In the age of binge-watching, where individual episodes fade into the sea of a larger series, it is important to remember the value of an incremental story. Not every episode dominates social media feeds or online ranking sites. Some simply give room to explore characters, lay narrative groundwork, and give the audiences breathing room.
“The Pitt’s” second and third episodes of its second season serve these exact purposes. There are no stress-inducing, climactic moments that bring audiences to tears or leave them exhaling in clouds of relief. But, just as the earlier episodes of season one did, they excel in subtlety and foreshadowing.
Season 2, Episode 2 is a fairly comedic episode (for the standards of the Pitt): a rivalry between two medical students leads to a fair bit of gags, glued-on eyelashes blink at the audience and who can forget a well-timed penis reveal? This brevity is welcome, especially considering how dark the latter half of this season almost certainly will be.
That episode has its share of meaningful moments, too. I watched it with my mother, who found the depiction of Alzheimer’s to be quite accurate to her experiences with my grandmother. Langdon and Mel have some good bonding moments, and we learn more about Al-Hashimi’s love of artificial intelligence, which may also explain her slightly less ‘human’ approach to treating patients.
The main ‘strand’ that ties season 2, episode 2 together is perhaps not the existence of a strand but instead a variety of ones. Healthcare workers encounter the comedic, tragic and frustrating — often multiple times in the same day. It tells us just as much about their experiences as even the dramatic episodes that concluded season 1.
Season 2, episode 3 — written by Noah Wyle — sees the day start to wake up, and the themes of the season take full force. The show deals with the aftermath of tragedy just as much as the occurrence of it, which is perhaps best emphasized in the treatment of a survivor of the 2018 Tree of Life synagogue shooting.
I’m slightly ashamed to admit that I had never heard of the shooting, and yet I could immediately tell how consequential the event was and how meaningful the response — from members of multiple religious communities — felt to its victims. The scene is treated with the grace it deserves and is an important history lesson about Pittsburgh. Similarly, it teaches a more lighthearted lesson is how the city has a storied history of firework-making.
The third episode is indeed very patient-centric — and arguably Robby-centric. There’s some foreshadowing after a biker dies due to a missing helmet — Robby hasn’t been wearing his helmet while traveling to work — but its heavy handedness makes me think it’s a red herring. Still, his recklessness stems from the aftermath of his personal tragedies and his grieving process.
Lastly, as the citizens of Pittsburgh begin to wake up, so do our newer characters. Those introduced this season have become more familiar by this point (and I’ve finally memorized their names!), which hopefully means we can soon learn more about them outside of their personality traits.
“The Pitt” has accomplished the above and more in its two most recent episodes. Though it may be tempting to binge and fly past these earlier installments in the future, their importance — thematically, narratively and in characterization — should not be understated.
