TV review: Code Black is about redemption and helping others

The television show Code Black is about the Angels Memorial Emergency Room that is in “Code Black” 300 times per year. “Code Black” refers to when the Emergency Room (ER) is overcrowded and understaffed, with not enough resources to treat the patients. An average ER is in “Code Black” five times per year. The Angels Memorial hospital is a fictional hospital, but the busiest emergency room is the Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center.

The cinematography in Code Black shows the characters’ emotions such as sadness or worriedness of a patient or even the lives of the doctors. The music also foreshadows when something bad is going to happen or if something good is coming. The music gives excitement, like a rush of adrenaline; it can make a scene intense or even scary. Speaking of emotions, the show makes you feel the same emotions with the characters. For example, if they are feeling sad, you will be feeling sad, too, sometimes to the point where tears are in your eyes. A sign when the scene is getting intense is when the monitor that shows the vitals starts going off and beeps. When that happens the intensity spikes and then everything becomes fast-paced. There are moments on the show that slow down and those are high points on the show. I think of it as a transition or a break from the rush of the Emergency Room.

What I like about Code Black is that it shows the injuries of the patients and it explains the severity of the injury. In addition, another thing I enjoy about this TV show is that when one of the doctors freaks out or is too stressed, the other doctors comfort them. What is interesting is that the doctors also end up as patients sometimes. When the ER has a new group of doctors from the first season, they’re called second-years now and the new ones from this season are first years; in a way, it’s like college levels: freshman are first-years and so on. What I do not like about Code Black is that they use medical terms and I usually do not know what they are talking about, therefore, do not understand.

A theme of the TV show Code Black would be second chances. However, in a way, every episode has its own theme. For example, in an episode where there is an outbreak of a virus, the theme is that everyone has a chance to survive, in other words, everyone has a second chance. The overall theme of the show would probably be never give up or second chances. One way to think of it is that they (the staff) are a miracle for some of the patients.

Several other television shows can draw a comparison to Code Black. One of the television shows that is similar to Code Black would be the show ER that is about the doctors at the emergency room in a Chicago hospital. ER went off the air in 2009, so it is an older comparison. ER is like Code Black because it is about a busy emergency room and the lives of the doctors who work there. The storyline is similar because it is more focused on the emergency room patients, but gives some insight into the doctors’ lives. A more modern comparison would be the show Chicago Med, which is about the daily lives of doctors and nurses in a Chicago emergency room. Chicago Med is similar to Code Black because it also is at a busy emergency room, but it goes more into the backstory of the characters. In Code Black, we rarely see the doctors and nurses outside the ER or work related. However, we do get a glimpse into their personal lives when they discuss it occasionally.

Unlike Code Black, Chicago Med shows the doctors out in their personal lives more and we get to know the characters a little more. Another thing that Chicago Med does is that it connects with the other two shows, Chicago Fire and Chicago P.D. A comedic comparison would be the show Scrubs which is about an intern at a hospital. Scrubs is like Code Black in the way that both shows feature new students coming to the hospital to pursue their career in medicine. We see how the new doctors and interns adjust to the ER scene.