CHICAGO MED’s Diane Frolov and Andrew Schneider Preview the Arrival of Luke Mitchell’s Ripley, Archer’s Transplant, and Relationship Hurdles

CHICAGO MED is finally back on Wednesday, January 17 (at 8/7c)—and things have changed in the six months since viewers last saw the characters at Gaffney Medical.

Here, showrunners Diane Frolov and Andrew Schneider share with Give Me My Remote what fans can expect this season…



The new kids in town.
Following Will’s (Nick Gehlfuss) exit, the ED gets a few new faces in season 9—including Luke Mitchell’s Mitch Ripley.

“What we’ll learn is that he has a very fraught relationship with Dr. Charles that goes back to when [Ripley] was an adolescent,” Schneider says. “And this will cause conflict with Charles. It will also cause Charles to do some soul-searching about this past treatment of patients.”

“We will see how Ripley’s past kind of comes into the ED with him,” adds Frolov.

But what does Ripley think of Charles (Oliver Platt) now? “He’s ambivalent,” Schneider says. “He’s carrying some resentment.”

And, of course, “he’s also a handsome romantic figure which could lead to something in our universe,” he adds.

The series will also be adding a new female resident in episode 2. “She’ll be a problem—or a headache—for Archer who runs the ED,” Schneider previews. “She’s someone who tends to overstep.”

And while there’s no current plan to bring back any series regulars for a guest spot, the showrunners tease a trio of recurring characters—Abrams (Brennan Brown), Liliana (Alet Taylor), and Ben (Charles Malik Whitfield)—will be back.

Will Archer (Steven Weber) get his transplant?
Archer’s plans to get a kidney transplant from his son, Sean (Luigi Sottile), fell apart in season 8 when the young man fell off the wagon…and the duo would have to wait until Sean was six months sober to actually go through with it.

Now, six months later, “dialysis has been very rough on [Archer],” Frolov teases. “Hannah is really pushing—we won’t be seeing that, but she’s really been pushing—for him to have the transplant. He’s about to have it because Sean has now been sober for six months.”

“The roadblock right now is Archer’s own feeling about it: that he is reluctant to get this from his son,” she continues. “He doesn’t feel he deserves it. He has guilt about—”

“His fathering, his parenting,” Schneider adds.

“So we’ll see him really struggling with that,” Frolov continues. “And Hannah is there with him and trying to help him through that emotional crisis.”

Despite the tension and indecision, Archer will ultimately opt to move forward with the surgery. “The transplant is going to actually happen soon,” Frolov previews. “So that part of the story will end in that he has the transplant, but we’re going to continue the relationship with Sean. And we’re going to continue the relationship with Hannah.”

But what kind of relationship will Archer have with Hannah (Jessy Schram)? “Well, they certainly were great as friends,” Schneider says. “And they have a deep relationship and a powerful relationship. And there’s always the question, ‘Will this friendship turn into something romantic?’

“We saw a little bit of it last year,” Frolov adds. “How does one of them feel about the other one’s romantic life? So we’ll play with that as well.”

Can Maggie’s (Marlyne Barrett) marriage survive?
After struggling—and briefly splitting—last season, things are still rocky for Ben and Maggie in season 9. 

“Well, there’s a lot of turmoil in that marriage,” Frolov says. “We saw that last season.”

“It hasn’t gotten better,” adds Schneider.

“Those issues did not resolve [in the months since we’ve last seen them],” Frolov continues. “So in the first episode, you’ll see a big, big sort of bomb in her life.”

As Maggie leans on Goodwin (S. Epatha Merkerson) and the nurses, the strife also “plays into some storylines,” Frolov says. “Her turmoil, [it impacts] how she reacts to patients when she says to them.”

“[It] gives her a broader perspective on what some of the patients are going through,” Schneider adds. “It makes her even more empathetic.”

How will the show adapt to the shorter season?
For the first time in the show’s run, the season will clock in at 13 episodes. (Previous years raged from 16—when television production was delayed due to the start of the COVID-19 pandemic—to 23 installments.)

“I don’t think it really changed that much how we develop our stories,” Schneider says. “Certainly the arcs will be shorter because we have a little more than half of what we normally do. I don’t think we are approaching the arcs differently.”

Another thing that won’t change? The jaw-dropping cases of the week. “We’re doing a really great OCD case,” Schneider previews. “Believe me, we will not disappoint you with our bizarre and wild medical cases.”

CHICAGO MED, Season Premiere, Wednesday, January 17, 8/7c, NBC

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