Fans will be reeling from Doc’s midseason finale, as Amy’s world implodes in a whole new way.
The midseason finale featured Jake laying his father to rest in emotional scenes that beautifully shaped his character, and it also saw his highly anticipated reunion with Amy.
We caught up with Jon-Michael Ecker to unpack the episode, Jake’s emotional journey, and what the future holds for Jake and Amy. Check it out!
The fall finale was a powerful follow-up to the previous episode, which I absolutely loved.
What was your immediate reaction when you read those two scripts and learned how the series would dig into Jake’s personal life more?
I was like, “Oh, I’m actually gonna have to work a lot for these episodes—a lot more scenes than normal!”
No, I was really excited. We were all excited. One of the nice things about doing a larger season, besides just working more, is that we knew the writers were gonna have more episodes and more time to kind of delve into the lives of the characters behind just the hospital.
I was always excited to find out more about my past and my life outside the hospital because in season one, it gets brought up that I have an ex-wife, and there are some infidelity issues, and I have a daughter.
But we don’t really ever get to explore that too much, or the history with my parents. So getting these scenes and finding more out about my character beyond the conversations I had with the writers is just exciting.
Can you talk a bit about the challenges Jake faces with his father and about making peace with the fact that he didn’t get to tell him everything he wanted?
Yeah, a lot is going on between episode eight and nine.
Obviously, for anybody who’s been in that position, losing a close family member, anybody that you love, is always difficult on its own. You always find yourself wishing that you had more time, and that you had said more things, and that you had had more discussion.
So it’s always hard, and then on top of it, it was a very unexpected death. Our lives were somewhat distant from each other at the time of his death. It just made it really tough on Jake. He always thought he’d have more time.
So that’s what Jake’s dealing with. Amy having the flashback of the dinner and her telling me that he was proud of me doesn’t necessarily make the situation easier, but it helps at least to know. Here’s something about what he thought about me in my life before he left.
Yeah, I love that moment. It was just a really special moment.
Speaking of Amy. The past two episodes are really great for quelling any concerns or criticisms about Amy and Jake’s love for each other and just how profound it is. The episodes re-establish them. I’d love to hear your thoughts about that pairing and where they are now.
It is nice because we pick up the whole show basically the day of her accident. So we never really get to see, as an audience, what their relationship was really like and what level of superficiality or depth it actually had.
Was it just a work fling, or were they really together? So it’s nice to have these flashbacks, and you see that they were. They were actually a legit relationship, and they were meeting each other’s family and doing all these things that I think give some legitimacy to Jake and Amy’s love before she had the accident.
Going through the death of his father just kind of pushes Jake to reprioritize things and say, “You know, I know this is a risk for my professional career at the hospital. HR might not like it, but I just … you know?
Dealing with the death of a loved one makes you kind of conscious of your mortality and that the days are numbered, and I don’t want to wait anymore. I want to be with you, so let’s be together and try. It’s going to be hard, but let’s try, and if you know, the hospital doesn’t like it, that’s a risk I’m willing to take.
I was going to ask about that because, of course, there’s a fascinating reversal now. He’s her superior, and she’s his subordinate. Joan is putting her foot down about this relationship. How do they intend to navigate it, because everyone and everything tries to keep these two apart, and it just doesn’t happen.
Yeah, it’s a gray area. She was my superior; now I’m her superior, so you can’t really make some of the arguments about why we shouldn’t be together.
I think Joan’s big thing is that she wants what’s best for the hospital and the patients, and she thinks that being emotionally entangled will get in the way of us being the best doctors we can be.
As far as how they’re going to deal with it, I think they know there’s going to be some obstacles. I don’t think they’re going to go and advertise their relationship, especially around Joan, but I don’t really know how it’s going to get dealt with.
We’re just filming a handful of episodes ahead of where the show’s actually at, and I don’t get told that much. And I don’t ask that much.
I kind of like to find out as we go. So I don’t really know what’s gonna happen. I got to keep reading episodes, and everybody else has to keep watching, and we’ll find out hopefully soon!
I love that those COVID flashbacks really cement Amy and Jake’s relationship professionally. They’re the A-team. They work really well together in a professional stance. What’s your interpretation of Jake deciding in that moment to stay at Westside instead of relocating?
I liked having those flashbacks because reading the episodes gave me a lot of background as far as what happened between them. Amy was a difficult person to work with for everybody. It didn’t necessarily affect me besides being around someone without the most positive energy.
I think that those flashbacks around their professional relationship during COVID kind of mark his turning point, where he sees that she actually does respect me as a doctor. She trusts me, and she’s giving me more responsibility and autonomy in the hospital.
It makes me realize that maybe I don’t love the environment she’s created, but I know she’s a great doctor, and I’ll learn from her. It’s a great place for me to be, and there’s a future for me here because she also respects me.
It’s probably actually a good place for me to stay and kind of see this through rather than starting over at another place.
I think that was a nice turning point that the writers revealed through those flashbacks. Hopefully, the audience enjoyed it as much as I did as an actor, getting to find out more about the relationship through that.
It’s such a pivotal relationship of the series, and fans love it. I know they’ll love all these Jake and Amy bits.
Now, that had to be one of the messiest and most dramatic funeral gatherings. It’s so rare to have so many of the characters together like that in a scene. How much fun did you have filming those scenes?
I think we did that over two or three days. Maybe all of those scenes. It’s great. Everybody was there, and sometimes we go a long period without seeing each other unless it’s “hi” or “bye” in the hallways because our characters just aren’t in storylines together. So that was great.
And since we’re on location, we all had one big green room with everybody — my daughter, the aunts and uncles, and all the other main cast — so it always just makes for a good time besides just shooting the scenes. It’s fun to explore these different dynamics that we don’t normally get to explore.
Also, as a cast, we like getting to spend time together and long periods of time, because I think it was like I said, two or three days all day, and since everybody is in the scene in the background or something, for the most part.
Everybody was there all day, so I think it’s almost like creators need to, like, force that in, like, early seasons, because it kind of forces a bond a little bit and makes them hang out together all day, have too much coffee, and talk.
What’s been the most exciting part about playing Jake this season?
We have a great cast and crew. The writers and producers on the show — it’s just all around a great situation, I think we all feel really blessed to be on the show in general, as far as professionally on this show.
One thing I’m really enjoying that’s different from stuff I’ve done before is being a dad on the show. I’ve never had that before, and I have two very young children, so it’s kind of overlapping.
My daughter on the show is slightly older, five six, and mine are two and sub one. I think just exploring that onscreen, being a dad and the relationships, getting to have scenes with my daughter and ex-wife outside of the hospital. I’m enjoying that, and hopefully there’s more of that in the future.
One of my favorite scenes was Jake explaining the funeral process. It’s such a quiet, meaningful scene. I loved his gentle way with her, the representation, all of it.
I think the writers did a great job through eight and nine, just everything around my father’s death. Jake’s dealing with it, the flashbacks, and explaining it to my daughter, because obviously that’s what you have to do if you have kids and that happens. It’s just something most people can relate to on some level.
The finale was explosive after that audio drop, and Jake is probably the most consistent person who’s going to be in Amy’s corner during this fallout. What can you tease about what’s coming up?
There’s a lot we have to deal with, the whole Hannah and Charlie fallout, and then yeah, on my side, just dealing with Jake and Amy deciding to be together and do it, but we don’t quite know how it’s going to work out.
We’re going to be figuring that out for the next handful of episodes that we have, and then there’s just a lot going on, and we’ve got Scott Wolf coming back, which everybody is super excited about him directing, and you know, Dr. Evil coming back in.
I don’t know to what extent or capacity that’s going to be, but I know we’re all excited to have him back on set, and I’m sure the audience is going to love it. People loved to hate him in the first season, so I’m curious to see what happens to him in the second season.
People did hate him. I also feel confident in saying the fans hate Hannah and Charlie more right now. Maybe viewers will warm to Scott Wolf’s return because of that!
The writers — they did a great job with his character, because I remember I knew what was going to happen in season one more than season two, because it was a shorter episode count. I
love talking to people, and they’d be like, “I like everybody, but I hate him in the best kind of way.” They hated his character, but it was just the way they kind of did it at the end that you found yourself feeling bad for him, even though he did a bad thing.
Scott did such a great job of making you sympathize with the character and what he was dealing with in his family and with his son. And that there was a reason behind it all, he wasn’t just some bad, evil guy.
Doc returns on January 6 at 9/8c on FOX.
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