The 2025 Emmy Awards were a happy time for the cast and crew of The Pitt, as they won five awards, including Outstanding Drama Series. In the span of 15 episodes, we see one entire ER shift that educates fans on the nitty-gritty of the healthcare industry. Given what a success the 2025 TV premiere was for television, HBO boss Casey Bloys got real on how he’s trying to bring The Pitt one step closer to traditional television, and he’s made one point I couldn’t agree more with.
Traditional medical dramas that aired on TV, like ER, had an average of 22 episodes per season. With streaming shows having a higher production value, they tend to crank out somewhere in the ballpark of 10 episodes a season. Bloys told Variety what makes The Pitt closer to traditional TV, and he makes a great point:
It’s hard to make any good show, regardless of whether it’s comedy, drama or documentary. But what John and Noah and Scott wanted to do going in was to do a high quality show, but also one that was set up in a way that you could do 15 episodes. So, the concept of the show being on essentially one set made the budget manageable. And you have a group of people who understand how to make 15 episodes, but also how to bring it back on an annual basis.
One of the best things about The Pitt is that the whole show takes place in the hospital. It’s not like other medical dramas where you’re constantly pulled into the medical professional’s personal life outside of work. With just one set, that should make it more cost-effective to produce 15 high-quality episodes that we can enjoy. Plus, 15 weekly episodes means that a season won’t feel like it’s over as soon as it starts, either.
There’s nothing more frustrating than waiting over a year for a new season of your favorite hit show. After the 2023 WGA Writers Strike put a lot of trending shows on hold for over a year, like Stranger Things, you hope there’s a recap to keep you up to speed. Casey Bloys got real about using models like The Pitt to ensure that new seasons are capable of premiering every year:
That is the one thing I think that we’ve gotten away from in television, that ability to bring shows back on an annual basis. It’s understandable, as we have shows that are huge and to do sometime like The Last of Us or House of the Dragon, the reason people love them is they’re huge spectacles with special effects and amazing locations. That’s great. But I think maybe as an industry we’ve focused a lot on those — and the bread-and-butter shows churning out high-quality episodes, week after week, is a really tough thing to do. For “The Pitt” to be recognized for what it’s done is especially gratifying. It’s always great to win awards, but it’s especially gratifying for the show that’s trying something that can be really hard.
I can imagine how tough it must be to tell fresh medical stories week after week that explore the realism of ER work. Sure, The Pitt may not be a “spectacle” like other HBO Max shows, but the streaming series was more than worthy of its awards. Each episode provided genuine, emotional storytelling that hit viewers hard. As each episode is one hour of the same morning shift, it’s very impressive how the exhaustion and grueling efforts of each character stay consistent as if it’s happening in real-time. What a job well done.
Casey Bloys is spot-on about why The Pitt is an excellent reminder of why we watched traditional television in the first place. Getting to watch a 15-episode season weekly with the promise of its new season next year is enough to keep audiences eager for what’s to come. Let’s hope the best streaming services going forward will be inspired to follow HBO Max’s new model.
The Emmy-winning series The Pitt will show you what a Fourth of July ER shift looks like, with Season 2 hitting your streaming schedule on January 8th. Until then, feel free to watch the first season that started it all with your HBO Max subscription.
