'The Good Doctor' Season 4 Episode 2 Preview: When can we expect another Melendez cameo?
'The Good Doctor' returned with its fourth installment on November 2, promising a Covid-19 themed season. It was missing a fan-favorite moment as Melendez (Nicholas Gonzalez), who was killed off in the Season 3 finale after being injured in a building collapse, was seen at the end of the premiere. Claire (Antonia Thomas) got a glimpse of her former lover. Initially, there was a flurry of questions around this appearance: Is Melendez dead or is he alive? Or is this just a figment of Claire's imagination?
The preview for the second episode might help us with a clue. The synopsis reads: "Dr. Shaun Murphy and the team try to get a better understanding of Covid-19, Claire looks for a way to grieve Melendez's death through her patients, Dr. Alex Park and Mia discuss their future together."
The big question remains: Will we get another cameo from Melendez again? We hope so. But he isn't alive, so sorry folks. In an interview with TvLine, David Shore confirmed that indeed he is just a figment of Claire's imagination. "Claire’s storyline is very much about trying to bring solace to people who have lost somebody [and] doing what you can do. Melendez is one of those people [for Claire], more so than anybody else in our hospital at that moment, given the way we ended last season. Of course, we did not anticipate any of this at the end of Season 3. Liz Friedman, who co-wrote the episode with me, called me up one day and said, “I think we should see Melendez,” and I went, “That’s a good idea.” We’ve done this before, obviously, with Shaun and his brother, and it seemed like an interesting way for this [grief] to manifest."
And the actor was immediately 'on board' for this, so which gives us some hope that we will see more ghostly cameos from him.... though, we don't know how erratic. "He was immediately on board. He may have been surprised that it was this soon, but he didn’t hesitate. It was wonderful," Shore continued.
In the previous episode, a lot of things happened, as we saw the doctors struggle with the pandemic. Shaun Murphy (Freddie Highmore) distanced himself from Lea as he did not want to expose her to the virus, and that took a bit of a nasty toll on him, but they finally get to spend time at the end of the episode. Glassman (Richard Schiff) is working from home...and the plot twist is that he sleeps with Debbie at the end of the episode.
Catch 'The Good Doctor' on ABC, 10 pm, Mondays.