Spoilers are ahead for the Season 8 premiere of Chicago Med, called “How Do You Begin to Count the Losses.”
Chicago Med returned with an action-packed premiere that paid off on the deadly Season 7 finale, and all of the major characters survived the fire. (Jo wasn’t so lucky.) That said, the medical drama still said goodbye to two characters before the end of the hour: Dr. Dylan Scott decided that he needed to leave Chicago after Jo’s death, and Dr. Pamela Blake transferred to a different hospital for rehab after Crockett’s decision jeopardized her medical career. Med co-showrunner Andrew Schneider opened up about how he’ll have to move on from Pamela leaving.
When showrunners Andrew Schneider and Diane Frolov spoke with CinemaBlend about Season 8, I noted that Crockett had a personal and professional bond with Pamela. After Frolov confirmed that Pamela does indeed blame him for the outcome of the surgery, Schneider previewed what’s next for Crockett:
He has to reconcile the decision he made, but he will move on. He will move forward and move on. We actually have a big storyline for him where he rescues a guy who is a very wealthy Chicago entrepreneur. He achieves a kind of celebrity status, which he never sought. It was kind of thrust upon him.
Pamela’s decision to leave goes back to her giving Crockett power of attorney before going under the knife for her surgery. When complications arose, he chose the route most likely to save her life but result in loss of mobility, which her daughter and Dr. Abrams insisted was not what she would want. Now, she’s off to a neuro rehab center in Boston.
Abrams noted the “irony” of Crockett’s decision taking out the chief of transplant surgery and bumping himself up the ladder in that department (which was obviously not Crockett's goal). After Goodwin shot down his attempt to leave transplant, he pulled off a pretty miraculous save in a liver procedure. While Blake fully intends to return (and not work with him), for now his future in transplant surgery is apparently bright.
Andrew Schneider’s details about a “wealthy Chicago entrepreneur” point toward the character whose casting was announced back in August, with Sasha Roiz of 9-1-1 and Grimm fame coming to the show. It sounds like he’ll be part of an important storyline for Crockett, whose future otherwise is kind of a blank slate after the events of the premiere. (Stars Nick Gehlfuss and Jessy Schram couldn’t 100% say the same for Will and Hannah.)
Joining transplant and working with Pamela (and the sticky relationship with her daughter) was his biggest story by the end of Season 7 (which you can revisit streaming with a Peacock subscription), and it sounds like he’ll make more of a name for himself as opposed to working at Pamela’s right hand as the eighth season gets into gear.
Combined with everything else that happened in the premiere – including Dylan’s departure, April’s return (following the end of Yaya DaCosta’s Our Kind of People), and Chicago P.D.’s Burgess crossing over to reveal that Jessa torched Will’s building – ”How Do You Begin to Count the Losses” set the stage for what should be an exciting new season.
Tune in to NBC on Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET to catch new episodes of Chicago Med. The medical drama opens a full night of One Chicago action, and the other two shows got off to intriguing starts as well. Chicago Fire is set to continue Severide’s dangerous storyline after the bad Brettsey news in Season 11, while Chicago P.D. has a brand new theme for what showrunner Gwen Sigan dubs the “messy” dynamics of Season 10.
