Scrubs: The cast’s chemistry is still so scintillating that it carries this spirited comeback | television

IIt is possible to believe contradictory things. For example, I think television’s reliance on reviving old shows is a risk-averse creative retreat. On the other hand, I like it. I especially love it when fictional characters age visibly. There’s a broken humanity that you can’t have with flawless, collagen-rich skin. You feel that you can talk to them about your sciatica and they will understand.

I had that feeling with the new series of Scrubs (Disney+, starting Thursday, February 26), a show I previously presented on E4. The scrubs were as comforting as the tea and toast. Surprisingly, it’s also flexible. At its core, this film was a workplace bromance between junior doctors J.D. and Turk, played by newcomers Zach Braff and Donald Faison. Their chemistry served as the show’s anchor, balancing irreverent racial harmony with irreverence and heart, as they bore witness to the universal human drama. But is he healthy enough to survive resuscitation, more than 15 years after the last episode aired?

Reasonably, the book has shaken things up. J.D. grew into a complacent early middle age, working as a private physician for the wealthy and elderly. “You write scripts in the suburbs” is a withering Turkish assessment. (For a dramatic moment, I thought it was going against Braff’s independent filmmaking.) Braff directs the first episode, in which a problem with one of J.D.’s pampered patients brings him back to Sacred Heart, the training hospital where he got his wheels.

The move brings him face to face with his old comrades, including Elliot, the cheerful chauvinist, and the emotional, jaded Turk. “I hope this man dies all at once, instead of in tiny little pieces,” the baby-faced chief surgeon shockingly shouted in the operating room. In fairness, he’s a father of four now. It’s amazing that he stands up.

At least JD’s irascible teacher can no longer call him a “rookie” like he used to, right? “What can I do for you there, my boy?” asks Dr. Cox. John C. McGinley remains a thriller, and his character, Martin Sheen, is a meth-obsessed man with wit and eloquence, delivered in sentences longer than those used by a 19th-century novelist.

But Cox has a problem. Tough love is out, political correctness is in, as watched by Sippy, the health/human resources character, who appears like a genie at any emotional outburst, with instructions to “take it down a few degrees” or attend cultural sensitivity workshops.

I was appalled when it showed up, and by the frequent jokes about the “emotion police.” Scrubs isn’t the only comedy to address a climate of vigilance about banter and power dynamics. It’s a particular problem for returning series that made their name in the good old days. I sympathize with that – the Puritans haven’t had that much cultural power since they closed the theaters. But it’s a defensive stance that TV shows have to take. Anxiety about gagging leads to an obsessive preoccupation with it, so you no longer talk about anything else. It’s half the way the culture war perpetuates itself, and it’s boring.

Fortunately, after two episodes, the show decided it could only be itself. “Why do you have a menopausal lesbian physique?” A sassy younger character asks the older JD, who has not yet been so generous. It’s funnier for him, and it’s clear that the show has affection for gays, among other minorities. He begins to address worthwhile topics: the inhumane American health care system; Doctors must meet patient quotas to maximize hospital profits; Tik Tok diets threaten health; Orthotics at the gym bros. It is more important to speak with conviction and with an open heart than to speak correctly. This is also something I believe in.

Will Scrubs Redux evolve in the style of Grey’s Anatomy, with generations of younger characters taking up the torch? The scenes with the new starters feel a little flat, but if Dr. Cox taught me anything, it’s that you have to give people time. The chemistry between the veteran leads sparks enough to keep things going for the time being. Turk will be walking on the moon again soon, as the book delivers a zinger that you might want to keep in your back pocket. I liked this much more than I expected. We all need a little TLC, more than ever, and it turns out I actually want a scrub. He gets some love from me.