Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
Hot on the heels of Atypical comes another show with an autistic main character. This time around, it’s ABC’s The Good Doctor, starring Freddie Highmore as a young surgical resident who has autism and Savant syndrome. He has an auspicious first day on the job, just the kind you see in a TV pilot.
A Guide to Our Rating System
Opening Shot: The opening of a pilot can set a mood for the entire show (think Six Feet Under); thus, we examine the first shot of each pilot.
The Gist: The “who, what, where, when, why?” of the pilot.
Our Take: What did we think? Are we desperate for more or desperate to get that hour back?
Sex and Skin: That’s all you care about anyway, right? We let you know how quickly the show gets down and dirty.
Parting Shot: Where does the pilot leave us? Hanging off a cliff, or running for the hills?
Sleeper Star: Basically, someone in the The Good Doctor cast who is not the top-billed star who shows great promise.
Most Pilot-y Line: Pilots have a lot of work to do: world building, character establishing, and stakes raising. Sometimes that results in some pretty clunky dialogue.
Our Call: We’ll let you know if you should, ahem, Stream It or Skip It.
THE GOOD DOCTOR
Opening Shot: Dr. Shaun Murphy (Highmore) gets ready to leave his home in Wyoming and start his new life as a surgical resident in San Jose. We see him fastidiously buttoning his shirt, combing his hair, packing his bag, and washing his hands. We’re not sure how much that establishes beyond the fact that it’s a person going somewhere, but that’s what we start with.
The Gist: We learn a lot about Murphy’s childhood during the pilot; the fact that his father was abusive, his mother was helpless, and his brother always tried to protect him. We also learned that when he was 14 he befriended a small-town doctor, Aaron Glassman (Richard Schiff), who somehow managed to become the president of a large hospital in San Jose. He brings Murphy in as a resident, despite the strenuous objections of surgical chief Dr. Horace Andrews (Hill Harper), who thinks Dr. Murphy’s autism and lack of empathy will eventually kill someone.
In the meantime, Murphy doesn’t get much past the arrival gate at the airport when he leaps into action to save a boy who got impaled by glass after a sign fell from the ceiling. He takes his photographic knowledge of human anatomy to determine things like how to build a one-way valve to help him breathe and to know that the other doctor helping the boy is crushing the boy’s trachea.
Meanwhile, the hosptal board continues to argue with Dr. Glassman about Dr. Murphy’s credentials, and hotshot attending surgeon Dr. Neil Melendez (Nicholas Gonzalez) is arrogantly saving lives and berating residents Claire Brown (Antonia Thomas) and Jared Kalu (Chuku Modu) — who happen to be sleeping together.
Our Take: If it sounds like we’re being sarcastic while describing this show, well, it deserves it. It feels like Highmore, who we last saw play the near emotionless murder Norman Bates in Bates Motel, has been lifted from what could have been a fantastic drama depicting the life of a high-functioning autistic adult with Savant syndrome and plopped him in a generic ABC medical drama not written by Shonda Rhimes.
Episode 1 of The Good Doctor has got all the requisite pieces of that generic medical drama: good looking, horny residents, earnest administrators, asshole attending surgeons, and people who don’t believe the main character can do his job. Not sure why creator David Shore (House) thought that he needed to build such a huge ensemble around Highmore, whose character could be fascinating if they go beyond his tics and monotone voice. But he didn’t choose to go that way.
Shore’s presence, however, explains why some of the scenes where Murphy searches through his memory banks to look for the medical information he needs feels very House-like. Actually, it’s kind of House-meets-Sherlock, and it’s distracting. It feels like both Highmore and Schiff have been set adrift in a drama that’s below their abilities.
Sex and Skin: We see Drs. Brown and Kalu sharing a residents’ crash room bunk at about the eight minute mark. It also turns out that arrogant Dr. Melendez is dating Jessica Preston (Beau Garrett), granddaughter of the hospital’s founder and Dr. Glassman’s biggest ally on the hospital’s board of directors. We’re sure there are more love affairs within the walls of this hospital, but two is enough for one pilot, right?
Parting Shot: After Dr. Murphy is tentatively welcomed to the staff, Dr. Melendez tells him during surgery that as far as he’s concerned, Murphy will only do suction in his OR, to which Murphy replies, “You’re very arrogant. Do you think that helps you be a good surgeon? Does it hurt you as a person? Is it worth it?” Oof. Let the softening of Dr. Melendez begin!
Sleeper Star: Thomas has the potential to do some good work as the empathetic Dr. Brown.
Most Pilot-y Line: There’s so many cringeworthy lines in this pilot. The one that stands out to me is Dr. Andrews telling Dr. Glassman that “Less than excellent means that someone else dies.”
Our Call: SKIP IT. This could have been a good show; Highmore does a good job portraying a particlular kind of autism. And it looks like Shore and company did their research. But the drama around Highmore is terrible, and undermines what could have been a high-quality network drama.
(Click to see all of Decider’s complete Stream It or Skip It reviews)
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, VanityFair.com, Playboy.com, Fast Company’s Co.Create and elsewhere.
