Following the nurses’ strike and the negative publicity that Gaffney Chicago Medical Center received when the #MeToo news about Dr. Hayes (Brendan Hines) was leaked, going into the Chicago Med finale, Sharon Goodwin (S. Epatha Merkerson) is once again tasked with making cuts to hospital personnel. And again, like it did with Maggie (Marlyne Barrett) and the negotiations with the nurses, it puts her in a difficult personal position.
Sharon already has issues in her personal life. She thought she had once again found love with Dr. Dennis Washington (John Earl Jelks). But then she found out he was keeping their relationship a secret from his daughter, even though he and Sharon had been together for a year.
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“I think that up until this point, Sharon has been somewhat denying the trauma that she went through earlier in the season [when she was stabbed], and I think that because of that her tendency was to just tell herself that everything is going to be normal,” Chicago Med showrunner Allen MacDonald tells Parade. “The moment where she’s actually confronted with the daughter and she realizes his daughter has no idea who she is, that infuriated her and that was an existential threat for the relationship. Sharon decided to accept his apology and move forward. But going into this episode, I would say that there’s still some residual resentment there.”
Speaking of resentment, now that Hannah Asher (Jessy Schram) has discovered she’s pregnant – an unplanned pregnancy, obviously, because she had planned to be her sister Lizzy’s (Erin Anderson) surrogate – she puts off telling Lizzy because she doesn’t want to experience her sister’s heartbreak at once again not being able to have a baby, but also the wrath that will come along with telling her the news. Why should Hannah, who was a drug addict, be able to conceive so easily when Lizzy is infertile, especially since the loss of her uterus?
“It was very important to Hannah to reconnect with her sister,” MacDonald explains. “I think that in the beginning, it was very black and white, the situation between them. Hannah had been a drug addict, Hannah had done terrible things. And the sister had tried to help her and just finally ran out of steam. So, from the beginning, the sisters accepted the premise that Hannah was the bad sister trying to rectify the sins of the past. And I think what we’re finding out as the season goes along is that Lizzie (Erin Anderson) has her prejudices and she also doesn’t want to let things go. So, when it’s convenient for Lizzie, she invokes the past.”
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The other question that will arise, even if it doesn’t yet in the finale, is who’s the baby’s daddy? Is it definitely Mitch Ripley’s (Luke Mitchell) or could it be someone else’s, like Dean Archer (Steven Weber)? MacDonald isn’t spilling any tea on that one, just saying we’ll have to watch and see.
Also having a personal crisis is Dr. Daniel Charles (Oliver Platt), whose mother died unexpectedly while visiting the hospital, and after they had had an antagonistic conversation, which left him with regrets. But her funeral did see the return of Dr. Charles’ two daughters, Anna (Hannah Riley) and Robin (Mekia Cox). Cox, of course, is a series regular on The Rookie, so it was nice for her to be able to guest star. But Anna is having some major issues, which we will learn about in the finale, so she may stick around for a while.
And then there’s Dr. Caitlin Lenox (Sarah Ramos), who has grown on us since she first joined the staff in the ED and was very abrasive. She betrayed Dr. Naomi Howard (Ashlei Sharpe Chestnut) by going behind her back to report Dr. Hayes’s actions to Sharon Goodwin, and now Lenox is realizing that her judgment isn’t infallible.
“The focus of the story for us, the writers, has always been the strengthening of the relationship between Naomi and Lenox and Lenox having to deal with the fact that despite her efforts through her whole life to be cautious, especially in matters of the heart which she usually doesn’t even engage in, she took a risk, engaged in it and chose the totally wrong guy,” MacDonald says.
“Moving forward, that’s going to make her question her instincts. I think that the relationship between Naomi and Lenox will only be strengthened by this because Naomi kind of schooled Lenox and said, ‘You should have pulled me in on this and had discussions with me before just going to Goodwin about this. I told you this in confidence.’ I think that is a lesson for Lenox because she’s convinced, she’s usually right about everything, and how she handles things, and I think that’s in question.”
Tune in for the Season 10 finale of Chicago Med tonight at 8 p.m. ET/PT on NBC. Streams next day on Peacock.
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