I will be completely honest, when I heard that the TV show Scrubs was getting rebooted, my first thought was, “Oh no, here we go again”. Honestly, after the truly horrible 9th season, I had a hard time even wanting to talk about the show. I have gone around basically pretending the last season doesn’t exist. I mean, it’s a medical show; amnesia is pretty common, right? And yet, every time I see Zach Braff and Donald Faison on TV or in a commercial, I am immediately brought back to the show, both the good and the bad.
I first watched Scrubs back as a young teenager, and I can say with confidence that a lot of the jokes went straight over my head. I think that’s why I really struggled to enjoy the show during my attempted rewatch a few years ago. As with most sitcoms, a lot—and I mean a lot—of the humor in the show was dependent on the time. While I do still enjoy many of the running gags like EAGLE!, Rowdy the taxidermied dog, and the Janitor’s pranks, many of the jokes, especially the sexist and LGBTQIA+ ones, really haven’t aged well. The prevalence of these jokes made it very difficult to rewatch the entire show, as most of the humor really fell flat.
So far, only two episodes of the 2026 reboot have been released, with a third being set to air tonight. The first episode, released on February 25, was aptly titled My Return. The plot focuses on JD’s career after he left Sacred Heart and how one of his patients ends up leading him back to the place that meant so much to him. JD gets to reunite with his best friend Turk, who is now the Chief of Surgery, and Head Nurse Carla. JD’s ex-wife, Dr. Elliot Reid, is also present, and his mentor, Dr. Perry Cox, who has a trick or two up his sleeve as he attempts to pass the role of Chief of Medicine on to his protégé. The second episode, also released on February 25, is titled My 2nd First Day, a callback to the show’s pilot episode. We see JD attempt to navigate his new role and interact with the various interns, doctors, and other staff members at Sacred Heart.
It was so cool to see all the returning actors and very nostalgic to hear JD’s voice-over narration, a hallmark of the original show. It seems that the reboot has retconned events from season 9, in which—spoiler alert—the iconic hospital is torn down and replaced with a new facility of the same name. For season 10, however, it appears that the original version of Sacred Heart once again graces TV screens.
As far as reboots go, I was really impressed with how many of the characters they were able to bring back. However, I was disappointed that my favorite character, the Janitor, hasn’t made an appearance so far. Overall, I am excited to see how the rest of the season goes.
