(S07E02) Despite what I knew about this episode going in -- that it would be the one where J.D. and Kim finally have their baby -- I didn't expect it to be so warm-hearted and almost gimmick-free.

We've been hearing rumblings from Bill Lawrence, Zach Braff and company that the final season of Scrubs was going to be more reminiscent of the show's earlier seasons, where there were flights of fancy but J.D. was a more realistic character and the fantasies weren't quite as outlandish. While last week's season premiere didn't quite reach those standards, this episode did. In fact, this felt more like one of those first half-dozen first-season episodes that were slower-paced and relatively restrained, and it was quite refreshing to see.

To be honest, the episode wasn't as side-splittingly funny as a decent Scrubs episode usually is, but it didn't need to be. What we saw tonight was how parents go to great lengths to protect their kids, how other parents need some "me" and "us" time to keep them sane, and how still others are determined to make things work even if conditions aren't ideal.

We knew that J.D. and Kim were doomed, but I didn't really expect her to figure it out as she was in labor awaiting an epidural (and a pill to numb her up before her epidural). I give J.D. credit for wanting to stick it out; he's a child of divorce and he knew what that did to him and his brother Dan. But we also knew that to set up the final season, both J.D. and Elliot were going to have to be unencumbered from their romantic entanglements. Elliot is still dealing with Keith's burning hatred towards her ("That's disgusting!" he yells as she walks towards him), and we knew J.D. was going to be next. But it'll be interesting to see if we're going to witness J.D. as a father or if little Sammy is going to disappear along with his mother into the sitcom ether somewhere.

(Is this the last we see of Elizabeth Banks, by the way? I'm ambivalent about seeing her return; she is cute as a button, as Kim said she heard about herself, but just kind of seemed like a forced-in character.)

For the first time in a while, Dr. Cox was in a story that allowed him to do some minor ranting while showing how much the character has grown over the years. He seems to really care for his little daughter Jennifer Dillon ("I'm going to call her J.D. forever," says J.D.) to the point where he doesn't want to give her a shot for her rash even though he could; he doesn't want her to associate her dad with pain. He seems to care about it even more than Jordan, who is very good at falling asleep instantly. Bringing in "Dr. No Shot" was a bit unnecessary, but it gave us a chance to see Elliot's days as "Dr. Never Says 'Terminal'." (By the way, nice touch with the Elliot flashback... in it, she was wearing her Sacred Heart staff lab coat, as opposed to her private practice lab coat with the frilly pink "Dr. Reid" name tag).

I think we need to see the Turkletons a little more. Even though the Turk/Carla/video game storyline was a bit slight, it had some nice moments, including those with the Janitor (who needed motivation to shoot aliens, then paid tribute to his fallen victims) to Kelso drunkenly consoling his son Harrison about yet another thieving boyfriend. Oh, and Janitor's "we're friends at night" line about him and Kelso was pretty good. It does seem that they're squeezing Janitor and Kelso in sometimes, but this week it worked.

Other fun stuff:

• "Thank you Perry much."
• The lame-but-not-lame triple jump hug.
• Turk looking forward to being little Sam's bluncle ("black uncle").
• The very familiar-looking OB nurse (if you don't want to know who it is then don't click here).
• Not sure how I feel about Fun Size (not Bite Size, like I said last week) Intern. Her voice is funny and annoying, but it's also an easy target for folks like Cox.

So this week the warm fuzzies, and the shocking lack of fantasies -- outside J.D.'s vision of Colin Hay popping out of Kim's bajingo, that is -- and other shtick we've come to expect from Scrubs, overruled the general lack of hilarity. If more season seven episodes are like this, with just a little bit more of the funny, the show will have a very satisfying conclusion.