Reality's a bitch

This show failed because it is bad, bad, bad. It was a disaster from the first line of dialogue in episode 1. You want to find out what it would really be like to be a bipolar neurologist working in an academic setting? You may as well watch The Little Mermaid. THIS show ain't gonna tell ya. It is about as true to life as Gilligan's Island was realistic about what would happen to a boatload of people stranded on an "uncharted desert isle." But Gilligan's Island was supposed to be ludicrous and funny. Black Box is ludicrous and laughable, but it wasn't supposed to be.

One scene comes back to me from later in the season. (By then I couldn't bring myself to watch whole episodes.) There was one episode where there was some patient who needed emergency surgery but Bickman (the most insufferable surgeon I've ever seen in a world full of insufferable surgeons) had no one to assist him. So there was this medical student there who knew the procedure for some stupid reason. So Bickman says, "Okay. Scrub in." Operation a success, right? Patient saved, right? Thousands cheer, right?

Wrong. Here's what would have really happened the following day: That medical student would have been summarily expelled from medical school. He would have been arrested, indicted and convicted for practicing medicine without a license. That's a class E felony in New York State, which carries a prison term of up to four years. Bickman would have been summarily ejected from the medical staff of that institution so fast he'd get windburn on his face. The state medical board would order him to surrender his license, his malpractice insurer would drop him like a hot rock, and he would have been arrested, indicted and convicted of being party to a felony. The medical careers of both of these bozos would be OVER.

But - but - but...the operation was a success! The patient lived! These guys are heroes, aren't they? There are two reasons why that doesn't matter. No. 1: It's not about that particular patient or surgeon or almost-doctor. It's about maintaining and protecting the checks and balances in the system that permits doctors to practice medicine. (Boys and girls, you have to actually know something about American history to appreciate this part.) The reason medical practice is so tightly regulated in this country is because at one time, it wasn't. That was the era of snake oil, and electrical therapy, and the traveling medicine show, and the unlicensed, unregulated surgeon, when anything went and medicine was overrun with the bogus and the fraudulent. No. 2: If Bickman did that once, he's probably irresponsible enough to do something like that again. And the next time could be not a success but a disaster, leaving the hospital open to the biggest malpractice lawsuit in history, which, knowing they would lose, they'd probably settle out of court for a sum that might well bankrupt them.

Take it from someone who knows: If you should ever REALLY find yourself in the care of medical professionals as incompetent (because she is) and crazy-ass as Black or as irresponsible as Bickman, I recommend that you run away. Very fast.