Chicago Med season 3, episode 6 recap: Ties That Bind

Chicago Med descends into chaos inside and out of the hospital in this week’s episode. Here’s what happened in Chicago Med season 3, episode 6.

Tuesday’s Chicago Med episode wasn’t just a new installment; it was one of those episodes that we’ll look back on as a turning point for Chicago Med season 3.

“Ties That Bind” opens with Dr. Connor Rhodes (Colin Donnell) leaving the hospital urgently, as he finds out that his girlfriend Dr. Robin Charles (recurring guest star Mekia Cox) has just been busted for attempted shoplifting. At his family’s department store, no less.

It’s awkward, but more than that it’s just sad.

Connor tries to convince Robin that this is her condition, and not her. Furthermore, he’s still trying to reassure her that she’s getting better, not worse. But she doesn’t believe him.

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And neither does his father (recurring guest star D.W. Moffett), who insults Connor by calling his “friend” unstable. It takes about fifteen seconds for the two of them to argue yet again, with yet more savage commentary:

"Cornelius: If she’s not unstable, she’s a cfriminal. Either way, fatherly advice. Get rid of her."

While he’s dealing with that and Maggie Lockwood (Marlyne Barrett) worries about the hospital being short nurses, Robin’s father Dr. Daniel Charles (Oliver Platt) and Dr. Sarah Reese (Rachel DiPillo) treat a young man who’s having a complete meltdown when he’s brought into the ED.

His aggressive behavior doesn’t sit well with the newly armed Reese, who views this week’s psych patient with immediate suspicion.

Later in the day, Connor is gut-checked when Robin reveals that she heard what Connor’s father said about her. He tells her that his father is “a son of a bitch” who likes to destroy things; she tells him that he likes to fix things, and it’s clear she still sees herself as something that he’s trying to fix rather than the woman he loves, no matter how much he says otherwise.

"Robin: My knight in shining armor."

She’s not the only one acting a little edgy. Dr. Will Halstead (Nick Gehlfuss) treats a woman who’s desperate to get pregnant, and Dr. Ethan Choi (Brian Tee) deals with a man who insists something is wrong with him but no one else knows what it is. Choi orders some lab tests to assure him that he’s fine.

Meanwhile, after Dr. Natalie Manning (Torrey DeVitto) treats a woman with a broken wrist, Chicago Med shows us that it’s her daughter who is the real patient here. She has a sudden abdominal pain, and tests show an inexplicable surgical scar. When Natalie asks, the mother reveals she had her daughter sterilized without her knowledge.

Elsewhere, Connor is a pain in Reese’s side when he takes her to task for not following up on Robin. He insists that he’s bringing her in the following day for a full workup, labs and scans, whether Reese is okay with that or not.

And then to make matters worse, Maggie explodes at her ex for bringing in a homeless patient since he obviously won’t be able to pay for his treatment, and suggests that the next time he gets a call for someone with “a fat wallet” he should bring them in.

We know why she’s saying that—because of the hospital’s money troubles and her being short a handful of nurses—but it still feels so incredibly wrong to hear, especially when she later talks to Sharon Goodwin (S. Epatha Merkerson) about how they should “motivate” paramedics. That’s not how this is supposed to work.

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After Connor takes his rage out on his phone, he consults with Will on his pregnant patient, who has an embolism. It’s just a few scenes until the clot gets worse and Dr. Rhodes has to scrub in for some emergency surgery. The woman’s heart fails while she’s still on the table, forcing Connor and his team to take drastic measures, but everything works out in the end.

Yet while he’s pulling off that tough surgery, Dr. Charles, who had previously confronted Connor about Robin’s shoplifting, turns up at his place to comfort Robin one more time. She bursts into tears:

"Robin: I am tired of being a disease. I want to be a person again."

The heaviness of this Chicago Med episode is briefly broken up by Noah Sexton (Roland Buck III) making his triumphant return to work and telling Reese that she looks good, but then “Ties That Bind” gets emotional again when Natalie and April Sexton (Yaya DaCosta) disagree on whether or not to tell their patient about the sterilization. Natalie does.

And Choi asks Reese to consult on his case, but when he finds out she’s a psychiatrist, he corners her and she maces him. Reese is promptly suspended for her actions, while Choi eventually finds out what’s really wrong with his patient because of having to treat him for the mace.

"Choi: She might have saved his life."

Connor returns to his apartment to find that Robin is gone. Her father has packed her bags and taken her to the airport. Connor confronts Dr. Charles with the note Robin left, enraged that he wasn’t told. He vows to find her before she leaves, but Chicago Med doesn’t show us any sort of final scene between them. Instead, we’re left with Charles going to Reese’s apartment to comfort his surrogate daughter, after sending off his actual one.

“Ties That Bind” is an episode that Chicago Med fans may have mixed feelings about, and with good reason. There are some hot-button medical issues here, like sterilizing your child without consent, and another instance of a patient threatening a doctor (but this time, the doctor fighting back). Everyone will likely have differing opinions on the cases, which is a good thing.

What isn’t so good is how some of the characters are portrayed here, particularly Robin. We all knew that Robin’s storyline was going to come to an end after it was clear that Chicago Med season 3 had moved on from her, but it’s still sad to see a character who was a strong woman spend almost all of her appearances this season portrayed as more of a patient or a liability.

And after all the time we spent invested in her relationship with Connor, to see it written out is also frustrating, because it became a very good pairing that could’ve kept contributing to the show. But alas, it won’t. Hopefully Robin will come back someday, because she deserves that. If only because Connor should get some closure (as would we!).

Plus, the whole Maggie/Goodwin plotline just rubs the wrong way. To see Goodwin put in a giant TV and a “pizza room” to get paramedics to bring more patients in feels like a form of bribery, and even though Maggie has the line about still treating the homeless man to the best of their ability, it’s hard not to see her whole spiel as favoring patients with money more than those without. That doesn’t sound like Maggie Lockwood at all.

But Colin Donnell is phenomenal yet again as Connor melts down in the face of his relationship ending, and whether or not you agree with what Reese did, at least Rachel DiPillo is handling it incredibly well and so is Oliver Platt (plus, Noah at Reese’s apartment?!)

“Ties That Bind” is a bittersweet episode, and it’s one that we’ll look back on and love some things about, and wish that others could’ve been done differently. But it’s definitely changed the season and the show for good.

Next: Which Chicago Med star has a birthday this week?

What did you think of this week’s Chicago Med episode? Let us know your reaction to “Ties That Bind” in the comments.

Chicago Med airs Tuesdays at 10/9c on NBC.

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