A moment of honesty on “ER”

I used to be a huge ER fan back when Eric LaSalle and George Clooney roamed the halls. There was one moment in an episode that struck me as so sincere, that I was hooked. A trauma patient had just died and the doctors had left, leaving behind nurses Haleh and Lydia. Lydia had been recently engaged and showed off her engagement ring to Haleh over a still-warm corpse.

I know that even good-hearted doctors use slang like “GOMER” or “circling the drain” so, for once, I thought I’d found a drama that tells it like it is. Too bad: ER devolved into improbable plot lines (Rocket Romano crushed by a helicopter?) and insanely rare medical conditions (flipped organs? rare blood conditions? benzene poisoning?).

Tonight’s episode started out with the doctors watching a car chase on TV, hoping that it would reach another jurisdiction so that they wouldn’t have to deal with the (eventual) crash victim. “C’mon, make it to the freeway, then you’re Mercy’s problem.” Too bad. Next week, it will be ebola and the black plague.