Chicago Med's Best Cliffhanger Proves Season 12 Can't Afford To Lose One Major Character

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Goodwin and Dr. Charles chatting in the ED in Chicago Med season 10

Published Jun 13, 2026, 9:01 AM EDT

Laura Hurley has been writing about the entertainment industry for more than twelve years, after a decade as a content producer and editor at CinemaBlend after writing for WhatCulture and Examiner. Attending events like SCAD TVfest and San Diego Comic-Con over the course of her career, she has been immersed in the world of network, streaming, and cable TV.

Chicago Med is still in the early weeks of summer hiatus, but NBC's medical drama ended on enough of a cliffhanger that fans may be fretting over one character's fate for the next few months. The season 11 finale concluded with Goodwin making a fateful decision to save Dr. Charles' job, and the result could be that S. Epatha Merkerson's character is ousted from the hospital. Considering that Goodwin was at the center of the show's best cliffhanger in recent years, the One Chicago franchise really can't lose her moving forward.

The season 10 fall finale twist shocked viewers when Goodwin was brutally attacked after spending most of the episode trying to reason with her stalker. Her only hope of survival was Dr. Archer, who witnessed just enough of the attack to start to panic. The episode ended without confirming Goodwin's fate, and fans had to face the possibility of losing the character for good after the end of NBC's winter hiatus.

The attack was the culmination of the stalker storyline that had been occupying Goodwin throughout the first half of season 10. Between S. Epatha Merkerson's performance, the sky-high stakes, and the very real possibility that one of Chicago Med's last remaining original cast members was going to be killed off, the twist remains one of the medical drama's top cliffhangers.

Now, the big question is how Chicago Med season 12 will handle Goodwin's storyline, when season 11 was set up with seemingly no way for her to save her job. Losing her from the hospital (and Merkerson from the show) is just too high of a cost for One Chicago to pay.

S. Epatha Merkerson Is One Of One Chicago's Best Actors

Sharon Goodwin looking confused at bad news in Chicago Med's season 11 finale

S. Epatha Merkerson and Oliver Platt are the only two members of the original Chicago Med cast still left, as of the end of season 11. The show has made the most out of Goodwin and Dr. Charles' friendship, which pairs the two acting powerhouses together more often than not. But Merkerson deserves a great deal of credit for making Goodwin into the standout character that she is.

After all, Goodwin is an administrator, and only scrubs up as a nurse when the ED needs all hands on deck. She's not in the emergency department as often as the rest of the characters, and has the task of reining in the doctors and nurses when they go rogue. In the hands of a lesser actor, Goodwin might have felt more like an obstacle to the doctors making exciting calls in the ED than a compelling character in her own right.

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Merkerson has certainly earned her status as a legend within the Dick Wolf TV universe, and not just because of her time on Chicago Med. She played Lieutenant Anita Van Buren for 17 seasons of Law & Order, and ranked as one of the Law & Order franchise's best characters before Chicago Med even premiered. In fact, between the police procedural and One Chicago, Merkerson is credited with more than 600 episodes in Wolf's TV world. She's an institution in one of the most successful franchises in television history, and Med would feel incomplete without her.

Goodwin Deserves Better Than Losing Her Job

Goodwin and Dr. Charles talking in Chicago Med's season 11 finale

As devastating as it would have been if the season 10 stabbing twist had led to S. Epatha Merkerson's exit, she would have at least gotten a thrilling final arc as Sharon Goodwin. Season 11 ended with Miranda giving Goodwin the ultimatum that she needed to resign "within an hour," or face the public embarrassment of the board learning that she'd leaked Dr. Rabari's medical files to help Dr. Charles. While that's triumphant in the sense that she was helping her best friend, it would be an underwhelming end for one of One Chicago's best characters.

The good news is that the season 11 finale wasn't the last time that fans will see Goodwin as part of the ensemble, and not just because the administrator promised that she was going to fight back rather than just accept the ultimatum quietly. Allen MacDonald, the Chicago Med showrunner, spoke with NBC Insider about what's next for Goodwin:

Miranda has pissed off Sharon Goodwin, and I think that probably isn't the smartest thing to do. Next season, I think that we're gonna see Miranda and Goodwin get in the ring. Goodwin is going to have to fight to keep her job.

Those comments certainly don't sound like MacDonald is setting Goodwin up to exit in the first episode of season 12, so the fallout of the latest cliffhanger could show her at her very best in the hospital. There is also the question about whether Chicago Med will deliver the usual time jump of a few months between seasons. Miranda demanded the resignation within an hour of her conversation with Goodwin; it might not make sense for the urgent issue that was introduced in May to still be unresolved in October.

One Chicago shows do sometimes pick up in the fall without time jumps right away, especially if the previous season ended on a cliffhanger. Chicago Fire season 15 will presumably pick up right where season 14 left off, with several characters who Fire could actually kill off in mortal peril. Chicago Med can certainly do justice to Goodwin's story as long as the problem isn't solved within the first few minutes of season 12, and ideally keep S. Epatha Merkerson in the cast for the foreseeable future.

Release Date November 17, 2015

Showrunner Michael Brandt

Directors Michael Waxman, Michael Pressman, Charles S. Carroll, Milena Govich, Anna Dokoza, Bethany Rooney, Fred Berner, Tess Malone, Mykelti Williamson, SJ Main Muñoz, Donald Petrie, Martha Mitchell, Vincent Misiano, Timothy Busfield, Jonathan Brown, John Polson, Stephen Cragg, Anthony Nardolillo, Michael Berry, David Rodriguez, Afia Nathaniel, Oz Scott, Valerie Weiss, Gonzalo Amat

Writers Joseph Sousa, Lily Dahl, Natalie Drayer, Darin Goldberg, Shelley Meals, Melissa R. Byer, Treena Hancock, Mary Leah Sutton, Simran Baidwan, Joshua Hale Fialkov, Jason Cho, Will Pascoe, Liz Brixius