Recap: Scrubs: My Jerks

Dr. John Dorian and company are back for another year of shenanigans at America’s favorite hospital. No, not Seattle Grace, I’m talking about Sacred Heart. The episode begins with a shot of JD walking down the hallway, you will notice that he has grown a little beard, not a Grizzly Adam’s kind of beard, but a “I accidentally super glued some pubic hair to my face” kind of beard. In the immortal words of JD, his foray into facial hair makes him look like a young Kenny Loggins.

Welcome to the Danger Zone!

It’s a new season at Sacred heart and you know what that means, new secondary characters! This season we have Katie, the self indulgent kind of bitch. Think of her as a mini Elliot. You know that girl in high school that would remind the teacher to collect the homework, the homework that you didn’t do, a minute before class was dismissed? That is Katie in a nutshell. Then there is Denise, the cold hearted kind of bitch, JD calls her Joe because she reminds him of that streetwise mannish girl on The Facts of Life. We also have Ed, the poor man’s Kal Pen. Ed has an infinity for having cyber-sex with middle aged men in Lost themed chat rooms. And Jimmy, the orderly that likes to touch people inappropriately. He doesn’t last long.

Oh Jimmy, we hardly knew ye

The most prominent of the new characters introduced in the episode was the new chief of medicine, Dr. Taylor Maddox. Ably played by Courtney Cox, in what some critics are saying was her best performance since the last time she had sex with David Arquette. She got a very sexy introduction, similar to the introduction that Heather Locklear got when she guest starred on the show. A slow motion entrance, with a wind machine on at full blast, all set to the sound of some 1980s heavy metal band. While the Heather Locklear scene gave me a boner, the Courtney Cox one made me question her gender. Monica Geller just isn’t that sexy. In an interesting choice of character traits, Dr. Maddox has an unusually high sexual affinity for killing spiders. So what if spider smashing seems to be her fetish, who am I to judge?

The Anti-Boner

The primary focal point of the episode is the interaction between Dr. Maddox and the other characters. JD succeeds at giving what in my estimation is literally the worst first impression ever. He starts off fine, talking to Dr. Maddox about his son Sam, but in an awkward turn of events he brings up the topic of vaginal tearing. If their was a book out there titled, “Things you shouldn’t mention when you first meet someone,” vaginal tearing would be in that book. If I recall correctly I think that in some cities within the United States, talking about vaginal tearing in public is considered a form of sexual harassment. JD’s second encounter with Dr. Maddox, doesn’t go over much better, considering the fact that he refers to her as erotic architecture.

Right from the get go Dr. Cox thinks that Dr. Maddox is a jerk, simply because every chief of medicine that he has ever encountered has turned out to be a jerk. Well in the case of Dr. Maddox, Dr. Cox turns out to be right, because by the end of the episode it is revealed that the only abnormal growth that Dr. Maddox cares about is the one in the patient’s wallet. Now I ain’t saying she a gold digger, but you get the idea. After watching the janitor pull one of his pranks on JD, in this case tripping him with a mop, Dr. Maddox, proving once and for all that she doesn’t have a soul, fires the janitor. She hasn’t even been on the show for more than 15 minutes and she gets rid of one of the shows most beloved characters! However I do reckon this isn’t the last we’ll see of the janitor. At the end of the episode a new janitor gets introduced, an older gentleman that looks a lot like Dick Van Dyke. Not all of the Dr. Maddox encounters ended negatively. Her and Elliot seem to have gotten off to a good start. I am making this assertion based on the fact that Dr. Maddox refers to Elliot as her favorite. They even engage in a pseudo-lesbian embrace.

The New Janitor

There is a lot of tension in this episode between Carla and Elliot. It begins with Dr. Cox telling Elliot that she is very self absorbed. Carla, in an attempt to keep her shit real, (something she has been known to do) tells Elliot that she agrees with Dr. Cox. Oh no she didn’t! Oh yes she did! The reason Carla goes there is because Elliot is so self involved that she can’t even see that Keith is still hurt over the fact that Elliot called off their wedding. This leads to a scene in which Elliot finally apologizes to Keith for doing what she did. So just like that the loose end that was Elliot and Kieth’s wedding finally gets tied off. Another source of conflict is found between JD and his new interns. JD gets tired of his interns sucking at life and being jerks, (the jerks referred to in the title are JD’s new interns) so he passes them off to the squeaky voiced doctor. This leads to a heart to heart between JD and Cox that doesn’t end in a Cox-ian tongue lashing. For the first time in 8 years JD and Cox are presented as equals.

I only had one issue with the season opener, where’s the Turk? Turk was barely in the episode, Ted had more on screen time that him, and there is something inherently wrong with that. I hope that this was just a one time thing and we get to see more of Turk as the season progresses. Aside from that, I feel that as far as season premiers go, this one was pretty good. Not much happened, but that is expected considering the amount of exposition that needed to be covered. It will be very interesting to see were the series goes. Will JD and Elliot get back together? Will we ever see the janitor again? Will someone hump Dr. Maddox? Stay Tuned.