Welcome Back Scrubs

I don’t think it’s a big secret that I’ve been a tad depressed lately. My brother leaves for war. I lose my job. The usual holiday decompression. Not to mention the fact that the sun has been absentee for damn near a month here.

But this week marked a turning point, if only a temporary one. After taking a break for the holidays, the bulk of my favorite television shows return this week with new episodes. Now it’s probably unhealthy to find solace in TV, but it’s amazing how your life drags when you’re used to two hours of entertainment every night. It'll be nice to have those two hours back, and if I can get over my melancholy, it’ll give me something to write about nearly every day. Right now, it’s all about killing time, and the networks are going to give me a lot to do once things get moving.

The first show back I needed more than any of them because it reminds me how hard I can laugh: Scrubs, which is now airing two episodes a week on Tuesday nights. Though I haven’t watched Scrubs passionately since it’s second season (are you kidding? Tara Reid was on this show?), I’ve fallen back in love with the program with season 1 & 2 debuting on DVD. Though the characters feel a little different after missing two years, the show maintains its unique charm. Much like another dearly departed comedy favorite, Arrested Development, this show is slightly manic with its daydream cut-aways and bedside lunacy. Yet as a writer, there are moments of this show that can bring me to tears, both from laughing and from heartache.

Arrested Development, on what is likely its last episode, poked fun at some of the explanations for its anemic ratings. First and foremost, the family wasn’t likable or sympathetic. This is maybe half-true (but the show was still hilarious). Scrubs does not have this problem. The characters are all sympathetic. And that is the thing I truly admire about Scrubs -- hence the tears. It finds a way to be both extremely funny and extremely poignant. As madcap as the show can get, a hospital is a place where life and death come in equal doses, and the writers do not shy away from that fact.

Tonight’s second episode saw the furiously unsympathetic Dr. Kelso replacing a poorer man’s spot in a potentially life-saving drug trial with a wealthier one. Always the cartoonish villain Kelso has earned a reputation for whistling on the way to his car every evening, even after the ugliest of days. So when the show rolls to a close and Dr. Kelso walks to his car without the whistle, it breaks your heart. Scrubs pulls off these kind of moments without being cloying or saccharin, and these heartfelt moments make it that much better than its contemporaries. Life doesn't fit into Award show categories, Comedy or Drama. Thankfully, neither does Scrubs (which is probably why it never wins anything).