Is Mitch Ripley Leaving Chicago Med? What Happens to Luke Mitchell?
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One doctor has already been fired on this season of Chicago Med, and fans are now worried that newcomer Dr. Mitch Ripley (Luke Mitchell) might meet the same fate in the Season 9 finale. Is Dr. Mitch Ripley is leaving Chicago Med? Here’s everything we know about the newbie’s fate on the show.
Is Dr. Mitch Ripley leaving Chicago Med?
Although we don’t know for sure, the final episode of the season will address the doctor’s troubled past once again and have the entire staff at Gaffney Chicago Medical Center questioning if they really know him. While the logline previews a case for Ripley and Dr. Daniel Charles (Oliver Platt) that involves a high-risk prisoner who may have dementia, it’s actually the return of Pawel Wapniarski (recurring guest star Kristof Konrad) that will land Ripley in hot water.
Pawel is the sister of Charles’ girlfriend Liliana, and he is always up to no good. Viewers last same him in Episode 8, when he came to the hospital with a broken arm in hopes of scoring some pain pills. When he didn’t get what he wanted, Pawel sued both Ripley and the hospital for malpractice. As Ripley’s portrayer Luke Mitchell previewed in an interview with TVLine, Pawel will show up again in the season finale, and this time, he’s been badly beaten. Given Ripley’s past, several staff members are worried that the doctor might have issued the beating.
More: See who’s leaving Chicago Med after Season 9
“Ripley has to leave the hospital for an appointment, suddenly, and then he comes back, and then Pawel comes into the hospital [beaten up], and so, there’s a question about the timing of that,” Mitchell told the outlet, noting that suspicions easily turned on his character because “there’s probably motive for Ripley to have some strong feelings towards Pawel … and there’s question marks about Ripley’s past and past aggressive behavior and his impulse control disorder.”
As viewers learned early on in the season, Ripley had a difficult upbringing in Chicago. His dad was not involved in his life and his mom had a string of boyfriends who never stuck around either. This lead him to develop intense abandonment issues and an impulse control disorder. At one point, he put another kid in the hospital and ended up in a juvenile detention center, where he was treated by a young Dr. Charles and over-medicated.
More: Check out our exclusive interview with Chicago Med‘s Luke Mitchell
Ripley was eventually able to turn his life around and become a doctor, which is how he landed at Gaffney working alongside Charles. Throughout Season 9, viewers have watched as Ripley has opened up about his past to both Charles and Dr. Hannah Asher (Jessy Schram), the latter of which he’s become romantically involved with. This new Ripley seems like a far cry from the troubled kid fans have heard about, but we’ve also seen him get angry and lose control of his temper, so it’s not impossible that he was the one behind Pawel’s attack.
Mitchell teased that the situation “certainly makes some of the other main characters look at Ripley and question how well do we know Ripley, and what exactly is he capable of?” He continued: “The audience will also be faced with the question, is Ripley a good guy? What is Ripley capable of? That’s really a question of how much has he changed? Is he still this person from this troubled youth, with impulse control disorder? Or is he a new man?” The actor also hinted that we might not get all of the answers by the end of the episode. “That’s a little bit of a cliffhanger,” Mitchell said. “I think it’s going to be really interesting to see if Ripley did do it. But also, if he didn’t do it, how he’s going to feel about people accusing him of doing it? There’s going to be some serious trust issues going forward, one way or another.”
Earlier in the season, fellow Season 9 newcomer Zola Ahmad (Sophia Ali) was fired for her compulsive tendencies and reckless behavior. Although Gaffney seemed to allow that sort of work style with Dr. Will Halstead (Nick Gehlfuss), they don’t have much tolerance for it nowadays. Could Ripley be the next doctor to get fired? Viewers will just have to tune into the finale to find out, but since Mitchell spoke about what fans can expect from Ripley “going forward,” we suspect that he’ll be there in Season 10. Plus, knowing his tendencies, Pawel could be making the accusation against Ripley up as part of another money or drug scheme.
Chicago Med streams on Peacock.
For more on Chicago Med, check out this gallery to see where the alums of the show are now.
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