There's no point in denying it anymore. ER is a soap opera. I've been watching it on and off for the past few years, and I've always liked the rare combination of intelligence, human interest, and cool medical procedures (back in the day, I used to watch the Surgery Channel). Recently, though, the ER overlords have been raising the stakes. The melodrama keeps escalating, getting more and more out of control, so that pretty soon they'll have nowhere left to go. From that great moment when Dr. Romano got his arm amputated by a helicopter blade (I was watching this at the gym, and an entire row of runners tripped on their respective treadmills when it happened—beautiful), ER seems to have become less a serious medical drama and more a theater of the absurd. Ionesco himself couldn't have been prouder of the way the show is turning out, although he might have suggested turning Dr. Dave into a rhinoceros.

Since the one-armed man episode, we've had epidemics, political corruption, and Bob Newhart committing suicide (we saw grisly blood splatters in this scene—is H.P. Lovecraft in charge of cinematography now?). Then of course Dr. Romano, in some weird Euripidean version of fate, gets killed by ANOTHER helicopter, which falls from the sky like a biblical plague. (Also, no one comes to his funeral, which irritates me. Don't the writers realize that people feel bad when one of the main characters of a show dies, even if he is a loudmouth, racist, sumbitch? People want to see at least a glimmer of humanity connected with it. To simply deny the viewers any sort of closure or display of compassion from the other characters is not only disturbing and unrealistic—it's lazy writing.)

So there I am, watching a preview for next week's episode. The announcer's voice thunders out from the television: "Next week, the ER you don't want to miss. You won't believe who doesn't make it out alive." And then there's this tank driving down the street in front of the hospital, crushing cars to a steel pulp, and I'm thinking, just what have I gotten myself into?!!? This is when the realization sinks in, like a gentle acid rain slowly burning through my epidermis: ER really is just a glorified "General Hospital," or any one of those other shows for the unwashed masses that I always considered myself too elite to watch. And yet, I'm just as caught up in this ridiculous stuff as everyone else. Who is Dr. Kovac sleeping with now? Will Dr. Corday ever get over the loss of her husband? Why is Dr. Weaver not so mean anymore? Why does Dr. Pratt have such an inferiority complex? Why don't they bring back Dr. Benton (the always pouty Eriq La Salle, whom I could never look at without thinking, "Just let your Soul Glo!")?

Not long ago, there was a plot string in which Drs. Kovac and Carter were in the Congo, trying to alleviate a little suffering in the midst of that country's internecine warfare. This was great television. Very humane. Very moving. And then the very next week it was back to: (in booming announcer voice) "You'll never believe who gets his head stuck in the manifold of a '57 Chevy!"

So yes, the writers of ER are running out of shocking tribulations to inflict on the long-suffering cast. Before long, they'll be resorting to alien invasions and bringing Jack the Ripper in as a guest neurosurgeon. Perhaps we'll see another Great Chicago Fire or a meteor that turns half the city into jelly (only the hardy souls at County will be able to stave off the chaos!). And of course, in the final episode, we'll be sailing up the river with Marlow, until we reach Kurtz and that great moment of annihilating truth! The horror! The horror!

Look, I still love ER. But all the gravitas got shipped out with Dr. Green's body bag.

Tags: popculture