- “Come on, I know it's tempting to just mail it in, but there's still a lot of people who rely on us week to week. I think we owe it to them to be as inspired as we were our first few years. Now I know we never do great come medical awards season, except for Dr. Shalhoub, he wins everything, but I still think we're as good as anybody else out there.”— J.D.
"My Jerks" is the first episode of Scrubs' eighth season. Sacred Heart welcomes Dr. Maddox (Courteney Cox), their new Chief of Medicine. Elliot realizes she is self involved and apologizes to Keith. Janitor gets fired.
Synopsis[]
Dr. Maddox arrives at Sacred Heart
J.D. & interns[]
J.D. notices something new (
), and Janitor assumes he wants a compliment back, thinking J.D. noticed his new watch. J.D. then conducts rounds with his new interns and doesn't like any of them. He thinks Katie is too much of a know-it-all, Denise is terrible with her bedside manners, and Ed is too unproductive. He welcomes the new Chief of Medicine for Sacred Heart, Dr. Taylor Maddox and is surprised at how attractive and nice she is. Later, during another session of rounds, J.D. leaves the interns alone in the ward to watch the patients and gives them specific instructions. When he returns, he finds that they allowed a patient to crash. He vows he is done teaching them and hands them over to Josephine. In the cafeteria, Dr. Cox tells J.D. that he was not too dissimilar from these new interns, and that it is his job to teach. He ends up giving the interns a second chance.
Dr. Cox[]
Meanwhile, Dr. Cox is upset that he is going to have to be "the guy" who tells the new Chief of Medicine every time she does something the staff doesn't agree with. He notices that Dr. Maddox is keeping a patient, Bernie Hicks in the hospital only because he has incredible insurance, and is ordering constant unnecessary tests and procedures simply to make money from it. He later stands up to her and argues with her.
Elliot apologizes to Keith
Elliot & Keith[]
After Keith Dudemeister calls Katie "Mini Elliot", Elliot obsesses that she is too self involved. Carla tries to nicely give her a reality check, and after failing to see the signs that Keith is still hurt by her dumping him, Ted shows her that he is still upset. She apologizes for what she did in private.
Dr. Kelso at Coffee Bucks
Dr. Kelso[]
Dr. Kelso enjoys a muffin at Coffee Bucks and watches the hospital drama. Ted tries to tell him off, but still does not have enough self esteem to do so.
Recurring Themes[]
More: Fantasies • Flashbacks • J.D.'s girl names • Janitor's pranks and lies
Dr. Cox tries to kill himself...
...but fails
Fantasies[]
- When Dr. Maddox walks into the hospital, she is walking in sexy slow-motion.
- Dr. Cox can't resist smiling at Dr. Maddox so he shocks his head with a defibrillator.
Flashbacks[]
- Elliot flashes her breasts and the image is featured on the cover of Drunk Blondes #1.
- Jimmy gives Dr. Maddox a face massage.
Janitor story[]
Janitor is fired
J.D. is upset that Ed is using his cell phone during rounds so J.D. tries to give it to the Janitor. Later, Janitor trips J.D. because he got "confused" when J.D. was trying to be nice. Dr. Maddox asked for his name to which Janitor gave her a smug response. After reading that his name tag said "The Janitor" she fired Janitor on the spot. The next day, Dr. Maddox saw Janitor fixing a light, walked him out of the hospital, re-fired him, and took his universal key. He is then replaced by a more cheery Marvell.
J.D.'s Girls Name[]
- Beth
Episode Running Gags[]
- Ed signed up for a fansite for ABC's Lost under then screen name HotGirl99, and anyone coming into the hospital to meet "her" will be holding a red balloon, including Ted and Colonel Doctor .
- Whenever J.D. refers to Katie as "Blair," Turk says "you're welcome" in that "smug way of his," which J.D. was trying to avoid.
- The Janitor replaces his set of keys for one key that works for everything, including a scooter, and Ted's briefcase.
Guest Stars[]
J.D. with the new interns.
- Courteney Cox as Dr. Taylor Maddox
- Eliza Coupe as Dr. Denise Mahoney
- Betsy Beutler as Dr. Katie Collins
- Aziz Ansari as Dr. Ed Dhandapani
- James Ritz as Bernie Hicks
- Eric Artell as Rodney
- Taran Killam as Jimmy
- Aseem Batra as Josephine
- Michael Spiller as The Balloon Guy
- Jack Grinnage as Marvell
- Bob Bencomo as Coleman Slawski (uncredited)
Music[]
♫ List of music featured in Scrubs
- "Catch My Disease" by Ben Lee
- "I Wanna Be Your Man" by Endeverafter
Quotes[]
- “(Narration) Lie! (Out loud) No.”— J.D.
- “(Narration) Lie! (Out loud) No.”— J.D.
- “How come all you have in here is a smiley face button and a revolver?”— Dr. Maddox
- “Well, one's in case I get sad, and the other one's in case I get really sad.”— Ted
- “Well, one's in case I get sad, and the other one's in case I get really sad.”— Ted
- “Come on, I know it's tempting to just mail it in, but there's still a lot of people who rely on us week to week. I think we owe it to them to be as inspired as we were our first few years. Now I know we never do great come medical awards season, except for Dr. Shalhoub, he wins everything, but I still think we're as good as anybody else out there.”— J.D.
- “The Neilsons beg to differ.”— Turk
- “The Neilsons beg to differ.”— Turk
- “Oh, they're just upset because their insurance won't cover a private room.”
Trivia[]
- The scenes with Courteney Cox were shot near the end of Season Eight's production, so Zach Braff had to keep his beard for the whole season.
- Courteney Cox (as Taylor Maddox) is the second Friends actor on Scrubs, the first being Matthew Perry as Murray Marks.
- This episode was nominated for Outstanding Sound Mixing For A Comedy Or Drama Series in the 2009 Emmy Awards.
- There are numerous references to Monk beating Scrubs during the TV awards seasons. Particularly the reference to Dr. Shalhoub is related to Tony Shalhoub who plays the titular character in Monk and the "Nielsens" is reference to the Nielsen ratings system, used to determine what ratings and demographics a TV show is reaching.
- When J.D. points to Janitors watch and says "That's new" it is also a sight gag pointing to the new ABC on screen bug, since this was the first episode to air on ABC after the move from NBC.
- The extended fantasy sequence of Dr. Maddox entering the hospital was composed of several takes put together. Courtney Cox thought they were only going to use one slow motion walk fantasy that has occurred in previous episodes.
- This episode along with Season Nine begins the trend of playing a deleted scene over the end credits rather than a still shot.
- It is revealed that Turk claims to be 1/8 Japanese.
- The picture of "drunk blondes" had to have the stars made bigger for ABC. In the DVD commentary Sarah Chalke admitted this made her feel good.
- When Ted calls Dr. Kelso a loser, he makes the "loser" sign, but he does so with his wrong hand, spelling a backwards L.
- This episode ends with the song "Catch My Disease" by Ben Lee. "My Bad Too" also ended with the same song.
- Originally, the first episode of Season Eight was to be "My ABC's", but the decision was made during production to make Courteney Cox's three-episode arc the first episodes of the season. Although there are no orphaned references as a result of this change, certain aspects of J.D., Elliot, and Dr. Cox's annoyance with Denise, Katie, and Ed in this and the following episodes are informed by the events of "My ABC's."
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