Line #35 Awesome/ER


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3	[[folder:General]]
4	* Virtually all outdoor episodes -- in which ER doctors prove that they're as good in the field as in the hospital.
5	* Anytime the words "Mass casualty alert" are said you're about to see some terrifying and amazingly awesome things happen as the entire ER staff mobilizes to respond to critical injuries and an overwhelming number of patients all at once. Things like a 50 car pileup in a blizzard, a high-speed police chase which ends in an overturned school bus, and the very last scene of the show when the call comes in for an industrial accident. Its no wonder they decided to end the series on one of these moments.
6	* Any of the long, frantic "[[TheOner oner]]" scenes are a [=CMOA=] for the cast and crew.
7	* Archie Morris' [[CharacterDevelopment development]] into a [[TookALevelInBadass seriously competent professional]] qualifies. When Carter tells him to "set the tone" as he departs in Season 11 (similar to how Greene told him to do so), Morris is too hungover to quite grasp the words. This leads an amused Carter to shake his head and reply, "Never mind", as if to retract the sentiment upon realizing that his chosen successor isn't emotionally mature enough to handle things yet. However, after getting taken hostage in Season 14 and seeing his taker (with whom he had bonded over the course of the episode) get shot dead by a sniper, Archie Morris is left shaken and grounded, and it causes him to mature quite a bit and take on a more mature role as a leader of the hospital. The death of his best friend, Greg Pratt, further forces him to confront life's harsh realities, and by the end, he's become one of the most competent doctors in the ER (and maintained a steady relationship with his police officer girlfriend). When Carter makes a return in the final season, [[CallBack he's quick to notice the shift in personality]]:
8	-->'''Carter''': [[SoProudOfYou Looks like you followed my advice, Archie]].\
9	'''Morris''': How's that?\
10	'''Carter''': [[SugarWiki/HeartwarmingMoments You set the tone]].
11	** Made all the better by Archie's faint smile, indicating that he recognizes the significance of the allusion.
12	** Abby [[LampshadeHanging lampshades]] the growth, as well.
13	--->'''Abby''': If I were in trouble, Archie, [[TheConfidant I would call for you. I would. I would trust you with anything]]. ''(Beat)'' And I didn't always feel that way, but I do now.
14	** The very last scene in the series finale is a perfect example of the product of his development, as Morris methodically triages the arriving victims of a power substation explosion in County General's ambulance bay.
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17	[[folder:Season 1]]
18	* Peter Benton does a ruptured abdominal aneurysm in the {{Pilot}}, despite the fact that he was just a resident, had practically no idea what he was doing, and had (to start with) almost no one to help him do it.
19	* In "The Birthday Party", Doug establishes himself as a PapaWolf as he [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENTTGtgNPUc punches out]] an {{Abusive Parent}} after discovering that his boot matched the shoe print he found on his daughter's back.
20	* "Dr. Bob", a Polish immigrant who for most of her appearances in Season 1 worked as a clerk in the ER, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7BDAht29sUk performs an emergency procedure on a patient and saves his life]]. It turns out that in her home country she was a cardiothoracic surgeon and was studying for her board exams while doing scut work at County.
21	** This later leads to a minor [[SugarWiki/HeartwarmingMoments CMoH]] when Carter finds her in tears, thinking she's ruined her chances of ever getting certified in the US. Carter reassures her, offers to help her with her English for the board exams, and escorts her back into the reception area, where "Dr. Bob" is greeted with applause and cheers by the rest of the staff.
22	** This entire episode "Blizzard" is actually a Moment of Awesome for the show. It's really the first time we've seen the ER respond to a "mass casualty" incident full force. In this case over 100 patients from a car crash all at once. And they go all out in this episode really showing what it is when this kind of things hits a major trauma center. The staff mobilize as if they're going into battle, complete with a full on slow motion LockAndLoadMontage and a TeamShot before the patients start coming in.
23	* In "Feb 5, '95", Benton berates Nurse Haleh for writing down a procedure before Benton ordered it. She proceeds to make him write down everything and even clarify initials that she has been using for decades. When Benton complains about her to Carol, she rejects his complaint and tells him to get off his high horse and recognize that it's the nurses who run the hospital and that while he is still technically "in training", Haleh already graduated and has been an ER nurse for over 20 years.
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25
26	[[folder:Season 2]]
27	* Peter Benton stares down an abusive Cop husband whose wife came in for treatment after suffering his abuse. He says to him, "What do you think when you're beating her? What a big man you are?"
28	** Then the very nice follow up later in the episode when said cop is brought into the ER. The other cops (one of whom Benton tipped off to the fact that the guy was beating his wife) claim that the guy fell down some stairs while chasing a suspect, but it's pretty obvious that they took him somewhere and beat the crap out of him.
29	* Peter Benton punches a prick orthopedic equipment salesman who parked in his spot. The guy challenged him to do something about it, so Peter threw his case of equipment out. The guy then tried to take a swing at him with a prosthetic leg, so Peter ducked and then punched him in the face.
30	* Doug Ross' rescue of a boy trapped in a flooding storm drain, under increasingly difficult circumstances, in "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bMxr5oM9GFI Hell and High Water]]". The shot of him triumphantly emerging from the river after getting the boy out is one of the most memorable in the show's decade-and-a-half run. It started the tradition of having one episode a season where one of the main characters must perform medical feats away from the ER, most of which are also [=CMoA=]s. The episode was also the highest rated in the show's history, pulling in 48 million viewers.
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32
33	[[folder:Season 3]]
34	* In "Fear of Flying", Dennis Gant, fed up with Benton's criticism, snaps at him, "You're a real prick, you know that?" Pretty ballsy considering Benton could have disciplined or even fired him for that.
35	** In the same episode, mild-mannered Abby Keaton ripping Benton a new one for his arrogant presumption in thinking that he knows better than one of the best pediatric surgeons in the country.
36	--->'''Keaton''': I didn't ''ask'' for your ''judgment!''
37	* In "Homeless for the Holidays", Jeanie Boulet voluntarily outs herself to her co-workers as HIV-positive not for their sympathy but so that they will stop talking about her in the hypothetical.
38	* In the season finale, Carter standing up for himself and his patients by shouting at Anspaugh when he won't get off Carter's back about doing his surgical rounds, while Carter is right in the middle of trying to help an elderly couple get into a nursing home together. [[ReasonableAuthorityFigure Anspaugh]] ends up backing down with some evident respect for the young doctor for doing what is best for the patients and standing up to him, and later allows him switch from surgery to working down in the ER when Carter requests it.
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41	[[folder:Season 4]]
42	* "Ambush", the live episode. Something like this had never been done with this type of show and while it wasn't perfect, overall, the cast and crew did a very good job of pulling it off.
43	** What makes the episode especially impressive is that not only did the crew pull off a live episode- they did it twice. One live episode for the East Coast feed, one for the West Coast.
44	** From the same episode, Kerry telling off the cameraman for even suggesting that certain patients get preferential treatment.
45	* "Fathers and Sons" - After listening to Mark whine and moan about his relationship with his father, Doug tells Mark to stop feeling sorry for himself.
46	* In "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61c9hiYdZXM Exodus]]", Carter takes charge after the hospital is contaminated by benzene and Kerry is incapacitated by the fumes. He takes an impossible situation and does the best he can with it, resulting in a lot of lives saved and him earning a personal commendation by the leader of the hazard team, even as the latter is calling out the whole situation as a complete mess that should never have happened. Even [[ByronicHero Benton]] defers to Carter during the course of this episode as he takes charge.
47	* Carter’s med student suddenly goes into anaphylactic shock (he has an allergy to latex) during a trauma and collapses. Without missing a beat, Carter is able to quickly resuscitate him while giving instructions to the nurses to help the patient.
48	* A husband and wife are brought in after the wife had tried to run her husband over. Since the man is a cop, his coworkers are ready to arrest his wife but Carter notices she has signs of abuse and refuses to cooperate, even dumping possible evidence away ''in front of the police''.
49	* Herb Spivak, Mark’s lawyer, successfully shocking a man in cardiac arrest.
50	* For a few episodes, there's been a serial rapist sexually assaulting and mutilating elderly women. When the guy has finally been found, he's brought to the ER after being shot by the police. But unlike the other traumas we've seen, almost everyone seems to be moving slower, as if they’re in no rush to help the guy. [[BewareTheNiceOnes Carter outright refuses]] to waste perfectly good fresh blood on him during the procedure and opts to autotransfuse him with his own blood, ignoring the risk and Anna's misgivings on the matter.
51	--> '''Carter''': ''"If they find the guy that did this, they should take him out back, shoot him and toss his body in the dumpster."''
52	* Kerry's speech to Ellis West in "Carter's Choice".
53	--> “You used me. That's what we've been about. You used me to get this deal. I don't like being used! You underestimated me once. And you were right to. But don't underestimate me again.”
54	* In a Season 4 episode, Greene is with his father at a VA hospital after a COPD episode when a multi-patient trauma arrives. Greene ends up enlisted to assist when a previously-stable patient codes while the other ER doctors are all busy on other codes.
55	* Corday was treating a patient whose leg and voice she'd saved earlier. The patient was coding and Corday and Romano tried to revive her. Romano was ready to give up but Elizabeth just wouldn't accept that a patient she'd worked so hard on would just die. Romano tells her its over. Corday tells him to stop being such a prick and eventually revives her.
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58	[[folder:Season 5]]
59	* Peter Benton doing procedures on a patient strapped to a load of dynamite. They trigger a detonator and everyone else clears the room before it blows. Peter just takes the detonator and throws it before ducking down, surviving unscathed.
60	* Doctor Benton is filling in [[FishOutOfWater at a small backwater hospital]] in the DeepSouth, and spends the episode gradually adjusting to his new environment, and gaining the trust of some of the racist locals. When it's time for him to go home, there is an explosion at a dock, and he ends up performing [[MeatgrinderSurgery some very expedited]] emergency medicine on a badly injured man, assisted by one of the aforementioned racist locals. This emergency work included using a large roll of saran wrap as a bandage due to the large gash in the patient's midsection.
61	** [[MoodWhiplash Saran wrap which the local had been forced to steal]] [[SugarWiki/FunnyMoments when a shop owner wouldn't give it to him willingly]].
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63
64	[[folder:Season 6]]
65	* In the Season 6 premiere "Leave It to Weaver", admissions clerk Randi punches out a patient who pulled the fire alarm because he was angry that the doctors wouldn't take his migraine headache ahead of the massive trauma they were dealing with.
66	-->'''Kerry''': Stay down. You move, and I'll let her at you.
67	* In "Last Rites", [[NervesOfSteel Malucci]] ropes Carter into [[ScrewTheRulesImDoingWhatsRight stealing paramedic gear with him]] and [[BigDamnHeroes charging together to the scene]] of a construction accident not too far away from the hospital to help out the injured among the rubble. Regardless of the trouble they got in over it afterwards from Kerry, they succeeded in their efforts.
68	* In "Truth & Consequences", Kerry not-so-subtly shames Malucci for snooping when she finds out that he's been asking everyone why she uses a cane. She [[TranquilFury cheerfully]] approaches him and casually tells him that if he wants to know, he can just ask her. He awkwardly responds that he would never do that, as it isn't any of his business, and she pointedly tells him, "No. It's ''not''."
69	* Gabe Lawrence saving one more life as he leaves the hospital after recognizing his encroaching Alzheimer's Disease.
70	* Malucci's OffscreenMomentOfAwesome where he leaves the hospital to track down some drug dealers pretending to be a pharmacy, after finding out they were preying on a hospitalized Hispanic couple he and Cleo were treating and were responsible for their hospitalization. Malucci poses as another prospective victim, before taking some evidence against them, being assaulted in the process, but managing to escape back to the hospital to give the evidence to the police and protect the couple.
71	* In "The Domino Heart", there's Corday's final confrontation with the serial killer who'd been psychologically tormenting her for weeks, coming up with the one way to beat him as she declares the very reason why she's unambiguously better than him, and she'll never be seeing him again. Then she turns and walks out, leaving him to impotently shout for her to come back.
72	* Mark is treating a patient who has revoked her DNR order. Kerry, of course, objects and tries to take control of the situation. First by suggesting that Mark's in no condition to handle the case because of his mother's recent death, then by threatening to take over the patient's care, and finally by nagging him endlessly as he tries to revive the woman. A fed-up Mark finally grows a pair and yells at her "[[BigShutUp Shut up]], Kerry or GetOut!" And she finally shuts up.
73	* [[PapaWolf Malucci]] assaulting a father who raped his daughter when he finds it out from the little girl, and later stitching the man up without anesthetics so it hurts him more, before the police arrive to take him away.
74	* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbGT_DDP86Q Doug and Carol's reunion]] in "Such Sweet Sorrow", the penultimate episode of Season 6. So spectacular that it garnered several immediate imitators (similar scenarios for character departures on ''Series/GeneralHospital'' and ''Series/{{CSI}})'', and so memorable and iconic that ''sixteen years later'', when word got out that Micheal Weatherly would be departing ''Series/{{NCIS}}'', fans immediately began clamoring for producers to "bring back Creator/CoteDePablo (Ziva) so that they can write them off like Doug and Carol."
75	* In the season finale, after an [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6vE5PagPS8 unsuccessful group intervention]] alongside Mark, Kerry, Jing-Mei and Anspaugh, Benton tries to convince Carter to attend rehab, only to be punched in the face by his protégé. Carter [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone immediately regrets this and tears up]], and Benton remains steadfast in his desire to help:
76	-->'''Benton:''' Carter, you wanna fight? That's cool, man, but either way, you're getting your ass in that van.
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79	[[folder:Season 7]]
80	* In "Benton Backwards", Luka actually kills a man who tried to mug him and Abby during their first date. Even better, he managed to recover quickly and beat him up mercilessly after said mugger blind-sided him. Unfortunately, Luka then felt rather guilty about the whole incident.
81	* In "The Visit", [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3YMzsP7fV8 Benton gets into a brawl with Malucci]], who really needed to be taken down a peg, for referring to his dead nephew Jesse as a "banger."
82	** He also elbows [[BadBoss Kerry Weaver]] in the face when she tries to intervene in the fight, whether on purpose or by accident/in the heat of the moment is unclear.
83	* In an early Season 7 episode, Abby (as a nurse) assists with the delivery of a micro-preemie who does not survive. When she returns with the husband to find a doctor with a group of med students "showing off" the baby, Abby then proceeds to rip into him about giving the father false hope and then puts him in his place regarding how to show compassion to the family. The doctor is left speechless.
84	* In the penultimate episode of Season 7, Mark treats a boy with signs of parental abuse. The father comes in, insisting that he wasn't abused, the boy finally admits the abuse and DCFS put him in protective custody. In the season finale, the father snaps and goes on a rampage, shooting up anyone and everyone who gets in his way as well as the people who helped get his son some medical treatment. He shot ''nineteen people'', killing at least nine of them, including the neighbour who brought in the son, and injuring at least twelve of them, including Adele Newman (the social worker who often worked with the staff, especially Doug Ross). Mark suspects that he might try to go after Elizabeth and their baby. Finally, the father gets shot by one of his victims and is taken to County where the ER doctors work to stabilize him. The father keeps screaming for his son and threatening to kill anyone who helped take him away. He sees Greene and starts threatening him as well. Greene finds out that the shooter would have gone to his house if he hadn't been shot. They stabilize him and take him up to the OR. Greene finds himself alone with the shooter when the elevator doors unexpectedly close. The shooter starts coding and Greene prepares to defibrillate. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHe55XbVLaE He looks in the shooter's eyes and instead decides to let him die]], shocking the air so that the monitor will show he attempted to save him. The shooter looks in Greene's eyes before he dies.
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86
87	[[folder:Season 8]]
88	* In "I'll Be Home for Christmas", on Peter's last day at County, he manages to save a six-year old boy who was accidentally shot by his mother. Romano claimed the boy was a goner. Peter told him to either shut up and help or get out.
89	* In "A Simple Twist of Fate", Luka [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFreb5ELj60 beating the crap]] out of Abby's abusive neighbor Brian, after the latter beat her to a bloody pulp for convincing his wife Joyce to leave him.
90	** The best part of the scene is the entire confrontation takes place in a crowded bar, yet ''no one'' does anything to stop Luka. Either they are that intimidated by him or they all know this guy used to beat up his wife.
91	* Kerry Weaver bodily ''throwing'' herself into an ambulance surrounded by rogue, sparking electrical wires in the middle of a torrential downpour and, with the help of Michael Gallant, performing ''an emergency C-section'' which saves both mother and baby.
92	** In that same episode, Sandy Lopez saving Kerry -- a.k.a. her future wife -- from a crashing telephone pole, and Gallant living up to his name by trying to save a firefighter who was being electrocuted.
93	* Luka reciting Hamlet's soliloquy ("To be or not to be") in Croatian in "Secret & Lies".
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95
96	[[folder:Season 9]]
97	* Luka saving Romano's life in the season premiere after a helicopter rotor chops off his arm.
98	* In "A Thousand Cranes", after being pulled over and harassed by some bigoted cops, Pratt and Gallant are now treating one of them:
99	-->'''Pratt''': This must be pretty scary for you, huh? All the white folks are gone and now it's just you and a couple of niggers with knives.\
100	''(Cop's heart monitor beeps rapidly)''
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102
103	[[folder:Season 10]]
104	* In "Impulse Control", Sam punches out a patient's abusive boyfriend after he makes the mistake of grabbing her arm.
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106
107	[[folder:Season 12]]
108	* In "No Place to Hide", Kerry walks into the ER after her surgery, without her cane for the first time in her life.
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110
111	[[folder:Season 13]]
112	* In the season premiere "Bloodline", Sam ruthlessly and fatally shoots her abusive ex-husband [[DomesticAbuser Steve Curtis]] three times with his own gun.
113	* Morris growing a pair and telling off {{Jerkass}} surgeon Dr. Crenshaw, to the point of almost bringing the guy to tears.
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115
116	[[folder:Season 14]]
117	* Luka slugging Dr. Moretti for taking advantage of a drunken Abby.
118	[[/folder]]
119
120	[[folder:Season 15]]
121	* All of the original cast members as well as some of the secondary/tertiary ones who joined in Seasons 2-4 not only returning for the final season, but stepping back into character as though it had been merely days instead of years that they had played the role.
122	* In "Heal Thyself", Cate Banfield has a flashback of the time her son was treated at County years before. The audience is viewing the scene from the inside of the ambulance. The ambulance stops. The doors open...and we see [[TheHero Mark Greene]] for the first time in six years.
123	-->"Welcome to County General, I'm Dr. Greene."
124	* Morris chasing out an over-eager med student when Carter starts coding during pericardiocentesis.
125	--> '''Morris''': Okay, that is an ER attending. This is not a teaching case. So please, turn around, walk out, get your attending and come back now.
126	--> '''Student''': I'm sure Dr. Wheeler would prefer I examine-
127	--> '''Morris''': I'm trying to remain professional here, but if you're not walking away from me within three seconds, I swear to God I may start doing compressions ''on your head''.
128	* In "Old Times", Benton observes Carter's kidney transplant and takes charge, forcing the surgeon in charge to run through the universal "Safe Surgery Checklist", much to the latter man's annoyance. It pays off when they end up needing reperfusion solution and thanks to one of the nurses raising the issue while going through the checklist, they have some ready[[note]]Without it, the kidney would not have been viable for transplant[[/note]].
129	* The [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZ98ke7ma3s last few minutes of the series finale]]. Specifically, the staff evaluating the victims of an industrial accident, combined with the full theme music, and the pullback shot of the hospital exterior. It was really a shining example of what ER did best.
130	[[/folder]]

Context Awesome / ER