The following contains major spoilers from Chicago Med Season 10, Episode 3, “Trust Fall,” which debuted Wednesday, Oct. 9 on NBC. It also contains mention of pregnancy loss.
Chicago Med has made Gaffney Chicago Medical Center the most dramatic place to work at — and anyone who thought that might slow down with the new showrunner needs only to watch Season 10, Episode 3, “Trust Fall.” After two episodes of shaking things up and moving pieces around, this episode is back to the same internal conflicts that have gotten the series this far in the first place.
“Trust Fall” offers an apparent resolution to Dr. Mitch Ripley’s storyline, but it also gives Dr. Hannah Asher an incredibly gut-wrenching, if also very predictable, plot in Ripley’s absence. Meanwhile, the latest issues to plague the hospital as a whole take a bizarre turn when administrator Sharon Goodwin gets a death threat. The episode is packed with everything fans expect, although some of it works out and some of it doesn’t.
Chicago Med Revisits Some Very Familiar Problems
Goodwin and Lenox’s Storylines Give Fans Deja Vu
Anyone who’s watched Chicago Med knows the hospital constantly has problems with its board, its budget, or some other kind of infrastructure concern. The conflict between medicine and business is something that almost every popular medical drama tackles at some point — but even by that standard, Gaffney Chicago Medical Center is a hard place to work. The latest issue is that the hospital has officially reached capacity, and so on top of firing doctors and nurses, Sharon Goodwin now has to placate upset patients who are stuck in the ED or otherwise unable to get all the help they need. And free Jello only goes so far.
Goodwin puts pressure on hospital lawyer Peter Kalmick (played by The West Wing pilot alum Marc Grapey), so that he will in turn pressure the board about the financial liabilities that result from straining their resources. It’s no surprise at all when she orchestrates to have ambulances lined up outside in a parking lot where Peter and one of the hospital’s major donors will see them. This kind of Goodwin vs. higher-ups battle was more compelling a few seasons ago when Tony and Grammy Award winner Heather Headley was playing Gwen Garrett. Of more note is that Goodwin receives a death threat, which gives viewers a scene of her reporting it to hospital security. Longtime viewers also know that the hospital has terrible security — people have been shot, attacked or have escaped numerous times — so it’s hard not to chuckle a little when they talk about taking this threat seriously. But when people send death threats on social media for everything from differing opinions to losing baseball games, it’s a plausible storyline, even if it comes with that bit of skepticism.
Chicago Med Puts Hannah Asher Through the Wringer
Jessy Schram Delivers One of Her Best Performances
When Dr. Hannah Asher returned to Chicago Med, it was hard to see how the writers would take a character originally designed for a short-term arc and develop her into a series regular. But it’s safe to say that Jessy Schram has become one of the cornerstones of the cast, and “Trust Fall” is a great episode for her, even as it’s absolutely terrible for her character. There’s a brief moment for the awesome friendship between Asher and Archer, and plenty of emotion as Asher treats a pregnant woman desperate to safely deliver her baby after miscarrying four times. As soon as that fact is revealed, audiences can guess how Elise’s storyline is going to end: either she or the baby won’t make it through the episode.
Yet Schram hits every emotional note she needs to through that journey, as Asher gains Elise’s trust, encourages her, shares in her relief and then is so equally desperate to save her that she performs chest compressions for over half an hour. There’s even a small but important piece of character development, as a conversation with Elise prompts Asher to admit that she’s interested in starting a family. This case is a great one for Chicago Med because it fleshes out Elise and her story just as much as Asher’s arc — and although fans will likely question why the writers had to pick the sad ending, there’s no denying what Schram does with it. The closing moments of Hannah’s emotional collapse are almost perfect… except for the Sam Cooke needle drop that isn’t needed. It’s a callback to an earlier Sam Cooke reference, but Schram’s work would have been even more impactful in silence, prompting the audience to focus entirely on Asher’s grief.
