Things get going in fine bitchy fashion this week as Sean and Julia engage in the blame game in reference to their son before being interrupted by Christian who, helpfully, suggests that they are both to blame and “self involved.” He’s not wrong, but I cannot help but smile about the irony of Christian telling anyone that they are too self involved. Then again, perhaps the revelation of having a son by his best friend’s wife and being attacked by a serial mutilator has made him grow up a bit.
That theory is dashed pretty quickly as Sean (who as most certainly regressed emotionally) chooses Quentin to help him perform the surgery. Christian reacts by storming out very much like a spoiled child.
Shortly after this, this episode’s “central” case is revealed. It involves a frat hazing gone awry for three new recruits, but amounts to so much background noise. It exists only as setup and is unlikely to wow anyone from either a medical perspective or an emotional one. It does provide a pretty silly sight gag mirroring this week’s theme of threesomes too, but that’s neither here nor there.
Armed with his new proactive stance towards parenting and his police detective girlfriend, Christian (with Kit in tow) visits Matt in the hospital and gives Kit permission to pull no punches. Kit continues to have a weird interviewing style involving questions her subjects’ manhood, but when Matt breaks down and admits that several transsexuals beat him in retribution of his savage assault of one of their friends, it makes that weird style 2 for 2. Maybe she is onto something.
The revelation draws battle lines in our firs threesome. Sean and Julia think it is time for a disciplinary academy to put Matt back on the straight and narrow while Christian recommends the pharmacological approach, at least in the short term. Christian loses 2 to 1 and, seemingly, accepts the formerly married couple’s decision.
It is a pattern that repeats itself later for poor the poor doctor when his girlfriends team up against him in deciding what film they’ll see. In the end, Christian buys tickets for both Kimber and Kit to see the new Jude Law film (he was favoring the cinematic stylings of Vin Diesel) and leaves them to it. Once again, Christian loses 2 to 1 in another threesome’s decision. Christian uses his newly acquired free time to visit Matt and give him the drugs that Matt’s parents didn’t want him to have in the first place. At first appreciative, Matt turns angry when Christian confesses to sleeping with Ava to protect Matt from her.
Meanwhile, Sean and Quentin have a bizarre night on the town. Not looking forward to spending another Friday alone, Sean lets himself be roped into attending a college party that Quentin and Christian were invited to because of their work earlier on the hazing case. Quentin meets Amber and sends her Sean’s way and everything looks like it will end up smashingly. However, as Sean is being…satisfied by Amber, Quentin stumbles in with her friend who begins to do the same. Dr. Q seems to be taking too much of an interest in Sean across the room. It freaks Sean out enough they he snags his pants, zips them up, and gets the heck out of dodge.
Back in the comforts of home, he runs into Julia rummaging through Matt’s room. They share a sweet moment of recollection that devolves into sweaty divorcee sex on their child’s bed. Sad, sweet, and creepy, all at once. It only gets worse when Matt, having checked himself out of the hospital, returns to catch them cuddling the next morning.
The Quentin-Christian rivalry evolves a bit more the next time in surgery. As Quentin brags about how effective he and Sean were at getting ladies the night before, Christian feels the need to prove his manhood by mentioning he has a girlfriend who, in turn, has a girlfriend and all three are quite “active” with one another. Dr. Troy eventually agrees to “loan out” Kit and the four of them have dinner together. Kit, always in control, manipulates the situation into a foursome and before you know it, the doctors have found yet another way to compete.
Quentin blows it for everyone, however, when he overplays his hand and exposes his bisexuality. Christian wants no part of it and ceases all activity. Kit, typically, questions his manhood again, but this time he does not take the bait. He kicks her out because he is tired of sharing Kimber with her and Kimber backs his decision because while she might like Kit, she is in love with Christian.
The next day at work, Sean and Christian finally experience a moment of levity as they joke and laugh about the new revelation of Quentin’s sexual orientation. Q proves to be Dr. Killjoy when he none too subtly brings up a crime where a bisexual woman’s complaint about office gossip got her 6 million dollars. This clams them up rapidly.
Finally, it is back to Sean’s house to stage an intervention on behalf of Matt. Not surprisingly, he is not receptive to this approach and the situation escalates. I’ve never been a big fan of the way John Henley essays Matt. His looks are too alien and often lead to distraction and his performances always seemed steeped in a kind of deadeye emotionlessness. In the past three episodes, however, he does plenty to redeem himself. That deadeye quality is actually of great aid as Matt continues to drop further and further down the spiral, flaunting his descent every step of the way. He’s come into his own early in this season and he steals this episode.
