“ The policeman calls the ER, requesting a chair (nine out ten members of the LAPD recommend sitting after trauma to the head). ”
Previously on City of Angels: Dr. Turner was in a tizzy because his broom-closet buddy Dr. Lilian Price was accepting a job at UCLA; Ron Harris got mad at Price for the umpteenth time, a severed hand found its way into a diabetic meal; and we got all kinds of foreshadowing for this week's heavy make-out session between Price and Turner. Two more pages, kids, and you'll get to hear about some Vivica Fox-on-Blair Underwood action!
Shout outs to Wing Chun and Pamie -- keep ya heads up, yo! My dear friend Heather Cocks wasn't able to make it over this week, so I've fashioned a crude puppet made of granite and bamboo to take Heather's place. I shall call her Bamboo Heather.
Gospel vocals up on a helicopter shot of an early-morning L.A. skyline. We pan to Angels of Mercy hospital, then go inside to see a tiny stegosaurus pressed up against a window. This stegosaurus is being held by a very large man, who is holding the hand of another man. They are father and son. As they walk through the waiting room, everybody stands up in shock. We come around to reveal the older man has a large hatchet lodged in his skull. If it weren't for Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire? somebody from Fox would be running in to sign him for his own reality special. The Hatchet Man politely pushes someone aside and whispers to the attendant, "I'd like to see a doctor." The attendant, who's busy with some of Dr. Price's prescribed paperwork, tells him to keep his trousers on. Then she looks up and reacts less than hospitably. "Oh that's funny," she says, thinking it's a prank. "My dad, he hurt," the younger man says. The attendant begins to realize it is indeed a real hatchet whacked into a real skull, and gets up to find a doctor. A policeman comes in to see what the hubbub is about. "Holy moley!" he says. "Help my daddy," the obviously mentally-challenged younger man tells him. The policeman calls the ER, requesting a chair (nine out ten members of the LAPD recommend sitting after trauma to the head), then starts pushing onlookers back, lest they disturb Hatchet Man, who has a benign, pleasant smile on his face as if he was just told his value meal will be super-sized for free. An attendant wheels in a chair and does a double take when he sees the hatchet. "Damn," he says. He carefully gets the man into the chair, then tells the son to let go. "It's alright Leon," Hatchet Man says, patting Leon's stegosaurus-holding hand. They wheel out Daddy, hatchet-first, into the OR. Leon begins crying, shouting, "I want my daddy!" The policeman tries to restrain Leon, but is pushed through a glass door. Leon blubbers some more and is tackled by four burly police officers and orderlies who just happened to be waiting for somebody to grab onto. "Did you see that?" I ask Bamboo Heather. A piece of her falls off and lands in my glass of V-8 Splash.
The full Artist Formerly Known as Prince "Gett Off" wail accompanies the opening credits. When we come back from commercials, Dr. Price is addressing a meeting of the hospital staff in preparation for the big Jayko accreditation. If the last two episodes are any indication, Price gives more speeches than George W. Bush and John McCain combined. She reminds everybody to be as anal as she is, and not to forget about their call assignments. "A certain individual in pedes...Dr. Syfax" crossed her name on the sheet and forgot to tell anybody. Way to discuss personnel issues in front of the whole staff. Because Dr. Anna Syfax is the woman currently competing with Price for the attentions of Dr. "You'll be seeing my new Kufi hat later in the episode" Turner, this may be a public catfight. Anna responds by saying she didn't know about it and wants to know if there were any problems. Price says there weren't, but that this is the kind of thing that could sink the ship. Dr. Turner sits back and enjoys the glow of being the most sought-after surgeon among the ladies. Ben Turner and Anna Syfax exchange looks as the meeting comes to a close.
Walking down the hall, Turner asks Anna about the missed call assignment. Anna says that something came up and it slipped her mind. Let's see -- undergraduate work, four years of medical school, three years of residency and it "slipped your mind"? Even Bamboo Heather is getting suspicious. Ever suave, Turner asks Anna where she was last Thursday. She comes clean, saying she was having dinner with an old boyfriend. Turner fails to come remotely close to telling her what broom closet he was in last Thursday. Anna says that it was a last-minute thing and she didn't think Turner would mind. "As long as it stays secular," he says. Anna doesn't even blink at that one. Instead, she says that while nothing happened, the conversation was serious. Her ex-boyfriend had moved to Indiana before they could get engaged and now he's back. And he wants to settle down. With. Her. (Note to Dr. Turner: this is what's called a jealousy play. I read about it in The Rules. Pick up a copy.) Anna says that the conversation got her thinking and after two years with Dr. Turner, she's not sure where they're going. Turner says, "I guess we have to talk about this," as if he's not too eager to schedule "relationship time" in his Palm Pilot. He promises to make time for it, she says he never does, and then his pager conveniently goes off. Must be one of those new "Relationship Bailout Pagers For Men" I see advertised in Maxim. Turner starts walking off as Anna boards the elevator. He says, "Later," as she crosses her arms and shakes her head, smiling. She's thinking, "I don't care how he treats me, I just want to hear about how good he looks shirtless on page three of this recap."
“ Nurse Patterson says that about three to four inches of the axe is stuck in the man's head. Turner corrects both me and Patterson: 'Hatchet. Axes are bigger.' Sure, whatever. Just keep it secular, Dr. Turner. ”
Turner enters the emergency room where Dr. Williams is waiting to tell him about Mabry Matthews, a.k.a. The Axe Man. Williams says that except for the obvious, the man seems okay. Nurse Patterson says that about three to four inches of the axe is stuck in the man's head. Turner corrects both me and Patterson: "Hatchet. Axes are bigger." Sure, whatever. Just keep it secular, Dr. Turner. Turner gets everybody to step aside. Mabry the Hatchet Man, who looks so incredibly friendly that you just want to nuzzle him by the hatchet handle, says he'd like to see his son. Williams reports that the forty-year-old son, Leon, broke a window by throwing a police officer into it. Mabry says his son is sensitive and that he can't leave the boy alone. Turner examines the wound with a pen light to confirm that yes, this guy's got a friggin' hatchet in his head. Dr. Weiss, who never actually says anything, stands by watching, with his arms crossed. This is what he and his fellow Beastie Boys call "Representin'." Turner asks Mabry not to move his head. He says, "This may sound like a silly question, but are you feeling any pain?" "Just a little headache," the man says. Bamboo Heather giggles. The man says he'd like some aspirin. Turner says he'll get him something for the pain, but that it's important that he not take anything orally. Like, say, a hatchet. Mabry says he feels very calm, and Turner says that some of the frontal lobe may have been severed. "You mean like a lobotomy," Weiss says, right to the patient's face. "Partial lobotomy, yeah," Turner responds. While Turner examines the patient's ears (for what, hatchet wax?) Mabry tells the story of what happened. After a movie, he and his son came home and there were "bad guys" in the house. His son, who (he says) is gentle as a lamb, couldn't do anything. Mabry chased them to the backyard, and thing you know, dad's got a hatchet in his head: "Am I going to die?" Turner says that Mabry has beaten a lot of odds to get this far, and the prognosis is pretty good. Turner asks about any family they might call. Mabry says that he has a sister, but that she doesn't want anything to do with them. And not just because of the hatchet. Mabry again asks the doctors to bring Leon over. Walking off, Weiss tells Turner that this must be a case for the record books. But not the Nielsen record books. Ha ha ha ha! Oh, I kid City of Angels about its ratings. Turner says he's seen a similar case before involving an ice pick, but not with Sharon Stone. In that case, when they took out the ice pick, the patient suffered massive cranial bleeding and died. Like the hatchet, it was holding in all the heady goodness. Dr. Williams has done a neurosurgery rotation, so it looks like he'll be performing the honors. Turner orders a CT and tells Williams that whatever he does, he should not touch the hatchet. They also have to shoo away some people who are taking photos with a pleasant Mabry.