Scrubs premieres February 25, 8pm on ABC. Weekly episodes will stream the next day on Hulu.
By Elazar Abrahams
Slight confession from a true television aficionado: until sitting down to watch this new revival, I had never seen a single episode of Scrubs, the popular hospital-set sitcom that ran on NBC in the early aughts.
My wife, on the other hand, would rank it among her all-time favorites. So we watched the first four episodes of its return together, which turned out to be the perfect way to experience a novelty like this – the tenth season of a show that last aired in 2010.
The refreshed Scrubs works both as a nostalgia vehicle for fans and a decent hangout for newcomers. And it’s certainly a huge step up from the infamous Season 9, which many fans don’t even consider canon. The 22-minute installments bring the show back to familiar rhythms: Zach Braff’s protagonist J.D. drifting off into quirky daydreams and narration, quick jingle transitions to silly cutaways, and an earnest tone that warms your heart after making you laugh. It is comfort food TV from what is now a bygone era.
There are, of course, reminders that things have changed since the last visit to Sacred Heart Hospital, including a funny change in the show’s intro. Whereas we once saw Braff hanging up an X-ray, the actor now swipes up on an iPad.
There are new characters here, mostly interns that have their own drama going on, but they feel positioned as supporting pieces instead of the main event. A show like Scrubs earns a deepened relationship with its characters over time, so while I just don’t see enough beyond surface-level archetypes in these youngsters so far, that could change quickly.
Where the revival really succeeds is in the return of the core trio’s energy. Braff and co-star Donald Faison still have that dynamite bromance chemistry, and the show knows exactly what to deploy when it wants the audience to smile. Even if you don’t know the history, the friendship is instantly legible. Sarah Chalke slips right back into Elliot too. The personality is fully intact: the nervous energy, the high-pitched angry voice, the clumsy awkwardness. Whether you find that endearing or grating will depend on your tolerance for Elliot, but the revival is clearly trying to reassure fans that the characters haven’t been flattened into generic “older versions” of themselves.
That reassurance is also where the revival runs into its biggest growing pain: the show feels like it is still warming up emotionally and comedically. To parrot my watching partner here, her main critique is that, at least so far, it doesn’t hit as hard as she remembers. Not as funny, not as moving. That could be nostalgia talking, but it could also be that the revival is spending its early episodes on reintroductions and recalibration.
There are also some notable absences. Dr. Cox, one of the show’s defining engines, dips out after the premiere. Carla, who is arguably the soul of the ensemble, is touch and go. If you’re bringing Scrubs back, fans want the full buffet, not the greatest hits platter with a few key sides missing. The Janitor’s absence is also felt, especially with another janitor floating around the hospital. And if Dr. Kelso is still alive in this universe, one question lingers: where is he?
The revival also introduces some new friction that may be doing too much too soon. The biggest shock is that J.D. and Elliot are divorced. The show clearly needs some tension, so why not break up the original series’ endgame?.
As a first-time viewer watching with a superfan, it passed the essential test… it made us smile.
I give Scrubs a B.
TV and City 