Sky1’s Critical is an ultra-realistic real-time medical drama from Line of Duty creator Jed Mercurio.
Lennie James (Line of Duty) leads the ensemble cast as locum trauma consultant Glen Boyle, alongside Catherine Walker (Strike Back) as trauma registrar Fiona Lomas, Claire Skinner (Outnumbered) as trauma consultant Lorraine Rappaport and Kimberley Nixon (Fresh Meat) as junior doctor Dr. “Harry” Bennett-Edwardes.
> Order Season 1 on DVD on Amazon.
The cast also includes Neve McIntosh (Doctor Who), Prasanna Puwanarajah (The Half Light), John MacMillan (Silk), Ellen Thomas (Rev), Mali Harries (The Indian Doctor), Paul Bazely (Casualty), Danny Kirrane (Trollied), Peter Sullivan (The Hour), Emma Fryer (Phone Shop), Orion Lee (Skyfall) and Juliet Oldfield (Top Boy).
Set in a state-of-the-art Major Trauma Centre, each episode scrubs into a different case.
Episode 1
Tuesday 24 February 2015, 9pm
A critically injured patient is helicoptered from a road accident to a new hospital emergency unit. As the major trauma team battles to keep him alive and determine the nature of his injuries, team leader Lorraine Rappaport is suddenly suspended and young doctor Fiona Lomas is forced to take charge.
To her horror, a CT scan reveals the broken tip of a knife has penetrated the patient’s heart. When he begins to crash, Fiona can’t wait for the specialist cardiac team and has to clamshell his chest, remove the knife-blade and sew up the wound to the heart before he bleeds out.
In the desperate aftermath, she gets in touch with the one person she thinks can save the trauma unit and the one person she shouldn’t call: army trauma surgeon, Glen Boyle.
Episode 2
Tuesday 3 March 2015, 9pm
It’s a horrific sight when a patient with a fence post impaled through her face is brought in. Fiona’s world is further turned upside down when Glen Boyle, locum trauma consultant and her ex-lover, takes control of the situation.
When the patient starts haemorrhaging uncontrollably, Glen insists on opening her up to locate the bleeds, discovering a heart-rending explanation for the injuries.
Later, Glen tells Fiona he came to CGH because she needed him, but she tries to convince him, and herself, that it’s the unit that needs him.
Episode 3
Tuesday 10 March 2015, 9pm
The team’s resolve is tested when a cyclist, involved in a collision with an HGV, is brought in with severe injuries. It’s already 30 minutes into the trauma call and a frustrated Glen decides to take drastic measures.
More worrying information comes to light in theatre forcing Glen to make a tricky decision, but it could be too late for this patient.
Elsewhere, Fiona is shocked when she learns that Glen has been socialising with Clive. As the next trauma patient arrives, Fiona and Glen agree to keep their relationship strictly professional.
Episode 4
Tuesday 17 March 2015, 9pm
A man has been found badly beaten and is suffering from life-threatening injuries. Despite being haunted by his army past, Glen leads the trauma call.
A curious serial number branded on to the patient’s skin indicates he’s a slave labourer who has been illegally trafficked, and when his temperature suddenly rises, there is a dawning realisation he is carrying a highly infectious disease.
As the unit goes into emergency lockdown, Glen performs a life-saving operation, making an enemy of Clive Archerfield, the head of the Emergency Department, and forcing Fiona’s true feelings for him to become clear when she fears he’s put his own life at risk.
Episode 5
Tuesday 24 March 2015, 9pm
A gunshot victim is brought in with the bullet still inside her body.
Everyone is confused, meanwhile, when Lorraine makes a surprise reappearance and takes up the mantle of trauma team leader, only to be publicly humiliated when Clive places her under Glen’s supervision.
In CT, the team make the shocking discovery that the patient is pregnant, with the situation becoming more intense when the on-duty obstetrics consultant turns out to be someone close to Fiona: her boyfriend, Tom. As Glen and Tom lock horns, the case stirs up painful memories for Fiona and she reaches a decision about Glen.
Episode 6
Tuesday 31 March 2015, 9pm
Harry’s shift couldn’t get off to a worse possible start when a troubled woman jumps from the hospital’s atrium walkway, landing, quite literally, at her feet. A drop of some 30ft, the junior doctor’s stomach sinks even lower after she recognises the patient, Nuala Barrington, a regular she’d discharged the night before – a detail she keeps schtum about.
Sporting multiple injuries, the team set to work, with Lorraine and Glen once again tussling for top dog status. Tensions only grow when a CTU scan reveals foreign bodies in the stomach and a bleed in the brain, prompting Glen to use his army expertise to riskily drill a burr hole in the patient’s skull to relieve pressure.
Lorraine is furious, but Glenn refuses to wait for the tardy neurosurgeon. Harry finally fesses up to Fiona about having treated Barrington, revealing that Clive had turned down her request for a psych assessment, information Fiona passes on to Lorraine.
Episode 7
Tuesday 7 April 2015, 9pm
Storage space can be hard to come by, but this week’s patient has found an unlikely (not to mention icky) solution. An eventful shift gets under way with an extremely agitated Mexican woman who has been involved in a car crash.
Arriving with her cab driver – he’s fine – and unable to speak a word of English, she lashes out at anyone and everyone around her. The source of the crazed behaviour soon becomes apparent, though, when a CTU scan shows the victim is packing one hell of a surprise in her stomach, a ‘parcel’ the original sender will stop at nothing to retrieve.
Personal matters flood the Major Trauma Centre, too, with Glen delivering an overdue apology to Fiona, and Ramakrishna fretting about Harry’s love life.
Episode 8
Tuesday 14 April 2015, 9pm
Take a deep breath because this week’s visit to the Major Trauma Centre is a dizzying, discombobulating one.
The team feel the pressure more than ever when they treat a horrifically burned patient caught in a fire in the hospital’s changing rooms. What happens next shakes up the series considerably.
Glen and Fiona grow closer, too, when the former sheds light on his army days, sharing footage of a clamshell he performed on a fallen Afghan soldier. All is not as it seems, however.
Episode 9
Tuesday 21 April 2015, 9pm
Still recovering from the events of last week’s episode? So are the team but, with lives to save, they throw themselves into their work, battling to bring a teenage drowning victim back from the brink of death.
The boy is hypothermic and the prognosis is bleak. Very bleak. Glen, though, refuses to give up, hooking the patient to a machine that will artificially warm his blood. Enter Clive, the constant gnarly thorn in their side, who gives Glen just five minutes to get the patient’s heart beating again, otherwise, body bag waiting, he’s calling it.
A tense stand-off between the men culminates in a bold, potentially career-damaging move from Fiona that, fingers crossed, pays off.
Episode 10
Tuesday 28 April 2015, 9pm
Hospitals are normally animal-free zones but, this week, the team make an exception when the victim of a vicious dog attack is rushed in – with the canine responsible still attached.
Struggling to work around the sedated animal, Glen is forced to administer a lethal injection. It’s a bad move, with the release of the dog’s clamped jaws causing the patient to haemorrhage as the full extent of the damage done hits home.
Secrets are spilled, too, when Ramakrishna opens up about his relationship with Harry, and things intensify between Glen and Fiona, despite the former receiving encouraging news from his army counsellor.
Episode 11
Tuesday 5 May 2015, 9pm
Scrambling out of bed – the same bed – Glen and Fiona answer a trauma call and are surprised to see a police cavalcade escorting a lorry into the ambulance bay.
All becomes clear when the team learn that their patient is lying on top of the lorry, and it’s a man who has been perforated by three crane spikes.
With typical gusto, Glen goes the extra mile to fight for his life, an impressive performance that spurs Nicola to offer him an extended contract at the Major Trauma Centre. Should he stay or go? The trauma consultant’s decision hinges on Fiona, who is still very much attached to Tom.
Episode 12
Tuesday 12 May 2015, 9pm
Stretched to the limit, the team hit the road to treat multiple victims caught up in a nasty traffic accident. Fiona isn’t on shift, but she’s called in to help, a smart decision because pandemonium soon ensues.
Amid the crying, screaming and spurts of blood, Fiona tries to keep her engagement to Tom a secret from Glen, who, growing increasingly frustrated about not being able to have a private word with his ex, ends up blurting out the news that he’s deferred his army redeployment and is staying put in the Major Trauma Centre.
It’s a decision that could change everything for Fiona.
Episode 13
Tuesday 19 May 2015, 9pm
The clock has finally run down as the season draws to a close in dramatic fashion – anyone of a sensitive disposition, be warned, there is a scene involving the bone-crunching use of bolt cutters.
Devastated by the news that Fiona is set to marry Tom, Glen bundles his belongings into a bag and tears off in his car. Fiona chases after her ex and, over the phone, begs him to stay because she wants to be with him.
Just as the trauma surgeon is considering turning around, however, a car careers into him. The phone line goes dead…
> Order Season 1 on DVD on Amazon.
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