Having never watched the Sopranos (heresy, I know), I didn't have any preconceived notions of what type of person Edie Falco should or should not be playing. Many of my friends tell me that the character of Nurse Jackie is a far cry from her Carmelo Soprano alter-ego.

Jackie is a full time nurse in a public hospital in New York City. Like most nurses and emergency medical workers, she is overworked and underpaid and trying to make do with what life has handed to her. On the surface, she is hardworking nurse who is a loving mother of two little girls and a devoted wife to Kevin Payton who runs a local bar. Scratch the surface just a little bit and the perfect facade peels away to reveal a drug addicted adulterer who regularly breaks the laws in order to suit her own perceived morals.

Nurse Jackie tackles quite a few heavy subjects during its initial season including assisted suicide, underage children caring for their parents, as well as the rigors of raising children who aren't quite perfect. Medical dramas are a dime a dozen and the comedy versions just always seem to be lacking substance, however the staff writers of Nurse Jackie do a masterful job of mixing the heavy subjects in with very lighthearted, almost slapstick humor.

While the Peyton household hasn't been expanded on very much (honestly you could replace the husband and two little girls with bricks and you probably wouldn't notice much difference), the hospital staff shines in every way. Doctor O'Hara is the archetypal rich doctor as well as the "straight man" for most of Jackie's exploits. While her character was explored a little bit in season one, there wasn't a lot invested yet. Doctor Cooper is the hotshot doctor straight out of Med School looking to make his mark. He's cute and naive and looking to make sure everyone thinks of him as their buddy while trying to become a serious doctor at the same time. Zoey is the nurse counterpart to Cooper; the truly naive nursing student straight from school who hasn't had her spirit crushed by the real world. The rest of the hospital staff, Miss Akalitus, Mo-Mo, and Thor, all play delightful comedic foils throughout the season. The cast list would not be complete without the mention of Eddie, the hospital pharmacist who "supplies" prescription pills to Jackie because he believes he is doing his duty as a good boyfriend. Eddie unfortunately does not know that he is being used by Jackie who has a happy family at home as well as a husband with whom we are led to believe she is still in love with.

Fans of shows like ER will appreciate the drama, however it should be noted that Nurse Jackie is relatively light on the medical science side of the house. While drugs are described, procedures mentioned, there is very little step-by-step-to-recovery type documentation on a per patient level. You'll see gunshot wounds come in, chest tubes inserted, CBC and toxicity reports ordered but not a lot of breakdown into why a doctor orders which test, why they should look at alternatives, etc like in ER. Nurse Jackie was written in order to revolve around the nurse not the doctor, and as such there is a much higher emphasis placed on patient care rather than just medical procedures.

My only gripe with Nurse Jackie is that there is zero conflict resolution throughout the entire season. Season one ended with a cliffhanger and as with all other Showtime/HBO episodic shows, the next season will not premier until sometime in the next year. All of the "will she get caught?" questions that you develop from episode one will still be there after you finish episode twelve (with a few dozen extra questions thrown in by then for good measure). Other than that, Nurse Jackie is a great show, and I suppose that the fact that I want Season Two to start right now! attests to how addicting the series is.

As a nurse, I love this show. You'd think I'd hate it, due to the fact that Jackie has a drug problem and she cheats on her husband. But, she is actually a good nurse in spite of her flaws. What I like about this show is that nurses aren't painted as helpmaids to the physicians. My problem with many of the medical shows is that they show doctors doing stuff that nurses do on a daily basis and the nurses are all but invisible.

Nurses aren't saints..we are professionals who want to be compensated for the work we do. And we're human. Sometimes, we're tired and cranky. Quite often, we're frustrated with a system that is more about the bottom line than actual patients. That's why Nurse Jackie rocks..because Jackie for all her faults and cynicism still gives a crap. She is a good nurse, and her faults can't change that.

I also enjoy the student nurse character..very realistic.LOL, she has that "deer in the headlights" look that we all had starting out..

I see some complaints that "Nurse Jackie", as played by Edie Falco, is not a positive role model. They have a point - Jackie cheats on her husband with a pharmacist who thinks he is her main squeeze, so that Jackie can be kept with a steady supply of narcotics.

But like the proverbial onion, Jackie has layers, and like another of my favorite Showtime eponymous characters, Dexter Gordon, Jackie is not by any stretch "all evil" and she is never, ever boring.

Jackie's an adulterous druggie - but she's more. Years of having to literally manhandle patients in the Emergency Room more than twice her size have left Jackie with an aching back, and she could pursue more permanent treatment, but she and her family need this week's paycheck, so she masks her painful back with ill-gotten hard stuff. Merritt Wever plays Zoey, a young nurse who is everything Jackie is not - naïve, inexperienced, and as likely to want to cuddle her patients as treat them. The interactions between the experienced Jackie and the still-learning Zoey are one of the cornerstones of the show.

Jackie does things on the other side of "ethical", but like Robin Hood, she does them because her heart is in the right place. She knows desperate patients wait for potential donors, so when a brain-dead bicycle courier is brought to her ER, Jackie forges the dying man's signature onto an organ donor card.

If she sees nurses or doctors doing wrong or even not doing as well as they should, Jackie gets in their face. She is not the touchy-feely one in her department. But she is the one the others go to if they're in a tough spot.

Eve Best plays Dr. Eleanor O'Hara, an experienced New York doctor who is as anxious to use her doctor's wages to buy the latest fashions as her doctor's skill to take care of patients. Peter Facinelli plays Dr. Fitch Cooper, a new and inexperienced E.R. doc who finds himself often on the receiving end of Jackie's verbal and physical barbs. Haaz Sleiman is great as Mohammed "Mo-Mo" De La Cruz, another ER RN with a heart of gold who has fought in the trenches with Jackie for years. Paul Schulze plays Eddie the pharmacist boyfriend. Dominic Fumusa plays Jackie's solid gold husband, Kevin. Kevin tends bar and helps raise their girls, and when you see Kevin in action you wonder how in the world Jackie could cheat on him.

But Jackie doesn't live in a world that is black and white. Since the real world has plenty of grey, I'm willing to overlook Jackie's faults in favor of the entertainment of her company.