Plot Summary (Coma) Coma

A routine surgery kills Susan Wheeler's best friend

Dr. Susan Wheeler (Genevieve Bujold), a surgical resident at Boston Memorial Hospital, watches her close friend Nancy Greenly go into the operating room for a routine procedure. Nancy never wakes up. She emerges brain-dead, one of an alarming number of young, healthy patients who have slipped into irreversible comas after minor surgeries at the hospital.

"Crichton turned Robin Cook's 1977 novel into a confidently crafted medical mystery with a sci-fi twist that's drenched in conspiracy-noir trappings." — John Hansen, Reviews from My Couch (2021)

Susan begins pulling records and discovers a statistical impossibility: too many comas, too many young patients, too many cases originating from the same operating room. Her colleagues dismiss her. Her superiors tell her she is overreacting, grieving, hysterical.

"Her growing anxiety and rational concern is met with dismissal from her superiors." — Ken Anderson, Dreams Are What Le Cinema Is For (2012)

No one takes the woman doctor seriously

The investigation pits Susan against the entire institutional structure of the hospital. Her boyfriend, fellow resident Mark Bellows (Michael Douglas), urges her to drop it. Her department head tells her she is out of line. The dismissal is not just professional but gendered — she is a woman challenging a male-dominated hierarchy, and every man around her treats her suspicions as emotional instability.

"Underneath the riveting suspense, this is really a sneaky feminist-type film." — Ken Anderson, Dreams Are What Le Cinema Is For (2012)

"Bujold gives Susan a mix of soft beauty and a hard, determined edge. Her performance is enthralling, with seemingly little effort." — John Hansen, Reviews from My Couch (2021)

Crichton emphasized at the time that he saw Susan as occupying the role typically reserved for a male lead. The film was released a year before Alien put Sigourney Weaver in a similar position.

"When we started work in 1976, the recent women's movies had not yet appeared. Coma had that rarity — a strong heroine with an important job and hence a personality structure similar to a traditional male's. Coma is still unique because its heroine has the Paul Newman role — her womanhood becomes an issue only as part of the story." — Michael Crichton, MichaelCrichton.com (1978 interview)

Susan crawls through the hospital's guts to find the truth

Susan's detective work takes her into the physical infrastructure of the hospital itself. She climbs into the ventilation ducts above Operating Room 8, tracing pipes and wiring, looking for the mechanism behind the comas. In a moment audiences remembered, she pauses to remove her pantyhose and shoes before crawling in — a small, practical act that broke with decades of thriller convention.

"After years of women in thrillers and horror films falling victim to their feminine finery, this small act of practicality was such a revolutionary repudiation of a sexist genre cliche that on the opening weekend screening of Coma in February of 1978, the audience actually broke into applause." — Ken Anderson, Dreams Are What Le Cinema Is For (2012)

Andrew Sarris, reviewing the film for the Village Voice, saw the moment as part of a larger shift.

"There is a new feminist spirit rising upward in compensation." — Andrew Sarris, Village Voice (1978)

She traces the comas to carbon monoxide piped into OR 8

Susan discovers the mechanism: a concealed tank in the hospital basement feeds carbon monoxide through a line running into the ventilation system of Operating Room 8, controlled by radio signal. The gas mixes with the anesthesia supply, rendering patients brain-dead while the surgical team sees nothing unusual. The gas is colorless and can deceive the doctors on the floor. Every coma case came from the same operating room. (wikipedia, afi)

"It's the kind of story that I like, because it's based on a premise that is not impossible." — Michael Crichton, MichaelCrichton.com (1978 interview)

The real-world impact of this plot point was measurable. A hospital in Tampa removed the number "8" from an operating room door after patient complaints. Organ donation rates reportedly declined 50 to 60 percent in some cities after the film's release. (afi)

The Jefferson Institute is a warehouse for the living dead

The brain-dead patients are transferred to a facility called the Jefferson Institute, presented to the public as a state-of-the-art chronic care center. Susan talks her way inside for a tour. What she finds is the film's most iconic image: rows of naked comatose bodies suspended from the ceiling by wires, their bodily functions regulated by computers in a vast, warm, mauve-toned hall.

"That image of dangling 'vegetables' is just as haunting today as it ever was. Now, it's iconic." — Roger Moore, Movie Nation (2023)

"It has several chilling scenes, equal to those seen in the best horror pics — rows of comatose patients hanging suspended by wires in a cold storage room." — Dennis Schwartz, Dennis Schwartz Reviews (n.d.)

The set was designed by production designer Albert Brenner at MGM Studios. The suspended bodies were real actors held in rigid positions by hydraulic jacks and slings, filmed in six-minute intervals over three days. Two versions were shot — one nude for theatrical release, one clothed for television broadcast. The building used as the Jefferson Institute exterior was a Xerox Corporation regional headquarters at 191 Spring Street in Lexington, Massachusetts. (afi)

"A concrete and steel variation on the typical thriller haunted house." — Ken Anderson, Dreams Are What Le Cinema Is For (2012)

Elizabeth Ashley plays Mrs. Emerson, the Jefferson Institute's administrator, who guides Susan through the facility with robotic composure.

"A heart of stone and steel, for all the humanity that she displays." — Amir Films, The Ace Black Movie Blog (2014)

The conspiracy is an organ-harvesting black market

Susan pieces together the full scheme: the Jefferson Institute is not caring for coma patients but warehousing them as inventory. Their organs are being sold on an international black market to wealthy buyers. Patients whose tissue types match a buyer's needs are deliberately rendered brain-dead in OR 8, transferred to the Institute, and harvested. It is, as one reviewer noted, an old crime in new clothing.

"It is really a Burke and Hare story in modern scientific drag." — Richard Scheib, Moria Reviews (n.d.)

Rip Torn plays Dr. George, the chief of anesthesiology, one of the conspirators inside Boston Memorial. The pathologists at the hospital provide dark comic relief — Crichton stages a scene where two of them cheerfully debate the best way to murder someone.

"Crichton demonstrates writing talent with a delightful scene in which a pair of pathologists argue about the best way to murder someone." — Rick, Classic Film and TV Cafe (2025)

Dr. Harris has been the villain all along

Susan has been confiding in Dr. George Harris (Richard Widmark), the chief of surgery — the hospital's most senior and trusted authority figure. He has listened patiently, offered reassurance, and encouraged her to take care of herself. He is, of course, the mastermind.

"Widmark is suavely slimy as the head doctor." — Roger Moore, Movie Nation (2023)

"His performance is so good that one can't be sure whether Mark is a good guy or a bad guy." — Rick, Classic Film and TV Cafe (2025)

The misdirection works because the film has trained the audience to suspect everyone. Mark Bellows could be in on it. Dr. George could be in on it. The entire hospital administration seems complicit. When Harris is finally revealed, the betrayal lands because Susan trusted him more than anyone else in the building.

Harris puts Susan on the table in OR 8

Once Harris realizes Susan knows the truth, he drugs her and schedules an unnecessary appendectomy — in Operating Room 8. The plan is to put her into a coma the same way he has done to dozens of patients before her: carbon monoxide through the anesthesia line.

"More entertaining than credible — its exciting climax plays out as more entertaining than credible." — Dennis Schwartz, Dennis Schwartz Reviews (n.d.)

Mark Bellows, who has doubted Susan throughout the film, finally pieces together the evidence she left behind. He finds the gas line in the basement and destroys it before the carbon monoxide can reach Susan on the operating table. Susan wakes up after the surgery. She is wheeled out holding Mark's hand. Dr. Harris stands in the operating room as two police officers wait outside to arrest him.

"Crichton's greatest contributions here might have been recognizing the hook in Cook's novel, the plausibility of it all, and in making sure he cast well." — Roger Moore, Movie Nation (2023)

Crichton himself framed the film's central tension as a paradox built into the medical profession itself.

"It's a Western — if the doctors are the bad guys, they are also the good guys." — Michael Crichton, cited in Wikipedia (1978)