Comedy
Dead Boy Detectives
Dead Boy Detectives targets teens in style and story. But it comes with very adult, problematic content.
Bunker Hill ain’t just any ol’ hospital.
The place is an amalgamation of the latest medical gizmos and bleeding-edge internet tech. It’s staffed by doctors and experts who got tired of bureaucracy, red tape and all those pesky rules. Every patient who goes there is terribly sick, walks out completely better and never, ever has to pay a cent.
Bunker Hill is what might happen if Mark Zuckerberg cashed out his billions and funneled them all into one nifty medical building, a health care utopia built in the only place such a thing could exist: television.
James Bell is this CBS drama’s Zuckerberg, a tech titan who’s funneled much of his fortune into Bunker Hill. And since he owns the place, he feels he can waltz around the hospital in bare feet. (Wait, wouldn’t that be, like, horrifically unsanitary?)
Why spend so much money on one San Francisco medical facility? James is just that kind of swell guy. Well, that and he has Gerstmann–Sträussler–Scheinker syndrome, a rare neurodegenerative disease that could rob the mogul of both his body and brain before it’s through with him.
But James knows that his own treatment is a long way off. In the meantime, he simply hopes to help the common man. To do so, he recruits a bevy of skilled, dedicated doctors. Dr. Walter Wallace leads the pack: The gifted physician was booted from his own hospital after he used an unapproved cancer treatment on an 8-year-old boy. Sure, the boy died, but Dr. Wallace’s go-for-the-gusto moxie is just what James is looking for.
A bevy of other physicians fill out Bunker Hill’s narrative prescription. Dr. Zoe Brockett and Dr. Malik Verlaine care for patients with aplomb. (And when they’re not curing their charges from the incurable, they’re giving each other longing looks.) Dr. Scott Strauss doubles as a Catholic priest, much to the chagrin of tech maven Angie Cheng, who has eyes for the handsome doc. Dr. Talaikha Channarayapatra is the hospital’s resident neurosurgeon who, alas, has no one to bat her eyelids at. But if CBS gets enough episodes, you can bet your bottom medical form that will change.
Our newsfeeds are filled with stories about government health care, ever-rising medical costs and overcrowded waiting rooms. CBS probably hoped Pure Genius would scratch some felt itch it thinks we all have, to give us a vision of what medical care should look like … if cost wasn’t an issue, if all the doctors were brilliant and pretty, and if technology had the ability to make all of our pains go away.
The result feels like a mix of Star Trek and Gray’s Anatomy—a soapy medical drama wherein most patients are cured with what seems to be a magic wand. (In one recent episode, Angie brags that their machines can detect the presence of E. coli in water in eight seconds whereas everywhere else it takes eight hours. Well, that’s great, Angie. Maybe you could share that tech with, say, a hospital in Bangladesh?)
Content problems in Pure Genius are less numerous than many medical dramas. Viewers smell more romance than cleaning agents in Bunker Hill’s air, but the show rarely traipses off to the nearest bedroom, Gray’s style, for explicit hanky-panky. And while we do see our fine doctors operate on always grateful patients, the hospital’s sci-fi environs (and the show’s cheaper special effects) staunch the blood a bit. We sometimes hear minor profanities, but nothing more. And there’s no question that Bunker Hill is filled with admirable folks doing admirable work.
Alas, sparse content does not always equate to a great show. I wish it did. As it is, Pure Genius falls somewhat short of its name.
Two people on their way to get married come in suffering from food poisoning in what turns out to be the beginning of an outbreak. Meanwhile, Dr. Wallace remotely operates on a man in space, with the astronaut himself serving as his assistant. We see him make a doctor-assisted incision into his own abdomen. The wound is separated with medical equipment, and the patient must siphon away his own blood via a plastic bottle and piping. Wallace also “operates” on a dummy in space, and fake blood pours from the fake patient. Needles are stuck in various sick people.
Zoe and Malik talk about how they never date workmates, but there is conversation about how the two kissed in a previous episode. Angie gushes over the fact that Scott touched her shoulder. Bunker Hill’s lovebird patients talk about how they hoped to marry underneath the Golden Gate Bridge. The doctors decide to marry them off in the hospital instead, Scott presiding over the wedding in his Catholic priestly garb and carrying a Bible.
After the wedding, doctors carry around flutes of champagne. Elsewhere, we hear people talk about vomiting, diarrhea and urinary tract infections. They also say “h—” three times and misuse God’s name twice.
Paul Asay has been part of the Plugged In staff since 2007, watching and reviewing roughly 15 quintillion movies and television shows. He’s written for a number of other publications, too, including Time, The Washington Post and Christianity Today. The author of several books, Paul loves to find spirituality in unexpected places, including popular entertainment, and he loves all things superhero. His vices include James Bond films, Mountain Dew and terrible B-grade movies. He’s married, has two children and a neurotic dog, runs marathons on occasion and hopes to someday own his own tuxedo. Feel free to follow him on Twitter @AsayPaul.
Dead Boy Detectives targets teens in style and story. But it comes with very adult, problematic content.
An elf mage contemplates on connection and regret as she watches her human friends grow old and pass away.
