Photo: Jeff Riedel / NBC
What In The Actual Hell Is Happening In This Promotional Image For The Night Shift?
Sarah and Tara get into it.
Our Players
Hello, I'm West Coast Editor Tara Ariano.
Hello, I'm East Coast Editor Sarah D. Bunting.
The Talk
...Tara. What in the fuck is going on in this photograph.
The thing about this "photo" -- which is clearly at least nine photos Frankensteined together (ten if you count the background) -- is that for a shot that's supposed to be promotional, what it really does is actively repel me from the show. Even if the only problem were the dickhole in the middle, dayenu. But there are so many more layers of stupid. (Layers, get it? Because Photoshop.)
The dickhole in the middle is himself a package containing multiple problems -- like why he has the bike's lights on indoors, why he's not wearing a helmet, that douchey necklace, and the fact that we already have a Patrick Dempsey and he's not that great to start with. But it's a hospital show, no? So why are they in the lobby of Initech, doing what appears to be the choreography from the traveling production of Battlefield: Office Space The Musical?
"I am so committed to my patients that I will drive my hog right into the waiting room past this wind machine! Also I am so authentic that I will wear my boots throughout my shift! Hang on just one second, I have to flat-iron my hair again!" - that guy.
And what is everyone ELSE in the shot supposed to be doing? Blue V-Neck looks like she's going to race him on foot; Olive T-Shirt is like, "Stop that exercise ball" and Maroon is all, "No, it's too dangerous!"; Ken Leung is about to have a bark-off with a patient's Jack Russell terrier? WHAT IS THIS SHOW?
Wait a second, Is Blue V-Neck in knee-high boots? Have any of these boners ever been in a hospital before? I never thought I'd be nostalgic for ER when the worst offense against verisimilitude was that people's hair was falling into patients' wounds.
Which it will also do here, although the TV promos give me the impression that more time will be spent on Dickhole's tragically foxy PTSD than on actual medicine.
Back to Ken Leung. Are we to assume that his position and shocked expression are due to the fact that a spleen just fell off an exam table? Except, wait, they're in the waiting room. Off the reception check-in desk?
Or Elvis Presley knocked all his papers to the floor? Honestly, Leung's whole deal in this photo makes me anxious. If Dickhole will ride his hog into the lobby, he won't think twice about rolling right over Leung's hand because he's a renegade who doesn't play by the zzzzz.
Let's turn our attention to the right of the shot.
Nice try, Not Fred Savage, but it's too late to reach for your phone and call your agent to get you out of this mess.
"All my lines are about insurance paperwork!" "Well, read the script before you sign on next time, doofus."
Sarah, oh my god, Not Fred Savage is Freddy Rodriguez. YOU HAVE FALLEN A LONG WAY FROM HBO, HALF-PINT.
WHAT. You're lying. ...Holy shit, that IS F-Rod. Dressing on the side, short stack, is one thing.
His hand IS perfectly positioned to have a cheeseburger shoved in it....
Or an unemployment check.
As ridiculous as everything is about this photo, the eye does keep getting pulled back to Harley O'Smolders in the middle.
Why is he making such intense eye contact with me? And...why is his headlight on inside? AND WHY IS HIS MOTORCYCLE INSIDE?!
And why is this still considered a "sexy" character beat when all the doctors on ER consistently called bikes "donor-cycles"? It's such a try-hard way to be a bad-ass. The scrub pant leg carefully nestled on the top of the boot so that you can see it -- what are you, 15? Fuck off. The Bachelorette set is that way, Barry Jerkwater.
So...how many episodes of this are you planning to watch? Please express your answer in dozens.
0.0000001.
That sounds about right. This show is such a holdover from the time when we all just had to watch whatever the networks puked up during the summer, but someone should tell NBC that cable now exists. And good shows are streaming on Netflix. And that, if all else fails, we'll just...go to bed.
And not with anyone in this photo.
I mean...Ken Leung? I still would. And he looks like he's prepared for whatever.