Well, if it seemed like Archer and Lenox were on the road to working peacefully together on Chicago Med this fall in the 2024 TV schedule, “Forget Me Not” definitely proved otherwise! The two ED chiefs ended up working on the same teenage patient after a rockslide at a disciplinary camp, and pretty much the only thing they agreed on in the episode was that those camps are despicable. Young Jordan suffered a brain injury that could either be treated medically or surgically, and – unsurprisingly – Archer and Lenox came to opposing conclusions.
By the end, the teen was dead, a threat was issued, and I think it’s safe to call this an incident that pushed them past the point of no return unless something gives. And as much as Archer has become one of my favorite One Chicago characters, I can’t commit just yet on who to root for with the promo suggesting that somebody has to leave the ED.
The Case That Went Wrong
There were two options for treating the injured teen in this episode (which will be available streaming with a Peacock subscription), and neither was particularly great. On the one hand, they could continue to treat him medically and monitor his brain issue to make sure that it wouldn’t get worse, treating surgery as the very last of last resorts. On the other hand, performing the surgery had the best odds of success if they started ASAP rather than waiting for the teen to get worse.
Archer wanted to stick with the medicine and hope for the best; Lenox wanted the surgery, with Dr. Abrams on her side. Archer managed to talk Abrams into delaying until Jordan’s parents could be reached, putting Lenox out of luck… until she realized that the man running the camp had the legal permission to make decisions for Jordan’s treatment without his parents present.
So, Jordan went off to surgery with Dr. Abrams operating and Dr. Lenox on hand. Alas, the teen’s condition worsened quickly, and he died on the table despite best efforts to revive him. Lenox was nearly in tears afterwards, telling Archer to “Save it” when he stormed up to confront her.
And since this is Archer we’re talking about, he definitely didn’t save it! He ranted that the “blame for that falls directly onto” her” and that Jordan would “still be here if not for” her. Lenox stuck to her guns and insisted that Jordan was a “time bomb” and the surgery gave him a chance to live. She pointed out that sometimes patients just die and he’s not always right. With both looking furious, Archer told her that she’s “gonna answer for this.”
Who Should We Side With?
My instinct is to side with Archer, just because he unexpectedly became one of my favorite characters after he bonded with Hannah and showed a different side of his personality. But Archer being a fun character to watch doesn’t mean that he’s always right, and he hasn’t really given Lenox a chance in the ED since he found out that he was supposed to be sharing the chief gig with her. As actress Sarah Ramos explained to CinemaBlend, Lenox would have been fired if she treated Archer like Archer treats her.
And even though Lenox hasn’t opened up too much (or embraced the Halloween spirit with a costume), she clearly feels for her patients and looked nearly as upset after Jordan’s death as Hannah did when she lost a patient last month. Archer wasn’t yelling at a brick wall at the end of this episode, and it’s worth noting that Dr. Abrams agreed to do the surgery, and Steven Weber‘s character wasn’t yelling at him in a hallway.
Then again, Lenox was pretty sneaky in how she got consent to do the surgery from a man she openly considered despicable, and there’s no way of saying that continuing to treat Jordan medically rather than surgery wouldn’t have worked. And based on the promo, somebody might have to go from the ED. Take a look:
It’s too soon to say if Goodwin heard about what went down in “Forget Me Not” and came to the conclusion about Archer and Lenox not being able to work together, and I’m curious to see if she’ll blame herself at all for the tension. After all, she did spring the news that Lenox was a new ED co-chief on Archer without a heads up, despite her best intentions. His reaction isn’t her fault, but could have been prevented.
See what’s in store with Archer and Lenox with new episodes of Chicago Med on Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET on NBC, ahead of Chicago Fire at 9 p.m. ET and Chicago P.D. at 10 p.m. ET. If you prefer streaming to watching on network TV, you can stream new episodes next day on Peacock.
