The Resident season finale gave us all the happy and sad tears.
We started on a super happy note with the CoNic baby! Nic Nevin (Emily VanCamp) and Dr. Conrad Hawkins (Matt Czuchry) named her after their moms, Giorgiana Grace Hawkins. It was so beautiful.
This happiness was short-lived. Dr. AJ Austin (Malcolm-Jamal Warner) was with his mother in the park, telling her how he didn’t trust her at first. That he tested her because everyone else had left and said, “as far as I’m concerned, my home will always be with you.” It was a lovely moment.
But then Carol (Summer Selby) started to collapse, and she couldn’t feel her legs. Nothing like AJ’s mom being in bad condition to set up an intense season finale.
AJ, of course, didn’t want Dr. Cain Barrett (Morris Chestnut) to do the surgery. He planned his mother’s transfer to Atlanta General to get another stellar neurosurgeon to do the surgery.
Unfortunately, his mom wasn’t stable enough to be transferred and had to go immediately into surgery. And Cain had left the building.
Dr. Kit Voss (Jane Leeves) had to bring in Dr. Billie Sutton (Jessica Lucas) to assist as they waited for another neurosurgeon, Dr. Yang. Did they steal Cristina from Grey’s Anatomy and turn her into a neurosurgeon?
Dr. Yang never shows up because of complications in their surgery. AJ is calling Cain over and over again only to get the voicemail. Billie has to step in as she’s having flashbacks to the patient she killed without supervision.
Kit told her she could do it and that she was AJ’s mom’s only chance. She jumped in and did the work. AJ’s mom’s stats were not good, but then Cain walked in to save the day.
This brought tears to my eyes. Maybe this man has really changed just as he’s about to leave.
It was a super intense surgery with Billie having to overcome her past while it’s AJ’s mom on the table.
I loved how Cain told Billie to be proud of what she did because AJ’s mom wouldn’t be alive if she didn’t remove that bone as quickly as she did.
I’m so glad we will see much more of Billie overcoming her fears and past trauma. At the end of the episode, her son comes to see her. She’s going to need all the strength she gained from the surgery to deal with meeting her son.
She’s so strong, and she doesn’t even know it. I’m so excited about her journey.
The finale wasn’t all about babies and intense surgeries. One of the nurses asked Conrad to get her nephew in the sickle cell trial. Unfortunately, Dr. Devon Pravesh’s (Manish Dayal) friend sold the company already. Of course, he was just greedy for money and didn’t truly care about saving people. Rose (Cara Ricketts) was lucky, but many more of her don’t have the money to pay for a medical trial.
I had a friend in England that had Leukemia as a kid. When I told her you had to pay for your treatments in the US, she couldn’t wrap her head around it. The system seriously needs to change, and at the core, that’s what The Resident has been about. These doctors are fighting the system.
Devon, Nic and Conrad are outraged but not necessarily surprised. They all want a better health care system for Giorgiana’s generation. The Resident has another season to showcase that fight.
Kit was also angry. She didn’t care that the hospital is now in the black. She couldn’t get past all the patients the trial would have saved. This is exactly why we love her because she cares more about the patients than the money.
The other case at Chastain was a domino liver transplant. Dr. Jake Wong’s (Conrad Ricamora) musician friend, Roland (Kim Estes), needed a liver transplant, and so did Devon’s patient. One was young, and one was old.
Jake asked Dr. Randolph Bell (Bruce Greenwood) to look at his friend. Then, Bell and Devon decided to put the donor liver into Devon’s patient and Devon’s patient’s liver into Roland. Devon’s patient’s liver was sending her body bad proteins but could help the musician live for years. It was a pretty incredible save.
What was even better than that, Roland’s daughter was a judge and could perform the adoption ceremony for Jake and Gregg (Christopher J. Hanke)! There were two beautiful families started in “Past, Present, Future!”
Sammie (Chedi Chang) was so happy to officially be the daughter of these two amazing dads that have been there for her throughout her sickness. And she’s also learned how to say, grandpa! Bell is officially a grandad, and it suits him.
I’ve loved Jake’s journey to becoming a father. It’s been hard, but there was so much joy when it finally happened.
What are you looking forward to most in season five of The Resident? Tweet me @MandyTTCarr or comment below.
