Scrubs-A Superbly Written Show

kellylife · July 19, 2010

Although the past fewseasons Scrubs had descended slightly from the levels ithad achieved in its first few brilliant seasons, its final season managed to recover afair amount of itsprevious charm. Buoyed by several new interns there was some fresh blood in thecast and there were a lot of nice storylines to keep the interest up. There wasan expected resolution of JD and Elliott's story. And we even sorta, kindalearned (maybe) the Janitor's name (Tony).

There is some talk that there might be either a SeasonNine of Scrubs, with significant cast changes. But I hopethat doesn't take place. Better to have a show go away with some gas in thetank than have it continue on fumes.

Scrubs8 saw a lot of major changes. With Bob Kelsogone and no longer head of surgery, Perry Cox becomes the new head of SacredHeart. Ted actually finds a girlfriend (a ukulele abusing one to boot). Turkbecomes chief of surgery while he and Carla expect their second child. AndJanitor finds a woman of his own (known as "Lady") and gets married.But the biggest changes involve JD and Elliott. They get back together andunlike in the past, JD doesn't panic at all, but instead delights in being withher, even embracing all her eccentricities. And the final big change involvesJD leaving Sacred Heart so that he can live closer to his son (with Elliottsneakily moving in with him by slowly sneaking her stuff into his place). The series began with JD preparing for his first dayat Sacred Heart and the series ends with him leaving. And in a cameo that putsone in mind of J. Michael Straczynski's showing up at the end of BABYLON 5 andRon Moore popping up at the very end of BATTLESTAR GALACTICA, Scrubs’ creator Bill Lawrence shows up in thefinal scene.

I'm going to miss this show. At its best it was one of the mostrefreshing, inventive comedies on TV. Even at its worst it was at leastenjoyable. I'll miss all the characters and I'll even miss Sacred Heart itself.They actually bought a closing hospital in which to film the show and house theproduction company offices. The result was a feeling of concreteness andreality that none of the dramatic hospital series on TV could fully match, wedded as theywere to sets rather than locations. The Sacred Heart grounds were somethingthat they had complete access to, rather than something that they just visited.The cars on the lot were probably those of the actors and production crew. Thewhole show just seemed at home.

The good news is that we got eight whole seasons. This translates in to lots of DVDs thatwe can watch and rewatch. The show has ended but it won't really be goingaway.

Well, looks like Scrubs is going to be back in Season Nine. ZachBraff and Sarah Chalke will be back for six episodes to provide a transition tonew doctors (the interns of Season Eight?) to take center stage on the show. Donald Faison (Turk--though, do we reallywant Turk without JD?--having Turk go on without JD would seem to belie the joined-at-the-hipmythology of the past 8 years), John C. McGinley (Cox), and Neil Flynn(Janitor) will be back if their new pilots aren't picked up, and I assume therest of the cast will be back. But I'm not terribly excited at this point aboutScrubs without JD, Elliott, andTurk-on-his-own-without-JD. But I'll give it a try. Also, it undercuts what wasa near perfect finale episode.

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