Warning! Spoilers Ahead for the fall finale of Chicago Med. Be sure to come back once you've caught up!
Well, folks. Chicago Med is done for a few weeks, as its fall finale just aired, and, as expected, the drama brought...you know, the drama and left many of our favorite medical staff with some emotional cliffhangers for us all to stew over during hiatus. Strap yourselves in and monitor those heart rates, because it's about to get very serious up in here!
Let's start with everyone's favorite on again / off again couple Will and Natalie. Will (and others at Med, for that matter) have been very worried about Natalie and some of the decisions she's been making due to the TBI she suffered from that shocking car crash at the end of last season. While Natalie has been back to work for quite a while, she hasn't been able to remember what happened the night of the accident. We'd be promised that she'd have some "specific triggers" in the finale that would help her remember, and that's exactly what we got.
Early in the episode, Natalie find out that Phillip's daughter Sophie had been admitted with her heart condition again. When she gets to her room, though, Phillip is no where to be found, and Sophie's aunt and uncle are there with her instead. Natalie is shocked, mostly because Phillip had told her he had no family in town, to which his brother-in-law replied that he would say anything because "he's a pathological liar." And, it gets worse.
Phillip's sister says that she hasn't been able to contact him for days and he's abandoned Sophie and her aunt and uncle are planning to try to adopt her. We soon find out that she needs another heart procedure, but when the specialist gets there and looks over Sophie's chart, she tells everyone that Phillip signed a Do Not Resuscitate order on her. The surgeon is uncomfortable operating on a child with a DNR, and when they tell her Phillip can't be found, she declines to do the surgery.
Natalie tells everyone that this makes no sense because he was so attentive to Sophie, but his sister and brother-in-law have a theory. They believe that because Natalie broke up with him, he no longer had a reason to deal with Sophie's complications, so he was assuming she would get sick again and then he could be done with his daughter. So, they think the only reason he was so caring with Sophie is that it got him into Natalie's good graces. Man, if it hasn't been said before, I'm going to spell it out now: PHILLIP IS A DICK.
Luckily, When Dr. Latham finds out he agrees to do the surgery, believing that Connor would have done it, and it goes well. Now, during some of this Natalie has been getting flashes of what happened the night of the accident. When she's going to see Sophie after her surgery, all the pieces fall into place and she realizes that she was going to tell Will that she loved him and wanted to be with him, after apologizing for how she'd been treating him. Woohooo!
This is perfect, right? Now that Natalie has had her epiphany and Sophie is on the mend, she finds Will on the roof celebrating his own successful case and does exactly what she was going to do before the accident. But, you know, this is Chicago Med. So, if you thought this now means that everything is rainbows, fluffy kittens and happy endings in Manstead land, you are dead wrong. Here's part of what he said to Natalie as tears streamed down her face:
It doesn’t matter; you don’t need to do this...Natalie, stop. You told me to get out of your life. We aren’t good for one another, all we do is hurt each other. There was a time I couldn’t imagine a future without you, but I can now. I feel free. I’m sorry.
Oh, alright Will. You feel free, do you?! Dammit! He's not wrong, and yet...will these two ever get it right? Will left Natalie crying on the roof, and Manstead fans everywhere were left shaken to their cores, friends. On to, well, another not so good relationship stunner.
April and Ethan...my, oh my. When we first see April, she's gotten her results back from the doctor. While some news is good, some of it is very bad. The results basically show that April is likely in early menopause and has a "low ovarian reserve." This means that she will probably not get pregnant the old fashioned way, but the doc tells her the situation isn't completely hopeless yet, as she can start IVF treatments, but she needs to talk to Ethan and begin right away, because even that might not work.
When she gets home, Ethan is packing because his reserve unit has been called to an aircraft carrier and he's leaving for six weeks. She sees him with a book on being a dad and gets even moodier than she already was, he asks what's wrong but she just leaves for work instead of telling him what happened. This is going to go well. You can sense it, right?
At the hospital, Ethan tries to talk to April about her seeing the book and tells her that he's planning to get a checkup to make sure there aren't any baby-making problems on his end but she bites his head off, saying that there aren't any problems. She yells that she's sick of all the pressure to have a baby and says maybe she doesn't want one at all anymore. She storms off and leaves Ethan wondering what's going on even more.
Ethan and April's patients end up at cross purposes, and they argue several times, with Ethan knowing that something more is going on with April that she won't reveal to him. Eventually, he finds her in the locker room and tells April that he won't be home because he's going to spend time with his patient, who will be extra devastated after he finds out the full story about the days' events with his family. Ethan is planning to leave for his deployment right from the hospital.
When everything is wrapped up with April's case, who she just happens to be working on with Dr. Marcel, she's alone in a perfectly abandoned hallway thinking when Marcel comes up to share his relief that their patient is going to be alright after a rough day. And then...they hug. And hug. And hug; waaaaay too long and with entirely too much pleasure at holding one another.
When they finally pull away, though, April goes and does it. Y'all? April kissed Dr. Marcel!! When they stop they touch foreheads like they've been wanting to do that forever and he asks, "Are you sure you want to do this?" That was where we left them, so, again, DAMMIT!!! What is with this show and the stupid love triangles?!?!
OK, really prepare yourselves for this one, because it's bad, you guys. When we meet up with Dr. Charles in the episode, he's watching over Caroline at home, and she's clearly not doing well. He tells her he's going to take the day off work to stay with her and tells her not to fight him on, and she smiles weakly and says she won't. Then she tells him she wants him to get remarried, but he asks, "How can I do that when I'm happily married to you?"
Caroline tries to press the issue, but he ignores her and heads into the kitchen to make pancakes. When Charles gets there, he quickly breaks down and cries, doubling over as he covers his mouth so that she won't be able to hear him sobbing. Oh, boy...
Later, Charles shows up at Med to tell Sharon that he's going to take a few more days off to take Caroline to Mackinac Island, a favorite place of theirs. But, when he tells Sharon that they're also having a party that night for close friends and family, it's clear that Caroline probably won't make it back from their trip alive, and Sharon tears up.
At the party, Caroline has managed to get dolled up (likely one last time) so she can have some fun with her friends and family. When their daughter Robin shows up, she greets her mom and pulls her dad aside to beg him to let her go with them on their trip. Dr. Charles tells her that her mom wants it to be just the two of them and that Caroline wants Robin "to remember her the way she is tonight; happy, beautiful and surrounded by friends and family." Of course, Robin starts to cry fiercely, but Charles tells her that he's trying to let Caroline call all the shots.
Phew. So, Caroline will probably be dead before long, Will seems to be over Natalie even though she's remembered that she still loves him, and Ethan is leaving April to (possibly) take solace in the arms of Dr. Marcel. What can I say? It's gonna be a long wait through hiatus.
Chicago Med will return to NBC on Wednesday, January 8 at 8 p.m. EST, so be sure to stay tuned to CinemaBlend for updates!
