‘Scrubs’ Season 2 Premiere: Boss Breaks Down Doctor Cox’s Fate Revealed

Season 2 of theScrubs revival has kicked off, and it revealed the fate of everyone’s favorite name-calling, insensitive, but always lovable Doctor Cox (John C. McGinley), who was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease at the end of last season. Warning: Spoilers for Scrubs Season 2 Episodes 1 & 2!

In the back-to-back episodes, fans were reintroduced to J.D.’s new girlfriend, Charlie (Rachel Bilson), whom he continued to try to impress as he cared for his mentor, Doctor Cox, at Sacred Heart Hospital. But ongoing tests and medication combinations proved to be unsuccessful as Doctor Cox’s levels continued to stay out of whack.

J.D., Elliott (Sarah Chalke), Turk (Donald Faison), and Carla (Judy Reyes) all vowed to get to the bottom of the mystery revolving around their friend’s autoimmune disease, with Jordan (Christa Miller) serving as a motivating factor. Ultimately, J.D. uncovered the mystery and figured out how to balance the medications in Doctor Cox’s favor to avoid a serious kidney issue.

Additionally, the premiere revealed the budding relationship between newbies, Tosh (Ava Bunn) and Asher (Jacob Dudman), which was of extreme interest to HR rep Sibby (Vanessa Bayer). And while Tosh may have been tied up in her new situation, Elliott made an effort to steer the up-and-coming doc toward a specialty, only to find that she was drawn to pediatrics with Doctor Steffie (Tamera Mowry-Housley).

Disney / Sergei Bachlakov

The hour-long premiere concluded with a shocking twist, though, as Doctor Cox was admitted into Sacred Heart Hospital for an extended stay in order to bypass insurance rates after J.D. attempted to problem-solve. What could it mean going forward? Below, showrunner Aseem Batra answers our burning questions.

The season kicks off with a look into J.D. and Charlie’s relationship. Will we see some growth and maturing on his end when it comes to romance?

Aseem Batra: Yeah, 100%. I think there were some moves back in the first iteration of Scrubs that I’m like, I’m not going to do anything like that with J.D.,  and even Zach acknowledges there are some things he just pulled that we don’t want to see him do again. And I think he has grown and matured as a person, like being married, understanding love and relationships on a deeper, more long-term level, and to show him some of the fun insecurities that come back when you’re dating at that age, and you haven’t dated in forever, but that ultimately the person he’s become has had a lot of growth. So we want to show that in the season, and I think we do end up getting there.

Doctor Cox’s illness is addressed right away, and there’s a bit of a resolution. Is he out of the woods medically speaking? 

Here’s the thing: Doctor Cox and John C. McGinley are such beloved characters, and an actor who is a fan favorite. We do want to put our audience at ease that this is a journey, this is a story, a thing that’s happening in his life, and we’re not trying to do anything that would just have the bottom drop out of everything; that’s just not our intention. We’re just getting such a rich arc for him in terms of the ups and downs.

It’s like once you conquer one thing, maybe you conquer the physical aspect of it, but then there’s a monetary aspect. There’s so much to being ill and having a chronic illness, and it keeps him back in our world, but we don’t want the audience to worry because we love this character, and it’s not like we want to do something to him. I feel comfortable that this is not a spoiler for me, like, hey, we can enjoy this ride. This illness was chosen too because, even though nobody wants an autoimmune disease, it can be managed so well with the right medications.

Disney / Sergei Bachlakov

The biggest hang-up surrounding Doctor Cox’s treatment is the cost, and J.D. decides to admit him in order to work around insurance. Does that mean we’ll be seeing a lot more of Doctor Cox than we did last season? 

We would love that, but if you know, I know you probably know we’re sharing him with Rooster, and so we’re trying to get him for a few more [episodes]. And we do have him for a few more, but it’s not as much as we would love. His schedule is just what it is, and so that is the challenge of a reboot; we try to get him for more than just a couple because you kind of plan these things at the beginning of the season and get the reality of what it’s gonna look like. So we’ve been working around shoot dates, and we will see him again.

That moment between Doctor Cox and Carla on the couch really honors their friendship from the show’s original run. Why was it so important to include that? 

They have a relationship that’s very special, and nobody else quite has that dynamic with him where she can call him on his stuff, and so I think it’s another layer of vulnerability: that he’s got to let himself be taken care of, and Carla is a nurse and has been for a long time. If anybody knows how to get that done for him, she does. So it felt really good because it felt organic and natural that they would be in that position to have that talk.

Likewise with Elliott, she gets to have her big stand-up to Jordan moment that quickly backfires. 

We always want to surprise the audience, so being able to show that, yeah, you got to do this, but did you think about what she’s going through? It’s just good. I remember when Christa did the episode where she’s pregnant and wants to get Doctor Cox back in her life, and she had such a beautiful, vulnerable moment sitting on the bathroom floor of that episode talking about how she felt, and I was like, she’ll play this really well. And so it was really nice to be able to give her a layer to play that wasn’t just our straightforward Jordan.

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The premiere also reveals Tosh and Asher’s romance, which seems to be a full-blown relationship. What can we expect on that end? 

Yeah, it’s interesting because we have a big cast; we want to service our legacy [characters], but we also want a new audience to come in and find the younger generation doing this. But we have so little time that some of these things get short-handed too much, and I think it can feel rushed, but I think those two actors are so sweet together that you just kind of see them together and happy, and you can tell that they’re the most stable of any of the couples that could develop in our storyline. So that’s what we want to do for them is just show them as the two that really spark to one another.

Doctor Steffie is also introduced; will we see more of her as Tosh continues to explore her options on a specialty? 

Yeah, we sort of resolved the Elliott piece of it, and we’re really lucky to have her come on and do this great guest role. We just needed someone who could play that, and you just watch what she does with the role, you can tell this is someone who’s done this forever, and it just feels really good to have her in that world for that episode.

Scrubs, Season 2, Wednesdays, 8/7c, ABC