Scrubs revival episode 8 shocker: Is Dr. Cox sick?

We knew heading into Scrubs season 1 episode 8 that we would be seeing John C. McGinley return as Dr. Perry Cox. However, there was still some mystery — how exactly that was going to happen. Let’s just say that we do now have a better sense of that.

Ultimately, Cox is now in a position where, despite being a brilliant doctor for so many years, he is now a patient. To be specific, he is JD’s patient. The teacher now has to be willing to sit back and take guidance from someone else.

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During the episode, it was revealed that Cox has microscopic polyangiitis, a rare autoimmune disease that can cause serious problems; however, it can also be treatable. The whole idea here seems to be that Cox will need to be at the hospital a lot moving forward, provided the show gets a season 2.

So how did this twist come about? Speaking to TVLine, McGinley (whose presence was limited this time due to his other show in Rooster) had the following to say:

Zachy [Braff] called me up with this pitch. I wanted to know how Cox was going to be integrated back into the landscape of the revival, and he said, “Here’s the pitch: Cox has a organ malady and he has to come back. And the mentor now has to be served by the mentee.” And I was like, that is so rich because writers can write that landscape. And [showrunner] Aseem [Batra], who is the new executive producer on “Scrubs,” just wrote the heck out of 108. It’s as good as the Brendan Fraser episode. It’s as ambitious a half hour of television as we’ve done.

The Brendan Fraser episode McGinley is likely referring to here is “My Screw Up,” where Cox was completely unaware that Fraser’s character had died for a significant chunk of the story. That remains, arguably, one of the greatest episodes of half-hour television that we have ever seen.

Related – Be sure to get some more thoughts on the finale for the Scrubs revival now

What do you think about the big Scrubs twist when it comes to Dr. Cox?

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