[This story contains spoilers for “My Celebration,” the season finale of Scrubs.]
The revival of Scrubs was never intended to be a one-and-done series. Evidence of that is all over the season finale.
Wednesday’s episode, “My Celebration,” introduces or furthers a host of open-ended storylines, including a new love interest for Zach Braff‘s J.D. in the form of Rachel Bilson; Dr. Perry Cox (John C. McGinley) trying to hide negative news about his condition from Jordan (a returning Christa Miller); and a potential love polygon among the new group of interns. It’s a finale that is very much setting up future seasons. (ABC hasn’t made a decision on the show’s future yet, but ratings have been solid — the season premiere grew to more than 10 million cross-platform viewers over four weeks.)
“There’s a lot we want to do,” showrunner Aseem Batra told The Hollywood Reporter about a possible second season. Batra and McGinley spoke with THR about the finale and the various open threads it leaves.
J.D.’s (Potential) New Romance
Bilson’s Charlie doesn’t spend a lot of time actually interacting with J.D in the episode. He botches a possible meet-cute in the hospital gift shop, so Turk (Donald Faison) and Carla (Judy Reyes) try to be his wingpeople — only to make it seem like they’re trying to pick Charlie up themselves. They finally have a chance to connect as J.D. flees the returning Janitor (more on that a couple sections down) and stumbles into the room where Charlie’s grandmother is a patient.
“We told her, ‘We’re sorry,’” Batra said of Bilson. “All she got to do, really, is walk past scenes and have J.D. see her, but not make contact. We promise we’ll have something more fun than that [next season]. But she was a sport and knew that it was setting up something to come. So we’re excited to flesh that out.”
J.D. and Charlie do have some time to connect at the wedding reception for a patient’s daughter — made possible after Elliot (Sarah Chalke), Turk and the interns get a win by both catching a heart problem in the bride’s dad and holding the ceremony at Sacred Heart before the father goes into surgery. Batra said that in a second season, she and the writers want to delve into J.D. taking a shot at dating at this point in his life.
“She and Zach have worked together [in the 2006 movie The Last Kiss] and know each other, so there’s a lovely built-in chemistry,” Batra said. “I think what will be interesting for her character coming up is J.D. is in a whole second chapter of his romantic life, and he’s bringing baggage into it. He’s got a kid, and it’s exploring what dating is for him now that he’s this age, how he’s changed and what he’s learned, and what it will kick up for him and Elliot.”
J.D. and Charlie do share a kiss, but he gets a text from Dr. Cox and has to leave. But there’s a definite “more to come” vibe around the budding relationship.
John C. McGinley and Chirsta Miller in ‘Scrubs’
Darko Sikman/Disney
Dr. Cox Gets Bad News
That text from Perry turns out to have been meant for someone else, but before that, Braff and McKinley continue the strong work they did in the previous episode, where Perry learns he has an autoimmune condition that will require long-term treatment.
Adding to the mix in the finale is Jordan, who is just as acerbic as she’s ever been and demands that J.D. offer top-of-the-line care to his mentor. On that issue, they’re on the same page, even as Perry resists having further tests for fear of hearing unencouraging results.
The results are, in fact, not great — but Perry still asks J.D. to put off telling Jordan (even though she shows up at J.D.’s house to demand answers) until he pulls himself together. Perry needs the time, he says, for the same reason that he “watched the Michael Jordan documentary eight minutes at a time in the bathroom” — so Jordan won’t see him tearing up.
J.D. and Perry work out a whole scene, which of course Jordan sees through immediately. “I love how you see me, and I didn’t want to lose that,” Perry tells her. Her reply: “If it helps, I’ve always seen you as a whiny baby-man. Let me be the strong one for once.”
McGinley said he loved getting another chance to work with Miller, whom he calls “the Rosalind Russell of her generation” for her ability to do rapid-fire comedy. “We were doing those short volleys at the net, and the scenes are an exercise in style. I don’t want her to know I’m going through these challenges. But [Jordan] is way too bright, intellectually and spiritually — you can’t pull the wool over her eyes. … So the conflict is explosive, and she handles it like a matador with a cape. She’s a Hall of Famer.”
McGinley and Miller are both regulars on other series — HBO’s Rooster and Apple TV’s Shrinking, respectively. McGinley told THR he hopes to return to Scrubs in a second season, and Batra said Miller wants to as well. (It probably doesn’t hurt that Rooster and Shrinking are both executive produced by Scrubs creator and EP Bill Lawrence, who’s also Miller’s husband.)
“I talked to [Miller] as she came in for an ADR session, and she said, and I’m gonna hold her to it, that she’d like to do more,” said Batra. “I think if we can get her up there for more and she wants to do more, we would love that, because she has been a fan favorite and has such fun energy. It’s fun watching her just fall back into Jordan. We’re really hoping for more Christa as well.”
Jacob Dudman and Ava Bunn in ‘Scrubs’
Darko Sikman/Disney
Interns in Love(?)
The wedding reception at the bar also upends several dynamics among the group of interns, whose characters have just begun to hit a stride after the first several episodes of the season focused mostly on the returning stars.
As a group, they’re all feeling burned out, to the point that Dr. Park (Joel Kim Booster) proposes a wager on which one will be the first to leave the hospital. Asher (Jacob Dudman) is feeling especially down due to the cooling of his relation/situationship with Amara (Layla Mohammadi). Elliot, remembering her own burnout from that stage of her career, rallies them to help save the father of the bride, and they all seem palpably relieved to cut loose at the bar.
So much so, in fact, that Tosh (Ava Bunn) kisses Asher and confesses that she’s liked him since day one. Asher returns the kiss and they spend some time in the bar’s photo booth. Amara doesn’t seem too upset, as she’s dancing with Blake (David Gridley), while Dashana (Amanda Morrow) sets her sights on a bridesmaid.
“They were slower to get to anything romantic, but that’s what we hear about their generation anyway,” Batra said of the interns. “They have a messier way of doing it. … I think we took our time getting them to a place where they should have their own version of a messy — it’s more than a triangle for them. It’s really kind of exploring why this happened, and what does it mean? Does Asher still have feelings for Amara, or is he really moving on with Tosh? I think it will be fun to get more into their romantic lives. But we have also heard from interns and residents about how busy and crazy their lives are and how hard it is to have any kind of romance. So it will be fun to see things fall apart too.”
Callbacks, Odds and Ends
• The Janitor’s (Neil Flynn) return was always part of the plan for this season, Batra said, and for most of the episode it seems like J.D. is doing a better job than he used to of avoiding the Janitor’s torment. Until, that is, he learns that Maintenance Guy (Darcy Michael) — with whom he’s had a lovely working relationship to that point — is the Janitor’s son and says it’s nice that his dad was able to get him a job at Sacred Heart. Wrong move: Maintenance Guy and the Janitor both take offense at the idea that there was nepotism involved, and J.D. has a new work nemesis.
• Elliot and the team initially diagnose the father of the bride with a bowel obstruction, leading her to reference a line from the original Scrubs‘ musical episode: “Everything comes down to poo … and toots.”
• Scrubs has a tradition of name-checking members of its crew and producing team in the show. In the finale, the intern who looks forward to rectal exams is named Winston, after episode director and long-time Scrubs EP Randall Keenan Winston.
