"Only Connect"



Cast: Noah Wyle, Laura Innes, Alex Kingston, Goran Visnjic, Maura Tierney, Sherry Stringfield, Ming-Na , Mekhi Phifer, Linda Cardellini, Shane West.
Producer(s): John Wells, Michael Crichton, Neal Baer, Jack Orman.

Original Airdate: January 20, 2005.

That's weird. Isn't this also the ep title of Joan of Arcadia's first ep this season?

not a bad episode.

Not at all - for some reason it took me a while to realize that Abby did tell the rest of the staff about her traumatic experience. Was it me or did it seem vague for awhile?

I really like what they have been doing w/ Kovac lately.

Glad Madchen Amick is still around. Good to see Eion Bailey back, too.

I'm so sick of NBC hyping every episode as the "most wild" or "most emotional" ER yet. While it was a solid episode, there was nothing particularly "wild" about it.

well, next week is an episode that "ALL OF AMERICA" will be talking about...

I'll be happy w/ it as long as it doesn't involve that fucking helicopter.

So the soft skills are still in the shitter for the residents as they struggle to connect with their patients. Susan appears to be overwhelmed by this problem, though Luka does his best to provide some training to the residents to help with their bedside manner. It doesn't prevent the ER from confusing 2 John Doe's and telling the wrong families about the demise and the recovery of the John Doe's, so the happy-sad situation arose from the mistake and lack of communication. Susan also has to deal with a lawyer trying to drum up malpractice business while waiting as a patient in the ER.

Pratt is horrible at teaching the interns how to perform the various procedures on ER patients, and does this in front of Susan. The interns aren't Pratt's biggest fan because he makes them feel inadequate and useless. Pratt gets his bedside manner called on by Luka, and when Pratt blows it on one of the John Doe's, Luka still uses the situation to teach Pratt about taking time to make a connection with the patients and getting the full story.

Neelah struggles with a foster home situation, and making promises that couldn't be kept after more evidence of injuries come forth, but Luka went around Neela so as to not undermine her confidence, but Neela finds out, and starts grilling Luka, and he explains the situation. Neela admits to Abby that she's crushing on Luka (which is ironic, considering Abby's former relationship with Luka).

Abby does struggle after her night of terror from the last episode. Abby's crabby and practically tells Neela that she needs to move out (Abby needed her space). Abby comes back to work, and she finds that she is struggling with her duties, and decides to take some more time off. Debanko (no idea how to spell the new chief of surgery dude's name) gave her a huge binder full of info on traumatic stress studies, but it only took a short conversation with Eion Bailey's character about the smallness of humans, the shortness of human lifespan to put things back into perspective for Abby, and then she received a cell phone call from the ER as Abby contemplates getting on the subway to go home, and Abby goes back to work, and appears to be in better spirits.

Neela finds that affordable housing isn't something easily found, but Ray offers to sublet his place, and Neela finally agrees to move in since their shifts rarely intersect during their downtime.

Sam and Luka had problems communicating, Sam's always pissed about something Luka gave her son, like buying him a $50 concert ticket. He's always trying to get her to admit that she's really upset about something else. He tries to ease her burden at work, but she's still miffed at him, but they patch things up while waiting for their train.

Madchen Amick looked very good in the all black outfit.
Hated the Dr Green era lawyer. If they wanted
to revist that era they should have kept Alex Kingston.

So when is Sara Gilbert's final ep.........
All of America wants to know.

I haven't watched in a few weeks so I was all like, "Oh so THAT'S what Darlene ended up doing with her life... good on her!"

Thanks for the recap, I was dinking around here and had it on in the same room, but didn't pay well enough attention and could NOT figure out who Neela had a crush on, or whether Abby knew the guy on the subway or was just meeting him, and then later he was at the hospital and I couldn't figure out what his role is... who is he?

::.... and a little

Wow, the taglines for ER episodes are just unbelievable...

It was great to see Herb Spivak back again. For all us old timers, he was from Season 4 when Mark got sued and Herb promised to defend him in return for performing a few procedures. Like he said in this episode, he was a high priced respectable lawyer back then.

Wasn't he Carla's dad on Cheers? He looks the same from 20 years ago.

Except, he's got more hair (or toup) going on.

He was Carla's ex-husband Nick Tortelli on Cheers and the short-lived The Tortelli's.

Oh that's right, her ex-husband

When he was getting looked at after his accident, the close up of his face made me immediately say he's had some work. His chin and face looked like plastic.

Every time I see Dan Hedaya (aka Herb Spivak) in something, I think "I know that guy from other movies," but for some reason, I can never place him. But he's been in so many things, you'd think I would know him by now.

He's great in Blood Simple as well as hilarious in Dick. Those are my two favorite performances by him. He's also a cop in the Unusual Suspects, the dad in Clueless, and was also in Alien 4 and tons of other films.

Too bad her character is such a damn bore.

What is up with her and Carter? Very strange.

Good episode.

Seems like they're already starting to phase Noah Wylie out. Carter hasn't had much of a story since Kim and the baby last season.

The Neela story was predictable, should be intersting with her and Ray as rommates.