The Mob Doctor

I am enjoying this show and it fills in the Fox Broadcasting hole that was left by the departure of House. The dilemmas Grace must face to fulfill her debt to the mob, stay under hospital radar when she needs to use their equipment and also follow her conscience to her oath as a doctor put her in some tough situations. Does she kill a mobster on orders from the people she owes? How does she fix up the guy that she knows just caused a family great pain and anguish and still live with herself? Grace faces all this and more. The show is gaining an audience in the 3 or so weeks it has aired. The cast is good and the show is well done. The premise is interesting and plot twists are not always expected.

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Time will tell, but it looks like a good show to me. I like medical drama/mysteries/suspense/adventure. This has it all with the mob twist that makes it interesting and even more intriguing and suspenseful to watch. Good Dr. "Grace" is a thoracic surgeon trying to do her best juggling the demands of her job and her obligations to mob in Chicago. There's no rule book-Grace must face a moral dilemma in each case as she goes along, always trying to balance her conscience with what is the right and wrong thing to do. The stress she feels lets the audience feel her pain and frustration which draws people in to this new TV show that seems headed for success.

9:00 PM Mondays on FOX

Dr. Grace Devlin (Jordana Spiro) is forced into working for the mob to cancel a debt his useless brother Nate (Jesse Lee Soffer) incurred. Only her connection to the mob boss Constantine Alexander (William Forsythe) is actually much more personal than that.

It's impossible to zero in on one thing that was wrong with this show. It was a critical failure, a ratings failure, and filmed only 13 episodes. It was dead on arrival. Jordana Spiro is a nice comedic actress, but the character really had a limited range. Jesse Lee Soffer plays Nate who is probably the most annoying and frustrating character around. Then there is Paul Moretti (Michael Rapaport) who played the bad Mob guy. He's annoying. He disappeared for awhile and then returned. It was bad idea. They should either kill me off, or let him be a constant character. That kind of change really can screw up a serial show. The problems were just never fixed.

It truly is a shame that such a well put together show will most likely be dropped simply because it's a doctor show that steps out of the 'box' that people are used to.

I thought that the chemistry between the cast was dead on, the character development was brilliant, the plot was unpredictable and creative, and while it dealt with the mob it also maintained it's interesting medical backdrop. The main character alone, has so much going on that it's easy to stay interested. I mean she is a women from the wrong side of the tracks trying to make a name for herself in a big city hospital, while also trying to protect her family from the mob, and on top of it all she has to not only find, a way to NOT get so attached to her patients, but she also has to figure out a way to keep some semblance of a social life (i.e - boyfriends, friends, etc.)

I mean yeah, the show is based on a doctor who is indebted to the mob but that isn't that far fetched of an idea...nor do I find anything in the show to be unrealistic. I think that the way that they didn't handhold us viewers through the whole process of introductions and just plunged us right into the action of the show, while slowly feeding us details about the characters as the show progresses was a great idea (imo).

Anyways, I think that people should stop expecting this show to fill the big shoes that "House" left behind and just go into it with an open mind.

I love the idea. Lead characters Grace and Constantine are well cast. BUT, it's just too hectic with too much drama and too many attempted subplots that detract from telling the story. The Michael Rapaport character is ridiculous. The petty conflicts with the Olivia character doctor whoever and are ridiculous and only last a few episodes for the artifice of establishing Grace's character before the offending characters simply have the "a-hole" gene written out of their behaviour, that's one way to remove an annoyance - just re-write the character. It wants to shoehorn an episode of the Sopranos plus an episode of House into each episode, but they really don't need these resident doctors to be super geniuses who are dealing with some bizarre medical diagnostic challenge every episode... what they need is to ensure Grace's workload at the hospital is not so overwhelming that she cannot possibly have a moment to be the mob doctor. I didn't tune in to watch House, i guess was hoping for the Sopranos with a twist rather than yet another hospital drama. I like the idea, but it's a bit too much soap opera for my taste.