The Knick Season 1 Episode 2: Mr. Paris Shoes

                                                                         
                                                                 

There is a new show on Cinemax and I posted a review of season 1 episode 1 last week. This is one great show and all my friends who are into Steampunk will especially enjoy the period sets and clothing. Think of the show as Penny Dreadful meets Nurse Jackie. It’s that good.

 On episode 2, poor Dr. Edwards (Andre Holland is forced into using a cluttered hospital basement as his office. This shocks Cornelia Robertson (Juliet Rylance), who is stand up righteous over women’s rights and the rights of minorities, but her hands are tied because the other doctors at the Knickerbocker Hospital are as bigoted as you can get.

                                                                                  

While the ever resourceful Dr. Edwards miraculously changes the dingy basement into a clinic to treat black patients, who are discouraged from using the white’s only hospital, Dr. Thackery (Clive Owen) and his fellow surgical comrades experience a horrible event due to improper installation of electrical wires causing a surgical patient to catch fire and an operating nurse to get electrocuted. The incident may have been caused by Herman Barrow (Jeremy Bobb) pocketing some of the money to get the work done right. Barrow is also in debt to a loan shark named Bunkie (Danny Hoch), who doesn’t take kindly to anyone being late with their payments.

                                                                              

We get an in depth look at Thackery’s drug routine which have him spending great deal of time and money at a local establishment in China Town. Thackery later questions Nurse Elkins (Eve Hewson) on her loyalty and her silence about an embarrassing incident.

                                                                                

Jealous over Dr. Edwards knowing how to do a complicated procedure for which he wrote an article in a French medical journal, Doctors Gallinger (Eric Johnson) and Chickering (Michael Angarano) have ambulance driver and bully Cleary (Chris Sullivan) break into a library in order for them to steal the journal.

                                                                                 

Later that night, Barrow loses a tooth thanks to Bunkie, Dr. Edwards stands up to a bully at his dilapidated boarding house, and Cleary catches Sister Harriet (Cara Seymour) wearing street clothing and entering a tenement. What is the good sister doing there? Sister Harriet is helping poor mothers to eliminate an extra mouth to fee. Will Cleary rat out the good sister? Tune in next Friday at 10 p.m. on Cinemax to find out.