Lea started it.

She seems to name-drop a number of TGD episode titles, and thus she did with “Growth Opportunities” when Shaun lamented the amount of multi-tasking he needed to do in order to perfect a surgery for Lim. And, Shaun being Shaun, he then used the term when saddling Asher and Combat Danni with certain non-surgical duties.

I, in turn, started my notes for this episode with What have we learned? And came up with a few. Okay, twelve. (I’d say one for every 5 minutes of the show, but those pesky commercials… )

Anyway, let’s see how many of our “notes” are in sync this time.

1) Lim is extremely vulnerable these days— which is why declining the surgery was the right decision.

In the previous episode (“Shrapnel”), Lim was away from St. Bon’s, fresh off severing her mentor/friend ties with Shaun, and seemed as close to content as we’ve seen in a while. But just look at her conflicting emotions with the two surgical presentations bookending the “Growth”  episode. She’s curious and, dare we say, hopeful at the outset… but, one rejection later (a rejection of at least two kinds, it’s important to note), she calls a halt to all attempts to get her “out of that chair” and practically leaves Andrews’ office in tears. 

Given all this, it was surely best that she decline the surgery– at least, for now. I can’t imagine that decision will hold all season, but remember Lea’s sage advice from S1 about the wrong times to make big life choices? 

“NEVER make an important decision when you are angry, upset, high… or right before or after sex.” (From “Islands Pt. 1”)

Not that Lea wants to be dragged into any of this, mind you…. But Lim probably doesn’t even want to think about sex after this episode (SIGH), and she’s definitely close friends with “angry” and “upset” these days. The stars in this story arc aren’t aligned yet. Everyone involved needs to breathe. 

5) Lea was the hands-down MVP of the episode.

If you were listening to the post-episode chat on Twitter Spaces after the “Growth Opportunities”– and you might wanna give it a try, as it’s fun to hear and talk about the episode right after it happens, as well as get some cool insights from Natty at The Good Doctor Argentina Twitter account– she mentioned that scriptwriter Peter Blake, who did this particular episode, always write some of the best things for Lea (Other TGD writing credits of Blake’s include “Vamos” in S4, “Teeny Blue Eyes” in S5, and “Afterparty” at the start of S6.). And in his care, Lea got to do a few pretty cool things in “Growth Opportunities:”

A. She was the one to convince Glassman to be the bigger man that Shaun needed him to be (as previously stated).

B. She became the best option for trying to persuade the bio dad to help save the life of Skyler. Had she not been a woman, and a very attractive woman at that, it’s hard to imagine bio dad giving her the time of day, let alone agreeing to “watch something“ which turned out to be his own daughter singing beautifully. 

C. She had a wonderful scene with Shaun near the very end about the success in trying, even if you don’t succeed. Yes, it got Shaun up to visit Park’s terminally ill patient and his impaired brother as requested, but as a bonus, we also got a new mention of Lea‘s brother in that scene. She didn’t call him by name (Donnie), But it did help throw us the seed of hope that the unfinished business within her family of origin could still become a plot within a season 6 TGD episode (or two).

8) From “You look snazzy” to “Sorry… should I go?” in two scenes was even more ridiculous than the guy in the yellow costume photobombing Asher’s cafeteria scene.

This storyline HAD to be a victim of time constraints to tell it properly. It’s frustrating because they took three episodes to get to this, and absolutely everything in the two episodes and first scene together in “Growth” pointed exactly the way Lim was thinking. It’s not like she had struck up an online relationship with the guy, and had elected not to talk about her paralysis, and he came to town to meet her for the first time, saw her chair, and started backpedaling immediately. “Joseph” saw her in bad days with the chair, in good days with the chair, he saw her looking “snazzy” (his words)... he seemed highly invested in her. We don’t know if he paid for her dinner or not, but he took charge of the dinner plans, made a reservation, etc…yet it was as soon as they sat down side-by-side that I felt the writing went sideways, and the situation suddenly became extremely rushed:

• Lim, hesitant as she is about the situation and her new body, tried to initiate a kiss. That felt odd all by itself. 

• And it’s not like there haven’t been millions of men around the world who seem to lead a woman on only to slam them into the friend zone. And yes, the reverse happens too. But the way he was all the way to that point and didn’t get the picture was jarring and strange. 

• Even worse than all that was the so-called conclusion… no attempt to explain himself, no (highly justified) outburst from Lim– just “Should I go?” “Yes”... and he leaves? Wrong. Just plain wrong.

12) Glassman’s progression with Shaun was profound… ONCE HE GOT OUT OF HIS OWN DAMN WAY.

On the surface, it might look as if Glassman is more often annoyed, irritated, or angered by Shaun than he is any other emotion. At least lately. It still amazes me a little that when Shaun burst into Glassman‘s house in the middle of the night at the end of “Shrapnel” claiming he had found the cure to Lim’s paralysis, Glassy didn’t seem that upset… Especially considering the argument they’d just had in the previous act of the show. But maybe he was just caught off guard enough to be civil in those few moments we witnessed. For when we got to Shaun‘s formal presentation of his plan in Andrews’ office, Glassman not only discouraged Shaun‘s plan but threw shade on his controversial previous surgical effort for Lim. I guess you could argue that Glassman is just trying to be as hard on his “own family” as he is with any other doctor/colleague, except that we know better. He’s still angry, still waiting for Shaun to apologize, seemingly unable to jump that hurdle, even for professional reasons… Until Lea intervenes. Then his “not good enough” rejections turn first into a clear proclamation of love, then a reiteration of his lack of confidence in the ideas, then cracking the door open enough for him and Shaun to try to work together on the idea. That was significant all by itself, but the scene that left Lim exiting Andrew‘s office distraught while Shaun stood there dumbfounded...