One of the biggest new TV hits of 2025 was HBO Max’s The Pitt, an American medical drama. Given its central star, Noah Wyle, and its creator, R. Scott Gemmill, both having worked on Michael Crichton’s medical drama classic ER, the ER parallels were unmistakable. The show was praised for a great many things, including a focus on realism, its 24-esque real-time season formula, and for how it felt like a return to a TV-season model that many of us are nostalgic for. Only eight months after the final episode of season one aired, the second season debuted in January 2026. It was a quick turnaround for the show, which, as the second season was being rolled out, had awards from multiple ceremonies thrown its way. Although the second season took some bold swings concerning challenging our relationship with its central character, the second season was largely more of the same (albeit with new cases and storylines), and, in the case of a television show executed at this high a level, that was mostly a welcome sight. It wasn’t without some notable missteps, though, and some of these were directly tied to the nature of its formula.
The second season of The Pitt, like the first season, takes place over the course of an entire 15-hour shift for the medical staff at the Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Hospital ER. Instead of following the first season by focusing on the very next day, it jumps several months into the future to July 4th — America’s Independence Day. The writers have made it so that it is on this very day that Langdon (played by Patrick Ball) returns from rehab and that ‘Robby’ (played by Noah Wyle) is planning a sabbatical to take place when the shift ends. This time jump means that the young doctors from season one are more experienced, while new, young medical students are learning the ropes, and a new attending physician, Dr. Al-Hashimi (played by Sepideh Moafi), is making her entrance. As the hours go by, characters must deal with a cyberattack and ICE agents, among other things.
Before I shower this show with more praise, let’s address some of the issues or missteps that are clear to see in season two. As is the case with many television shows that swear by a strict formula, there is some level of convenience to the events depicted on screen. It is a little bit far-fetched that all of these major events happen on the very same day, and on Independence Day of all days. This is especially true when it comes to 1) a major malpractice lawsuit deposition happening on a national holiday and 2) Robby, who the show makes clear didn’t want to have a confrontation with Langdon before he went on his sabbatical, choosing this day to be his last.
I think my biggest problem with this season, though, was with how some major season one characters felt sidelined by storylines that didn’t go anywhere particularly interesting or that removed them from the action. Taylor Dearden’s bubbly, neurodivergent Dr. King was a fan-favorite character in season one, but, for some reason, they opted for her to have this major deposition be her most significant event this season, despite the fact that it happens off-screen. Then there’s Fiona Dourif’s Dr. McKay. While McKay does have a strong emotional storyline later in the season, I thought the way the season opened for her (with a doctor-patient romance tease that went absolutely nowhere) indicated that the writers didn’t always know what to do with the entirety of their cast. I’ll also add that having Dr. Al-Hashimi be the foil for Wyle through the first half of the season’s AI focus (Al-Hashimi is promoting an AI-charting app) didn’t go in a particularly strong direction. Initially, it felt like the show was going to make a big statement about artificial intelligence, but it felt to me like it never really delivered the big swing that they had been building to with this subplot.
However, in general, the new cast inclusions worked really well. Sepideh Moafi made for a great new attending to butt heads with Robby, even though her mental health storyline lacked proper resolution. Irene Choi, Lucas Iverson, and Laëtitia Hollard were all great as the savvy Joy Kwon, the ambitious and often infuriating medical student James Ogilvie, and the kind nurse-in-training Emma Nolan, respectively. I will say that Ogilvie was an absolutely infuriating character, but, at the same time, I think it is also probably very realistic that some young aspiring doctors fail to recognize that this is a caring profession, where you have to meet people face-to-face, meet them at eye level, and show care, which includes kindness and respect. One of my favorite storylines this season, and which really affected me (as someone who has to think about his weight more than most), was the subplot involving an obese patient with whom Ogilvie was unnecessarily curt. I obviously found this to be absolutely infuriating, but my heart was warmed by the love, respect, and professionalism that McKay, Robby, and Whitaker all showed him. I really related to the patient’s tendency to want to apologize for any inconvenience, and it made me very emotional to see how caring the medical professionals were.
Another highlight storyline this season was the way the show handled the Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner subplot, which had Katherine LaNasa’s nurse Dana Evans front and center. Everyone involved in this was note-perfect, and I thought it was especially good to see the anger that LaNasa showed when she found out officers hadn’t come to pick up rape kits. This subplot should be commended for its focus on compassion, accuracy and realism in showcasing the steps that go into this procedure, and the importance of demanding that law enforcement takes this seriously.
In addition to these highlight storylines, I will add that I thought the ICE storyline was handled really well. There had been a lot of talk going into the episodes in which the storyline took place that the writers had been asked to be more balanced about what they were showing — whatever that means. But I have to say that I didn’t think the episodes held back. It was genuinely upsetting and infuriating to watch. It hadn’t crossed my mind that their appearing in the hospital would lead to not only patients leaving but also hospital workers, and I thought the show got to depict the anger that the medical staff felt in a way that made sense.
Let’s talk about the big swing that I teased at the start of my review. One of the interesting choices that the writers made this season was to take our image of Robby as this pristine but emotional doctor who could do no wrong, and add some blemishes, some of which were more significant than others. I think some of these scenes worked better than others. ‘Physician heal thyself’ is not a new idea on The Pitt, and it isn’t the first time Robby has been walking down that path, but while a great many scenes with him being unusually curt worked as intended, other scenes — especially the subplot involving Dr. Mohan (played by Supriya Ganesh) — left something to be desired. Given the convenience of Langdon’s return and Robby’s exit, it was always apparent that their eventual heart-to-heart was going to be extremely consequential, but I’m not sure the scene had the oomph that I had expected it to carry, given the build-up that led up to it.
One could argue that writerly conclusions and resolutions are not very realistic, and I would even agree with that in many cases. Indeed, you can’t expect a season of the show to naturally find resolution for each and every storyline if you want it to be the kind of social realism show that is honest about systems and people. At the same time, this is also a narrative with a beginning, middle, and end, even though it has a real-time structure, and so it can be tricky in the long run to have resolutions take place off-screen for characters, even though change often happens more gradually than over the course of a single shift. One of the challenges of this show’s formula is balancing creating satisfying resolutions in a single season and leaving room for off-screen developments (as we’re getting time-jumps every season) without it feeling dissatisfying. Having said all that, I think the show is doing a good job of that thus far, but it will be interesting to see what changes have happened when the next season starts and what relationships or statuses remain unnaturally static. Realistically, Robby’s mental health problems will be a permanent fixture of the show, but I also sense that the show needs to be careful about frontloading his physician heal thyself storyline for three seasons in a row, but I digress; that’s more of a future potential issue than a problem the show has right now.
On the whole, I found the second season of The Pitt to be incredibly emotionally investing and gripping. The cases shown this season in major storylines were deeply affecting and allowed the show to emphasize systemic issues, the hard work and dedication that go into some of the more challenging and traumatic procedures that take place in an emergency room, and to show that medical staff — nurses and doctors both — are in a caring profession where kindness, respect, and professionalism outweigh self-serving ambition. In addition to featuring strong and deeply affecting work from the show’s leads, Noah Wyle and Katherine LaNasa (and its recurring star Shawn Hatosy), the second season also gave room for new additions to shine, as well as make clear just how far someone like Gerran Howell’s Whitaker has come as a doctor. I loved it.
– Review written by Jeffrey Rex Bertelsen.
