ever happened?), and how she decided to finally move forward and form something of a bond with Simon. I could imagine the writers were working on a little tête-à-tête between the two, all while not fully diving into it just yet. It’s clear that Rebecca and Simon were destined to end up together at some point, but it’s not what the first couple of episodes were focusing on. That is quite refreshing for a show not bothering with any of the romance crap that was filling the airwaves back then.
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| Love finds a way in Kandahar. |
Only Colonel Marks didn’t get much attention, despite the story that he was given. But then again, it’s part of the realism of the show. Everyone with a heavy heart worries when the partner says with a serious voice that “we have to talk,” and everyone with a heavy heart is happy that the worst-case scenario didn’t turn out to be. On the other hand, the story was a cop-out. Marks could have gone through a character arc, worried that he will lose an anchor by losing his wife and his family essentially, but the writers destroyed that opportunity and went back to the status quo, possibly not wanting to get too dramatic by the end. What the episode delivered instead was a nice talk between Marks and Pederson. It’s almost like they truly are friends, reliant on each other’s objective perspective in an emotional situation.
