'Call the Midwife' Tests the Junior Nurses in Explosive Episode

Our Midwife trainees, Rosalind (Natalie Quarry) and Joyce (Renee Bailey), won't be forgetting this week on Call the Midwife anytime soon. The junior nurses each had their hands full with separate cases that tested all of their patience and decorum. 

Rosalind had to bite her tongue when a well-to-do family was super prepared for their first child but immediately turned into cowards when their baby girl was born with an unexpected ailment. Meanwhile, Joyce was trying to do the best for a struggling mother of three while dealing with a tantrum-throwing racist male patient in the same building. They were both put to the test, even as Joyce's caseload led to a literal explosion in Poplar that could have turned deadly for everyone involved. 

Meanwhile, Trixie, pardon, I mean Lady Aylward, finally faced off against the Board of Health to get Nonnatus House the funding it needed for crucial home repairs while Rosalind and Joyce dealt with their tough cases. This is the fight that Sister Julienne and Trixie have been preparing for since Christmas, but the clever duo were not to be outdone, even as Poplar changes rapidly around them. 

Here is how everyone fared in an action-packed third episode of the season. 

Rosalind thought her week would be a piece of cake when she first encountered Norma Williams (Alexa Davies), a well-read mother with all the latest products and clothes to welcome her first child into the world. Norma had read every child-rearing book she could get her hands on to prepare for her incoming daughter, and everything was right on track as she went into labor on schedule. The delivery was a success, but the baby girl was born with spina bifida. The baby's diagnosis freaks out Norma and her husband, Lasley, that they abandon her at the clinic, leaving Rosalind and the nuns to look after her in the interim. They still refuse to take her even after the little girl has successful surgery to remove the large welt from her spine, which increases her odds of survival and her potential range of motion as she grows older. 

Rosalind and Doctor Turner (Stephen McGann) turned to the council for help, but even the council refused to step in because of the Lasleys' financial stability. With resources stretched thin, they didn't want to send a message that anyone could just abandon their child and let the government take them in. That left the poor baby with no one but Rosalind and the nuns to fight for her. Those aren't bad people to have in your corner, but it was distressing to see the baby abandoned so quickly by her family who were in a better position to take care of her than most people would be. 

We'd love to say there was a happy ending here, but the baby ended up being placed in an orphanage supported by the Order. Miss Higgins (Georgie Glen) and the crew at least gave her the name June before she was sent away so she didn't enter the orphanage as a nameless infant. 

Joyce had the super fun task of doing the aftercare of an elderly patient, Mr. Cottered (David Troughton). She was in charge of monitoring his catheter after a recent surgery at the hospital, but the crotchety old man did not make it easy for her. He belittled her and made barely veiled racist comments about her being a Black nurse. Joyce bit her tongue instead of going off on the man, but only because she was temporarily distracted by Nerys Anderson (Georgia Landers). Nerys was a young mother of three who had just lost her husband, so she was trying to take care of all three of her children by herself in the flat above Mr. Cottered. 

He was constantly using his broom to tell the children to be quiet, even when they were playing during regular daylight hours. It turned into a big drama when Joyce was checking on Mr. Cottered and noticed Nerys rushing into the building while her baby cried upstairs. Joyce followed her and discovered that Nerys had taken a kitchen job in the early mornings, leaving the children alone while she worked. Joyce promised not to report her as long as Nerys swore to quit the job so the children wouldn't be left alone again. 

Fred came by to help mitigate Mr. Cottered's attitude by fixing some of the broken things in his apartment, but Fred wasn't qualified to fix Mr. Cottered's water heater. Little did we know that was foreshadowing. Joyce arrived the next day to check on Mr. Cottered and the Andersons when the water heater exploded, putting the entire building in danger of collapsing. 

Fred was also there and rushed into the building when he heard the crying children. He ran upstairs to discover Mr. Cottered stuck with the Anderson children. He came up to look after them when he realized Nerys was gone again, which saved him from being in his flat when the water heater exploded. Fred rescued the children, and the firefighters were able to get Mr. Cottered out before the floor collapsed. Nerys arrived just in time to thank the man for caring for her children. She tried to quit her kitchen job, but they wouldn't allow her to on such short notice, so she was working the final shift when the water heater exploded. 

Since this was the second offense, Joyce was required to report Nerys to the council, but this went a lot better than Rosalind's case. Joyce was able to get the Andersons into a nicer building that allowed Nerys to hold a job and put the children in daycare. Mr. Cottered was also able to recover from his injuries. This may have been the more "explosive" case, but it was also a pick-me-up after Rosalind's depressing predicament. 

Of course, the main attraction was really Trixie vs. the Board of Health. She put on her smartest suit and took a folder of charts and figures to prove how valuable Nonnatus House and the Order were to all of Poplar. The Board of Health maintained that Catholic nuns were not useful to the community when the NHS had expanded. They weren't ready for Trixie – or Lady Aylwood if you prefer – who came prepared with the facts and figures of all the patients the nuns and nurses of Nonnatus House had seen over the past year. 

She effectively proved that it would cost the council and Board of Health more in healthcare services if Nonnatus House were to shudder than for them to pay for the roof repairs the building needed. The secular nurses of Nonnatus House provided enough services to show how the entire Order kept healthcare costs down in Poplar. She argued based on math and urged the Board of Health to look at reason instead of falling pray to their own biases. 

It was a moving speech, and an effective one. She convinced the Board to change their mind and secured the funding that Nonnatus House needed to stay open. Trixie, the nuns, and the nurses will live to fight another day. 

Call the Midwife Season 14 continues Sundays at 8 p.m. ET on most PBS stations, the PBS app, and the PBS Masterpiece Prime Video Channel. The series has already been streaming as an early weekly release on PBS Passport for members since Friday, February 28, 2025, and will stream the finale in mid-April. The series will stream on the PBS app and the PBS Masterpiece Channel weekly through mid-May. As always, check your local listings.