I'm trying to catch up on a backlog caused by summer, work business and a 'thing'.
Mikey dies. No-one in the audience is shocked because it has been clearly on the cards ever since he shipped back to Iraq and the Neela/Ray 'ship started to be in the text instead of the subtext. The episode is very nicely topped and tailed with Gallant: it starts with him alive, thinking of Neela, and ends with a tape he's made for her in the event of his death, in which he is thinking of Neela. Neela's reaction to the news - her desire to hear it straight away, her running away back to work, hiding on the roof, going home not because she wants to but because she is sick of everyone's concern - is wonderful. Parminda breaks your heart as Neela breaks down. Gallant was always thinking of her and instead she was buying a coffee or doing her laundry as he died. She's guilty not because anything had happened with Ray but that her thoughts had even strayed towards the idea. In the rooftop scene I was especially taken with the fact that she started to talk to Ray until he said he'd do anything, when she suddenly backs away as if remembering that he is part of the problem. Their burgeoning feelings have robbed them both of their best friends. Oh yes, and she has surgery next year which, as profshallowness remarks, is dangerously similar to what they did with Cordey but hopefully the different dynamics (Dubenko and Albright) will make it work.
Pratt is back from Africa and busy demonstrating that he has matured as a consequence. His own grief over Gallant makes much more sense and is well played. He also deals with two kids who have killed their abusive father and doesn't argue with Luka once. I like the new Pratt, I just hate the way they went about maturing him.
Clemente goes nuts. No-one in the audience is shocked because it has been clearly on the cards ever since he arrived. Again, that's a nice piece of mirroring. At the start of his storyline, he was pretending to be a patient on drugs in order to see how this new ER operated. At the end of his storyline, he is a patient, zombied out on drugs, and being wheeled upstairs.
Wednesday, June 07, 2006
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I'd forgotten about Clemente's long ago entrance, good catch on the reversal. The lack of surprise vis a vis gallant and Clemente is so true. There's a part of me that wishes they'd gone somewhere a little different with Gallant, but the Ray/Neela shipper in me doesn't care. Like you say, PM was devastating, and I think they have a strong sense of her character, so I'm looking forward to her development in s13.
You're right abut the way that they got there to mature Pratt being theissue. It felt that they had to take him back a few steps - I suppose that it could be argued that the return of his father into his life was part of it - to make him a prat, and then take him through the Darfur experience.
Mmm, looking forward to your thoughts on the finale.
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