As any good revival of a beloved TV show needs to do, Scrubs has had to adjust to the changing times since the original series ended in 2010. Naturally most of this revolves around the inner workings of a hospital, and the episode “My Rom-Com,” which aired earlier this month on the 2026 TV schedule, provided an example of how far technology has come by having Donald Faison’s Turk acquire a surgical robot for Sacred Heart. I was curious about what TV magic went into pulling off the robot for Scrubs, so I asked actress Amanda Morrow about it on behalf of CinemaBlend.
Morrow stars in the Scrubs revival as Dashana Trainor, one of the two main surgical interns, the other being Layla Mohammadi's Amara Hadi, working under Turk. Dashana was definitely more excited to work with the surgical robot, so when I spoke with Morrow alongside Blake Lewis actor David Gridley (who was with Zach Braff when the revival got greenlighted), I asked her what she and the other actors were actually working with on set. She told me:
So when we were in the OR, there was a surgical robot, but there were also two incredible people that were operating the hands. And so the hands were working and we had two different components. So we did have the driver's seat hand manual, and then you had the robot arms itself. And those robot arms do move, and that's something that our props department got for us, which is also just incredible.
I’m impressed that Scrubs got ahold of an actual surgical robot, though I’m sure this was just a rental rather than something that will be a permanent addition to the set. I’m also not surprised none of the actors got to operate the hands of Lisa, which Turk named the robot because, like WNBA Hall of Famer Lisa Leslie, “she is all arms.” It’s unclear if medical professionals were brought in to control the robot or if some crew members on the show’s behind-the-scenes team were able to get the hang of it, but either way, better to let people trained in its usage handle the delicate machinery.
Article continues belowIt’s hard to say whether we’ll see Lisa again this season on Scrubs, but Amanda Morrow pointed out robot is just one example of the medical equipment the ABC series has been able to get its hands on. As the actress put it:
The amount of medical material and instruments that we have on set are all real, and it's so cool to see what's coming out in 2026. But we had two folks that were kind of manually off like puppeteering those arms during it. And then we had Layla on the actual hands in the driver's seat.
Unfortunately for Dashana, Turk chose Amara to operate the surgical robot first because of her knowledge of its capabilities, whereas Dashana was just excited to “slice somebody open” with it. However, it didn’t go smoothly, as Amara “massacred” the grape she practiced on. As it turns out, she didn’t know how to drive, so Dashana decided to boost her coworker’s morale and enlisted Turk to get ahold of the hospital’s new buffer vehicle so she could get behind a wheel. That way, Amara would be more prepared to operate the robot for a laparoscopic cholecystectomy that Turk had planned.
There are three episodes left in the Scrubs revival’s debut season, though I’d like to think the chances of another season being ordered are strong given how well the first two episodes performed. Continue tuning in to Scrubs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET on ABC, or stream episodes afterwards with your Hulu subscription.
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