Scrubs: the forged’s chemistry remains to be so sparky it completely carries this zinger-packed comeback | Tv

It is possible to believe contradictory things. For instance, I believe TV’s reliance on reviving old shows is a risk-averse, creative regression. On the other hand, I love it. I particularly love it when fictional characters have visibly aged. There’s a broken humanity that you don’t get with flawless, collagen-rich skin. You sense you could talk to them about your sciatica and they’d get it.

I got that feeling with the new series of Scrubs (Disney+, from Thursday 26 February), a show I once mainlined on E4. Scrubs was as comforting as tea and toast. Surprisingly malleable, too. In its bones, it was a coming-of-age workplace bromance between junior doctors JD and Turk, played by then newcomers Zach Braff and Donald Faison. Their chemistry was the show’s anchor, balancing sassy racial harmony with irreverence and heart, as they bore witness to universal human drama. But is it healthy enough to survive resuscitation, more than 15 years after its last episode aired?

Sensibly, the writers have shaken things up. JD has grown into complacent early middle age, working as a private doctor for the affluent and elderly. “You write scripts in the suburbs” is Turk’s withering appraisal. (For a hot second, I thought he was beefing with Braff’s indie film-making.) Braff directs the first episode, in which a problem with one of JD’s pampered patients takes him back to Sacred Heart, the training hospital where he earned his wheels.

The move brings him face to face with old comrades, including old flame Elliot, cheerful chauvinist the Todd and an emotional Turk, who is suffering from burnout. “I wish this guy would die all at once, instead of in tiny little pieces,” the baby-faced chief surgeon shockingly exclaims in theatre. In fairness, he’s a father of four now. It’s amazing he’s standing.

At least JD’s irascible mentor can’t call him “Newbie” any more, like he used to, right? “What can I do for you there, Oldie?” asks Dr Cox. John C McGinley is still electrifying, his character a methamphetamine Martin Sheen, given to virtuosic, rhetorical putdowns, delivered in sentences longer than those of a 19th-century novelist.

Cox has a problem, though. Tough love is out, political correctness is in, as policed by the figure of Sibby, a wellness/HR figure, who pops up genie-like at any impassioned outburst, with instructions to “take it down a few degrees” or attend cultural sensitivity workshops.

I was dismayed when she appeared, and by recurring jokes about the “feelings police”. Scrubs isn’t the only comedy that has to address a vigilant climate around banter and power dynamics. It’s particularly an issue for returning series that made their name in the good ol’ days. I sympathise – puritans haven’t enjoyed this much cultural power since they closed the theatres. But it’s a defensive stance for TV shows to take. The anxiety of being muzzled leads to an obsessive preoccupation with it, so you no longer talk about anything else. It’s half of how the culture war perpetuates itself, and it’s boring.

Happily, after two episodes the show decides it can only be itself. “Why do you have the physique of a menopausal lesbian?” an insolent younger character asks the older, not yet dignified JD. It’s funnier for it, and the show clearly has affection for gay people, among other minorities. It begins to take on worthy subjects: the dehumanising US healthcare system; patient quotas doctors must meet to maximise hospital profits; TikTok diets that threaten health; orthorexia in gym bros. Speaking with conviction, and an open heart, matters more than speaking correctly. That’s also something I believe.

Will Scrubs Redux evolve, Gray’s Anatomy-style, with generations of younger characters taking the torch? Scenes with the new newbies fall a little flat – but if Dr Cox taught me anything, it’s that you have to give people time. The chemistry between the seasoned leads sparks enough to sustain things for now. Turk is soon moonwalking again, the writers are throwing out zingers you’ll want to keep in your back pocket. I liked this far more than I expected. We all need a little TLC, more than ever, and it turns out I actually do want a scrub. It gets some love from me.