#What The Actual Fuck Holby

[pers-books]

Peter Capaldi is the fucking greatest! Here he is on the picket line outside University College Hospital supporting the Junior Doctors’ strike. The Doctor with doctors.

Bless the man!

Here’s a link to a story about the strikes for those who aren’t aware of what’s going on. But for anyone who doesn’t know - a Junior Doctor is simply anyone who’s not actually a consultant. So, for Holby fans, Morven and Raf, Dom and Zosia - they’re all classed as junior doctors. And Junior Doctors have a range of skills and experience, but they’re all paid peanuts. Collectively, 3 junior doctors working to take out someone’s appendix would earn £66.55 per hour between them. Which is fucking insane! And MPs are now earning £86,584 pa from 1 April 2023 - plus MPs get expenses paid and subsidised meals in the House of Commons - whereas NHS staff have to pay for car parking and they’re lucky if they can get a break long enough to find food - assuming there’s even somewhere to supply food for them, because a lot of hospitals don’t have staff canteens.

[becausegoodheroesdeservekidneys]

Doctor Who, but Chronologically 31

Fun fact! The timelines have intersected, almost - if we were watching this show in the normal order, this episode is actually only one out from where we would be. It's 1930! And we all know what that means - it's time for some terrible stereotypical New York accents as we watch Daleks in Manhattan.

Martha's back! Very exciting, Martha put herself into God Tier in the companion rankings with her last episode, and frankly she is very solid in this one as well. She and Tennant arrive in New York, discover it's 1930, and immediately launch themselves into the mystery of working class people going missing during the Great Depression as they live in a Central Park slum in sight of the Empire State Building being built, a tale that is so richly anti-capitalist the only thing they don't do is turn to the camera to break the fourth wall and say "The real monster here, children, is capitalism."

(Also, side note, if you watch in this order, you do feel the devastation of the First World War).

Plot-wise, this is a two-parter! Our second one that is actually intentional. In fact, the plot is fairly basic and simple, meaning the emotional stories and anti-capitalist morals can take centre stage, which is nice - homeless people are vanishing from the slum. They are being turned into pig slaves, by which I mean, humans in fetching brown boiler suits with pig heads who squeal a lot. This is being done by a sort of wannabe mobster who wears stylish spats in the Empire State Building, who insists his workers risk their lives to attach Dalek bumps to the top - because, as the title made clear and the episode wisely chose not to hide from us, the real bosses behind it all are Jeff Bezos inhuman monstrous perversions with no morals or emotions other than hate or racial purity aka Daleks.

Which is exciting! Because you see, while we have SEEN Daleks before, next to the big cube in the second episode, and we got that brief cameo from Rusty... this is actually the first time we get to meet them properly! First Dalek episode, to show us why they're scary!

Except it turns out there are only four of them and they're a cult.

Also the Doctor is proper freaked out by them. We get SO MANY PLOT THREADS HERE

"How are they still alive?" he asks the showgirl who has followed him into a sewer (she is played by Her From Spooks). "How do they always live, while I lose everything?"

Later, Martha, having been kidnapped for experimentation by Daleks and literally shaking with fear, steps up to the Daleks and stares them down.

"I demand to know what's going on," she proclaims (god she's so fucking cool.) "Report."

"Our planet and species were lost in a war," a Dalek says (HOW MANY FUCKING WARS -) "We're the Cult of Skaro. Dalek Sec is hybridising with a human so we can evolve to live outside the shell."

(The other Daleks do not approve. Racial purists. I foresee a mutiny.)

And the merge is complete! The final cliffhanger is that the wannabe mobster now has a single eye and a beard made of penises.

Far be it from me to agree with Daleks, but I also think that's a bad design, actually.

Anyway, other little stories in this episode include Rick Griffin from Holby City playing a man called Solomon, the sort of leader of the slum, who in his first scene resolves a conflict by splitting a loaf of bread in half I-see-what-they-did-there; Her From Spooks playing a showgirl whose boyfriend gets turned into an incomplete pig slave, so he just has the snout and that's it (on being reunited she is very good about it, good for her); and ACTUAL LITERAL SPIDER-MAN IS HERE. That is. Andrew Garfield. Like, THE Andrew Garfield. His name is Frank and he's from Tennessee and he is also about to be experimented on with Martha. And he's played by Andrew Garfield.

The Doctor jokes at one point that he'll let Frank kiss him if he wants, and all I can think about is Andrew "I want to play bisexual Peter Parker" Garfield's eyes lighting up at the line.

But, a nice moment for us watching: the showgirl bonds with Martha (of course) and offers to let her watch the show from the wings.

"Have you ever been on stage?" she asks

"Oh, yeah, a bit," Martha says. "Shakespeare."

WE UNDERSTAND THAT REFERENCE!!!!!

Anyway! New plot threads again!

“She” (an unknown person) is returning (perhaps River returned as Missy. Maybe Me? Maybe Clara???!)

There is something on Donna’s back

An entire planet, Pyrovilia, just… disappeared, somehow. (Maybe because the TARDIS is exploding??? Saturnine was also lost, and that WAS because of the TARDIS exploding. The lion man’s planet was also lost but he was a bit of a knob about it if I’m honest.)

Amy is maybe dead (she’s not)

The Doctor has been cubed (he’s out, but how?)

River is possibly blown up  (unless she’s Missy)

The TARDIS has blown up  (It’s fine now. Except it’s sort of melting now because it’s corrupted, but it’s fine again)

The universe appears to have ended  (the universe is back again)

The Doctor has employed(?) Nardole

(And Nardole was “reassembled???” Nardole had glass nipples and invisible hair?? WHAT THE FUCK IS HE)

There’s a vault in the TARDIS and it contains Missy but we don’t know why (sometimes she knocks for the bants)

What has happened to all these companions and where are the new ones coming from?

There’s an immortal Viking girl now. Her name is Me and she’s now looking after the people the Doctor abandons

What’s With The Silence?

Why was Rory entirely unconcerned by the entire world suddenly going silent when that is Not Normal and should have been, at the very least, extremely disconcerting?

What did the Doctor do to Queen Lizzie One?

Who is Captain Jack Harkness? (Is he the one who gave the companions a warning about the lone cyberman?)

Why is Amy seeing a one-eyed woman in a vanishing window?

What’s with the Doctor’s future involving getting shot by an astronaut?

Is Amy pregnant and why is it inconclusive?

Who is Sarah-Jane Smith?

How is the Doctor Bill’s teacher and why/where does he have an office?

What is going on with the Cyber War and the Cyberium???

Who did the Doctor lose to Cyber Conversion?

What happened with the Other Cyber War?

What happened with the Third War that deleted the void?

Why does Rose seem particularly important?

What’s with the Weeping Angel statues, and why can’t you blink at them?

What order do these Doctors go in? (Eccleston, Tennant, uncertain, Smith, Capaldi, Whittaker)

Which companion just… forgot the Doctor, and how?

Yaz and Vinder are about to die as Mori/Mwri/Muuri

There is a Lupari shield around Earth.

What’s a Time War?

What’s the Rift?

What’s Bad Wolf?

What happened with Amy’s pregnancy?

In which war did the Doctor become a war criminal, and how?

Who is the Master?

Why has Amy forgotten Rory?

Is Rory plastic or not?

Why is the Doctor sulking on a cloud?

How exactly does the Doctor have a cloud?

What exactly happened with Strax to, uh, tame him?

Which friend killed Strax?

Which friend brought Strax back?

Where did this lesbian lizard and human couple come from?

What happened with Clara as Souffle Girl and the Daleks?

How does Clara actually join?

Why so many Claras?

Why is Missy apparently in robo-heaven?

Why is probably!Missy pushing Clara and the Doctor together?

What is Trensilor and what happened there?

Who is Handles?

The Doctor is about to be dissolved by a beautiful geode man

The universe is being crushed by the Flux

Will the Doctor open the fobwatch?

Sontarans are invading Earth again

Who is Kate?

Who is Osgood? Another name of Clara’s again?

The fuck is the deal with the Grand Serpent

Does Martha get to go to an ice cream planet with 12-fingered massage aliens?

How did the Doctor forget Clara?

Who is Bill’s puddle girlfriend Heather?

How did Nardole die?

When does Bill get Cyberman-ed and die?

When does the Doctor shrink and enter a Dalek called Rusty?

Whittaker is falling to her death rn

Was that ring relevant?

Does anyone know the Doctor’s name?

When did Yaz talk to Dan about fancying the Doctor?

When did Dan talk to the Doctor about fancying Yaz?

Who was the Doctor’s wife?

What's happening with the bees?

What happened with Donna's ex and a giant spider?

What war wiped out the Daleks, and is it one of the ones already mentioned?

What did the Doctor mean when he said "The (Daleks) always live, while I lose everything?"

[listen-to-the-inner-walrus]

im back watching the terrible cruise ship murder show i was liveblogging last night and heres some more notes:

i havent mentioned the show's intro yet but its exactly what youd expect it to be, both in style and budget. i have friends who have made much better videos on less of a budget and those videos were ship edits for holby city.

said friend showed me said videos whilst we were sat on a curb at like 9:30pm just before we were approached by police thinking we were lost children. we were in university

im beginning to adore the red colour filter over the ocean, unironically

showing a giant cruise liner docked at any small island really does not make the cruise ship look good. it towers over the island like its about to attack.

...you know, everyone laughed at isambard kingdom brunel for his big fuck off ship, we should bring that back.

oh hey, a case i actually know about prior to this show. im sure this will not highlight any flaws of the show going forward

[lonelier-version-of-you]

All in all, I thought tonight’s episode of Casualty was really quite good.

The Rash and Ashok storyline is shaping up to be great, although it’s an emotional watch. My one criticism would be that I think they’ve rushed into the storyline a bit too quickly, but other than that, I think overall it has very strong potential. And obviously it’s an important storyline to tell.

The actors involved are great, too, as I mentioned last week. Kriss Dosanjh is great as Ashok himself, and Neet Mohan is playing Rash’s reactions just brilliantly. Neet’s acting in the panic attack scene and then the scene on the bench with Paige was particularly fantastic.

Paige and Rash had actual chemistry tonight for the first time in ages, as well, even though I am still confused because I honestly thought they’d broken up ages ago. I’ve mentioned Neet Mohan’s acting in the panic attack scene already, but Shalisha James-Davis was great in it too.

Speaking of breakups, Marcus and Stevie are over... apparently. I’d like to be able to say I think this breakup will last, but I doubt it.

I’m really starting to see what Jon Sen meant about Marcus being coercive. Whenever I think Marcus can’t be more of a prick, he manages to be more of a prick. And the spoilers for the next episode... wow, he’s really crossed a line there, what the fuck. But this isn’t about the spoilers so I won’t go on about those.

I continue to adore Stevie, and to think she reminds me of both Henrik and Gaskell. She’s great. I loved her in that scene with the vicar lady on the bench especially. Oh, Stevie, the queen of being a Gaslight Gatekeep Girlboss.

Although I’d appreciate Casualty not rubbing in what Holby did to Jac, thanks, I will admit I laughed when Jonty said Jac never slept with anyone to get further in her career. Two words: Lord Byrne.

I liked the variety of patients tonight. The storyline with Sam, the man with schizophrenia, was absolutely heartbreaking, but he was written and acted really well.

(Also... look at Casualty, managing to portray someone with delusions of grandeur sympathetically, rather than framing them as terrifying out-of-control villains. If only Holby could’ve done the same, huh? And yes, I know I make every well-done psychosis storyline on Casualty into a “imagine if John Gaskell had been handled with this kind of respect” thing, and it’s probably annoying, and I’m sorry, but I’m still so bitter about the Gaskell storyline - maybe because I’d just had some major struggles with my own mental illnesses at the time.)

Does anyone care about Paul? When he was onscreen, I busied myself with checking social media.

Dylan was great in this episode. Dylan is, of course, always great, but I really liked him tonight. Seeing him trying to support Rash was lovely.

[riverstardis]

high tide:

here we go😥😥

aw connie pulled some strings to get emilie in a good hospice

jez! him trying to flirt with connie and then his face when she introduces herself as the clinical lead sjsjdjfkfk

is that patient in sex education? just looked it up and yes she is. i miss when they used to put the full cast list up on the website not just the main ones

aww they’re looking at childhood photos. it must be so weird for them realising that they’d never actually seen pictures of themselves at that age before

cal telling ethan to go breathe into a paper bag SJDFKFKKF

emilie asks ethan if he’ll get the test done and he doesn’t answer but then later says he will and then cal crashes the ambulance trying to stop him finding out that his results are already there😭😭

“your sense of responsibility is pathologically stunted” “i just don’t think the world’s gonna end every time i leave the house. you’re like one of those nut jobs who walk around holding placards predicting apocalypse. you’re a disaster fantasist” pretty succinct descriptions of their characters tbh sjdkfkfk although ethan’s life is basically just one disaster after another can you really blame him😭

i love how they’re both so aware of how fucked up they are. and they’re both trying so hard to hide it from other people, especially ethan because cal does kind of use it to his advantage a little to seem dark and mysterious to women (taken from his character bio) whereas ethan tries to hide it completely

they’re a bit wrapped up in it all at this point but i wonder if afterwards at any point they really thought about how much of The Way They Are, which they probably couldn’t explain before, could be explained by them being neglected and then taken away and adopted

aw lofty’s patient turns out to be diane’s daughter and she’d come to take pictures of him to put on twitter but he wasn’t like she thought he’d be

they’re so funny😭

ethan saying they could be at the hospice right now if they’d left it to him but no cal had to make a big spontaneous gesture and now emilie might die on the side of the road and cal says at least he’s trying something and the side of the road is better than some hospital trolley and ethan actually walks off to look at the tyres instead of responding which probably means he knows cal’s actually right for once but doesn’t want to admit it sjdkfkfk

cal carries on “oh hang on, you’d prefer that wouldn’t you? because then you could control it. like you love to control everything. antiseptic ethan bubble, never taking a chance. like a selfish, misanthropic little baby” “what did you call me?” “you heard me.” what cal’s describing sounds an awful lot like an anxiety disorder to me🤷🏽 well except the selfish misanthropic little baby part that’s just him being mean

i’m sorry but there is absolutely no way that police officer didn’t see ethan go into the ambulance as she approached them😭

this is a perfect example of why having sibling relationships is SUCH a good idea because only siblings could bounce back from the argument they just had in about 5 minutes flat (it’s also why will was never gonna work as a cal replacement for ethan because if they argued like that they just,, wouldn’t be friends)

cal’s like why do i always do this why do i never think things through and ethan’s like no it’s me who hasn’t been thinking and says that he’ll be there for him when he opens his test results

ethan calling emilie mum for the first time🥺 though does that actually reflect how he feels about her or is it still for cal’s benefit??

jez giving iain a piggyback sjdkfkfk

“charlie we need you. it’s lofty. he’s gone up into the ceiling” coming full circle then? back into the loft

emilie saying cal’s a dreadful driver sjskfkfk

lofty’s decided to leave. he’s going to do a charity walk and then after he says he’s going to retrain as a bereavement counsellor. well that doesn’t happen does it? actually idk how long it is before he joins holby?

ethan being scared of crabs skskdkfk i love him

aww emilie’s crying watching them :(

cal is going to open his results and ethan says how he wishes he would’ve told him so they could do it together and cal’s like “we did do it together” and pulls out ethan’s envelope and explains how he took his blood

CAL BESTIE WHEN HE SAID HE WISHED YOU COULDVE DONE IT TOGETHER HE MEANT THE WHOLE PROCESS NOT JUST HAVING THE RESULTS SUDDENLY PRODUCED WITH NO CHANCE TO PREPARE

noo he looks terrified i can’t watch this🫣🫣🫣

zoe saying to dylan that she knows how close he got with lofty and how much he’ll miss him and dylan says “he was just a nurse. and not a particularly competent one” but his face says otherwise :(

aww everyone group hugging lofty🥺

here we see cal’s new and improved year of birth: 1984 (instead of 1986 which it was earlier in the series) which they must’ve changed because they’re about to show ethan’s date of birth too for the first time and in deciding what year ethan should’ve been born they realised they’d made cal too young because 1986 is the latest ethan could possibly have been born to be where he is in his career but if ethan turned 2 when cal was 4 they can’t have been born in the same year

i’ve paused it to mentally prepare and i’m actually shaking rn wtf someone tell my brain it’s just a tv show😭

ethan points out that the statistics aren’t in his favour after cal’s result is negative but actually his personal chance hasn’t changed it’s still 50% it’s just that it seems to get worse because if you take their chances together, it’s more likely that one of them will have it than neither of them having it, but with cal testing negative that takes away his part of that and the chance that one of them will have it change to just ethan’s individual chance (yes i did just pause it again to draw a probability tree)

THE STORY ABOUT HIS FUTURE😫😫😫😫😫😫😫😫😫

“cal and i are doddery old men by then. cal’s on his 4th wife” this is now even worse than it was originally because NOT ONLY is ethan not going to make it to that age, CAL DIDNT MAKE IT EITHER NOR DID HE EVEN HAVE A FIRST WIFE LET ALONE A FOURTH WTF CASUALTY I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU

[notasapleasure]

Holby City S09E05-06 (2006)

I can’t actually find these episodes online, but there’s a clip from one of them on Joplin’s showreel on Youtube.

He plays a character called Eddie MacGuire. The episode summaries from Wikipedia are as follows:

He’s not named in the summary, but Jade’s pimp is Eddie, a thoroughly charming bloke as demonstrated by the few seconds in the showreel:

(Jade is Ophelia Lovibond, for the Elementary/Guardians of the Galaxy fans out there!)

There’s something awfully 1970s about his hair here.

According to Doctor Sam, all this is Eddie’s ‘mess’. He wants to just hoik Jade out of hospital because she’s losing him money and he doesn’t believe the doctors can ‘fix’ her.

He stomps on Doctor Sam’s surgery hand and makes some pretty threats and then fucks off.

Bad hair. So bad.

I mean, I’d watch it if I found the episodes, but I don’t feel like I’m missing much here other than seeing him get his comeuppance. Nevertheless, I won’t bother rating what I can’t watch in its entirety! I could be missing a dramatic twist, after all...

[madam-wakefield]

Love is...

Well holby clearly don’t know

[gayness-and-mayhem]

I cannot even begin to explain how obsessed I am with this bit from The Return of A.J. Raffles.

[gottagobackintime]

I’m sorry but... THAT’S WHAT WE GOT?!?! After everything that was said between them, felt between them and they got to say like two lines each to each other?! AND THEY WEREN’T EVEN IN THE SAME DAMN ROOM!

[jacnaylor]

do holby doctors know how to keep a secret? do they know they don’t have to tell patients every single thing that has ever happened to them or their friends? 

[pers-books]

20 Questions fic writers' Q&A. I was tagged by @meluisart (thanks pal - sorry I forgot to mention that in the first version of this post!)

1 - How many works do you have on AO3?

661 (one more than the last time I did this meme in Nov 2023!)

2 - What's your total AO3 word count?

2,444,608

3 - What fandoms do you write for?

Most recently Berena (Holby City) and Original Fiction. But I’ve written very little since losing my mum in April 2023.

4 - What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Letters to a Naturalist (Holby City) (30,350 words)

Jason Haynes: Matchmaker (Holby City) (17,560 words)

The Red String of Fate (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)) (51,896 words)

One Life Stand (Holby City) (33,815 words)

The Hacktivist, The Agent, and the Clairvoyant (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Thor (Movies)) (35,849 words)

5 - Do you respond to comments?

Hell yes, always.

6 - What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Still this one:

Lascia Ch'io Pianga (Let Me Lament My Cruel Fate) for the James Bond (Movies) fandom. Although it does have an ambiguous ending, almost everyone who commented on it said they assumed that Bond & M both died.

7 - What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

The vast majority of them have happy endings as I rarely write sad ones.

8. Do you get hate on fic?

Used to back in the day when I wrote Ten/Martha fic for Doctor Who. There were a lot of Doctor/Rose shippers who hated my pairing with a passion and didn’t hesitate to share that hate instead of just staying in their fucking lane and using the back button/scroll button. Bunch of snowflakes.

9. Do you write smut?

Used to, not so much lately.

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

I have done, yes. The craziest one is probably the Doctor Who x Wallace & Gromit one.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I’m aware of.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yup - a few years ago someone translated one of mine into Russian.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

A long, long time ago.

14. What’s your all-time favourite ship?

Eh, I don’t have just one - given I’ve written for 20 different fandoms over the last 16 years.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but probably won’t?

Oh, I’ve no idea - I only have one incomplete WiP actually posted on AO3, but I’ve no particular desire to finish it, especially given it’s 6 or 7 fandoms ago!

Of course, I have a whole heap of WiPs on my hard drive, but I doubt I’ll get to finish any of them.

16. What are your writing strengths?

Goodness knows. Someone else would have to answer that.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

I have been told I write too much. Ironic, really, given how little I’ve written this past year.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I’d do it if it’s needful, though I don’t think I have.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Doctor Who!

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

Eh, no, I don’t have a favourite fic - I’ve liked every fic I’ve written as I was writing it and I’ve occasionally re-read some of my own fic just because.

Tagging, with the usual caveat that you don't have to participate if you don't want to! @slightlyintimidating @doctorjameswatson @jinxedwood @bonnissance @ariverandasong @daisydoctor13 @fortytworedvines @onaperduamedee @hokuspokusthings @ceridwyn2 @thisbluespirit and anyone else who wants to participate!

Questions to respond to:

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

3. What fandoms do you write for?

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

8. Do you get hate on fic?

9. Do you write smut?

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

14. What’s your all-time favourite ship?

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but probably won’t?

16. What are your writing strengths?

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

19. First fandom you wrote for?

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

[politedemon]

i hate the wicked london accents which is annoying bc rachel tucker is like. one of my fave elphabas but there isn’t a boot of her on broadway wicked and i just. cannot listen to those accents

[bernietaylors]

what the fuck

[lonelier-version-of-you]

Well, Casualty have finally, finally managed it. An episode without Faith The Abuser Cadogan in it. I mean we had to sit through ages of both Paul and Adi but at least Adi’s presumably going now.

I didn’t hate this episode as much as a lot of people did. It was a bit ‘meh’, what with all the focus on the surrogacy storyline. The special effects were way too much and the fight scene was just embarrassing. But thankfully, we had Queen Stevie Nash to carry the episode.

I love Stevie. I know I say that like every week now, but I really do love her, and she just keeps getting better and better. It helps that she reminds me SO much of Henrik - more specifically, Henrik back in the day before Holby stopped calling him out on his shit. What was that anon ask ages back about watching Holby for Henrik because he’s “my poor fucked up little man... I need him to go to therapy... I need to see what he will do wrong next”. That’s how I feel about Stevie. She’s like Henrik - but, ironically, without the sexual harassment. (Although she faced more consequences for false allegations of such than Henrik did for actually harassing Sahira. :/)

Actually, thinking about it, Stevie’s sort of like early Henrik, yeah, but she’s also like a mini Gaskell. To the point I’m tempted to nickname her Mini Gaskell now. To be fair, that’s probably because most of the traits she has in common with Henrik are also ones Henrik has in common with John. Stevie is probably what would happen if Henrik and John somehow produced a kid. But what Jonty called the ‘self-righteous’ “I’m Dr. Nash and I can do no wrong” attitude, it feels more John than Henrik to me, so yeah. Not that her selfish streak isn’t a trait shared by both of them. (Indeed, you could compare Jonty’s rant to Mr. Clarke’s description of Henrik in S19E03: “A terrible old narcissist’s power struggle. [...] Acute lack of empathy. Borderline sociopathic need for immediate and total obedience.”)

Stevie is what John could’ve been if he were written well. Stevie is how you do a villainous mentally ill character right - her mental illness affects her behaviour just like anybody else’s would, but it’s not, at the end of the day, the reason she’s a villain (well, more like antagonist or anti-hero by now, but still). She’s a wonderfully complex character and I cannot praise her enough. Elinor Lawless is brilliant, too, her performances are so fantastic.

I really do think tonight’s episode providing insight into Stevie’s psyche is probably one of the only reasons I enjoyed it. She got a lot of interactions and all of them were fascinating. Despite the Jonty drama, she proved herself ultimately a good doctor in how gentle she was with the woman who was a rape survivor, and how she talked to the pregnant woman trying to decide whether to have an abortion. (Incidentally, this is actually another aspect in which she reminds me of both John and Henrik, but especially John. One of John’s trial patients, Mara, was a domestic violence survivor and he was just lovely with how he treated her.)

I don’t know where I was going with this really. I just love Stevie. I think she’s great. She rescued what otherwise would’ve been a mediocre at best episode for me.

Also, speaking of Jonty, he was throwing stones from his glass house with that rant about Stevie being a bad person. Just saying.

There was really only one other storyline tonight, and it was the Marty/Adi/Paul/Robyn surrogacy stuff. That was... eh. I’m glad Marty’s broken up with Adi and I hope we never hear from Adi again now - he’s outstayed his welcome already.

Speaking of people who have outstayed their welcome, Paul doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. He and Robyn are a thing now, I guess.

Watching Paul yell at Adi was the epitome of that “Heartbreaking: The Worst Person You Know Just Made A Great Point” meme. Like, he wasn’t wrong, but also... he’s Paul. And we’ve seen him being a bit of a misogynistic prat himself.

What the fuck was that fight????? The fact that they tried to play it as comedic when the rest of the storyline was serious made the tone feel seriously off. And the music was SO not needed.

In other news, why are we barely seeing Ethan at the moment when he’s literally leaving the show in a few months? This lack of Ethan scenes is going to be especially frustrating if they go the route of him having a sudden severe Huntington’s decline for his exit story. Just... sigh.

One thing I complained about last week was that, unlike the rest of the series so far, the episode didn’t feel busy enough - thankfully tonight’s episode fixed that, and it felt like a busy, crowded department again. So I did like that.

All in all... meh. Liked the Stevie stuff. Liked that we saw a lot of patients. The rest frustrated me. I wouldn’t mind if we were getting a better episode next week, but unfortunately, there’s no ep on the 15th. It’s that “Casualty gets shifted around the schedules for Strictly” time of year again, I suppose. Next recap will come whenever we get another episode.

[riverstardis]

in the name of love:

connie enjoying her name being on the office door

lmao zoe telling max to leave some space between their arrivals

“she who is now me”

connie having meetings with everyone now that she’s clinical lead

ethan being in the middle of treating a patient when he’s meant to have his meeting so connie goes with him to watch

“right, you were with that patient for over 18 minutes, what’s your diagnosis?” and then he takes ages saying what his diagnosis actually is sjskfkf

“dr hardy you have the most breaches of the 4 hour target of any doctor in the hospital” “right. i’m guessing that’s not good?” “no, not in the ed. if you want to run thousands of tests become a rheumatologist not an ed physician” “i’m hoping that’s sarcasm and not a recommendation?” “correct. you’re gonna burn yourself out not to mention my budget.”

then he exhales after connie walks off and lofty pats him on the back sjskdkfjdjd

jeff saying his wife’s away in peru and “it’s complicated” so you’re not gonna tell her exactly how it’s complicated because it sounds like you’re tryna cheat😭😭

LMAO lofty going “what’s up, sherlock?” to ethan

he’s got a patient with a chest infection and he thinks it’s probably just a normal one but he wants to know which pathogen caused it but then connie walks past and he’s like “though, that’s not something we will necessarily work out now in the ed”

lofty going “you’re going to look up chest microbiology in your break aren’t you?” and ethan goes “probably” SJDKFKFK nerd (affectionate)

lofty robyn and max selling sweets and chocolates

“ah lofty, i’ve been hearing tales of illicit confectionary”

lmaoo ash finding robyn and lofty selling out of a store cupboard

oop cal’s turn and connie is not happy “dr knight.” “hey” “hey?” “sorry i missed our appointment i got stuck with a patient” “no according to the records you never get stuck, you have the fastest turnover of patients there is” “thank you very much” “no it wasn’t a compliment. my office. your notes are very sketchy. CN2 12 intact? that doesn’t tell me you’ve done a full neuro examination” “yeah but that was just shorthand, i always do every step” “if your patient walks out of here and dies i would not be able to defend you in a coroner’s court, be more thorough dr knight, in you go”

i love how cal has the exact opposite problem to ethan. and i love how different connie’s demeanour is with them skskfkfkf ig bc cal didn’t tell her that he couldn’t make the appointment and then was so cocky and dismissive whereas ethan actually listened to what she told him

patient’s dad asking louise if she knows what these pills are and her saying “sorry i’m not a medic” interesting…

the patient who was flirting with jeff is on some “friends of holby trust” committee with connie and they raised money for an echo machine. connie saying she normally goes private so they have to show her the very best of the nhs

“ten years ago ct scans in the ed were unheard of. if i get my way, you’ll be training in echo, and a lot more besides” and zoe rolling her eyes sjskfkfkfk

connie letting ethan use the new echo as a reward🥺

i love how the patient’s literally awake here like it must be so disconcerting to be aware of a consultant actively training a junior doctor using you, even if it’s just a scan

i hate that i now can’t watch this scene without thinking of that bloody london episode. honestly fuck whoever thought up that kiss😭

connie and zoe walking towards the door as they watch ethan with the echo “he’s in his element” “mhm” “i hired a few good ones in my time” “yeah, you did” i love how he can absolutely still hear them like they didn’t even leave the room just walked like a metre further away from him sjdkdkfkf

robyn and lofty trying to sell lily some chocolate. unsuccessfully of course

aww ethan telling cal “mrs beauchamp let me do an echo on the guy who collapsed in the car park!” and cal replies sarcastically “wow. that is impressive.” and zoe’s sighs like “oh, give your brother his moment of glory for once” and cal really over exaggerates and pats his shoulder and goes “well done”

lmaoo max asking zoe if she and connie have finally called a truce and she’s like “i’m not that petty. anymore”

rita saying she feels like she’s walking on fletch’s grave by applying for his old job skskdkfkfk you can literally see him again in like a few weeks

jeff going to visit the woman who was flirting with him and she’s wearing heels despite having a cast on her leg???? girl…