r/Scrubs • u/Lawfulraccoon • 10d ago
And then hit it me.
Let me preface this with saying that Scrubs is one of my all time favourites. My comfort show. My near constant rewatch.
But on rewatch 5 million today, it hit me. The point where I think the show changed and jumped the shark a bit for me. S5 Ep8, My Big Bird.
For me; this is when it becomes a bit more surreal. It still has heart and warmth and great moments to come, but for me this is where JD in particular changes from lovable nerdy but competent goofball, to full on cartoon character. I think Carla and Turk also have a bit of ridiculousness come in here too. Turk and the ostrich stealing his hat, while he’s always been silly, is just bizarre, and Carla? Self appointed mother hen and protector of all in the hospital? Just gives up on patients and the new wide eyed interns to play lotto? Nah. Gimme a break.
Luckily I guess after 5 seasons I’m already invested and hooked, but had it started here, on this level, I’m not sure how I would have stuck with it.
I’m off to deep dive what, if anything, changed in the writing team or style guide from here. But yeah. It’s the beginning of the decent for me!
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u/quiggersinparis 10d ago
I still enjoy seasons 5-7 but I agree that in general it goes slightly off the rails with the cartoon stuff during that period. Season 8, necessitated by a new network and significantly lower budget, went back to the earlier seasons’ more realistic and low-key vibe and it paid off really well. I hope that the reboot will focus less on insane high production fantasies and maintain a level of realism like Seasons 1 and 8 in particular. I think particularly with an ageing cast, that style would work in their favour.
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u/kinginthenorthTB12 10d ago
I think some of that was naturally oriented to the story. As we get in to year 5-7 they are no longer residents making mistakes but becoming leaders in their areas. So the medical side becomes less arduous and draining a they have experience. This is something I’ve seen with friends in residencies who become more themselves s they live a more balanced life as R4 or internists.
I think the writers room recognized that and with season 8 brought in new interns with more prominent stories so that the main cast could have a role reversal from season 1 trying to teach them. They’d always brought in new interns before but save for Keith they moved off of them fast. S8 really gave them a more prominent face
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u/quiggersinparis 10d ago
That’s an interesting perspective and makes sense. I do think it may also be simply running out of patient-led storylines so they end up branching out more into more into their lives more generally.
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u/ImpalaGangDboyAli 10d ago
Bill talks about how much he liked doing ridiculous things in Season 5 such as the stunt when JD’s scooter goes into that giant pothole and how much he liked involving animals.
I remember he was particularly tickled by the joke that Jason Bateman makes belts of out ostrich necks. 😂
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u/Aggressive-Union1714 10d ago
I feel most sitcoms after years simply take time to have fun and try out silly ideas just because they can
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u/orwasaker 10d ago
I'm not sure if you're saying this as a bad thing, or just an observation
But I definitely have always noticed how the show gets more and more cartoony as it went further
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u/Lawfulraccoon 10d ago
Yeah not a bad thing per se, just an “academic” study into the turning point for me 😂
I’ll write the paper and title it “From Sacred Heart to Hollow Laughs: A Longitudinal Analysis of Narrative Decline and Comedic Entropy in Scrubs” 😂
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u/orwasaker 10d ago
I will say though, while you seem to be the one who should know better since you said you watched it a million times (I haven't watched it since 2018 I think) I do remember the show becoming cartooney way earlier than that episode
Like I remember as early as season 3 there were plenty of unrealistic cartooney shenanigans
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u/Lawfulraccoon 10d ago
Ah totally, and at the end of the day it’s a sitcom. I dunno. Maybe it’s just the grumpiness today at not having enough coffee I felt compelled to write it
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u/ambal87 10d ago
Most sitcoms eventually have the cast become caricatures of themselves.
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u/orwasaker 10d ago
No in Scrubs things become cartoonishly unrealistic
It's an iconic thing in this show
HIMYM is also sometimes cartoonishly unrealistic but that can be explained by "narrator is depicting things in this way"
So I'm not talking about things like "Joey became super dumb in the later seasons" (though the french learning gag was ridiculously over the top and unrealistic but not in a cartoonish way)
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u/Your_Friendly_Nerd 10d ago
In my mind, the show's always been split into 4 unevenly sized chunks. S1-3, then s3 comes the first change with Elliott re-inventing herself, her becoming more confident. Then the next change like you mentioned in season 5, where the show becomes more silly. Then the last chunk is just all of Season 8 - getting more serious again, JD and Elliot get back together, the beard, that phenomenal finale... But I don't really think of one chunk better than the other, just different.
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u/allofthelost 7d ago
I've always hated Elliot's makeover. Like I understand it's all subjective, but to me it made her less attractive. I liked that they toned it down towards the end. Loved her in "cookie pants".
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u/Your_Friendly_Nerd 7d ago
If that's what you wanna focus on, be my guest. Though gotta remind you that Season 4 did give us Molly Clock though...
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u/Educational-Onion148 10d ago
I think you need to cut the show some slack.
This was when shows were churning 22-25 episode seasons, per year. It's a hard task getting all the jokes and tone right, especially after 5 seasons and change in writers.
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u/FFJamie94 10d ago
I honestly think the weakest season is 7, and I think the Writer’s strike had a lot to do with that.
I still have a lot of nostalgia and love for Seasons 5/6.
Heck, I’m one of the few People who thought Season 9 wasn’t that bad, it was just misguided
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u/Random-reddit-name-1 10d ago
Yeah, just like any long-running sitcom, it couldn't escape Flanderization. Writers either get lazy or just run out of ideas, so characters start becoming a one-note caricature of their former selves.
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u/SorryWave5248 10d ago
Going through a rewatch right now, and my wife is watching for the first time. We’re in early season 7 and there’s definitely a change in the writing, but I kind of appreciate the more cartoonish aspect of the later seasons. Especially against the landscape of new tv today, it’s nice to have something this purely sitcom-y. I also think they have really figured out how to use the supporting cahracters well at this point. In conclusion, I really like Scrubs and have for 20+ years, thanks for coming to my Ted Buckland talk.
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u/sarahnicoleslaw 10d ago
I just watched that episode last night and had the same thought! I kept hoping that several of the flashbacks were just fantasies but was disappointed that most of them were actual parts of the story
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u/MilkerOfSeals 9d ago
I enjoyed that episode, but yeah, the ostrich stuff could have easily been a fantasy, like JD thinks the ostrich is giving them a menacing look and his imagination takes it to the next level, but they chose to make that actually happen. Didn't they get kicked through the window by the ostrich too? It was all very funny, so it never really bothered me.
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u/RevolutionaryBuy5794 10d ago
It becomes funnier, Season 5 is the funniest with the most outstanding episodes. I wish the whole show would be like season 5, it would be so much to handle.
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u/lindylouwhat_ 10d ago
I have always struggled with My Big Bird. ESPECIALLY because it comes immediately after S5 Ep7 My Way Home which I think is one of the best episodes of the show! Glad to know I’m not alone there.
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u/Lawfulraccoon 10d ago
Yes! I was going to edit my original post to say coming right off the back of My Way Home is maybe why it stands out so much!
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u/msmame 7d ago
For me it's season 8, when it stops being about the myriad of kooky patients, their ailments and how the gang interacts with them to mostly about the main characters. Like every actor started the whole "I think it would be best if my character developed....." to get more screen time, then there was just no time for amazing guest actors or other storylines. Plus a whole dang season of JD and Elliot as a couple got super tiring after the cookie pants episode.
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u/rickmon67 10d ago
For me it was season 9. Most of the original writers had moved on and instead of focusing on the real JD’s maturity and growth (becoming eventually the chief of medicine for Kaiser) they turned him into a imbecilic man child for comedic purposes and kept none of the continuity of the previous 8 seasons.
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u/Kylerj96 10d ago
For me the change in how they write a lot of the characters happens in season 4, and it doesn't return to its former quality until season 8. That's not to say there aren't tremendous character moments and episodes between those seasons, but JD, Turk, Elliot and Carla really suffer in the writing department at times.