The Pitt Season 2, Episode 14 Live Blog: Al-Hashimi’s Big Secret, An Intervention Attempt, And Langdon Vs. Robby Part 2
Only one episode is left after this week!
What To Expect From Episode 14
8 p.m. has come around for the doctors and nurses of PTMC's ED, and the night shift doctors are going to be a lot fresher than the exhausted day shifters. And not just because Dr. Shen has about a gallon of iced coffee in hand! Take a look at what's coming:
Another confrontation between Langdon and Robby has seemed inevitable ever since Robby dropped the bombshell on his resident that he doesn't want him in the ED... and then followed it up with some serious unprofessionalism.
The promo also indicates that Dr. Al-Hashimi is finally going to open up about the secret she's been dropping clues about all season, and it looks like we're in for a doozy of a performance from Sepideh Moafi as part of it. And hey, even if Dana's intervention on Robby didn't work, maybe Abbot's will?
Find out at 9 p.m. ET on April 9 with the second-to-last episode!
I'll Finally Say It: What Is Up With Dr. McKay...
...and wearing a sweatshirt all day on the 4th of July?! I've been to Pittsburgh in the summer and I own that brand of sweatshirt, and I'll tell you – she would be way overheated by this point. I don't care how cold it is in the hospital! (Apparently, this is the one thing I can't suspend my disbelief for this season.)
Dr. Ellis Is Dropping Truth Bombs On Langdon
Dr. Ellis coming on board as a series regular next season is really the only factor that soothes the sing of Supriya Ganesh's exit as Mohan, and The Pitt wasted no time in delivering an excellent scene between her and Langdon.
According to Ellis, Robby isn't really mad at Langdon, but mad at himself for not seeing what was happening and failing his former favorite. Personally, I think Robby is perfectly capable of being mad at more than one person at a time, but I'm curious to see what Langdon does with this info.
They Had Cell Phones On ER!
I try to avoid making too many comparisons to ER when writing about The Pitt (other than wanting The Pitt to handle Langdon like John Carter), but there's no avoiding it after Robby's exchange with Javadi about not filming her TikToks. After he mentioned medical school, she started listing all the things he didn't have back then: cell phones, TikTok, internet, or ICE agents.
It was a good point, but it felt like a loving callback to ER when Robby responded with "We did have cell phones. Maybe not in the beginning." Given that ER started in 1994, Noah Wyle definitely wasn't walking around with a smart phone as Carter back in his earliest days in a fictional emergency room.
What's Better: A Flag Stabbing Or Robby's Bike Getting Smashed?
If human-to-human interventions aren't working, maybe Robby really needed a divine intervention for an ambulance to smash his bike and stop him from going on his vision question. That was great.
But definitely not as funny as a guy coming into the ED on the 4th of July with a mini American flag sticking out of his chest. I'll take any reason to laugh on The Pitt when I can get it.
I Can't Trust Jeff Kober's Character
Jeff Kober was all over the small screen well before coming on board The Pitt as Robby's friend Duke, but his most memorable role for me was as Joe in The Walking Dead. And Joe was... a really, really bad guy, with threats to beat a main character to death and assault two others, including a child. Duke may be Robby's new BFF, but looking like Joe isn't doing him any favors in my book.
Misplaced Leads Were Bad For A Patient, But I Feel Validated
I watch a lot of network TV medical dramas, and I've always wondered if the reason why men rather than women tend to come in with heart attacks and chest traumas is that NBC, ABC, CBS, and Fox can't show a woman from the front without a shirt on.
That doesn't apply on HBO Max with The Pitt, and the show used the freedom for nudity (and F-bombs) to make the point that EMTs can make mistakes with women compared to men. We can add this to the list of storylines that couldn't happen on Chicago Med or Grey's Anatomy, and I appreciate when The Pitt makes the most of having fewer limits than network TV.
Dr. Frank Langdon, Not St. Langdon
As much as I usually avoid using Langdon's ill-fitting first name at all cost, I'll use it in this context to say how much I love when he gets cranky in Season 2. He's spent so much time making amends and being as helpful as possible that we don't really get to see him being snarky with his coworkers anymore. Seeing him clean and functional has been great; clean, functional, and snarky instead of pushing everything down is even better.
Let him have a personality beyond making amends, even if that just means getting sarcastic about Gilligan's Island and getting irritated at Whitaker for side-eyeing him while taking Advil. Langdon wouldn't be as entertaining of a character if he's just... nice, and he doesn't have to be a saint after rehab.
Mel's A Nerd Too!
I got two weeks of enjoying Langdon revealing his inner nerdy side, first with the Fort Pitt reenactors and then hearing Mel quote Kelly Clarkson and assuming she got it from Friedrich Nietzsche. Even in this episode, he recognized Ellis quoting Rumble Fish and a patient talking about Styx, which are arguably kind of obscure for a doctor of his age.
Now, Mel is apparently also a history nerd as well, with an interest in historical reenactors beyond just the ren faire! Embrace your very specific interests, Mel. Go on a field trip with Langdon to Fort Pitt. Let's have them being nerds together in Season 3, whether it's set in the winter or not. My season-long mission for Mel to make a friend is looking good.
Can We Keep Dr. Crus?
I hate to get greedy since I'm already hyped about getting more of Dr. Ellis next season, but I'm also ready for more of Luke Tennie as Dr. Crus. He's a great addition so far.
Langdon Vs. Robby, Round 2...
...Was NOT a disaster! Robby yelling at Langdon to "doctor the fuck up" in the promo didn't seem to bode well for their next interaction, especially since Langdon seemed to be doctoring just fine this season before Robby started poking holes in his confidence.
But instead of that confrontation leading to disaster, the procedure usually done by neurosurgery was pulled off blind by Langdon, and Robby almost smiled for the first time in quite a while in Langdon's presence. Could Robby coming to terms with Langdon's return stop him from going on his possibly suicidal sabbatical?
Also, VERY cool procedure from Dr. Langdon. Sign me up for never having that happen to me, though!
Is Robby Getting The Intervention He Needs?
An intervention from Dana didn't work to get him to truly open up. He hasn't gotten what he needed from Abbot to come clean yet. Duke's comments didn't exactly get Robby to commit to taking care of himself, but Robby admitting that he's not sure he wants to be alive anymore is a big step. Maybe now that he has acknowledged the problem to somebody, he can make strides toward healing?
Or maybe not, since there's only one hour left this season, but it made for a good scene. Maybe I should stop flashing back to Jeff Kober as The Walking Dead's evil Joe whenever Duke shows up.
Dr. Al-Hashimi's Secret
Dr. Al-Hashimi has been trying to keep a secret all season, with Robby noticing her seemingly zoning out a couple of times while working on patients. Still, he didn't see it coming when she asked him for his opinion on a patient's chart, only to learn that it was hers. This is what he learned:
Patient is a 40-year-old female with a history of seizure disorder for the past 35 years. She had no perinatal complications and was in excellent health until age five, when she had the onset seizure activity following prolonged illness with viral meningitis. Her altered mental status from the infection...
That's as far as Robby got before realizing that he was looking at Dr. Al-Hashimi's chart, not the chart of a random patient. While we'll apparently have to wait until the Season 2 finale next week for the full context, it appears that the fans who have been predicting that she's suffering from absence seizures at work but mostly hiding them are likely right.
It just remains to be seen what Robby will do with the information, since she clearly intended to speak with him in confidence but her seizures – if that's what they are – have also affected her on the job. Of course, it's possible that this is an example of a Pitt ending that seems like a big cliffhanger, only to not amount to a whole lot in the next episode, but that's not my guess based on the preview for next week.
What's Happening In The Season 2 Finale?
Well, I may not have gotten as much of an Abbot intervention on Robby as I expected in Episode 14, but the preview for the Season 2 finale suggests that I just need to wait a week for it. But could the intervention he really needs come from... Langdon, of all people?
Take a look:
I'm not sure if it's because we've been watching Robby's spiral for 14 episodes now or just because the Dr. Al-Hashimi cliffhanger was so juicy, but the tease of her trying to convince Robby that she's "fully capable" has me closer to the edge of my seat than anything else.
Plus, after Sepideh Moafi impressed me with her understated performance at the end of Episode 14 with Al-Hashimi looking exhausted and scared of sharing her chart, I'm psyched for what she does in what appears to be a second confrontation with Robby opposite Noah Wyle.
And now, the countdown starts! The Season 2 finale of The Pitt will begin streaming on HBO Max on Thursday, April 16 at 9 p.m. ET, and then the wait will begin for Season 3 in 2027.
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