Transplant (TV series)
"Transplant" follows Dr. Bashir "Bash" Hamed, a Syrian Civil War refugee and a newest resident at York Memorial Hospital, as he navigates through numerous obstacles to resume a career in the high stakes world of emergency medicine. Produced by Sphère Média Plus, the series entered production in June 2019. The series is primarily filmed in Montreal, with some limited location shooting in Toronto for establishing shots and other scenes which require a clear Toronto geographic marker. Production on the second season was delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada, but commenced in February 2021. In May 2020, NBC acquired the U.S. broadcast rights for the series; it premiered on September 1, 2020, filling a timeslot usually held by its own medical drama "New Amsterdam" (whose next season was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic). On December 11, 2020, NBC picked up the second season of the series for broadcast which premiered on March 6, 2022. In New Zealand, the series is available for streaming on TVNZ OnDemand. In French Canada, the series airs on Vrak, simultaneously with its broadcast on CTV, and later on Noovo. In November 2020, Sky Witness acquired the UK rights to the drama after striking a deal with international distributor NBC Universal Global Distribution. In Brazil, the series is available for streaming on Globoplay. John Doyle of "The Globe and Mail" wrote that the show's positioning of Bash as an immigrant struggling for acceptance in his adopted country set the show apart from other medical dramas: "The plot device that kick-starts the series—and Episode 1 sure comes with a kick—might seem ludicrous, but it gets your attention and signals what themes in "Transplant" are about to blossom. It's about the terror and frustrations that immigrants experience, trying to use their skills in a new country. Much is made of Bashir's knowledge and knowhow being heightened by his experience working in a war zone with few resources. He can intuit medical problems and injuries faster than most of his colleagues. This does not, however, make him either distinctly heroic or arrogant. Given his situation, he's actually an extremely vulnerable man. He's not the irascible Dr. House, nor is he the spookily wise young virtuoso at the heart of "The Good Doctor"." He praised the series and Haq's lead performance in particular, ultimately concluding that "There are numerous medical dramas that move with a breathless, hectic pace and then stop for some romance or heart-warming moments. "Transplant" has some of that, but there is an astutely Canadian spin on the familiar. It gives grim articulation to the issues of immigration and the harried, under pressure immigrant experience. It's not entirely original, but certainly superior to the usual and disarmingly different. "
In his year-end review of television in 2020, Doyle named Haq and Leboeuf as having given two of the year's best performances in Canadian television. For "etalk", Christine Estima also favourably reviewed many aspects of the show, giving special praise to its choice to avoid positioning its two female doctors, June and Magalie, as competitive rivals, instead presenting them simply as doctors who respect and support each other even if they don't always agree. In advance of the show's American premiere, John Anderson of "The Wall Street Journal" reviewed it positively, calling it the best medical show currently airing on American television and potentially one of the better dramas ever aired by NBC in its history. "The Hollywood Reporter" observed that it was "not a hugely innovative or adventurous medical drama" and had a "heavy reliance on that "House" trope of a loved one bringing in a patient, only to have the loved one be the one with the actual medical mystery", but that Hamed was "an interesting main character" and Haq was a "solid leading man, giving Bashir a frazzled soulfulness, but never making him saintly". In conclusion, it was felt that "in a fall in which the broadcast drama slate is populated mostly by mediocre acquisitions and dismal holdovers from last midseason, there's value to an above average new show like "Transplant"."
The industry trade magazine "Playback" named Haq as Canadian television's breakout star of 2020.
Premise
The series centres on Bashir "Bash" Hamed, a doctor from Syria who comes to Canada as a refugee during the Syrian Civil War, and is rebuilding his career as a medical resident in the emergency department at the fictional York Memorial Hospital in Toronto.