ER: Season 2 (Full Season)
March 12, 2018 11:15 AM - Season 2 (Full Season) - Subscribe

Major changes are in store for Dr. Green's personal life as he gets into the swing of his attending position, Carter's confidence is shaken as he begins his surgical internship with Benton, and Dr. Kerry Weaver joins the ER staff as an unpopular replacement for Chief Resident. Meanwhile, Dr. Ross' reckless disregard for hospital policy and himself puts his fellowship and his life in danger, and he struggles to confront his complicated relationship with his absent father. Dr. Lewis is stretched thin trying to balance the demands of her residency (and Dr. Weaver) and an ever-mounting responsibility for her sister and newborn niece. Dr. Benton struggles with the prospect of having to report one of his superiors for discrepancies in a major study in the face of pressure not to. Jeanie begins working in the ER as a physician's assistant and later receives unexpected news. Carol's personal touch with patients gets her into trouble and she begins a relationship with a paramedic.

- Carol and Susan continue to be just the best

- Episode 7 (Hell and High Water) was the most watched episode of the entire series (42 million viewers), and the highest rated episode of the season. It is considered among the best episodes of the show

- Really did not like how long Carol's boyfriend was a thing. Especially uncomfortable when he got all racist.
posted by Krazor (5 comments total)
 
What is interesting to me is to realize, that despite being a devoted viewer of ER for its first several seasons, I have never seen the "Hell and High Water" episode.
posted by nubs at 3:05 PM on March 12, 2018 [1 favorite]


Go and watch it when you can! It's a tight episode, but I think what gives it so much impact is that it starts in the ER as usual, follows Ross outside, and then it just sticks with him the whole time. We see characters go home or go out after a shift, but always to cut back to the hospital. It just feels so out of left field as a narrative.

On a personal note: I watched it with my parents when it first came on TV. I was probably about five. Watching the episode now, I'm on the edge of my seat. My wife and I, who normally talk and riff on even our favorite shows, are dead silent and locked into the show. And when it gets to that scene, I still remember Ross in the pipe with the water rushing in from the first time around.
posted by Krazor at 6:16 AM on March 13, 2018


Is Hell and High water the episode where we learn how to give a tracheotomy with a Bic pen? Because I'm betting that's the reason it's been watched so much. Research.
posted by tofu_crouton at 8:47 AM on March 13, 2018


I think what gives it so much impact is that it starts in the ER as usual, follows Ross outside, and then it just sticks with him the whole time

As I recall, ER was Clooney's big breakout as a star, and there was fear/rumours that he would leave the show. So to hear that's how they designed the episode makes sense - they wanted to follow the big star around and get him away from the ER and play with that tension, likely. Plus it gave them a chance to test the idea of doing episode that weren't primarily set in the hospital - later seasons would have the characters on ride alongs with paramedics or responding to huge accidents offsite; that way they didn't have to have a fixed setting that might get stale.
posted by nubs at 9:36 AM on March 13, 2018


Is Hell and High water the episode where we learn how to give a tracheotomy with a Bic pen? Because I'm betting that's the reason it's been watched so much. Research.

I, for one, learned it many years before on an episode of M*A*S*H*, and remember thinking to myself when watching that episode of "ER" that they cribbed it from there.
posted by briank at 12:01 PM on March 14, 2018


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