Showrunner David Shore also previews Lim’s conflict with Salen in the midseason premiere.
Where do Shaun (Freddie Highmore) and Lea (Paige Spara) go from here onThe Good Doctor?
That’s one of several questions fans were left pondering after the ABC medical drama’s midseason finale.
ABC/Jeff Weddell
Thankfully, answers arrive Monday when the show returns from its lengthy hiatus.
“[Shaun] doesn’t simply go, ‘I was upset.
Let’s move on.’
Christina Chang as Dr. Audrey Lim and Paige Spara as Lea on ‘The Good Doctor’.ABC/Jeff Weddell
He goes, ‘I was upset for a reason.
You [Lea] let me down.
You did wrong, and you have to make it right.’
And so can she make it right?
Can she correct that?”
Shore continues: “How she responds to his intransigence is also part of the story.
She’s coming to him apologizing [and asking], ‘What more can I do?’
And he gives more she can do.
Will anything be enough?
And what does that say about Shaun, and what does that say about Lea?”
“We are a show about hope.
There is always hope,” he says.
But we want to have the happy ending, and more often than not we will.
But those happy endings are made all the sweeter by the sad endings."
Additionally, the surgeons and Salen must find a way forward after the baby’s death.
Unfortunately, both parties learn the wrong lesson from this tragic event, which puts them at odds.
“[Salen] doesn’t distance herself from it.
She acknowledges this is a mistake.
But mistakes are going to happen is her attitude and we should do everything we can to avoid them.
She doesn’t view it as an indictment of her approach to the hospital.
She views it as a mistake that needs to be remedied.
We need to make adjustments,” says Shore.
“They’re very good at medicine, they’re not good at bureaucracy,” Shore warns.
“They don’t have MBAs, any of them.
It’s like a great sprinter has a beef with a great chess player.
They are genuinely threatening her livelihood and things she cares about, and she will respond accordingly.”
“He cares about her deeply and believes that she is potentially doing something great,” says Shore.
It’s naive to pretend that…
It’s worse than naive.
It’s dangerous to ignore that reality.
And that attitude gets challenged from both sides as we go forward."
The Good Doctorairs Mondays at 10 p.m. on ABC.
