The last time we saw the Marco Polo of the brain, she was shroomin' and chillin' with the Virgin Mary. Can we keep cranking up the stupid from there? You know we can. Let's rock.
We find out right away where Catherine gets her love of jazz: her father was "the great jazz pianist Hunter Black". So there's our daddy issues. Her patient this week is an Afghanistan vet who's missing the lower half of his left arm, and has phantom pains. Leo's been staying with his parents, who hate him unless he's using his awesome brain powers for awesome, while he recovers from brain surgery. And Will is meeting with a guy who I guess is the restaurant owner? Shrug. Anyway, the restaurant is not profitable. Don't worry, this doesn't go anywhere except the land of "Not how people really talk and act but some cokehead thought it looked good on the page":
Will: "I'm thinking of scaring up some more coin by opening up a Sunday brunch."
Owner: "Mimosas? Ka-Ching! I love it!" *fist bump*
Scaring. Up. Some more. Coin. Then the owner talks about how hot Delilah is, and Will says he wants to fire her. The owner says now that Will's slept with her, that can't happen. Why does the owner look and act like the Mayhem Like Me guy, yet isn't entertaining? Simply amazing.
Dr. Black's other patient, Beatrice, is going blind but has vivid hallucinations. Bickman stops the elevator when Catherine's in there with him, because even the emotionally distant supersurgeon just can't resist the sultry wiles of Dr. Catherine Black. She melts even the coldest hearts! Ugh. He gets all "No means yes" again, but Catherine rejects him. Next, Will and Catherine are at Josh's. Will's not just a chef, but also a master sommelier.
Esme: "Well, for the record, my glass of 2014 sparkling cider is epic."
Quite possibly my least favorite word in the English language, said by one of only a few Black Box characters I don't want to see get all the kinds of cancer. And one of those few already died of all kinds of cancer! Also, Esme does not pass for 15. Like, at all. If she did I would feel a lot dirtier than I do. Josh and Esme invite Will and Catherine to go see Hunter in concert, and once again we have the "bipolar as an excuse to be unnecessarily bitchy without really being manic or depressed" trope made famous by Jennifer Lawrence in "Silver Linings Playbook".
Catherine: "He left us the day of Mom's funeral. Have you got amnesia?" *storms off *
I don't think I can explain why, but this whole scene makes me laugh hard. It's the way she says "am-nee-zee-uh?", and pretty much overenunciates her entire side of the argument. It's the dialogue that kind of reminds me of Engrish with less insight. It's the way bipolar affects TV characters differently than it affects the rest of us. See, we'll have mood swings, and sometimes we'll act destructively or irrationally, but we do it in the context of an emotionally altered state. We don't just get bored and decide to be assholes, which to this point, defines Catherine as a character. Something I try to get across to everyone I discuss mental health issues with is that being mentally ill doesn't decrease your personal responsibility when it comes to being a good person. It increases it, because people are going to expect you to fail at it. In short, "don't be an asshole" is a good and ACHIEVABLE goal for the healthy and sick alike. Dr. Black has managed an awe-inspiring career and a long-term relationship with someone I think is supposed to be a catch, all without learning not to treat others like crap. It makes less than no sense. Anyway, Josh stalks down Catherine to apologize- you know, because asking someone if they'd like to go somewhere is just super offensive and a totally understandable reason to get pissed off. Catherine's ensuing screed on abandonment and not wanting to expose Esme to it is- all together now- BORDERLINE PERSONALITY DISORDER, not bipolar. Idealization and demonization. Intense, PTSD-esque reactions to any unexpected thing. This scene would even ring true for me, as a Borderline sufferer, if that was what the character was supposed to be . But she's not Borderline. She's just a bad person. Josh has to apologize to her for not holding a grudge, and for wanting to know his own father. Yeah. Catherine isn't just a self absorbed idiot, as the first few episodes led me to believe. She's a bona fide monster. Also, huge boyfriend points to Will as they deal with the fallout from this. You knew her well enough to propose, but you knew nothing about her ridiculously traumatic childhood OR her mental illness? Frankly, I'd expect better from a master sommelier who is also a head chef.
Bickman and Dr. Mahmoud sit in on a House-ish diagnosis session on the one-armed soldier. The psychiatrist pitches psychosomatic due to repressed memory of the incident and survivor's guilt- and Catherine snaps "That's absurd." Weird. Pretty much everything you've done so far, medical or otherwise, could be described with those same two words. But it's someone else's idea, and the show isn't called Mahmoud Box, so... Yeah. Allie goes to Catherine for reassurance that Leo's post-surgery memory deficits will get better, and she's super noncommittal. Bickman gives Leo a pop quiz during his checkup, and he fails. Leo storms out, distraught, and Catherine goes snarly den-mother all up in Bickman's business.
Catherine: "Emotions matter. And so does kindness, and decency, and compassion."
Great statement of truth. As with all of Catherine's wisdom, it comes out when it's at its most completely hypocritical.
Catherine: "If you fix his head and you break his heart, then you're a lousy man and you're a lousy doctor."
Actually, letting someone practice medicine when they're mentally disabled would make him a worse doctor. But whatever. Surgeons aren't the ones who are supposed to have bedside manner anyway. Beatrice hallucinates a dog in a suit and calls him dashing. Pretty sure that's the new highlight of the series. Usually I'm not cool with dogs in clothes, but you know what, that was one classy hallucinated puppy. I'll allow it. Hunter comes to The Cube and Catherine refuses to see him. She goes to tell Josh she's not still mad at him- again, he did nothing wrong and indeed he, Esme, and Hostage Redgrave remain the show's only decent human beings. As long as Esme doesn't say 'epic' again, that is.
Josh: "I should never have given Esme the idea that you'd go see Dad. That was wrong of me."
Um, yeah, except adults set their own boundaries and it's ok for them to say no- to polite requests, to friendly invitations, even to demands. As if anyone would ever DREAM of demanding something from the Marco Polo of the brain! I mean, I guess it's possible that whoever makes this show is truly, deeply misogynistic and believes that if a man asks a woman if she wants to do something she always has to do it. And if Catherine is both a Mary Sue of infinite strength and wisdom but at the same time not possessed of her own free will, that would go a long way toward explaining these bullshit storylines. Yes, I know I'm way overthinking this, but I have to find some way to make this fun! Catherine has Josh make something to help the soldier's therapy and they talk some more about Hunter. According to Josh, Hunter wanted to take the kids with him on the road, and Josh and Catherine's aunt put her foot down and told him to leave. Catherine says Josh's memory isn't objective, when of course hers is. Later, she's having drinks with Will and still talking about daddy issues. You know, not everything needs validation from every possible source. Turns out Will's father, despite being an abusive drunk, always left a Thanksgiving turkey for his favorite bartender. I love how every single character complexity is described as occurring off-camera. This show's really found a market inefficiency and a new alternative to hiring real actors. Speaking of real actors, we see Hostage Redgrave again.
Redgrave: "Life life FORWARD."
Catherine: "What if my memories are false?"
*headdesk x1,000,000*
Catherine's mirror-box to trick the soldier's brain into thinking he has two hands works perfectly. Beatrice's brain misses having clear vision so it gives her hallucinations as "a gift". Bickman comes up with a virtual reality program that does the same thing as the mirror-box. Bickman gives Leo a chance to work on his memory, and he shows some improvement.
Catherine: "I'm proud of myself."
Bickman: "Really? And why's that?" (In a cringe-inducing, patronizing tone that sounds like he should really end the question by calling her sweet-cheeks or something like that)
Catherine: "Because I shamed you into [giving Leo a chance]."
Sexual tension achievement unlocked. If you're keeping score, that's a bet, a raise, and a call in the poker game of undeserved self-congratulation. How Bickman ended up being the most likable person in that exchange, I'll never know. Esme texts Catherine, and she winds up showing up at the concert just long enough to make eye contact with Hunter, then leaves.
I have to say I didn't notice this the first time through the show, but the second time around it's striking me as anti-feminist at best, and traditionally misogynistic at worst. There are shows I could not or cannot watch because they're so bleakly misanthropic- How I Met Your Mother, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, The Office, and Seinfeld, just off the top of my head- and Black Box is gradually putting itself on that list. A few of the ancillary character are basically not flawed at all- Well, Esme smokes pot and Hostage Redgrave is a really bad therapist, but Josh is perfect- and all the people the plot centers around are personal and moral cesspools. This one wasn't fun or funny to rewatch. It was just saddening that someone thought this show would be entertaining to people, and for some people, it was.
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