'the knick' season 2 episode 2 review: the return of dr john thackery

Thack is back. There is a bang but not a good kind. THIS IS NOT A SPOILER-FREE POST. DR JOHN THACKERY IS YET TO CURE US OF THAT DISEASE!  The poster boy of The Knickerbocker Hospital is

back. The second episode of Season 2 of _The Knicks_, 'You're No Rose' marks the return of Dr John Thackery. After Dr Everett Gallinger drags him out of a correctional

facility centre for the '10 knots experiment', he comes back to take his position from his competition, Dr Algernon Edwards. He assures the board of the hospital of his clean body

after 'The 10 knots' experience and then shocks them by telling them about his intentions to find a cure for the 'disease' of addiction. A brave move in the world where

addiction is a moral slip than a problem. Speaking of slips, health inspector Speight's body is found floating in the Hudson river after he was supposed to meet someone in the dockyards

to get more information about the stowaways who are bringing bubonic plague to New York. Newly-wed and recently back Cornelia Showalter becomes the accidental, amateur, yet enthusiast

detective. This season will have her do more running than she did in the last one where Speight and she were looking for 'Typhoid Mary.' Cornelia is outsmarted at all steps by the

people who are not willing for Speight's dead body to talk. They have bribed the people to the ranks of the police. She is told that teetotaler Speight got drunk and then might have

slipped in the river. Cornelia is a smart woman for her time and that's why has no hesitation in calling her lover, Dr Edwards, to know about any procedure available to determine if the

body has alcohol in it even after the person is dead (Bad news for the modern day drivers, isn't it?) I have my suspicion that Speight's death has some connection to

Cornelia's brother Henry Robertson, given his ambition and the disapproval of the way their father runs the shipping business. Cornelia asks for Cleary to go back to his old ways and

dig up the grave of Speight. Cleary, already in the muds with the troublesome electric vehicle, bad investments, failure as a wrestler manager, has sought to help out Nun Harriet. Harriet is

still in prison for the abortion charges and Cleary, her business partner, has secured services of a Harvard lawyer whom he cannot manage to pay. Cleary, while digging up the grave, asks

Cornelia to help her out. Delivering the best lines of the episode, he says, "The two people who dragged me into malfeasance are a society lady and a fucking nun!” Back at the Knick,

Thackery is leaving his old ways behind and that starts with Nurse Lucy Elkins. He tells her when he said that he loved her, it was all under the influence of cocaine. Nurse Elkins is

devastated and her problems get worse when her father visits her unexpectedly. This is the introduction to the other sub-culture of the time. The scene where Lucy's father starts

preaching is made extraordinary with the use of the theremin in the background score. It represents the possible rise of another issue for the Knick. Thackery, on his way to the future, has

hurt his protege Dr Bertram 'Bertie' Chickering. Bertie knew that Lucy had a soft corner for Thackery, but the speech Thack made about the pretentious notions society follows about

the virginity of a woman, made Bertie realise the depth of the relationship between Thack and Lucy. That sealed his decision to leave Thack and the Knick. Thackery, on the other hand, is

trying to stay away from his desire for cocaine by drowning in liquor at the bar room and banging B-girl in the dirty alley. In another side story, Barrow has hired Dr Mays, a questionable

GP, for the sole purpose of exploiting his connections to attract more donors for the hospital. But it turns out that Dr Mays' even more questionable bedside manners will help Barrow

more than his help in the operation theatre. Dr Mays good old ways of gynaecology will not sit well with brothel owner Ping Yu, but for now, ever so sly Barrow will hold on to Dr Mays for

his life. Coming back to Thackery, he has spotted that Edwards is handing over surgeries to Bertie and Gallinger. He notices that there is something wrong with Edwards' eye. Remember

Edwards' fist fight in the last episode of season 1? Edwards has an experimental procedure as a solution to reattach his retina and he is willing to go under the knife in the hands of

Thackery knowing the addiction episode. We are taken back to the sneaky days of night operations. But Thackery loses his confidence when he hallucinates about the girl who died on his table

because of failed blood transfusion. Edwards abandons the idea and we see Thack back in the barroom, talking to the same B-girl who offers Thackery with a very tempting idea of subduing

cocaine with the heroin.  The smirk on Thackery's face in the last shot has two possible intentions. One, he will use this new information for his research to stop the addiction. Two,

he will go back to his old ways. Let's wait and watch. _THE KNICK SEASON 2 AIRS ON HBO DEFINED EVERY SATURDAY AT 9 PM_