'Animal Practice' Season 1, Episode 4: 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Coleman' Recap

A woman enters the hospital with an authoritative air. Immediately, Rizzo dashes off, causing chaos in his hurry to reach Dr. Coleman, just as the woman is demanding to see him. Rizzo books it to Coleman’s office and draws the blinds. Coleman, surprised by his behavior, says he hasn’t seen him act that way since…

Yes. It is Dr. Coleman’s mother, Virginia. Everyone is in an uproar—especially Dorothy, since he told her his mother was dead. She’s in with her cat, creatively named Cat. George agrees to run some tests on him.

Dr. Jill Leiter, the new hire, is bugging for a new office, but Dorothy is more focused on the appearance of Mr. Wesley, from the board. Wesley tells Dorothy the board isn’t thrilled with her casual way of running things—like games and free lunch in the break room—and they want her to rule with an iron fist, as her grandmother did.

Dr. Yamamoto, meanwhile, is on a mission to find out who has been killing pigeons in the city. He has a board with pins for all the pigeons, and there’s a big hole where pigeons are dying. Juanita informs the puzzled Doug that Yamamoto’s wife has kicked him out, hence the obsessive behavior.

Reluctantly, George goes to his mother’s to inform her that Cat has a malignant brain tumor, and isn’t likely to make it. Virginia is crushed—she will need George more than ever if Cat dies. Therefore George feels a new urge to save Cat, and takes off with purpose to perform a miracle surgery. He misses the visit from Virginia’s neighbor, who is checking on her cat, and the second opinion Virginia was so kindly getting for her on her sick animal.

Dorothy is still stuck in the shadow of her grandmother, whose presence is all over the hospital. She goes to visit her old office, when Dr. Jill pokes her head in, impressed by the (unused) office. Dorothy confesses that she fails at everything. She dropped out of Columbia to open a bakery, which failed. She lives with a pig. Literally. Dr. Jill tells her to go out and kick ass, and Dorothy smacks the desk with gusto, embedding a thumbtack in her hand.

Doug is becoming increasingly worried about Yamamoto, who is on stake out to find the pigeon murderer. He attacks an old man feeding them stale bread, and when Doug pulls him off, he cracks, crying about the pigeons just trying to be the best husbands they could.

Encouraged, Dorothy takes out the fun stuff in the break room, but the nurses respond by going on “Slow Down,” which literally just involves them working in slow motion.

George finishes the surgery on Cat, who has amazingly survived. Virginia is shocked. She tells George she is proud of him and he is a good veterinarian—no insults following. George later confesses to Angela that poor Cat died before he could make it to the operation, and he replaced him with a cat from the shelter.

He goes to see Virginia to tell her the truth, and she just points out that he will go to any length to avoid spending time with her. George realizes there’s no evidence of her having owned a cat, and that she lied. Stalemate.

Yamamoto sees the blood work come back on the pigeons and realizes that they are not being poisoned, but killed by a simple disease. Doug tells him that pigeons have friends that are there for them. Confused, Yamamoto gets “lost in the metaphor” and tries to give him an actual pigeon to care for, but Doug tells him that he knows what has happened, and invites him to move in for a while.

“Fair warning, I like to free ball it at the breakfast table.”

Dorothy is still morose over not being able to live up to her grandmother’s legacy, but George shows her an old memo from the staff, and Dorothy realizes that although she ruled the hospital well, everyone hated her. Jill volunteers to take the office and Dorothy brings back the games and fun atmosphere.

George brings his mother a gift—a turtle. He tells her he will come to check on it holidays, and once every 3 weeks. Virginia is placated—but not too sure she likes Rizzo as a stand in, reading to her as she drinks her vodka in the bathtub.