Private Practice – Recap & Review – The End Of A Beautiful Friendship

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Private Practice
The End Of A Beautiful Friendship

Original Air Date: May 13, 2010

Farrah Kaye – Sr. Editor
farrah@thetwocentscorp.com

It’s the season finale of Private Practice and the end of last week’s cliffhanger: Dell and Maya arrived at the hospital via helicopter after being involved in a car accident while Dell was driving Maya to meet Sam and Addison at the hospital after she went into labor. Sam was asked to go with the paramedics to assist with the driver so he has no idea anything is going on (and he also doesn’t know he’s working on the man that could possibly have killed his daughter).

While this is all going on, Cooper decides he wants to marry Charlotte who was on a date with Sheldon and Fife has decided to give the ALS treatment to William. To put it lightly, there’s a lot going on.

Sam gets into the operating room and Mr. Hagan, the driver, says that God is mad at him for screwing up. He’s drunk out of his mind and Sam reassures him he will be fine. Charlotte is walking feverishly into the hospital and Sheldon is insecure about why she is bailing on the date. She reassures him she’s leaving the date purely because of the helicopter that landed on the roof of her hospital. Charlotte gets inside and discovers it’s Dell and Maya. When she asks Maya how she is feeling, she says she feels better with the epidural, only she didn’t have one. Holy moly, she can’t feel her legs. Addison calls Amelia in. Dell has a few bumps and bruises and a fractured arm and is worried and filled with guilt. Pete and Violet show up and Charlotte tells Violet to stay calm and to take care of Naomi and has to tell her what happened because she doesn’t know anything besides Maya being in labor. She asks Pete to take care of Sam. Coop shows up without a clue of what’s going on and asks Charlotte to dinner for the next night. Charlotte says “not now” and leaves Sheldon to explain everything. Naomi walks in all excited for the birth of her grandchild and William getting the treatment and Violet has to shake her into reality and tell her what happened. She gets to Maya and Dell apologizes. Violet reassures him he didn’t do anything wrong. Pete goes to tell Sam what happened and figures out that Sam has no clue he’s operating on the guy that hit Maya and Dell. The doctor paged to cover him hasn’t arrived yet and Charlotte doesn’t want Sam to know who he’s operating on. Addison performs a C-section on Maya and Naomi and Dell are in the room. When Maya’s blood pressure drops and she starts to bleed out, Naomi starts to freak out and Addison decides to not perform the C-section until they figure out what’s wrong.

Everyone is sitting waiting for Amelia to finish running scans on Maya when Dink comes in jumping with excitement. Cooper takes him aside to tell him what happened. William comes to Fife and Fife is all set for the ALS drip. William tells Fife about Maya’s accident and also tells him to go to the hospital and that he’s going to Sun Valley. What’s there? His daughter. He’s going there to die. He has a whole plan put together for what Fife should say to Naomi and he’s also figured out that Fife loves Naomi. Fife can’t believe William isn’t going to say goodbye to her. William tells him to be a better man than he has been and leaves. Peace out old man, peace out. Cooper watches as Sheldon and Charlotte share a sweet moment when Pete tells Violet the details of Lucas’ whereabouts (he’s with a babysitter). She doesn’t understand the concept of co-parenting but thanks him eventually. Amelia tells Addison and Naomi that Maya has a broken L2 and L3. The baby was keeping her back stable so when Addison moved the baby “all hell broke loose” as Amelia puts it. She wants to brainstorm ideas with Addison and asks Naomi to leave. The reason? All options are bad. Save the baby, save Maya (who will be paralyzed), lose Maya, lose the baby. None of these options are good. Meanwhile, Pete is standing outside of Sam’s OR when he finally comes out. Pete asks him to walk with him and drink something to stay hydrated. Sam is confused. Pete tells him what happened and Sam runs to be with Maya.

Fife comes to the hospital and has an idea to save Maya from paralysis: hypothermia. However, it may kill the baby. He’s also the voice of reason in saying that being paralyzed is not a death sentence. Naomi says do it, she wants Maya to walk again. Sam argues with her because she never wanted Maya to have the baby. Pete asks Dink what he wants, he’s her husband after all. He says he doesn’t know and says “can’t you save them both?” Amelia gets snarky back and he says he’s just a kid, they don’t teach how to make this kind of decision in mathletes. Fife says if Amelia is fast enough, she CAN save them both. Charlotte comes in to call Sam back on the OR. Addison follows him out to see how he is and he asks her just to stand with him for a minute. Oh dear, how I love these two. Just hug already! Sam goes back in and Pete updates him on the status of Maya’s surgery. While they’re talking, Pete notices the patient is waking up. Because he was so drunk, he’s going through anesthesia quicker than they can administer it. Sam figures out it’s the guy that hit Maya and doesn’t want to operate. He pulls back from the patient and he starts to code. Pete lies to him and says he heard Charlotte say the guy that hit Maya died. Pete swears it and Sam continues operating.

Naomi looks on as Dink sits with Maya and Fife comes to her. She’s upset that Maya called Dell instead of her and that if she had been there for Maya, she would’ve called her and this wouldn’t have happened. Dell overhears and Naomi sort of but doesn’t apologize by saying “I know you didn’t crash the car.” Fife tells her to stop beating herself up. Naomi asks him about William and he does just as William asked and uses his script. Charlotte is outside waiting for Sam’s replacement and she is a wreck with worry. Cooper tells her a story about Maya from when she was younger. Cooper also decides this would be a good time to propose to Charlotte. She thinks he’s being hysterical but he promises her he was going to do it the next day at dinner (which is why he asked her to go to dinner). He even has a ring, which he’s been carrying around for a year (since Violet got attacked). It’s not the sweetest proposal, but it’s very Cooper-esque. Charlotte is in total shock. Addison finds Naomi and she begs Addison to forgive her for how horrible she’s been to her and that she understands now what Addison was doing (referring to the Sam situation). Sam comes out of the OR when the replacement doc shows up and lets the cat out of the bag that it was the driver. Sam punches Pete for lying, despite him trying to explain why he did it. It was actually more about Addison, considering he said “What else are you gonna take from me? What else?!” Back to the waiting room, everyone is pretty quiet and no one really knows what to say, other than they’re waiting for Violet to freak out. She says she’s fine but that she’s sick of them having to be in the situations they’re in. Violet makes a bad joke about when she was hurt and finally decides to make it into a happier conversation by talking about Lucas’ birthday and takes out pictures of Lucas and shares them with everyone. Some of them are really crappy (like a picture of Lucas and Pete’s nose taken by Sheldon). It lightens the mood when Addison comes in to update them that everything is going well so far. Cooper decides to announce his engagement to everyone and Sheldon is not happy. He tells Cooper he is NOT going to marry Charlotte. Everyone congratulates Cooper except Dell and Sheldon. Sheldon leaves but Dell … well he’s passed out and unresponsive. After being examined, they find out he’s bleeding in his brain. The gang wants to get Amelia but there’s no time. The doc on call drills a hole in Dell’s head to control the bleeding.

Dell is awake and asks why no one took a picture of the doctor drilling into him. He says he has a headache and Charlotte figures out that something else is wrong. She brings the scans to Amelia and asks her if she can do it when she’s done. At first she doesn’t want to but when Charlotte tells her it’s Dell, she says she’ll be out there ASAP. Charlotte tells Dell he has another bleed and tries to make light of it and puts on a smile. Dell asks for Betsey and when Violet says it’s the middle of the night, Charlotte tells her GET HER. Pete offers to go and Violet stays with Dell. He tells Violet and Charlotte that he got into medical school. Aw man, don’t do this. PLEASE don’t do this. In Maya’s OR, the baby’s heart rate is beginning to drop but Amelia isn’t done. Betsey is with Dell and first he talks about her pet and how she shares and that she’s a good person. Then he gets all sad and makes his “I’m dying” speech to her. He tells her he loves her and Heather dying was bad and that if anything happened to him that would be bad, too. But on the bright side if it did happen, that means all of the bad stuff would be over and she can be happy after that. Violet looks on. Amelia finishes working on Maya and runs to start working on Dell while Addison finally does the C-section as Fife looks on. Charlotte is in the OR with Amelia as Dell’s bleed worsens and he codes. The bleeding won’t stop and … yep, you guessed it. Dell dies. WTH. DELL DIES.

Addison comes out of Maya’s OR with a smile on her face while Amelia comes out with “that” look on her face. They’re completely silent until Amelia says “who goes first?” Addison decides she will. They walk to the waiting room holding hands. I’m not sure why, but I loved that moment. They get to the waiting room and Amelia stays back while Addison tells them that Maya and the baby are both fine. Everyone cheers until they see Amelia’s face. She doesn’t say a word … she doesn’t need to. Pete decides to tell Betsey. Oh that poor little girl. Naomi watches as Dink holds his daughter and Maya is resting. Fife comes to her and she feels guilty about Dell. She decides to call William and Fife decides to tell her the truth. Violet is with Betsey in the waiting room while Pete looks on. Addison sees him and tells Pete that Violet’s ready. Not for Lucas, but for Pete. Addison tells him they’ll always be friends but he and Violet love each other and it’s okay. Cooper goes to Charlotte, who has to fill out all the paperwork from the crappy day. He just wants to sit with her and says it was a crappy day for proposing. He decides he should unpropose and do it again the next day. Charlotte thinks he just wants to get out of it but he assures her that’s not it. He just wants her to have a better story. She says she’ll say yes when he asks the next day. Pete goes to Violet and takes her hands and they have a talk, only we don’t get to hear what they say. I can only assume it’s “I love you” and “I love you too. Let’s make this work.” Addison watches on as Sheldon walks up to her. He’s upset at being everyone’s second choice and she feels the same way. She says she wants everything and Sheldon says she should and she deserves it. And if she loves someone who loves her back, don’t let him get away. The next morning, she goes to Sam’s place and asks him if she makes him happy. He says yes and tells him he makes her happy too. She takes off her clothes and well, I assume we all know where this goes….

THE. END.

Holy mother of all things Private Practice. While I’m glad we didn’t have a cliffhanger like someone bleeding in their living room, this was one heck of a finale! First off, Dell died. DELL DIED. Why did Dell die? Well, because Chris Lowell didn’t sign on for season 4. So it was easy to give him a dramatic exit. But that poor little girl! I mean two parents in one year. Come on now! Pete and Violet are giving it a go, Cooper stepped it up with Charlotte, and Addison finally went to Sam. My only worry for Sam/Addy is that their little romp on the couch is a cliffhanger and they won’t go through with it because he will feel vulnerable. Most shows are doing time-jumps next season, so I hope I’m wrong and the time jump will have everyone nice and happy. I also hope that now with William out of the picture, Fife and Naomi can get back to that place they were at before she went to Switzerland. I love them together. Hopefully next year’s finale will be happy, like, maybe a wedding. I’d like that. Or a double birthday party for Lucas and Maya’s daughter. No more hospital scenes, ok writers? Thanks. What did you guys think? Leave your two cents below.

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