The Pitt

HBO

The Pitt season 2 will come to an end next week, the show winding down as the end of shifts tends to wind down, without some explosive finale or cliffhanger, as we saw in season 1. Most likely, in any case. But what we saw this week appeared to be a very clear test for a spinoff show, one that hasn’t been announced, but seems inevitable at this point, The Pitt: Night Shift.

While we certainly saw some night shift characters in season 1, namely Dr. Abbott, Shawn Hatosy, but in season 2, we are getting many more night shift characters spotlighted heavily, this week adding even more. And I don’t think they add people like one of the stars of Shrinking just to have him there for a bit part in three episodes.

We have already seen at least the following characters before this: Dr. Abbott, Dr. John Shen, Dr. Crus Henderson, new intern Nazely Toomarian, charge nurse Lesley Boon and season 1’s Mateo Diaz, who has moved to the night shift as of this season. This week, we saw a new girl taking over the front reception desk, a friend of Dr. Javadi’s, and at least one more nurse(?) who had a good amount of lines, though I don’t know her name. I also wonder if someone else, like the frequently mentioned nurse Vivi, could end up on the night shift. But in terms of confirmed night shift characters, that’s at least eight of them featured already, with a clear lead in the form of Shawn Hatosy’s Abbott. He’s mentioned this idea a few times already:

"There's been a lot of talk about the night shift. That would be really cool. We could do some cool, interesting things with the tone of the show," he told People.

It’s easy to see how you’d add a few more characters, probably pull another person or two from the main show, and get this in motion. HBO would no doubt die to have 30 weeks of The Pitt content out a year, provided it maintained that length and schedule. I don’t see any way this doesn’t happen at this point. I don’t know if the finale will lean as heavily on the night shift, as you’re really going to want to wrap up the main day shift story points, but last night? At least half that episode was a night shift show preview.

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Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.