Editor's Note: The below recap contains spoilers for Watson Episode 2.Nearly a month after Watson made its debut, the series returns to its regularly scheduled timeslot this evening. Episode 2, aptly titled “Redcoat,” opens with an American Revolutionary War reenactor — dressed in the iconic red military uniform — arriving home to what appears to be a home intruder waiting for him. All that we see is a gun aimed at Andrew Tanner’s (Damian O'Hare) head before the camera pans to the exterior of the house and the gun fires, effectively setting up the medical mystery of the week.
But, before Dr. Watson (Morris Chestnut) taps into his deductive reasoning skills to solve Andrew Tanner’s case, he pushes his skilled team of doctors to look beyond their specialties to deduce the root cause of a young girl’s illness, which appears to be a textbook case of Uncombable Hair Syndrome. While he talks through the patient’s symptoms and lays out his reasoning behind this exercise, Dr. Lubbock (Inga Schlingmann) is far more occupied with abusing a bouquet of balloons that someone purchased for her, in anticipation of her engagement to her boyfriend Zack — which didn’t happen. Lubbock and the Crofts (Peter Mark Kendall) make suggestions of other underlying causes for the girl’s condition, but it is ultimately an incredibly smug Dr. Derian (Eve Harlow) who figures out that Dr. Watson is putting them through their paces to diagnose the girl with exactly what it appears to be: Uncombable Hair Syndrome.
‘Watson’ Solves a Curious Case of Mistaken Identity in Episode 2
Unlike Dr. Watson’s UHS case study, his soon-to-be ex-wife, Mary Marston (Rochelle Aytes), brings the team Andrew Tanner’s case because his medical mystery is not so straightforward. After being shot in the head with a .22 caliber handgun, Tanner has seemingly forgotten who he, and his family, are, instead believing himself to be the Scotsman Patrick Ferguson, who fought for the British Army in the Revolution — and who Tanner reenacted as. The team theorizes that he might be suffering from Foreign Accent Syndrome or face trauma-induced delusions, but none of these really explain the full scope of his condition.
Dr. Watson splits up the team, sending the Crofts to research Andrew’s social media presence, while he and Dr. Lubbock meet with Andrew’s wife, Karine Tanner (Lauren Akemi Bradley), at their home to get a better understanding of the crime scene, and Dr. Derian searches for a neurosurgeon who is willing to operate on Andrew’s aneurysms. During their reconnaissance missions, the Crofts learn that Andrew has a tremor in his right hand that has been getting progressively worse. Dr. Watson and Dr. Lubbock piece together the timeline of events at the Tanner residence and discover that there is a one-hour window of time between the initial bullet that struck the family’s clock and the bullet that landed Andrew in the hospital.
They also discover that Andrew’s $20,000 bottle of whiskey has been opened and that whoever drank the whiskey shared six drams with someone else. With this revelation, Dr. Watson and Dr. Lubbock came to the natural conclusion that Andrew knew who shot him, and likely staged the break-in to ensure that his wife and daughter received the insurance money after his death. Their theory is further compounded by the fact that the Crofts discovered that Andrew had recently learned that he had the genetic markers for Huntington’s Disease, which would have resulted in a slow and painful death.
Dr. Watson goes to Dr. Marston with his theory that Andrew is pretending to be insane to ensure that his wife still gets the insurance money, but they aren’t able to divert resources to ensure that Andrew doesn’t try to kill himself under their watch because they have no hard evidence to support Watson’s theory. So Watson opts to sit on the roof of the hospital, hoping to catch Andrew in the act of attempting to kill himself again — and his waiting pays off. Andrew arrives on cue, and Dr. Watson reels him off the ledge before he has the chance to jump. Watson tries to talk sense to the man, offering up his own experience with leaving Mary two years ago to follow after Sherlock, which ultimately ruined their relationship, but it doesn’t really have an effect on Andrew. Watson notices something off about Andrew’s eyes a moment before he collapses and begins to seize as one of the aneurysms breaks loose, leaving him in a medically induced coma until they’re able to get him the help he needs.
It turns out Andrew doesn’t have the deadly Huntington’s Disease, even though he has a family history and the genetic markers for it. What he actually has is Wilson’s Disease — a disease that shares symptoms with Huntington’s — which is both treatable and non-fatal. Dr. Watson presses Andrew into deciding if he wants to fight for a future filled with anniversaries and birthday parties, and he drops the Patrick Ferguson act and declares that he wants his life back.
Dr. Derian’s Past Comes into Focus in ‘Watson’ Episode 2
From her first introduction in the premiere, Dr. Derian is positioned as a thorn in Watson’s side, needling him about the ethics of practicing medicine, despite his TBI, all the while concealing her own dubious ethics. At the top of the episode, Watson accuses her of avoiding him since he called her bluff and saw through one of her lies and she all but admits to being upset about the accusation that she lied. As the episode progresses, Watson provides audiences with a much deeper look into Derian’s tendency to lie to everyone around her. It first manifests itself when she and Watson visit Brodie “BDE” Davis Emerson (Jared Canfield) and attempt to convince him to operate on their patient. Emerson sees through her little white lies, and the fact that she has a “tell” gets under her skin so much so that at the end of the episode, audiences get to watch her practice her lies in the bathroom mirror.
But Derian’s inability to maintain her poker face isn’t the most revelatory aspect of “Redcoat.” After eleven neurosurgeons refuse to operate on Andrew Tanner, Watson suggests that Dr. Derian should pay her old friend Dr. Isaac Niles (Hampton Fluker) a visit. She is immediately on the defensive about enlisting a doctor “in exile” in Johnstown, but Watson insists that he sounds exactly like what the doctor ordered. It has been seven years since Derian and Niles were students together, and she isn’t the only one reluctant about the prospect of working together again. Niles initially shoots down her offer, citing the fact that Derian was responsible for his proverbial exile. He agrees to perform the surgery if she admits to what she did to him, but even when he’s set to scrub into the OR, Derian maintains her innocence.
Between the two conversations, Niles reveals that Derian was the reason that he lost his scholarships, racked up credit card debt, went to jail, and has been unable to find meaningful work since graduating. While the details are painted in broad strokes, Niles alleges that while the two were dating, their team went out to celebrate after passing a particularly difficult assignment, and someone — Derian — called the cops to report a drunk driver matching his description. Despite claiming that he wasn’t drinking, the report still managed to derail Niles’ career, and he believes that she orchestrated the entire thing to take her competition out of the picture. It’s hard to deny that Niles’ claims make sense, when Derian employs sex appeal and manipulation to coyly deny his claims. By the end of the episode, Niles isn’t the only one who knows about Derian’s questionable past. After the successful surgery, Dr. Morstan offers Niles a position at UHOP (University Hospital of Pittsburgh), but he turns her down while warning that Derian is an “incredible danger” to everyone there.
Related
“They Had Me When They Told Me the Mythology of It All”: ‘Watson’s Morris Chestnut on Who the Doctor Detective is Without Sherlock Holmes
Chestnut also talks about how important Moriarty will be to Watson's story this season.
2
Moriarty’s Presence Is Felt Even When He Isn’t on ‘Watson’
One of the big twists at the end of Watson’s pilot was the reveal that Dr. Watson wasn’t the only man to survive Reichenbach Falls. Moriarty (Randall Park) also survived — and he’s out to get Watson by way of Watson’s close confidant and colleague, Shinwell Johnson (Ritchie Coster). At the top of Episode 2, Watson tasks Shinwell with filling one of the prescriptions he has prescribed himself to manage his TBI, which proves to be a disastrous decision. One of the unassuming pharmaceutical reps who turns up at Watson’s offices trying to hock the latest in evolving medical equipment is revealed to be one of Moriarty’s allies.
Porsche (Sofie Kane) instructs Shinwell to switch out the pills in Watson’s newly filled prescription with a drug of Moriarty’s choosing. Shinwell ultimately follows through with the plan, but not without questioning if the new drug will hurt Watson. Stephens later catches Shinwell in the act, though the older man is able to play off his presence in Dr. Watson’s office, as he’s always sort of loitering around. Still, Stephens seems noticeably suspicious of Shinwell, which will surely come into play later in the season as more is revealed about Moriarty’s plans for Dr. Watson.
Watson and Marston Remain the Most Compelling Part of the Series
While Dr. Watson’s team of quirky doctors continue to be hard to get a true feel for, the dynamic between Watson and his soon-to-be-ex-wife Dr. Marston remains the most compelling element of the series, and Episode 2 continues to build on that dynamic. In between unraveling his patient’s mysterious ailment, Watson spends most of the episode agonizing over the fact that Mary has an appointment on her calendar with someone nicknamed “Gummi” — and he’s convinced it means she’s dating again. Of course, this isn’t the case.
At the end of the episode, Watson tells Mary that he knows about “Gummi” and that he has decided he won’t pry into her personal life any further. She seems amused by this revelation and offers to have lunch with Watson after Andrew’s miraculous recovery, but he has to decline because his tactics for solving the case have earned him a meeting with Human Resources. Inadvertently, Dr. Watson’s meeting with the Director of Human Resources solves the mystery of who “Gummi” is — as it is revealed that her nickname is “Gummi” and Mary was just having lunch with a friend from work. Between the pilot and Episode 2, Watson makes the case that Dr. Watson and Dr. Marston might be able to reconcile someday. Watson clings to the fact that they aren’t divorced yet, going so far as to acknowledge their sixteenth wedding anniversary, while she seems amused by his insistence that they aren’t officially exes yet. It will be interesting to see how this relationship plays out, considering the other liberties the series has taken with its Sherlockian inspiration.
Watson wraps up the episode by doling out a few more details about Stephens and Dr. Lubbock. Stephens has a mysterious girlfriend who appears to be a digital sex worker. They share a brief conversation before he dramatically shuts his laptop, ending the call, when Dr. Lubbock walks into the room. Lubbock seems blissfully unaware of what she just walked in on, as she is far more interested in presenting Stephens with a balloon because she figured out that he was the one who bought her the congratulatory balloons at the top of the episode. Stephens essentially calls her boyfriend an idiot for “requesting an extension” on their engagement and treating her like a tax return. It’s not quite clear if Watson intends to forge relationships between the interns, though it seems to at least be creating a bond between these two. The episode ends with Shinwell watching Dr. Watson take his “new” prescription, leaving audiences on a cliffhanger with what this medicine might do to the good doctor and how this all factors into Moriarty's Machiavellian plans.
You can watch new episodes of Watson every Sunday on CBS at 9 PM ET/PT, and on the Paramount+ app the following day.
Your Rating
Rate Now 0/10
Your comment has not been saved
Watson
Episode 2 finds Watson and his team diagnosing an American Revolutionary War reenactor while Moriarty plots from the shadows.
Not Yet Rated
DramaMystery
7 10
- Release Date
- January 26, 2025
- Network
- CBS
- Showrunner
- Craig Sweeny
Pros & Cons
- Morris Chestnut and Rochelle Aytes' chemistry keeps the series afloat when all else fails.
- Watson's core cast of characters come across as smug know-it-alls with no real redeeming or relatable personality traits.
- Episode 2 doesn't do much with improving the likability of any character beyond Dr. Watson and Dr. Marston.
