S1.E12 ∙ The Doctor Whose World Collapsed

Quick summary: Bronx General must contend with a massive disaster — Dr. Kenny’s apartment building collapsed with her inside! Classic drama fodder for a medical procedural season finale. Wolf runs to the scene for no good reason other than the fact that he’s the show’s main character. Van and Jacob learn to lean on one another. Dr. Carol helps some lonely old ladies. A scruffy terrier is involved for extra heart warming. Kenny makes it but ends up traumatized. Metaphors are tortured.

Nash and Oliver Wolf flirt over the body of a woman who needs immediate neurosurgery but unfortunately is trapped under a bunch of rubble that, if shifted, will cause the building to collapse and kill everyone. And she’s a runner! What do you do? A. Amputate her legs and save her life. B. Go looking for her emotional support terrier.

Cliffhanger reminder: Kenny’s building has collapsed! She’s stuck in an elevator with an old dude “grandpa” and a young woman named Cecelia. 

Dr Wolf briefs the Wolf pack and tells them that they have to dissociate to help the dozens of victims of Erika Kenny’s building’s collapse. “I know this goes against everything I’ve ever taught you.” 

Mama Wolf is on the scene and being cool, calm and collected. A boy who needs surgery asks for his mom and Oliver says, “I’m sure she’s on her way. In the meantime why don’t you borrow my mom.”

An old man who looks SUSPICIOUSLY FAMILIAR* leads hot EMT to a woman who is half buried under rubble. She needs a neurosurgeon stat! Cut to Dr. Nichols flanked by Dr. Wolf. “They called for a neurosurgeon not a neurologist,” Nichols says. GOOD POINT. What is Wolf going to do to help, exactly? Is Queens bereft of trained first responders? Is that hot EMT lady the only EMT around? 

Wolf gives Nichols a ride on his motorcycle. 

Dr. Carol Pierce meets a older woman in the lobby of the hospital named Ms. Chase. She is bleeding but not from a building collapse injury. 

Dana Dang turns out to be the dissociation queen and she coaches the boys who are both sort of falling apart. She tells them to do their damn job like Ericka would want them to. She also says that Ericka is probably busy helping people. 

A mysterious man who says he used to be a doctor helps out a woman who is crushed in her building’s collapse.

The building, by the way, looks like it was bombed? The way it’s just a specific corner. They say the whole building is about to come down. The EMT leader leads Wolf and Nichols to the woman who is pinned under the rubble and needs emergency neurosurgery. But it quickly becomes clear that she needs to get her legs amputated because they don’t have time to do the neurosurgery or dig her out before the building collapses the rest of the way.

Erika wakes up to find herself in the elevator. “Ladies we need to get out of here, I think the building is collapsing,” Cecelia’s grandpa says.

Back in the hospital, Dana Dang has a chatty old lady patient who asks after Betsy, the lady with the unrelated unhealing arm wound. She says that Betsy hasn’t left her apartment in years. “Well at least she didn’t die alone.” This upsets Dana who is clearly thinking of Kenny dying alone. She calls Kenny and winces when she gets her voicemail. “I just need to know that you’re OK,” she says, her voice wavering. (Actress Aurey Krebs, LEAVING NO CRUMBS.) 

Cut to Erika Kenny, who doesn’t have cell phone service. The three elevator buddies chat about their lives. We learn that Cecelia has a date tonight with a cute guy she met on the subway. Her grandpa frets that she spends too much time taking care of him, and not enough time living her life. He springs to action and tries to bust through the top of the elevator, but then he collapses and starts sounding very confused. Kenny tells Cecelia that she thinks he’s having a stroke, and there’s basically nothing she can do about it, even though she’s a doctor, since she needs her doctor equipment and meds. She yells for help.

Josh Nichols and Wolf are with Jenny, the semi-crushed runner. Dr. Wolf tells Jenny that Nichols is the best neurosurgeon he’s ever worked with, and Nichols looks happy to hear that. Cute. Jenny asks for Stuart, says that she can’t go through this without him. So Wolf runs off to find Stuart, which Nichols clearly thinks is kinda dumb because this woman needs emergency care right now.

Hot EMT and her colleague examine the crushed runner.

Wolf trots off into a sea of blurry faces, yelling for Stuart. He finds Katie the hot EMT, who tells him that the building is about to collapse. Then, honestly for no good reason, we flash back to that old scene, where kid Dr. Wolf (Teen Wolf) finds his dad apparently trying to kill himself, blood all over his arms, over the sink. “You’re bleeding,” kid Wolf says. “Because your mother hurt me.” Bad parenting right there.

New flashback scene. Kid wolf wants to visit his dad in the mental hospital. Mama Wolf says that he can’t just now, and then she distracts and cheers him up with a story about her doing a triple bypass surgery. Cute! This flashback is still wildly unmotivated, though. 

Now we are back in the present, Wolf is still looking for Stuart. 

Intern Jake finds intern Van huddled in a supply closet. He says he can’t do his job without Erika there, because of his mirror touch. Jake comforts him and gives him a pep talk. “It's ok to ask for help. I’ll be your anchor.” 

Back in the elevator, Kenny takes grandpa Gene’s pulse. He’s tapping on the floor of the elevator. Apparently he has Pulsatile tinnitus, which is a weird thing where you can hear your own heartbeat. In his case, it’s due to narrowed blood vessels in his head, so he doesn’t have a stroke after all! They can help him just by limiting the blood to his arms, so it goes back to his brain. Erika makes a little tourniquet. It’s a temporary fix but not bad when you’re trapped in an elevator hanging from a thread. Good job Erika! You Dr. House-ed that issue in record time.

The older doctor (who looks mysteriously familiar*) brings a little terrier to Jenny the runner’s side. Apparently that’s the Stuart we were looking for. “Stuard’s a dog? Christ,” Nichols says. I’m on his side, but the writers want us to know that Oliver Wolf wasn’t off his rocker, so her vital signs start looking a lot better once she can pet him.

We get a very cursory glimpse of Jennie being loaded into an ambulance, legs and all. “They were able to get her out,” Wolf says. Well, that was anticlimactic! Wolf apologizes to Nichols for being stubborn. 

Motorcycles keep neurosurgeons in business!

Wolf waves over a bus driver and asks him to take all the people standing on the street to Bronx General. Nice leadership skills!

FLASHBACK! We see kid Wolf getting off of a city bus. “I want to see my dad,” the kid says. “I miss him.” Actually that was a VO, but it seems like a very clumsy way to explain what’s going on. Kid Wolf wanderers around a mental hospital, and the orderlies ignore him while they help a woman who is distressed and deranged. Papa Wolf shuffles by muttering and doesn’t see Oliver.

I’m a Gen Xer, I grew up in the ‘90s like Wolf, so I know all about unsupervised children on the loose. But this seems a little weird, that no one -- not the city bus driver or the people working in the mental institution -- notices a 9 year old out and about by himself? 

Dr. Carol has a chat with Betsy, the old lady with the unhealing wound. We learn that loneliness is as lethal as 15 cigarettes a day! Is that really true? (Not literally, it turns out, but it captures some truth.) Betsy tells us that her husband died and then the pandemic hit and she became agoraphobic. Dr. Carol and Betsy agree that the building collapse has given her a second chance at life.

Dr. Carol gives us a lesson on the lethality of loneliness.

The elevator friends try to take their minds off of the sound of cables snapping by having a chat. Cecelia tells us that she met this new love interest of hers on the L train. He was reading Homegoing, “one of my favorite books.” I am worried about this gal. We are learning way too much about her hopes and dreams. 

Rescuers arrive and pry open the elevator doors. Grandpa is hoisted out. “Who’s next?” asks the fireman. Cecelia says that Kenny should go next, because her grandpa needs her. “Your grandpa needs you too.” Kenny replies. GIRLS why the hell are you yapping! Oh shit! The cable breaks and Kenny watches her new friend fall to her death. 

This is a classic “that door is big enough for two people,” situation, in my opinion. Cecelia’s death is clearly motivated by something external to the story, besides her actual situation. You can almost see the writers holding their little puppet strings. It’s still a shock.

Kenny shuffles into the hospital and then passes out. Wolf sews her up and tells her how much he loves working with her.

Kenny tells Dana about how she saw Celia fall to her death. “How am I supposed to look at that man and tell him that his grand daughter didn’t make it?” Dana takes angel of death duty and tells the old dude. I seriously can’t watch. 

Van’s babymamma knows exactly what you need after a long day of saving lives: QT with your emotionally needy child.

Mama Wolf says that Oliver is an excellent doctor and a true leader. “Thank you for taking a chance on me. I’m grateful to be here,” he says. Awww…

Van thanks Jacob for his help, Jacob apologizes for telling Erika about his kid. Kid Liam shows up with his mom, Van’s ex. She says that he must need a some sunlight after his tough day. OK the last thing you’d need after a day of trauma triage and mass casualties is to take care of a young child. For real. 

Dana brings the hot EMT lady sandwiches. “My love language, carbs and deli meat,” she says. Very flirty. She puts her number in Dana’s phone. 

The two old ladies, Betsy and her neighbor, are hanging out together and petting the dog Stuart. Dogs are allowed in hospitals?? Also, where is Jenny?

Kenny is crying about how she lost all her belongings. Dana says Kenny should move in with her. Cute!

Wolf gives the interns a pep talk.

Nichols shows up with a bag of food… it appears to be Arby’s? He’s bringing the MEAT! Apologies for the dumb joke.

Anyway, Wolf VO’s a truly tortured metaphor: “Sometimes in the face of tragedy we build walls to protect ourselves. It feels safer to shelter in place, to pretend that we don't need other people in our lives. But in fact, what we really want is to find people who can tear down our walls. People who can strengthen our foundation so that no matter what happens, the ground won’t fall out from under us.”

CLIFFHANGER SCENE: Mama Wolf comes home to find a broken window! Someone has broken into her house! She picks up a plunger(?) and creeps into the kitchen to find an older gentleman drinking OJ by the sink.

“Noah?” says mama Wolf.

“I’m sorry about the window. Old habits,” Noah Wolf says.

“You cant be here. Noah. Has he seen you, Oliver? “No but I've seen him,” Noah Wolf replies. We flash back and see that this dude was the old doctor on the scene of the apartment collapse. “You were right. He is his father’s son.”

OK, so apparently Wolf’s father has been alive all this time! Wolf is not going to take this well!

Now, my dears, if you want me to recap the final episode of the series, let me know. After this exciting episode, it feels like a slow denouement. For now, I will tell you this: (spoiler alert, obviously). The writers borrow from the titular case study in Oliver Sacks’s most famous book, “The Man Who Mistook his Wife for a Hat.”

* I mean, not to me, but maybe to you? Because I, too, have prosopagnosia.