Episode Guide
Wheels Up The Goldfinch Dumb Doggy Mature Group Action Deuce to Nines, Double Draw Lasagne As A Whole Everybody Panic! Just the D! Real Heavy Hitter Everything Goes Back To Normal I really enjoyed Children’s Hospital when it first aired back in 2008. Released during the height of Grey’s Anatomy’s success and suitably parodying all the usual medical drama tropes, the 5 minute bite-size splashes of comedy did well to get in and get out without outstaying its welcome. Netflix’s follow-up Medical Police is ultimately a series that’s a tale of two halves. On the one hand, there’s some good humour here and a couple of genuine laugh out loud segments sprinkled through every episode. At the same time however, the series struggles with its run-time, with ten 30 minute episodes that stretch the comedy and plot a little too thin and subsequently fails to keep the laughs as free-flowing as it was in Children’s Hospital. Fans will ultimately get more out of this series, especially with the established relationships at Children’s Hospital and the little gags along the way that reference that show. If you’re going in with no prior knowledge to that though fret not, there’s enough here for newcomers to enjoy too. At the heart of this one lie Doctors Owen Maestro and Lola Spratt, who work as dedicated doctors. When a deadly viral outbreak sees patients brought in to the hospital, what follows is a globe-trotting adventure that see our duo recruited by the CDC to track down the origins of the virus that threatens all life on Earth. Each episode sees the duo move to a different country and location, bringing with it a whole host of plot twists, double-bluffs, betrayals and heightened tension that plays on all the usual action-drama tropes you’d expect. I have to admit, as a binge-watch this one isn’t nearly as effective as Children’s Hospital was but there’s still some really good jokes peppered throughout. Whether it be a hilarious card game that feels ripped from Casino Royale or an awkward Muslim terrorist incident, there’s a whole foray of ideas here that work well with the overall plot. Ultimately the series feels like a series of funny jokes that were written out in a brainstorming session and in desperate need of a plot to tie everything together. That’s not necessarily a bad thing but I wish the show was a little tighter and free-flowing with its comedy. There’s a tad too many twists here that neuter some of the initial enjoyment and the comedy, while enjoyable, relies heavily on the same sort of tropes throughout to keep things ticking along. These range from fart jokes all the way through to narration from news reports and while Medical Police isn’t necessarily a one-trick pony, at times it does feel like a compendium of Greatest Hits thrown on repeat. Aesthetically, the show does well to pepper in some nice edits and slow-mo shots that accentuate the jokes and when these nail, they’re laugh out loud funny. I won’t spoil too many here of course but some of them, especially toward the end of the show, do so well to tie in Children’s Hospital references to Medical Police in the best possible way. Although I could have done without the teasing cliffhanger ending, there’s enough here to make for an enjoyable watch, even if it does work far more effectively in short-form bursts rather than as a 10 episode series.
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