Mob Doctor- Resurrection & Life and Death

My favorite thing is that, on the Mob Doctor facebook page they say, "Don't miss the action packed finale!" and then they post the above picture.  Alright, guys. You got me. I'm intrigued.

RESURRECTION

Constantine hasn't seen his son Luke in 25 years.  Luke is in real estate and took a loan from a Miami cartel.  Now they're calling in the debt, and he needs Constantine's help.

A man is rolled into the ER after passing out at a lamaze class.  For some reason, the entire class accompanied him to the ER, as you might expect.  Olivia makes a judgement call that they have to shock him to get his heart beating at a normal rhythm, but when they do so, he flatlines.

Constantine goes to his buddy Tripani from the triumvirate, because he has a connection to this cartel.  Tripani complains that Constantine didn't bring him any pignoli biscotti.

sorry

Tripani's girlfriend is sick, so Constantine offers for Grace to make a house call in exchange for Tripani calling the cartel and telling them he'll pay Luke's debt.

Olivia is upset she killed her patient, and she and Grace explain to his wife why he died.  While they're doing that the guy sits up on the table and is like,

 and they're kind of all like,

Which is I think below minimum requirements for a reaction when someone who is dead for 30 minutes comes back to life.

Constantine brings Grace to Tripani's, and tells Grace about his son.  Tripani says that the cartel already ordered a hit on Luke, so it may be too late.

I'm not sure why Tripani's girlfriend can't go to a real doctor, but anyway, Grace suspects that she has silicone implants that are leaking, which is causing her problems and says they need to replace them.    Chloe is hesitant for some reason.  When they replace the implants, Grace and Brett discover that they are saline, not silicone.  Then Chloe's urinary tract starts bleeding.

Luke is being trailed by the hitman, and gets scooped up by Constantine just in time.  Constantine throws Luke's cell phone out the window so he can't be tracked anymore. They take Luke to a hotel and he starts freaking out about almost being caught, but Constantine says he won't be found again, unless he's stunad. Tripani calls Constantine and says the hit can't be called off because the hitman goes off the grid once he gets a hit.  That sounds kind of dumb, but sure.

So Brett finds out that Chloe has a tumor and it's on her... prostate?  WHOA. Chloe was born a man.  She's upset because she doesn't want Tripani to find out, but when she comes out of surgery, Grace tells Chloe and Tripani it was an "abdominal tumor" but they had a complication and had to remove Chloe's uterus.  Quite crafty.

Afterward Tripani corners Grace and he's like, I want to know the truth about Chloe because I already know the truth!!  And then he's like, don't tell nobody.  And Grace walks away without actually telling him the truth of what Chloe had.

Stuart is getting worse and  now he is seeing halos.  The doctors realize it could be some type of toxicity and they realize he's overdosing on foxglove?  Because of some natural cough suppressant he's been taking.  They give him something to counteract it and in seconds he's pretty well cured.  Amazing.

Gio had gone to a newsstand to pick up some magazines for Luke.  He gossips a little with the guy at the newsstand, who turns around and spills the beans to someone as soon as Gio turns his back.  Gio goes back to the hotel room and looks for Luke, but then walks out.  The hitman is close behind him.  He hears the water running in the shower, so he slips into the bathroom and shoots through the shower curtain.  When he pulls it back, no one's there.  And when he turns around,

Constantine shoots him dead.  That hitman fell for the old running shower trick.  I think Macauly Culkin used that one in Home Alone.

AND, here's where things actually get good!  It only took 12 episodes + cancellation, but this is it.

Gio knew the newsstand guy was going to run his mouth, so the whole thing had been a set up.  Luke decides he'll stay around for a while, and he wants to meet Grace.  Now why would Constantine's son want to meet Grace?  Hmm...

Constantine needs to go see Grace's mother.  While he's gone, Stavos gets a call from the cartel, and there's a BIG problem.  Tripani double crossed Constantine and never took his offer to the cartel.  Now it looks like Constantine just killed their hitman without trying to make a deal or make good on the loan.  Constantine left his phone in the car while he goes to get a drink so he doesn't get the message, of course.

The cartel comes into the bakery with crazy automatic weapons and shoot the place up.  Gio gets killed!  Some other guy gets killed!  A third dude gets killed!  Only Stavos survives!  But then they torture him to find out where Constantine is.  Now this is what I thought the mob was supposed to be like this whole time!

Constantine shows up on the Devlin's doorstep and tells Grace's mother that it's time they tell her the truth.  But while they are talking, the cartel drives by and shoots both Grace and Constantine a bunch of times!  Grace runs out and sees her mother and Constantine dying.  She starts screaming, help, help. Is there a doctor in the house?  If only there was some number one could call...  Who knows what to do in a situation like this?

LIFE & DEATH

Constantine and and Grace's mother are rolled into the ER. They are alive, but barely so.  All of Constantine's belongings are in a plastic bag, and Grace sees Nate calling him.  She pockets the phone and walks out of the ER.

Nate was calling to tell Constantine that everybody's dead, even Stavos.  So good on Stavos for giving up Constantine's location.  That really worked out for you, huh?

Detective York asks Grace some questions, but she doesn't give him much information.

Grace asks Dr. White if she can scrub in on Constantine since she's his doctor, but Dr. White says no.  He's tired of ignoring her frequent absences and odd patients and now he has a better idea of what she's been up to.  Agent York approaches Nate and says he knows he works for Constantine.  And Nate is basically like, Yeah but you can't prove that.  Maybe Nate should rethink going to community college.

Tripani comes to the hospital to give Grace his condolences, but also slyly mention that Constantine killed her father.  Which kind of pisses her off.

York then questions Ro to get some information, but she doesn't give anything up.  Then he's like, oh one more thing, what's the deal with Franco and Grace.  And Ro says they broke up years ago.  To which York is like, Cool, didn't know that, thanks.

Grace barges into Constantine's room and says Tripani told her he killed her father.  Constantine says he couldn't have done that and deep down she knows why.  "Love me or hate me...

Ok, but still.  You know what she meant.  So you're NOT denying killing the man she was raised to BELIEVE was her father?

Grace goes to their mom and tells her Constantine told her he's her father.  The whole family is upset, but Nate is relieved as long as he's really his dad's kid.  Nice.  Their mother starts having some complications and Grace starts barking orders at Brett, but Brett says she's gone.  Grace starts explaining why their mother died to Nate in a very clinical way.  Nate says

Grace goes to Constantine and tells him she's tired of this and she's going to go to the FBI and tell them everything.  He plays the message Stavos left him about Tripani double crossing them, and convinces her she should avenge her mother.  She goes to Luke and asks him to arrange a meeting with the cartel.

Meanwhile York goes to Franco and says he KNOWS Franco still has the hots for Grace.  Still has the hots!!  It really shows in like... you know... their chemistry?

York takes Franco's gun and badge.  Yikes.

Grace and Luke meet up with the cartel guy.  They're all pissed that Tripani played them against each other, so Grace makes a deal with him and convinces him to turn on Tripani.  So the guy is like, ok we're done, and then Grace is like, no wait.  Which one of you shot my mother.  Some guy smirks, and Grace...

She sure showed him.

When she gets back to the hospital, Constantine says now they're ready to make their move.  Grace is confused because she made a deal and she thought they would be at peace.  Now she realizes it was a ploy.  Constantine used her, he never had intentions to make a legit truce.

Constantine falls asleep because of his pain killers.  Grace turns the sound off his alarm for his monitor, and then pumps him full of insulin.  She takes the simcard out of his cell phone.  She puts the phone and the syringe in the hazard bin, and walks out as he flatlines silently.

She speaks to Nate and tells him she's done with this life, but Nate says he's staying in.  So Grace strolls out of the hospital in slow motion.  Franco is waiting in a car at the front.  She hops in.

It's just the two of them now.  They drive off to Mexico.

FIN.  THE END.  AND HALLELUJAH.

So pretty much the last five minute of the last two episodes were pretty great.  Other than that...

What did you all think about this show?  How could it have been better?  Hope you enjoyed it more than I did!

One thing is bothering me though... what will become of those poker machines??

Picture Credit: realitytvgifs, tumblr, FOX

Mob Doctor: Confessions & Sibling Rivalry

Yes, a horse.  We'll get to this.

It seems like it's been forever since I did a recap, and to make up for that, I'm doing a DOUBLE RECAP.  That's right.  You may be unaware that Mob Doctor aired one of the remaining episodes on a "special night," aka Saturday night, aka a night that no one watches television.  And they also aired an episode on another special night, known to many as New Year's Eve.  So things are going well.

Before I begin, congratulations are in order, as one of the Mob Doctor stars, Zach Gilford, got married last week.  Cheers for your nuptials, and the freedom to star on a better show.

The only way one can prepare for watching 2 Mob Doctor episodes

CONFESSIONS

Grace meets up with Constantine at his bakery, figuring he needs an insulin shot.  But what he really wants to talk to her about is the fact that she was spotted helping King and Franco in the last episode.  Constantine now assumes that Franco is the one who referred King to her.  Now Constantine tells Grace he wants to know everything she knows about Franco and he wants Franco DEAD.

Grace tells Franco he's in danger but he says he needs to stay on the inside with King for now.  He tries to hook King up with forklifts or something for some reason.  I'm going to be honest... I've been paying very little attention to the "mob" aspect of this show.  From here on out I am just going to assume everything is about video poker machines.

So Franco is going to hook King up with some forklifts so he can lift video poker machines.  When the forklift guy finds out King is from Detroit, he FLIPS.  He doesn't work with people from Detroit because he lost $100,000 on a Bulls game 20 years ago.  But he throws King some trivia about Chicago until he's satisfied that he's actually from there.  Now the poker machines can be lifted.

So Grace has a patient who is a priest with a nasty infection on his cheek.  He was performing an exorcism on a woman when the demon who was using her body as a vessel bit him.  Here we go again.

Brett is in on this demon case and says something about "an exorcism in 2013."  Aw Brett.  Too bad this episode aired in 2012.

Constantine tells King he can't forklift around any poker machines without kicking into the syndicate.  In my opinion, Constantine is focusing too much on the organization and not enough on the CRIME.  I mean is this the mob, or what?  I don't know why this man expects everyone to agree to play by the rules.

FYI

So Nate is sent with Gio and Louie (aka Danny Romalotti Jr.) to do some errand for Constantine and probably pick up $5,000 he made from the poker machines.  So Louie goes in this store, we hear a gunshot and then all of a sudden Louie runs out chasing this kid.  They catch him and Louie says Constantine's guy on the inside of the shop got killed and they need to take care of this kid.  Nate gets worried because the kid is unconscious so he calls Grace.

The priest's leg goes numb and they think he had a stroke as a result of the infection.  Brett goes to take a spinal tap, which is never good.  On these shows, any time someone gets a spinal tap, something is about to go down.  The priest starts threatening Brett and Dr. White with a needle.  Meanwhile the possessed woman has passed away and now another priest thinks the demon is in the first priest.

Now Constantine is trying to create a triumvirate within his syndicate.  What is this man doing????  Well neither of his two partners in "crime" are digging this idea, so he sweetens the deal by going behind their backs and offering each of them 50% of the profits.  Leaving him with... nothing?  But he claims they'll never agree on anything, so in the end, he'll make all of the decisions and all of the money?

So they find out the possessed woman actually had rabies.  And now the priest has rabies.  And rabies can hardly be treated once symptoms are showing, so he's pretty much a goner.  But in the beginning of the episode, Grace cut herself on a scalpel and now she was exposed to the rabies!  So Brett tries frantically to call her so she can get treated.

Grace can't be bothered to return any of his 7 phone calls, because the teen Nate called about has woken up and won't talk.  Nate goes to Constantine to ask him about it, and Constantine is like, you kidnapped this kid, you're STUNAD, let him go.  Now he sounds like my mom.

Grace is alone with the kid, but he's having an asthma attack.  She needs to get an inhaler from her car, so she leaves him alone with Danny Romalotti, which means he's about to do something dumb.  She comes back and the kid is unconscious, so she gives him a shot of epinephrine, which revives him.  Then she notices he's been strangled!  Danny pulls a gun on her but then Nate comes in and shoots him in the back.  That's when the kid admits that Danny shot the guy in the store and stole the $5,000.

Constantine and his triumvirate go to King and they're like, we want 30 cents of every dollar you make forklifting the poker machines. And he's like, I don't like this but OK, I guess that's how the mob works in Chicago.

Constantine is coming for Franco, and now Franco is on the run.  P.S. Grace got her rabies shots.

SIBLING RIVALRY

At the beginning of this episode, someone sends Constantine a bottle of champagne rigged with explosives.

Champagne for my real friends, real pain for my sham friends

A VIP comes in for surgery, and they specifically request Brett.  Turns out the patient is his brother, and I guess in this universe it's totally cool to operate on family members?  In the ER, Grace is grilling Brett with a thousand questions, including why his last name isn't Hanson like his brother, and so on.  You know what Grace?  These would have been nice things to find out about Brett while you guys were a couple.

They start moving into surgery and Dr White says Brett is hands off from this point.  Thank god someone on this show has a lick of sense.

Grace has a patient come in saying she has abdominal pain.  Grace discharges her without giving her a CT scan because the patient has come in 81 times this year looking for drugs.  What year would that be, 2013?

Now for the horse!  Nate calls Grace in a panic.  He was trying to get very valuable sperm from this race horse, so he and his friend gave it viagara, and now the horse is experiencing an erection lasting longer than 4 hours, so Nate contacted his health services provider.  What show am I watching?

Grace calls Ro to bring her drugs and apples for this ridiculous plot line. Grace is all, I don't have time to deal with this stupid horse, and yet there she goes, feeding pills to a HORSE.

Grace's drug addict comes back, but now she's on Brett's brother's case so Olivia has to treat her.  I don't know why everyone in the hospital expects Grace to deal with this drug addict every one of the 83 times she comes in for drugs a year.  Like, doctors don't have assigned patients they treat every time they come on so Olivia is complaining it's not fair, but that is dumb. Olivia decides to one up Grace and gives the patient a CT scan, and finds out that she needs surgery or else she will die.  So that's the end of this plot.

Brett hasn't seen his brother since his mom died, and we get a bunch of Brett backstory.  His brother is getting worse so they need to find out how he fell to see what kind of injuries he might have.  They get a video of the crash which shows him passing out before he even falls off the bike, so now they have a new set of questions.

Meanwhile, Nate is going nuts because the pills Grace gave the horse are making him "aggro."  And I'm really tired of the horse now, I don't even think this plotline got resolved.

As it turns out, Brett's brother got a UV tattoo of his boss's name, because they are having an affair.  He got the tattoo in Barbados, which his boss knew, but she denied that he had been out of the country recently when they were trying to find out if he could have a weird infection.  Like, ok, fine, lie in front of the family, but then pull a doctor to the side and say, hey by the way, I was lying.  Then she has the nerve to cry and ask the doctors to save his life!  After you withheld important medical information???

They save his life, anyway.

Constantine tracks down where his champagne came from, and it led him to Titus.  But Titus doesn't know anything about it.  It turns out, it was his brother who Grace had saved from being poisoned by his wife in one of the first episodes.  Constantine shoots him.  All's well that ends well.

At the very end, some man shows up for Constantine and Constantine is like, who is this?  I never forget a face.  And the guy is like, Oh really?  It's me dad.

Bombshell

The next episode is airing on another special night!  So catch it this Saturday.  Or don't.  Whatever, do what you want.  And after that, just one episode to go!

Stay tuned for what will certainly be a satisfying conclusion.

Picture Credit: realitytvgifs, FOX

Mob Doctor: Fluid Dynamics

December has barely started, but it's Christmas in Chicago!  I guess when you are OFFICIALLY CANCELLED and have ONLY 5 EPISODES LEFT, you really start getting in the Christmas spirit.

As we near the end of this series, less and less details start to seem important, so I'll gloss over some nonessential stuff.

Grace gets paged by a shady character who has come into the hospital with back pain.  You can tell he's shady because he is wearing a leather jacket.  He heard Grace sees patients off the grid.  But before she agrees to see him, he collapses, which I can tell you from experience, is not a good thing to do in a doctor's office or hospital.  That kind of draws a lot of attention to you and keeps you very much on the grid. 

Grace calls Constantine and tells him he can't send her patients like this.  But Constantine didn't send the guy.  Grace describes him, and Constantine recognizes the description as belonging to Russell King from Detroit.  Grace meets up with Franco who admits to sending King.  He needs to be hooked to someone in the biz to stay in the biz.

King's daughter comes to the hospital and they discuss their plans for the night.  Grace tells them she doesn't think it's likely that Russell will be able to make it, and his daughter assures him she can handle it.

I'll sum up the medical plot quickly, because as usual, it's useless.  This kid comes in named Kyle Bennett and he has an antler embedded in his head.  Dr. White acts really weird around this patient, until he reveals that he once had a stepson named Kyle Bennett who would have been about this age, but he and his mother died in an accident.  Patient Kyle talks about baseball, which is something Dr. White's son used to love.  And Patient Kyle's mother is also dead.  Do you think anything comes of all these coincidences?

Constantine comes to the hospital and visits Russell.  He tells Russell that there are no individual contractors in Chicago anymore, so I guess that's what last week was about.  He tells Russell if he's planning a job, he has to kick into the syndicate.  Russell says he doesn't think so.

So Grace talks to Russell and asks him if he told Constantine who referred him to her.  Russell says something to the effect of, he's not stupid and ever so nicely compliments Grace saying that she must be pretty slick to be a lady doctor and what not. 

He goes on to babble about how he and Constantine are both fathers, to which Grace asks if Constantine has kids.  King says Grace must not be as slick as she looks.  Because, duh, he just said so, and probably Grace is Constantine's daughter anyway.  WE WERE ALL THINKING IT.

So the plan for the heist, and it IS a heist, is that King and his daughter are going to sneak into an auction house through a water main that is going to be drained for construction or something.  Russell needs some emergency surgery because something is terribly wrong with him, but when Grace looks for him, he's escaped the hospital.  She calls Franco to make Russell come back, but Russell is already in the water main and he's too far down to get service.

Franco goes down the main, and Grace rushes over.  When she gets there, she sees Constantine paying off the city workers.  The tunnels are going to flood, and once again, Russell is collapsed.  It's touch and go for approximately 4 seconds, but it turns out everything is alright.

Grace starts to perform surgery on Russell right there.  She makes an incision and then makes Franco stick his fingers in it and pull the skin apart.  IT.  IS.  NASTY.

Russell survives.  It may seem weird that I said it like that with no explanation in between, but that's kind of what happens in the show.  They get to the hospital, Grace is straddling him on the gurney as they roll him into the ER and then, next thing you know, he survives.

THEN, Grace goes over to Franco's new place.  And they hook up.  It is the most awkward 90 seconds of television I've ever seen.  It is more awkward, even, than Twilight.

Constantine's men tell him that Franco and Grace were both there to save Russell.  Constantine says he'll deal with her on his own time.

Mob Doctor is giving me a break!  No new episodes until December 29th. We're only 4 episodes away from an unsatisfying conclusion!

How do you guys feel about the ~official cancellation?  Anyone happy about Grace and Franco getting together? Anyone rooting for those two?

Picture Credit: tumblr

Mob Doctor: Game Changers

This episode opens with a reminder that Constantine has diabetes, and he has bought a bakery.

Franco is in a warehouse showing off his display boards where he cut and pasted pictures of mob hierarchies to the detective from last week.  Franco tries to make the case that he should stay in Chicago and bring the rest of the mob down, but the detective tells him he's going to Miami and will change his identity.  He probably would have been more convinced if Franco had done a powerpoint presentation.  It's the digital age boo!

The detective wants to know how Grace is involved, but Franco sidesteps the question.  What I want to know is why they made Franco go "undercover" with his REAL identity.  How does no one know he's a cop?

Grace gets a call from an old friend.  She shows up at her house and her 18 year old daughter is handcuffed to the bed, going through withdrawals from her heroin addiction, which she wanted to quit cold turkey.  Now I know nothing about drugs.  I barely watch drug movies.  But even I know that quitting heroin, cold turkey, handcuffed to your bed, is pretty much the worst idea.

Franco shows up at the hospital to talk to Grace.  She says she's going to call the cops, and he pulls the old "I am a cop" routine.  He proves he's a cop by rattling off about 45 details about one parking ticket she got.  So he's definitely either a cop, or a stalker.  In fact, he's definitely both.  He tells her he can't protect her from the FBI anymore.

I won't waste any time on the stupid medical subplot.  Trust me, nothing of value will be lost.  But I did find it interesting that Grace was called in to consult on this foot/leg/hip fracture considering shes a THORACIC surgeon.  Turns out, she knows it all.  Surprise, surprise.

Grace and Brett are officially dunzo.  They perform this surgery with an Indian surgeon named, what else... Sanjay.  Sanjay starts hitting on Brett hardcore, saying he has nice eyes and stuff, and then asks if he ever dates Indian girls.  THIS OFFENDED ME!  What on earth is that supposed to mean?  What a dumb question.  Sanjay sets him up on a date with his daughter.

So Katie, the heroin addict, gets her drug dealer boyfriend to pick her up from the hospital.  Her mom begs Grace to do something, and you can see her wheels spinning.

Grace goes to have a burger at a bar, and Ro comes in saying she saw Grace leave.  So now she has 2 stalkers.  Ro tells her to have the drug dealer whacked.  Grace says she has to go back to the hospital.  She has not even touched her burger.  Luckily Ro says she hasn't eaten anything cuz I was about to GO OFF.

Grace tells Constantine she wants out of the agreement.  You can probably assume that doesn't go well.

Grace asks Nate to help her shake down the drug dealer, which they do.  Nate roughs him up.  Katie has ODed, so she goes back to the hospital, where Grace does some shady stuff to get her a rapid detox.

I've pretty much glossed over the entire mob aspect of this episode, but it was basically Constantine organizing a gigantic "round table" of mob bosses at the bakery.  Franco stalks the meeting and gets pics of all the guys, which convinces the detective to keep him in Chicago.  He meets with Grace and tells her the only way for them both to get out is to go back in.

This episode wasn't so horrible.  But maybe that's because the end is in sight!  What did you guys think of this episode?

Picture Credit: Fox, tumblr

The Mob Doctor: Turf War

Pew pew pew

It's the 7th episode of Mob Doctor which means we're over the hump!  But there's still 6 more episodes left.

Couldn't go two in a row without these horrible flashbacks, so we learn that when Grace was a kid, there was a desk drawer that was off limits.  But one day she decided to sneak into it and she found a loaded gun and started playing with it.

At home, Grace is treating her bullet wound.  She calls Nurse Ro, who says Grace has been out of work for 3 days in a row.  Grace asks Ro to bring her some medical supplies, and Ro says Grace needs to be resting, not treating her "off the book" patients.  Grace is still obsessively looking at the bullet and moving it from place to place, so surely it will become a plot point later on.  Maybe it will become a much larger plot point than we could even imagine, like these video poker machines, and the bullet will get mentioned in every forthcoming episode.

Moretti is trying to get his business back from Constantine.  He meets with Titus (alias Uncle Eddie, alias Professor Professorson), the guy from several episodes ago who started all this video poker machine mess.  Moretti wants his deal back but Titus said he already gave the deal to Constantine and no one wants Moretti back.

One of Constantine's guys, I want to say Gio, drops off 6 pizzas for Grace in case she gets hungry.  Grace tells Nate she can't fake the flu much longer.  Nate breaks down and apologizes for getting Grace involved with this mess.  It's times like these I wish I knew what exactly Nate had done to get Grace involved in this mess, and why is Grace involved in this mess? But then I quickly stop caring, and just look forward to the day when I don't have to think about it.

Moretti's guys break into Constantine's warehouse where he keeps the video poker machines.  PSYCH!!  That's just where he keeps the empty boxes.  Plot twist~  Constantine is a hoarder and he had plans for those boxes.  Just kidding, Constantine knew they were coming and set them up.  Everybody gets shot.  One of Constantine's guys even shoots into traffic, hitting an innocent bystander, Paige, in the head as she is driving by.

At this point I want to point out that the guy who shoots Paige has a recurring storyline in this episode about the fact that he took a woman out on a date and spent a lot of money on it.  It is brought up on two occasions.  Why?

Ro drops the stuff that Grace asked for off at her house, noticing the mafioso type standing guard by her porch. She sees Grace's gunshot wound and gives her a little talking to about it.  Then Ro gets a call about some gunshot patients so she goes to the hospital.  Grace says she's coming with her, and magically painkillers cure her limp.  Somehow she gets past the guard.  It's not addressed how.

At the hospital, they are treating Paige and Gio for wounds.  Paige was shot in the head and abdomen, and she starts seizing.

When Moretti finds out there were no gaming machines in the warehouse, he's all "Whaddya mean no gaming machines??"  He wants to know how Constantine could have seen them coming, and he suspects Franco.

So Grace calls Nate to check in on him since she knows what went down in the warehouse.  Then she talks to Paige's mother and tells her there is bleeding in Paige's brain, and there are two options: remove the damaged part of her brain which will leave her disabled, or give her medication, which, if it doesn't work, she'll die.  Her mother chooses the medication.

The cops come to investigate at the warehouse.  Constantine says he don't know nothin about no break in.  He's just a normal dude, trying to run a normal, run of the mill, *legitimate* video poker machine business, just like anybody else.  The detective doesn't get anywhere with that, so he goes to visit Gio in the hospital, which Grace discovers.  Then Grace talks to Gio and Ro catches them.  By the way, am I sure his name isn't Gino?  No, I'm not.  So Ro wants to know what's going on with Grace, but of course, she doesn't have anything to say.

Brett runs into Grace and asks if she really had the flu.  Does he really need to ask?  She pulls out her tired "Nate is in some trouble" act.  Brett wants to know what's going on, but Grace gets a code on Paige and runs out.  Paige is brain dead, I guess, but Grace tries to revive her.  I don't know why I'm bothering to talk about this medical B-plot because, as always, it goes no where, so I'll just stop here with that.

Constantine walks into a diner where Moretti happens to be.  Constantine tells him to keep his hands on the table.  Constantine says he wants Franco, and Moretti says he wants everything north of Madison.  They go back and forth, until Constantine sticks a fork in Moretti's hand.  There must be a Constantine flash mob in the diner because no one bats an eye at this.

At this point, Franco and one of Moretti's other guys get into a fantastic argument about whether or not the sandwich Franco is eating has provolone in it.  It lasts, I kid you not, like an entire minute.  If there was a Mob Doctor spin off called "Franco and this Other Guy Argue About Whether this Sandwich has Provolone in it Or Not," I would happily prefer to watch that show.

Brett and Dr. White check Gio's x-ray and find that the bullet they left in his leg went into his blood stream.  Take a guess at whether this actually matters by the end of the episode?  Spoiler alert: no.

So Brett and Grace talk, and he says he needs to know more of what's going on with her or else he can't keep doing this.  Honestly, I'd be surprised if Grace cares because they hardly spend any time together nor seem to have ANY chemistry.

Dr. White says maybe they can find out who shot Paige when they send the bullet inside her to the crime lab.  The bullet currently inside her is from Constantine's doofus who splurges on dates.  Grace, with Ro's help, swaps that one out for the bullet she's been saving in her underwear drawer.  The cops then arrest Moretti for Paige's murder because the bullet came from his gun.  I am SUPER SURE they didn't find any of Grace's fingerprints on there, because why would they?

Grace tells Constantine she wants him to take care of Paige's mom now, and Constantine says fine, and also, Grace is a real natural.

In the flashback, Grace discovers that the gun, which she assumed belonged to her father, actually belonged to her mother.

And in a shocking twist, Franco is revealed to be an undercover police officer. He wants to go in deeper, but the detective says now that Moretti is in jail, his assignment is over.

UGH.  This show is exhaustingly dull, even when it isn't so bad.  I just don't understand anything about it.  Glad to be over the hump!  What did you guys think?

Picture Credit: FOX

The Mob Doctor: Complications

This is only the sixth episode??  GASP

It feels like just yesterday I was dreading a new episode of The Mob Doctor.  Oh, that was yesterday.

Well, last night's episode started with NO FLASHBACK and NO DUMB VOICEOVER.  Could I really be so lucky as to have a Levine-less American Horror Story episode back to back with a flashback-less Mob Doctor?

Grace is walking out to the parking lot, and Franco is standing there.  She says she is too tired to help him, and whoever he has should just go to the ER like a normal person.  Franco apologizes, and Moretti pops out and kidnaps her.

We flash back to six hours earlier.  This flashback doesn't offend me (as much).  The doctors are preparing for some presentations they are doing.  A swimmer named Casey comes in, she was hit by a speedboat.

Constantine is working on coercing a politician named Spence to change his vote on the gambling ordinance.  He only needs one more vote to pass it.

Grace goes into the waiting room, and the guy who hit Casey with the speedboat is waiting there for her.  He is pretty upset by what happened, but if he's looking for a shoulder to cry on, it won't be Grace's.  Maybe she can give him some morphine to stop the tears, I don't think she'd have a problem with that.

Moretti, meanwhile, is determined to get Constantine today.  I can tell because he says today like 10 times.  Franco is all like, to be clear, you mean kill him, right?  Well Moretti thinks that's pretty darn suspicious.  If there's one thing the mob hates, it's being clear.  And if there's one thing they love, it's video poker machines.

Casey wakes up from surgery.  She says she has no recollection of swimming, and in fact, she HATES swimming, almost as much as Moretti hates being clear.

Constantine got Spence to change his vote on the gambling ordinance, so everybody is celebrating and gets an extra thousand dollars for the week.

Now we're back to the beginning.  Moretti dumps Grace in the trunk.  She's surprised to see Moretti alive, on account of having seen him get killed and all.    Moretti thinks that Grace set him up, and now he wants her to get Constantine to come out to meet him, so he can "get" him.  Not sure what he meant by that, he wasn't very clear.

Casey insists that she doesn't swim, and the guy who hit her with the speedboat insists he is taking care of her dog.  I feel like I'm not spending enough time with the patients to actually care if they live or die, but oh well.

Grace calls Constantine and lies saying she can't keep treating patients in alleyways and pet stores.  She needs a facility and some supplies.  She knows a guy who's selling stolen stuff for $20,000.  Constantine says ok, I'll send someone with the money.  But Grace is like, no, it has to be you, but doesn't really give him a good reason, so yeah, he's suspicious.

Brett asks Ro what she knows about Franco when Casey starts coding. Brett has to intubate her, but he struggles with it.  He's not a pro like Dr. Robert Chase: Intubator Extraordinaire.

Grace starts talking to Franco.  She tries to call Constantine to let him overhear their conversation but she has no service.  Franco catches her, and does nothing?

When Casey is intubated, Dr. White finds worms in her lungs.  Gross.

Olivia and Brett present their case from last week with the two boys.  Oh maybe they'll wrap up that storyline and tell us which of the parents had that genetic disorder called DYSTONIA, thank you very much.  Oh they're not going to mention that?  Ok.  Brett realizes Grace is set to present next and she hasn't shown up yet.  He tries to stall to buy her some time, but he's just being redundant so they tell him to knock it off.  Grace misses her presentation which Dr. White finds UNACCEPTABLE.  If that's unacceptable, I wonder what word he would use to describe knocking a patient out so you can give them a heart transplant they didn't consent to, intentionally almost letting someone die from internal bleeding, or leaving work every 4 minutes to do something for the mob?

Grace and Franco are still talking.  He didn't learn his lesson from last time, and she clocks him in the head, and then escapes.  She tries to run but Moretti sees her.  He starts shooting at her and hits her in the leg.  Grace finds somewhere to hide, but Moretti's goons are in hot pursuit.  Even though she is bleeding uncontrollably, she manages to not leave a trail of blood, so they can't find her.  She's just that good.

She finds some pliers and sterilizes them with gasoline??  And she pulls the bullet out of her thigh.

Dr. White tells Casey she has tapeworms and she probably got them from her dog.  Her hand starts shaking so they get her a CT scan and find a cyst of tapeworm eggs in her brain.  Ew.

Moretti still can't find Grace, prompting him to say, "What is with this broad, she's like a freakin Houdini or somethin?"  Indeed.

Grace manages to call Constantine right as he pulls up to the lot, and warn him about Moretti.  Constantine pulls away in time and then gets Grace to the car.

Dr. White and Brett perform surgery on Casey to get the cyst out.  If it ruptures, Dr. White says she will die.  It's touch and go, but ultimately the get it out.  I guess Casey will be ok.  Who cares though?

Grace is back at home and is oddly sentimental about her bullet.  She wraps it in a scarf and puts it in a drawer.  Brett calls, because she has been missing for 8 hours, NBD.  She's like, oh I was with Nate, but Brett knows she's lying.  They need to talk but Constantine shows up at the door and she has to go.  Constantine came to tell her that Franco and Moretti drew blood and they started a war.

I think my feelings for this show can be summed up by the fact that my sister told me it got picked up for a full season as a prank and I almost cried.  I'm basically counting down to the 13th episode at this point, which feels like a long way off.

Is anyone else out there watching this show anymore??

Picture credit: FOX

The Mob Doctor Recap: Legacy

Whatever she's saying, it's a lie.

Despite all odds, The Mob Doctor is back.  That'll probably be the nicest thing I say in this recap.

This episode starts out with another insufferable flashback.  In this one, Grace remembers that one weekend, her mother left her alcoholic father to watch her and Nate alone.  And that weekend, he was a great dad and didn't drink at all.  Sounds plausible.

In the present day, Grace is treating a patient named Sarah who is expecting a heart transplant.  Sarah is afraid someone else will pop up on the donor list and she will lose this heart.  Presumably, this has happened to her before, but Grace all but promises her that won't happen.  So we already know that Sarah isn't getting a heart.

Grace is set to perform the surgery under Dr. Baylor, the surgeon who flipped out at Olivia in the last episode for screwing up that surgery.  However, just as they are about to start, they fear that Sarah is septic and they postpone it until they can run some tests, which means the heart has to go to someone else.

Meanwhile, Brett is trying to diagnose a patient, Will, with an intestinal blockage.  Olivia comes along and gives him some suggestions, and he accuses her of "patient surfing" and trying to get back into Dr. Baylor's good graces with her diagnostic skills.  As Brett is discussing Will's situation with his parents, Will's younger brother Ethan tries to plug something into an outlet, and gets shocked so badly he flies across the room.  He tells Brett he is ok, except he burnt his finger, and Brett, accepts this even though the child just got electrocuted, and tells Ethan that Olivia is really good with burnt fingers.  He thinks it's sweet revenge.

Um, first Brett diagnosed the bleeding bride with a panic attack, and now this... I'm thinking he's the worst doctor... pretty much ever.

Constantine calls Grace and says he has a patient with a unique medical situation.  She finds out that his patient, Eddie, is serving life in prison with no chance of parole.  Constantine used to be his cellmate, and Eddie knows all about Grace and everyone in her town.  Eddie faked chest pains to get transferred into the infirmary.  He is Sarah's father, and he knows she needs a heart transplant, so he wants Grace to kill him in such a way that she can use his heart for Sarah.

Constantine thinks Grace should just do what Eddie wants, but Grace doesn't want to kill people.  She says there are other options for Sarah, even though like two scenes earlier she was all, THIS COULD BE HER LAST CHANCE.

Olivia treats Ethan and says he has no muscle damage from the shock, and Ethan says his finger is great.  As he walks out of the room, Olivia notices he is limping.  She says it could be nerve damage from the shock, but he says probably not because it's been like that for  awhile, but the doctors can't find anything wrong.

Sarah's tests came back and showed she wasn't septic after all, but now her heart is failing faster.  Grace says there is some operation they can do to replace her heart with an LVAD, maybe?  Sorry, I'm no doctor.  But this surgery would buy Sarah a few weeks.  Grace asks if Sarah has anyone she can call, but Sarah says both her parents are dead.

Olivia starts to give Ethan an MRI, but as she reaches to take off his shoe, he says his foot is killing him since he got shocked, even though he said nothing of the sort after he got shocked.  Olivia takes his shoe off... and this kid's foot is TWISTED.  Like the sole of his foot is pointing up towards his face to the point where I don't even know how that could happen while you are still wearing shoes! This is BEYOND House at this point, this is some Emily Rose type stuff.  They should have aired this episode on Halloween.

Sarah's father Eddie has himself transferred to the hospital by faking a heart attack.  Grace says he's pretty dumb to do that if he's trying to donate his heart.  Eddie says he knows what drug he wants to take to kill himself, and he just needs Grace to get it to him.  She says she isn't going to lose her license by aiding and abetting a suicide.  Funny where she draws the line.

Grace performs the surgery on Sarah to put in her LVAD.  Dr. Baylor says it looks good, but Grace remarks it would look better if it were a real heart.  Dr. Baylor don't appreciate Grace's passive aggressiveness, but Grace says she just wishes Dr. Baylor had trusted her judgement the day before.

Sarah starts bleeding and Dr. Baylor asks Grace if she nicked something.  Grace is appalled to be asked!  Of course she didn't nick something, she's a finest surgeon in the land!  Stupid Olivia must have snuck in and nicked something when they weren't looking!  Grace says the aorta must have torn but comes up with a quick solution.  Problem solved.

If two and a half plots weren't enough for you, here comes a third.  Constantine has Nate going around trying to pressure people who owe him "favors"  into buying....  wait for it... video poker machines!!!  I've been waiting 3 weeks to find out what was going to happen with these machines, and it wasn't in vain.

Also, this episode must be sponsored by Apple, because every doctor is checking their patients' test results on an iPad.

Eddie tries to convince Grace to kill him by telling her he killed two guys, but Grace says if she plays god, then she's no better than him.  Grace tells Sarah she only has a few days left.  I guess when she told Sarah this surgery would buy her a few weeks yesterday, she was lying.  She tells Sarah that Eddie is in the hospital and he would like to see her.  Sarah doesn't want to see him, but Grace convinces her to, because if it were her dad she would want to see him so he could apologize.

Olivia visits Ethan and his mother to tell her that all the tests are negative.  While they are talking, Ethan's entire body starts twisting up.  Olivia keeps trying to figure it out, and Brett is surprised she cares.  They look at Will's intestines and realize that his intestinal blockage is also due to twisting.  They decide it is genetic, and they need to get a full chromosomal map for both kids.

Nate goes into a bar and tries to get the owner to buy some Video Poker Machines.  The owner tells the cop who happens to be sitting there before noon on a weekday, that Nate is trying to shake him down.  So they cop roughs Nate up and tries to get him to say that Constantine is the one who sent him.

Grace manages to get Eddie away from his police escort and into Sarah's room.  Sarah says this is only the third time she's ever seen her father, and both other times were before she was 9.  Kind of makes you wonder how he even knew she needed a heart transplant at just the right time.  Sarah doesn't accept Eddie's apology.

Olivia and Brett show Dr. White the DNA mutations.  They determine Will and Ethan have... Estonia?  Is that what I heard?  That's a country, not a disease!  Well, I have no idea what I heard, but they make a big deal of the fact that one of the parents HAS to have it too.  So I'm sure we'll be hearing more about that soon.

Constantine calls Grace and asks her to meet him in the ambulance bay because he is feeling funny. She goes out there, and Eddie is being taken back to jail.  He sees her and mouths "thank you."  There is something suspicious going on, and then Eddie gets shot in the head.  Grace immediately tries to keep the heart going and get him into surgery.  Some guy's response to this is, "there's brain matter in his hair!"  Best line ever on this show, hands down.

In a predictable moment, the cop who roughed Nate up is revealed to be working for Constantine. That was a test to see if Nate would squeal, and he passed.

Here's where things get CRAZY.

Dr. While is suspicious that Eddie is Sarah's father and he happened to be shot right outside the hospital.  Dr. Baylor spoke to Sarah about the heart, but she declined it when she found out it was Eddie's.  Grace goes in and tries to change Sarah's mind, but she gives her a very clear "no."  So what does Grace do?? She knocks the patient out with morphine and then tells her bosses she got verbal consent.  Ethical misconduct!  Medical malpractice!  Seriously, even when this woman is not involved with the mob she has ... not questionable ethics... NO ETHICS AT ALL.

Dr. White, Brett and Olivia inform Will and Ethan's parents of their diagnosis of... Estonia, and...  that's it.  They don't even tell the parents that one of them may be unwittingly suffering from this debilitating disease, or ask them if they have ever exhibited the symptoms? What??

Grace is by Sarah's bed when she wakes up.  Sarah is upset because she didn't want her dad's heart.  Grace says, too bad.

In Grace's childhood, her dad started drinking again when her mother came home.

In conclusion, if I ever go to Chicago, I am going to avoid the hospitals.

What did you guys think of "Legacy"? Was it worth waiting for?

Picture Credit: FOX

The Mob Doctor: Oh Baby

Before I get to the recap, I'm going to answer the question on everyone's mind.  The Mob Doctor is on hiatus until November 5 because of Major League Baseball, and not because it stinks.

I don't think it's a secret that I haven't been a fan of the flashbacks to Grace Devlin's childhood, and this week's was particularly weak.  So weak, in fact, that it isn't even worth mentioning.

Aside from that, the episode starts with Brett and Grace playing pool.  Some of Grace's high school friends come into the bar, and they seem like the type one Aviva Drescher might call "white trash," and by that I mean uneducated and a little drunk.  One of them stands on the bar and then falls off of it, cracking his head open.  Grace and Brett tell him he needs to go to a hospital to get stitches, but he decides to keep bar hopping instead.  Good idea.  Grace gets a text from Franco and ditches Brett.

Franco tells Grace that Constantine is putting feelers out to try to find out who blew up his car, and he advises Grace to take her family and get out of Chicago.  But first, Grace's new patient is a pregnant young woman named Tracy.  You may remember her as Denise from Full House, as I do.  Tracy is concerned because she hasn't felt her baby move in a couple of days, so Grace just rolls up the ultrasound machine and gives her an ultrasound.  I know what you're thinking.  How does she have an ultrasound machine?  That's just one of life's little mysteries.

Grace determines that the baby is breech, so she starts to turn him.  Tracy wants Grace to know that she's a good person.  Grace asks Constantine what's the deal with Tracy then?  Constantine says that Tracy is pregnant by some politician.  But who isn't these days, am I right?

Franco visits Moretti and tells him that he's tracked down where Serevino is, who is the informant that Grace was supposed to kill in the pilot episode.  The news reports that the trial against Moretti is going to move forward.  They describe him as a fugitive at large, and if he is convicted, he will likely end up on the Most Wanted list.

Constantine speaks with a politician who is against the gambling ordinance.  He shows him Tracy's ultrasound to see if it will change his vote.  The politician responds that he is happily married and he suggests Constantine doesn't call him again unless he plans on making a sizable campaign donation.

Grace's old friend comes into the hospital, saying he needs help because his head won't stop bleeding and he has to be at work in like an hour.  Leave it to a man to put off an errand until the last minute!  He complains over and over that he needs it done fast, so Grace just pops his head full of staples.  He is about to leave when Grace and Ro see a blood stain on his jacket that has, what they call a "halo sign" meaning there is spinal fluid leaking.  Grace tells him he is going to have to take a sick day.  Brett comes up and asks her why she isn't some special meeting for THORACIC surgeons, so she scurries off and slips into the meeting late.

The main gist of this meeting is that Grace and Olivia are competing for the assist on a great surgery.  Grace upstages Olivia by pointing out that the patient has a family history of an allergy to a certain anesthesia which wasn't in the patient history.  The surgeon is impressed by Grace, who probably just saved the patient's life.  But at the end of the day, she still chooses Olivia for the assist.  It's probably for the best since Grace comes and goes as she pleases.

Grace and Brett check in on her high school friend, who asks her if she ever talks to Franco and is yet another person saying he thought they would have been hitched.  He realizes that Brett doesn't know about Franco and he has put his foot in his mouth.  No time to dwell on that though, because they find out that her friend is not leaking spinal fluid, but he was horsing around with the other guys.  Grace runs to the waiting room and finds one of the other guys, Jimmy, is unconscious and he is absolutely LEAKING spinal fluid out his nose.  Hard to believe anyone missed that red flag.

Constantine calls Grace to say that Tracy's water broke.  Apparently, once this politician changes his vote, Constantine will have close to a majority in the city council.  I can't get enough of this video poker machine plot line.  Grace needs Ro to get her some stuff to deliver the baby, and then she drags Ro along for the ride.  The deliver Tracy's baby in seconds, but Tracy doesn't want to see the baby, she just wants Constantine to give her money.  Constantine tells Grace the baby is going to end up with a nice Canadian couple.  Before long, Tracy begins hemorrhaging.  Grace is about to call 911 but then Tracy loses consciousness so she performs an emergency hysterectomy.

Meanwhile, Franco is stalking a waitress named Peggy for Moretti.  He observes her and watches her video chat with Serevino.  He suspects that Peggy is Serevino's daughter.

Tracy regains consciousness and Grace breaks the bad news to her.  Now that Tracy realizes this baby is the only one she'll ever have she decides she wants to keep him.  Grace tries to convince Constantine to let her have him, but Constantine says that Tracy was a $2,000 a night call girl and she's going to get $100,000 out of the deal.

Olivia is assisting on the surgery Grace wanted to be on.  She makes a huge mistake and now the patient won't be able to talk.  The surgeon tells Grace she should have gotten the assist but the Chief of Staff has a soft spot for Olivia because she's a brown noser.

Grace's friend Jimmy's surgery went well, but they found something in the CT scan of his brain.  He has what's called an AVM which Grace says is a ticking time bomb.  There's a 10% chance of it rupturing and he would most likely die from it.  Grace says there's a surgical option and it should be done ASAP so she wants to get it on the schedule.  Jimmy's wife is like, chill out, we want to think about this.  And I'm wondering what the rush is, considering Grace JUST said he could have had it from birth.  Ultimately the wife decides they would rather live with the chance than risk blindness or stroke that could come from surgery.

Grace visits Tracy and gives her a plane ticket so she can run away with the baby. She says once she leaves, she can't come back.  As Tracy drives off in the cab, Franco catches Grace sending her off.  He gives her a lift back to the hospital and upsets her by asking how she feels about lying to her family all the time.  Bret walks in on them having a heated conversation but can't be bothered to intervene, or even ask if Grace is ok, although she's clearly sniffling?

Constantine visits the politician and gives him a lock of the baby's hair, threatening, if he doesn't change his vote, he will reveal the truth about the baby.
 
Moretti breaks into Peggy's apartment and tells her to call her father on video chat.  He tells Serevino he left him a gift in the desk.  It's a gun, and Moretti tells him if he doesn't shoot himself on video chat that he will hurt Peggy.  Serevino pulls the trigger.  Moretti tells Peggy that when the cops come to tell them that her father had been depressed.  With Serevino dead, the charges against Moretti will have to be dropped.

Grace is about to leave the hospital when Constantine pulls up. She says she knows he's angry but she actually did him a favor by saving him $100,000.  Constantine gives her cash to reimburse her for the plane ticket.

I suppose this episode wasn't quite as good as the last, but not as bad as the first few.  The plot lines are becoming more relevant, but I've just about given up any hope for ever caring about any of these characters.  A lot of people are predicting it will be the first new show canceled this season.   What do you guys think?

Picture Credit: FOX

The Mob Doctor: Protect and Serve

Yet again, we start the episode with a flashback to 1987, or thereabouts.  Grace is outside the house, watching her parents fight in the kitchen through the window in front of Nate.  This is the moment Grace learned that choices are hard, for some reason.  Six-year-old Grace decides to run away, but in hindsight, adult Grace says, where she comes from, even if you run away, you never truly leave.

A family of four is rolled into the ER one by one.  They were in a car and were hit by a red SUV, the father mentions to the doctors.  It should be noted that EVERY doctor we've met thus far is working on this family.  They are totally maxed out.  The kids and the father seem pretty chatty, despite the fact that the son has a crushed pelvis.  He doesn't cry or moan, all he says is "I guess I ruined my jersey, huh?"

Grace's patient is the young daughter in the family.  She says she's not hurt, but a second later she feels funny, and two seconds later, she's dead.  Grace tries to save her, but quickly stops because the girl is gone.  Her rival, Olivia wants to perform some procedure, but Grace says there's no use, the girl is dead.  Olivia says they should do it for maximum educational benefit.  Grace says, "I'm not going to rip open a little girl's chest for YOUR benefit."  I guess that's Grace's way of saying she has nothing left to learn.

Grace gets a page, and goes to Constantine.  He has another patient for her.  When she opens the patient's shirt, she sees a bruise shaped like a seat belt, and then notices glass in the cuts on his face.  She puts two and two together, and realizes he's the one who hit the family's car.  Grace goes to Constantine and tells him she will have to call the cops, but Constantine tells her that the guy is a cop.  He's Captain Shaw.

Grace sets out to do MacGuyver whatever medical instruments she can.  She asks for a hose from the vending machine.  She cuts a pretty large gash into his abdomen, and tells him she is going to fill his belly with liquid.  If it comes out clear, he doesn't have internal bleeding, but if it comes out red, they'll need to get him to a hospital.  Grace sets the hose in the sink, and there is blood.  Grace pretends he's fine and sends him on his way.

We can tell Constantine is a mobster with a heart of gold, because he grinds the broken glass into Captain Shaw's face for killing that girl.  If Constantine didn't need him for something, he would be dead.  Meanwhile Grace finds out that Nate is working for Constantine too.

At the hospital, Grace asks Brett how long it would take someone to go south from a slow abdominal bleed, and he estimates 24 hours.  So Captain Shaw should be dead by tomorrow.

At a meeting, Constantine says soon there will be poker machines everywhere.  I am so glad this plot point got it's own story arc, because I didn't really feel it got resolved in the last episode.

Grace and Brett look at the skyline while she tells him how upset she is about losing her patient this morning.  At the same time, Nate is working with Franco.  Franco asks Nate about Brett, and we get to find out about the backstory between Franco and Grace.  They dated while she was in undergrad, and she thought Franco was going to propose to her, but then he had to go to New York and got stuck there for a year.  Nate says Grace thought he left because of her.  Franco says Grace never said anything about it.  Nate says that's because she's a pain in the ass, but Franco says Nate should be more appreciative of what Grace has done for him.  They torch the red SUV Captain Shaw was driving during the accident.

Brett is with the boy, who says his leg doesn't hurt. He talks about playing soccer, so we know right now he's going to lose that leg.  He asks if he's going to have to sit out the rest of the season.  Poor, simple child, can't see the foreshadowing.

Grace's mom stops by the hospital to drop off pastries.  Her family really needs to stop bothering her at work, it is not normal.  Grace pulls her aside and tells her that Nate is working for Constantine, and she needs to tell Nate the truth about their father so Nate doesn't go down the same path.

Nate is hanging out in a car with Constantine.  Constantine reveals how he was arrested.  He was ratted out by a guy named Marcellas Coin who was so jelly of Constantine's power and money.  But Constantine assures Nate, he's going to get it all back.

Brett, Olivia and Dr. White talk about the boy's condition.  Brett says he wants to do whatever he can to try to save the leg, but Dr. White says the procedure Brett suggests is too risky.  The boy could end up dying if they try to save the leg, so Dr. White says they should get the father's permission to amputate.

Grace texts Franco to come over to the hospital.  She tells him she is not ok with covering up for Captain Shaw.  Franco tells her that Constantine and Shaw are planning a raid on a gang that sells drugs in the streets, The Disciples.  When they were kids, the streets were clean, but now things are a mess because Constantine wasn't around to keep everything in order.  But Franco said everything is going back on track since Grace fixed up Shaw.  Grace has a guilty look on her face and says she needs to see Shaw as soon as possible.  Franco says he may not always be around to cover for her.

She starts to roll Shaw into surgery.  Flanigan catches her and asks why he doesn't know about this surgery, seeing as how he is, ya know, the surgeon, and she's a resident.  She's kind of like, it's an emergency bro, and he lets her go to it.

Brett speaks with the father and tells him he has to ask for permission to amputate his son's leg, but P.S. he doesn't WANT permission because he thinks they should save the leg even though it might mean the kid dies.  When Dr. White asks where Brett is, Grace spills that he's in surgery to save the leg.  Dr. White confronts Brett, but Brett insists it was a quality of life issue.  Ok, but no one in America cares about soccer.

The surgery doesn't go exactly according to plan, and Dr. White has to clean up the mess.  Turns out Brett used the wrong stitch to sew up the graft.  That's probably because he isn't an experienced surgeon.

Grace is driving and hears about the raid going down on the radio.  She hears the report that Marcellas Coin was the leader of the disciples, and realizes that Constantine didn't organize the raid to clean up the streets, he did it for revenge on the guy who ratted him out.  She meets with Franco and tells him she's sending a report to the police saying that Captain Shaw's injuries were consistent with the car accident, and she tells him not to lie to her again.

Grace tells Constantine what she's done, and he says she did the right thing.  As they are walking to his car, it explodes.

And at the very end, Franco drives up in the woods to Moretti, who is still alive!!  Franco is working for Moretti and planted the bomb in Constantine's car.

I feel like this was the best episode to date.  Only one medical side plot, and it related to the main plot.  Everything that happened made sense and was kind of important.  I think there's promise for future episodes based on this ending.  What did you all think?

Picture Credit: FOX

The Mob Doctor: Family Secrets

This scene must have been very important since it's the only one I can find a picture of.

We begin this episode, yet again, when Grace is 6 years old.  Grace's mother told her that her father couldn't come to her birthday party because he was busy with work, but in actuality he was stumbling drunk.  That was the first time Grace's mother lied to her, she says.  I guess Grace's mother never told her about Santa Claus.

All this is to make the the heavy handed point that, sometimes, we can't trust the people closest to us, and, sometimes, the only way to  protect the people you love is with a lie.  I could really do without this Grey's Anatomy voiceover at the beginning and end of every episode.

Grace's mother has invited Brett to dinner with the family.  She's making duck, which is a meal she reserves for whenever Grace brings a doctor home.  Seeing as how Grace IS a doctor, I'm not sure why her mother is so impressed that she is dating one.

Grace's brother, Nate, asks her if she's heard from Moretti lately.  She says, for the tenth time, she hasn't and she tells him to enroll in community college.

Constantine visits Dante Amato, who is in hiding, because of something to do with shooting some Filippino people or something of that nature.  Dante's brother Titus is there as well, and informs Constantine that the video poker machines will be coming in next week.  I don't know about anyone else, but video poker machines remind me of my grandmother... that is to say, not very mob-like or ominous.  Anyhoo, Constantine says he can distribute and collect, and Titus offers him the same deal he offered Moretti, 10%.  Constantine wants 15%.  Is this what it's like to be in the mob, really?

Grace shows up to work, and an old man without family is admitted to the hospital.  And if that wasn't thrilling enough, a woman in a wedding dress appears, saying "Help, I need a doctor."  She is crying blood tears and her dress is soaked with blood.  Like a lot of blood.  So much blood that it couldn't possibly have come out of her eyes.

At this point I am certain that either Grace or I am dreaming.  Why do we have to do the House thing?  Is it not enough that she works for the mob on the side?  Must she also figure out mysterious cases?

Since there's no external trauma, Dr. White, the head honcho says it might have to do with the bride's heart, so Grace says she will stay close, lest we forget she's a THORACIC surgeon, because that's so important.  And then Grace immediately leaves.

Franco, Moretti's former henchman, now Constantine's, picks Grace up from the hospital and brings her to Dante.  She examines him but says she won't know anything until she can get him to a hospital, which is obviously out of the question since he is in hiding.  So she tries to make due by taking a urine sample.

Grace's brother goes to the post office.  Oh wait, no, he's actually registering for community college classes.  The guy behind the bulletproof glass window, for some reason, gives Nate the third degree.  He asks him questions like, do you have proof that you graduated high school?  And, what classes are you going to take?  Nate changes his mind about community college, it's dumb.

Grace asks her nurse friend Ro to find out about Dante's urine.  Ro says it shows a risk of renal failure.  Grace knows she can't help Dante without getting him to the hospital, so she tells Ro to keep her eye on the old guy from the beginning of the episode, and not let anyone call it when he dies.  Ro says, ok, seeing nothing wrong with this picture at all.

Meanwhile, Brett diagnoses the bride as having had a panic attack.  I don't think he even tried to explain why that made her bleed from the eyes.  Maybe Grace's mom should rethink that duck.

Nate storms into the hospital to yell at Grace and tell her how dumb city college is, because they wanted to know what classes he would take and stuff.  She basically tells him, don't bother me with this stuff at work.  This is the first thing Grace has done in two episodes that I have actually liked.  In the parking lot, Nate catches Grace bringing Dante into the hospital.

While Grace gives Dante tests, she finds out that he knew her father.  She asks if he knows who killed her father.  Dante says she'll have to ask Constantine.

Brett is running some more tests on the runaway bride, and finds a shadow on her kidney.  When he presses on it, she screams in pain and pushes him into a window.  She starts bleeding from the eyes and nose again.  Somehow now Grace is involved, and helps Brett inform the family that pressing on the growth released adrenaline that made her go nuts, and the first incident was caused by her corset.

Meanwhile, Flanigan is back from his, um, weekend off.  He has an axe to grind now, and he is suspicious as to why Grace is running to many tests on an octogenarian.  He's about to take over as the doctor for the patient when Franco runs up and says the patient is his grandfather and he insists that Grace stay on as his doctor.  The scare is too much for Dante, so he decides to go back into hiding.

During surgery, Dr. White talks about Grace and Brett's dinner plans, because apparently her mother had called him to tell him all about it.  How embarrassing must it be for your mother to call your boss to tell him she invited your boyfriend over for a duck dinner? 

Before dinner, Grace makes a quick pit stop to Constantine's to ask if he killed her father.  He swears he didn't.  Dante's breathing is very shallow so Grace calls the hospital for results.  She gets some... and based on that and the fact that his nailbeds are pink apparently means it could be cyanide.  I usually don't feel this out of the loop when I watch tv.  But apparently, Dante's wife was so sick of being in hiding, she was poisoning him with cyanide so he would die and she could leave.

Brett is the only one to show up on time for dinner, so Grace's mother gets to speak with him privately.  He helps her cook, and she tells him he has to keep stirring the potatoes or else they get lumpy.  UM... I don't think that's how it works.  That's like saying, if you don't shake the orange juice it will turn back into an orange.

Grace heads home and sees Nate on the side of the road.  He tells her she's in deeper than he knew. Then they go home and arrive just in time to miss the whole dinner.

Dante has survived, and to show Constantine his gratitude, he offers him... 10% on the machines.  Oh.  Well Constantine still wants 15%, so he leaves.  He and his men hijack the truck transporting the machines.  They douse them in gasoline and are going to burn them, but then Constantine realizes that each serial number matches two machines.

Apparently, I neither understand the medical part of this show, nor the mob part.

At this point I discover that Grace still lives at home AND she sleeps, which I was pretty convinced she didn't do.

Constantine visits Dante's brother Titus and tells him he knows about the twin machines, and how half the money can be collected tax free.  So wait... this money was going to be taxed?  What was illegal about these video poker machines then?  Constantine says now he's going to take 25% on all the machines.  Good for him, I guess.

A patient comes into the hospital and is pretty instantly pronounced dead.  Grace recognizes it is Dante's wife, and tells them to tell the coroner to check for cyanide.

Nate goes to Constantine and says he knows Grace is working for him, and now he wants a job.

I was hoping this episode would be less confusing than the last, but that wasn't the case.  For some reason this show wants to be EVERY medical drama that's ever existed AND MORE, but for me it is falling flat on all levels.  Why do we have to have to be subjected to Brett's ridiculous cases?  Why do we have to be subjected to Brett at all (no offense, but he doesn't serve much purpose)?  They could use that time to, oh, I don't know, tell us what debt Grace is even paying?  Maybe show her actually being an ethical doctor?

Is it just me?  What did you guys think of episode 2?

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Picture Credit: FOX

The Mob Doctor: Pilot

Look to the left.  That's how I felt watching this show.

Grace Devlin wasted no time in answering one of the burning questions I had after watching The Mob Doctor trailer.  The infamous dead body in the field was the neighborhood drunk.  Then she answers a question no one was asking.  She's touched 237 dead bodies to date.

Immediately after this, Grace is in a back room somewhere, with a man who has a screwdriver stuck in his temple.  We can tell the room isn't clean because there are dogs in cages there.  I gather the injury is from a hardware store robbery gone awry.  After making sure her patient has no brain damage, Grace gives him a chew toy, pulls the screwdriver out and essentially drives away, leaving any residual mess for someone else to clean up.

Grace has been paged back to the hospital and is late for surgery.  Another doctor has scrubbed in for her, but Grace tells her to take a hike, but she can still hand her scalpels if she wants.  Grace starts the procedure of removing a bullet from a young boy.  In the midst of doing that, her boss, Dr. Flanigan, pops his head into the OR to make a snide remark about her being late.  His timing is impeccable.  The patient begins to crash, which I'm sure was in no way related to anyone unnecessarily distracting the surgeon mid-surgery.

Everyone in the OR wants Grace to do one thing, but she decides to ignore everyone and starts to cut the pericardium.  "Not the pericardium!" you might be saying to yourself.  It just goes to show, Grace Devlin plays by her own rules.  It seems to do the trick.

Everyone spends some time speaking very quickly with a lot of medical terms.  I may not know what's going on, but one thing is for sure... these people are doctors.  Don't you forget it.

Grace finds out her mother is in the hospital.  She's brought in a girl Grace used to babysit, Susie, who fainted at their house.  Grace checks up on Susie, who is being attended to by Grace's boyfriend Brett (also a doctor).  Brett tells Grace that Susie's tests show she's pregnant, but that is impossible because he performed a pelvic exam which showed her hymen is in tact.  Something about this doesn't sit right with me!  If only House were still around to get to the bottom of this mystery.

Meanwhile, Grace has another patient, Serevino, who is in the witness protection program.  She has a wacky and unorthodox idea for treatment, which I think involves stopping his heart in segments.  She ponders her approach using a gigantic touch screen to manipulate the image of the heart, and now I'm not sure if I'm watching Iron Man or The Mob Doctor.  Then, Grace gets a note that says "Kill Him."

Grace goes to meet Paul Moretti, who is the mobster she works for on the side.  She tells him she never agreed to kill anyone, but he insists she agreed to do anything to make Moretti call his guys off of her brother's debt.  Serevino is an informant and Moretti isn't going to let him screw up his latest deal.

Back at the hospital, Grace checks on her gunshot patient, and is relieved to find that his hemoglobins are in range, as am I.  The doctor who she kicked out of the OR earlier is Dr. Olivia Watson, and though they appear to be equals, Grace treats her like she's an assistant, and tells Olivia to check the kid's platelets before giving him any treatment.  Olivia thinks this is classic countertransference, and I could not agree more.  CLASSIC.

Brett tells Susie she is pregnant, which I think may be inappropriate because she's only 14.  Susie thinks Brett is an idiot because she hasn't had sex.  Grace speaks to Susie privately, about this time in Star Wars when Luke makes a one in a million shot, something something... "It's called outercourse."  I totally saw where that was going.  Looks like poor Susie is going to lose her swimming scholarship to St. Catherine's next year.

Grace visits her mom at home, but not for the tacos.  She's a doctor who doesn't have time for tacos.  Her brother Nate tells her she should go easy on their mom, even though Grace wasn't really doing anything, but then Grace is all "she's been in remission for years," so consider that bomb dropped.  Nate tells Grace he didn't ask for her help, he had a foolproof system.  For the love of god, will anyone tell us how much this debt was???

Grace then makes a housecall to recently paroled former kingpin Constantine Alexander to give him an insulin shot.  He gives her like, $500 in exchange for one shot.  I think that would be a better way to pay off the debt, because diabetics need a lot of those, and she is making BANK.  And that's not illegal at all.

At the hospital, Brett tells Grace that Susie's pregnancy isn't viable.  It's a ruptured ectopic, so he's going to get her father's consent to do the surgery I guess.... I get confused at this point because Grace gets all up in arms, and blabbers about losing the swimming scholarship, which I don't understand why Susie will lose the scholarship if she has the surgery... and what is the alternative?

Then, Grace's gunshot patient dies, and right away she's all "Olivia, you didn't check the platelets!!"  Olivia tells her that Dr. Flanigan, aka the guy who likes to interrupt surgeries overruled her and said, don't even think about checking those platelets.  Grace decides one good turn deserves another, and pages Dr. Flanigan to Operating Room 2 so she can tattle on him to Dr. White, while Dr. White is about to perform surgery.  What is wrong with these people?  She tells Dr. White that if he doesn't open an investigation on Dr. Flanigan, she's off the Serevino case.  Somehow he cares, so he tells Dr. Flanigan to take the weekend off.  Really, the whole weekend???  Gee whiz.  "This isn't over," Dr. Flanigan says to Grace ominously.  Clearly, she has made an enemy, in addition to the two or three other enemies she made this episode.

Against Brett's wishes, and the wishes of the law, Grace lies to Susie's dad and tells him she has an ovarian cyst.  Brett is pissed off because that's illegal, but what does Grace care?  It's the least she's broken the law so far today.

Moretti sets up the Serevino surgery so Grace can kill him using the marked syringe.  She's distraught about it.  One of his goons waits outside the operating room to make sure she goes through with it.  Grace accidentally-on-purpose drops the syringe and it shatters.  "Uh oh, spill on aisle 5," someone says, as though no one has ever dropped anything before.  At the end of the day, the operation was textbook.  Serevino lives.

Olivia is pissed at Grace because she told her not to report Flanigan, and now Flanigan blames Olivia for being reported.  Olivia says no one wants to work with a rat like Grace.  Brett is pissed at her as well.

Grace gets a call from her mother, but when she answers the phone, it's Moretti on the other end.  Grace rushes home and sees Moretti has her mother, and is armed.  Thinking quickly, she jumps in her car and begins wildly backing into his car.  We know it's his car because of the vanity plates.

The best idea, I think, if you're in the mob, is to own a flashy car with your last name as the vanity plates.  "Mor3tti."

Anyhoo, Grace drives straight to Constantine Alexander's house with Moretti hot on her tail.  Alexander tells him to back off, and just as Moretti is saying that no one is scared of Alexander anymore, Alexander shoots him in the heart.  Alexander tells Grace she didn't see nothin.  Problem solved, I guess.

As it turns out, Alexander has really been after Moretti's job this whole time, and Grace brought everything to a head much quicker than it was supposed to.  Alexander tells her she knows too much and she needs to get out of Chicago.  She says she can't leave because of her family.  Alexander tells her to remember that he gave her the choice.  But now he'll be collecting the debt she owed Moretti.

Grace sees a white car on the lawn, and now we're back to her childhood.  Grace reveals the dead drunk at the beginning was actually her father.  A young Grace sees the same white car that we just saw on Alexander's lawn, suggesting that he's the one who killed Grace's father, and that he kept the same car for nearly 30 years.

And that was the pilot!  Anything I missed?  I thought it was too much plot and too much characters too soon, hard to keep up.  I wish they could have found another way to introduce Brett without that ridiculous Susie plotline.  What did you all think?

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Picture Credit: Fox