25 Years Ago, ‘ER’ Aired One of the Best Episodes of Television Ever

In 1994, ER premiered. Back then, broadcast shows were recognized with Emmy Awards (ER won 23), social media was not yet around, promos didn’t spoil surprises to come, and the medical drama delivered quite a few shockers over the years, none more notable than the two-part “Be Still My Heart” and “All in the Family,” with the latter (inarguably) one of the best episodes in the genre still to this day. (It was nominated for four Emmys, including Directing for Jonathan Kaplan. It deserved it. The episode won for Single Camera Picture Editing.)

If these episodes first aired today, the clock wouldn’t even have the chance to turn from 10:59 to 11:00 before it would be all over social media that, in the final moments of the first, Carter (Noah Wyle) had been stabbed by schizophrenic patient Paul Sobriki (David Krumholtz) and discovered, to his horror, that his med student, Lucy (Kellie Martin), was laying on the ground, bleeding out, in one of the show’s best cliffhangers. If you didn’t watch live, if you’d paused the episode for any reason, you would be spoiled. But in 2000, that wasn’t the case. I remember watching these episodes live. I remember staring in shock at the TV after “Be Still My Heart” and having to wait another week, to February 17, 2000, 25 years ago today, to find out if Carter and Lucy would live or die. (It’s been long enough that there’s no spoiler alert here.) Then what aired was beautifully tragic, well-written, directed, and acted, and unforgettable.

Doctors having to treat one or more of their own has been done time and time again. It was done multiple times throughout ER‘s run. Each is memorable (Mekhi Phifer’s Pratt? Heartbreaking). But nothing reaches the level of “All in the Family,” a standout episode of television for how it handles the big and small moments. Let’s get the facts out of the way first: Both Carter and Lucy suffer multiple stab wounds, once they’re found it’s all hands on deck to treat them, and while Carter survives, Lucy dies. Not one moment of this episode is wasted along the way. (Yes, there are other patients — including Sobriki — but those scenes are brief, with the focus rightfully so on Carter and Lucy.)

Once Weaver (Laura Innes) arrives at work, it’s almost like you can hear the clock ticking down to her finding them, which she does, after noticing Sobriki’s bloody footprint outside the exam room. Her horrified “Oh!” upon seeing Carter and Lucy bleeding out? Chilling.

“People are having parties while these two are in there, bleeding to death,” she says, disgusted, in the middle of treating Lucy.

© NBC / Courtesy: Everett Collection

The first of several perfectly-directed scenes (again, Kaplan should have won an Emmy for this episode) comes when the camera tracks from an officer going into the exam room to collect Sobriki’s chart to Benton (Eriq La Salle) rushing down the stairs, running into a cop and refusing to stop, and into the trauma room to Carter (“Is he conscious?” he demands of the doctor he trained). Also of note: moving between Carter and Lucy’s trauma rooms, seeing it from Carter’s point of view as he’s brought up to the OR, and the camera circling Corday (Alex Kingston) and Romano (Paul McCrane) as they lose Lucy (she’s shocking her, he’s doing compressions on her heart).

“All in the Family” is also the perfect example of the quiet moments speaking louder than explosions: Greene (Anthony Edwards) and Corday’s reactions when they’re paged back to the hospital while out for dinner with his dad (John Cullum) and her mom (Judy Parfitt); the doctors having to balance their emotions with trying to save their friends; Weaver’s hand shaking as she must intubate Lucy, then again before using the external saw on her chest; the way everyone stops when Haleh (Yvette Freeman) tells Benton Weaver she needs him to trach Lucy (to open an airway); the silence as Benton, Corday, and Anspaugh (John Aylward) scrub in; and Greene admitting, “I don’t know,” when his dad asks if his friends will be okay.

It’s not just the doctors treating them that know what everything means. At multiple points, you can see realizations for both Carter and Lucy. They know the risks, know what’s coming, with their injuries: when he comes to in the trauma room, then later before surgery (“It’s bad, isn’t it?”) and for her, when PE (a pulmonary embolism) becomes a real risk, and then as she throws another clot. The fear in Lucy’s eyes? Among Martin’s best work on the show. Carter, after his surgery, as Benton checks on him: “How’s Lucy doing?” he asks, and the surgeon doesn’t answer. You can see the moment he’s about to ask again before it dawns on him: “Lucy’s dead, isn’t she?”

But what makes this episode as great as it is is how the big moments, the ones that needed to, land. These characters are both doctors and humans throughout it, especially when it comes to medical decisions. Benton rushes to treat Carter upon hearing he’s been stabbed, then it takes Anspaugh slowing him down in the OR for the doc to keep his kidney. (He also leaves another patient on the OR table because he refuses to be away from Carter for long, forcing Michael Michele‘s Cleo to treat him the only way she can when necessary.)

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Corday and Romano are both visibly affected throughout treating Lucy, and it’s one of the few times we see that be true of Rocket (for a human patient, at least, after seeing him with his dog in the previous episode). It’s McCrane’s performance that especially stands out. Sure, Romano is still Romano at times (“Don’t worry, Ms. Knight, we’ve put far too much time and energy into your training to lose you now,” he tells Lucy), but he’s the one who refuses to give up, even when it’s clear Lucy is dead. “Son of a bitch,” he says, standing a few feet away, gloves bloody, before walking back over and starting compressions on her heart again. “Come on, Lizzie, let’s go!” he shouts at Corday, who stops him with a simple “Robert.” Romano’s also the one to close up Lucy’s chest in the final, powerful scene, featuring him and Weaver with their dead med student.

Other moments worth noting: Corday’s frustration as she must show her ID to get into the hospital, knowing they’re waiting for her to treat Lucy; Weaver ignoring everyone approaching her as she walks outside after sending Lucy up to the OR and throwing up; Carter telling Benton, “I’m glad it’s you,” operating on him; Weaver being outraged that no one was supervising Carter and Lucy when they treated Sobriki in “Be Still My Heart,” then asking Greene to take over his care when he’s brought back in; Lucy’s whispered, “Thank you,” to Corday; the way Chuny (Laura Cerón) only has to say Lucy’s name for everyone at Doc Magoo’s and Greene only has to look at Weaver to know she died; Corday just sitting in her living room when she gets home; and Greene asking Carol (Julianna Margulies) if they can talk about it later when she comes in for her next shift when it’s all over.

There will never be another episode like this one (or show like ER).

But what did you think of “All in the Family”? Let us know in the comments section below.

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