Shaun Murphy: a good representation of autism or a fanciful vision of a disability?

By Audrey Rameau

The Good Doctor tells the story of Shaun Murphy (Freddie Highmore), a gifted autistic man who fight to keep his place in a team of brilliant surgeons-to-be when the whole medical team doubts of his skills. In his journey to be recognized as a skilled doctor, he can count on his father figure, Aaron Glassman (Richard Schiff), a neurosurgeon, who considers him as his own son.

When The Good Doctor premiered in 2017 on ABC, a lot of people placed all their hopes in the show. Indeed, it was one of the first time a TV series was about a disabled person trying to find his place in the society. Shaun is dealing with ASD, which makes him different from the others. Abandoned by his family – his mother was absent, his father abusive – he is only close from his little brother, Steve who has run away from their house with when he is 14. This is how he meets Aaron Glassman for the first time. This man raises him as his own child after Steve accidentally dies playing with other children in an old building.

The show is the reboot of the Korean show, 굿 닥터 (Gut Dakteo) which aired in South Korea in 2013. But from the beginning, The Good Doctor distanced itself from its elder very quickly, only keeping the characteristics of the main characters. In this version, Shaun does not fall in love with the nice, naive Claire. She becomes his best friend instead. Shaun is a resident in general surgery while he works in the controversy center in the original version.

When ABC got the rights of the show, many viewers put their hopes in this new show that could shed a new light on autism and how to help people dealing with this trouble integrate better into the society. Because it is the whole subject of the show (at least at the beginning): How Shaun will be able to succeed when everyone is clearly against him in Bonaventure?

Claire Browne (Antonia Thomas) and Shaun Murphy (Freddie Highmore)

In his journey to become a doctor, he can count on Claire (Antonia Thomas) who from the beginning is the nicest person to him. The first season is almost a flawless performance, showing at which point it is difficult to be autistic and to live a normal life. It shows how a person with autism had troubles to interact with the world surrounding him/her. It depicts the harshness of people towards them, just because they apprehend the world differently, feeling by other means, and expressing in their own ways.

Then, season 2 came and all the hopes the viewers had put in the show fled away. Shaun became a common character, way too common to be autistic. His characteristics melted as snow under the sun and what made him such an original main character vanished. Worst, his main storyline in season 3 was him having sex with his new girlfriend, Carly (Jasika Nicole), who is clearly used as his sex toy for the whole season. His character lost any interest and it is logical that the viewers who are still here – the show lost 5 millions of viewers in three season – got attached to the other characters, mostly to Neil Melendez (Nicholas Gonzalez) and Claire Browne, whose backstories were more moving and interesting. But this is not the point of this article we could get to it later.

Let’s focus on the bad treatment made of autism from the beginning of season 2. From this moment, emphasis on ASD is left on the sidelines, focusing on Shaun’s social interactions, almost making him a common character like the others. Episode after episode, he lost more and more of his autistic characteristics, so much that sometimes the viewers forgot about his medical pathology.

The highest moment of mistreatment takes place in episode “Breakdown” (217) when Shaun break his stim toy, a little plastic scalpel his brother gave to him when he was 14 and that is the only thing in the world which can calm any of his crisis and his anxiety.

I talked with Nia Louise, a 19-year-old woman from Minnesota (USA) having ASD. According to her, “Many people on the spectrum need their stim toys to help control their mood and be able to feel calm over all...To many of us who are neuro divergent and/or on the ASD spectrum face ridicule for our stim toys, and season one I felt accepted for my stims since Shaun had a stim toy like I do... But then he broke his, which yes I’ve done that many of times during meltdowns, but notice season 3 he basically acts like it never existed... It’s inaccurate, whenever I break a stim toy I try to find a replacement AS SOON AS POSSIBLE because I feel so weird and on edge without one.”

Examples of stim toys pictured by Nia Louise

She – herself – has many of them always with her because they are the only things in the world which can calm down her crisis or control her mood. To be sure not to be a day without one of them, she made a lot of them just in case she breaks one.

Stim toys video explanation by Nia Louise

Nia Louise also points the lack of realism when it comes to love and autism. “Many people who are autistic and/or neuro divergent will develop strong connections with people, sometimes to the point of obsessions just like they do with interests. However on The Good Doctor when Lea says “I cannot date you due to your autism” and then Shaun goes to her, anyway it is incorrect. Most on the spectrum would be extremely hurt by such remarks, and the image of the person would be tainted. But instead David Shore writes Shaun to be in love with someone who is ableist anyways using a very cheesy line “You make me more".”

A point of view that is also shared by Elin, a 20-year-old Swedish woman dealing with ASD too: “I have autism (ASD is the more correct medical term) & Shaun is nothing like me. Most people with ASD aren’t like him. It’s a spectrum, so of course everyone with autism is unique. But Shaun is [a] minority. I have met a lot of people with autism... But never anyone that reminds me of Shaun. Most people with autism are not like him and that’s why I don’t like the depiction of autism on The Good Doctor. It gives people a very distorted picture of what autism really is and what people with autism are like.. […] Yes my autism (ASD) makes my life more difficult sometimes but it’s also a gift! & I want people to know that. ASD is a weakness but also a strength!”

Daianny, a 29-year-old woman from Brazil, whose cousin is dealing with autism regrets that the show is so far from reality, showing a part of autism which is romanticized instead of pointing the real pathology and open people’s minds about this condition way more common that it seems.

“My cousin has autism and he's nothing like Shaun. My aunt, when she was pregnant suffered an accident and with this she had complications during pregnancy, doctors said he [my cousin] would not survive, but he succeeded, today he is 20 years old, he can not speak properly, read and write.

His family has not been able to put him in a proper school, education needs to improve. He's a protective son with his mother. The Good Doctor shows everything except reality. Most people over there say they're a Shaun fan, but they'd have the same attitude and prejudice as Lea.”

The show fails then to depict reality as it did (and as it should), when it was its main motto when the first season aired on ABC for the first time on September, 25th, 2017.

Jasika Nicole as Carly Lever

But there is another problem which is pointed by many people, including Jasika Nicole who used to play Carly Lever in the show.

This is the link between The Good Doctor and Autism Speaks, a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting research into causes, treatment, and cures for autism spectrum disorders. This organization that promotes autism awareness, use their time and raised money to defend autistic people and help their closest ones is often criticized to spread lies and misinformation about autism and autistic people. Worst, they would be seeking a cure for autism.

Freddie Highmore talks about Autism Speaks for The Good Doctor

This is what is the most disturbing for Nia Louise. She doesn’t understand that “The Good Doctor works with an autism hate group known as Autism Speaks “ because they are known for being anti-autistic (promoting ABA therapy, a therapy aiming at masking autism traits like stimming for example). Their board does not even count a person having ASD, which beats everything when you think of it. And the money they raised would be used to promote anti-vax propaganda.

Example of Autism Speaks commercial

Once again, The Good Doctor is delivering a double speech. How can you defend a cause when you are siding with a problematic group known for discrediting the cause you are supposed to shed the light on.

Contrary to Atypical which has managed to keep his autistic hero relevant through its three seasons (the fourth season will be available on Netflix in 2021), The Good Doctor has lost itself in the details, the same details a real autistic person will never take into consideration, because they are irrelevant to his/her eyes.

Atypical On Netflix

To become the show it was once, the show will need to revise its way of depicting Shaun, his habits, his reactions, his way of living. And also to learn that a show is not only about one character but about a whole group, which in a way could allow Shaun to be more pertinent and closer to reality. Because autistic people need the others to learn new things as well as the others need them to be more tolerant and open-minded.

It would be interesting to focus on real autistic people’s concerns, maybe by including in the writers room one or several autistic people who could make the scripts more perceptive, more judicious, more accurate. Or by including an autistic consultant on the set who could fix the mistakes when he/ she witnesses them. A word to the wise!