Brilliant Minds is making its midseason return with Mandy Patinkin playing a mysterious role as a fellow doctor in a life-or-death medical case.
In Us Weekly‘s first look at the Monday, January 6, episode, Oliver Wolf (Zachary Quinto) and Josh Nichols (Teddy Sears) show up to help a woman trapped under a collapsed building, which is when they notice a good samaritan on the scene.
“Paramedics did what they could, but triage is overwhelmed right now. I am a doctor,” the unnamed character (Patinkin) tells Dr. Wolf in the clip. “I was on my way to see my wife. I heard the collapse, and I thought I could help but there wasn’t much I could do other than sit here with her.”
Dr. Wolf reassures the man that sometimes emotional support “is everything” before he shares more of what he knows about the patient.
Us Investigates How the New Slate of Medical TV Shows Differ From Each Other
“Her name is Jenna. From what she has been able to tell me, she is 41 and runs a nonprofit,” Patinkin’s character explains. “She keeps calling for Stuart — a boyfriend or fiancé I am guessing. She’s in and out [of consciousness] over the last 10 minutes. She is strong.”
Patinkin, 72, ultimately leaves to “go help the neighbors” as Dr. Wolf contemplates next steps.
“Our options are limited. We either wait until she is freed and get her to the hospital,” Dr. Nichols says in the clip. “But if we intervene here, we risk infection or a catastrophic bleeding we can’t stop. She could die.”
Dr. Wolf, however, doesn’t want to wait since Jenna “is just going to get worse.” The patient briefly wakes up to say she is a runner and wants to keep her legs, which makes Dr. Wolf less willing to perform an on-site amputation. An emergency responder urges him to reconsider.
“The priority is evacuation. This building has lost half of its foundation. It is not a matter of if the rest of it goes down but when,” the fire service member tells Dr. Wolf. “The problem is moving this much rubble can bring down the rest of the building.”
He continues: “We are working on evacuation as fast as we can, but it is going to take some time. We need to move her, like, now — even if that means she loses her legs.”
Shocking 2024 TV Moments: ‘Bridgerton’ Gender-Swap to ‘Monsters’ Backlash
Brilliant Minds, which premiered in September 2024, is inspired by the Oliver Sacks books The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and An Anthropologist on Mars and follows a neurologist and his team of interns as they tackle challenging neurology cases while dealing with their own relationships and mental health.
In addition to critical success, Quinto, 47, is making history with his character on the hit NBC procedural, marking the first openly gay character to lead a network medical series.
“I think the thing for me that is so significant about that is that it’s not significant at all. Actually, it’s not significant to the character,” Quinto said on The Drew Barrymore Show in December 2024. “It’s an aspect of who the character is and NBC was really open to and invested in this story, the value of this story in our contemporary culture and the conversations that are happening today in the society.”
Quinto noted that the role meant “so much” to him because it is based on Sacks, who died in 2015.
“He lived and worked primarily in the mid-20th century, and he was a gay man himself and was celibate for 35 years of his life. When I found that out, I was like, ‘If you’re not somehow called to the clergy or living a life that restricts that, why would you ever make a choice like that?’” He recalled. “Then the more I learned about him and the more I read about him and the more that I observed why someone would make that decision, it became clear to me that it was because he didn’t feel he could be authentically himself and be afforded the same opportunities in his field of medicine. He knew he was designed to change the field of medicine, which he did.”
Biggest Fall TV Finale Cliffhangers — And Questions We Need Answered ASAP
After reading about the inspiration for Brilliant Minds, Quinto considered the role “an honor” to take on, adding, “The tragedy of his life was that he felt like if he brought that part of himself into his work, he would have been denied those opportunities. So for me to be in this situation now — a generation later — and to be an openly gay man who’s leading this show and who’s telling this story. It’s such an opportunity to honor the original man himself, Oliver Sacks.”
He concluded: “And to say how grateful I am that I don’t have to cut that part of myself off in order to enjoy a life of fulfillment and success.”
Brilliant Minds airs on NBC Mondays at 10 p.m. ET. New episodes stream the next day on Peacock.
