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A Complete List of All 196 Surgeries Performed on Nip/Tuck

TCDNITU EC029 Photo: Warner Bros/Courtesy Everett Collection

It’s hard to believe that a decade has passed since Nip/Tuck premiered on FX and brought both plastic surgery and titular slash marks to the mainstream in a way not seen since the 1997 action flick Face/Off. To celebrate the Ryan Murphy drama’s recent tenth anniversary, Vulture scoured all 100 episodes to compile a list of every single surgery performed on the series, which depicted the exploits — medical and otherwise — of Sean McNamara (Dylan Walsh) and Christian Troy (Julian McMahon). And those sexy cable doctors sure did perform a lot of them! Despite all the infidelity, drug use, run-ins with organized crime rings, and sex with patients, they found time to tackle nearly 200 sometimes humorous, often entertaining, and usually disgusting procedures. Here they are (along with a few depicted by other doctors on the show), counting down from head to toe.

Body (general)

  • Identical twins don’t want to look the same anymore, so go under the knife. But then the girls decide they don’t like the results and ask for the procedure to be undone. Fickle! (S1, E2)
  • Hair plugs for a dog. Sean and Christian turn the procedure down, but their rival Dr. Merrill takes it on. Sadly, the pup dies on the operating table. (S1, E13)
  • Celebrity look-alike surgery on a woman wanting to look like J.Lo. The doctors refuse, so she goes to an uncertified doctor and dies during surgery. (S2, E13)
  • Tattoo removal from the body of a reformed gang member. (S3, E2)
  • Corpse reconstruction. The doctors are paid to reconstruct the corpses of four women whose limbs were to remove to create a creepy embalmed corpse doll made up of the limbs of the deceased. (S3, E6)
  • Full-body liposuction on a girl Christian sleeps with and describes as looking like a road map to hell. (S3, E11)
  • Surgery reversal on Kimber done by serial rapist the Carver. After he slices open her cheeks, he reverses every single surgery the doctors ever gave her. (S3, E14)
  • Plastic surgery restoration on Kimber. Christian restores the work the Carver destroyed. (S3, E14)
  • Full-body liposuction on a woman who won the lottery. (S4, E5)
  • Liposuction on the corpse of a regular patient so she looks good at her funeral. (S4, E8)
  • Liposuction and eye lift on the anesthesiologist Liz, seemingly at the request of her new girlfriend. (S4, E9)
  • Body rejuvenation on an actress in her forties who was beaten by Cameron Diaz for a part. (S5, E1)
  • Body contouring on a popular actress who had gastric bypass surgery and needs her extra skin removed after losing over 100 pounds. (S5, E2)
  • Skin grafts on 30 percent of Matt’s body after his hotel meth lab explodes. (S5, E8)
  • Human shrapnel removal on a woman who was almost killed by a suicide bomber. A full-body scan reveals she is filled with bone shards and tissue bits of the man who almost killed her. (S5, E9)
  • Plastic surgery disaster repair on a minor celebrity who comes in with uneven breast implants, overly puffy lips, and a “deer in the headlights” eye-lift, all done in Thailand.(S5, E14)
  • Facial reconstruction, pec implants, and liposuction on a man who keeps getting mistaken for a woman because of a decrease in his testosterone. (S5, E16)
  • Fungus removal on a man whose entire body is covered in growths that make him look like a tree. (S5, E20)
  • Full-body plastic surgery makeover on a woman whose husband has prostate cancer and wants his wife to be able to find a new husband when he dies. (S5, E21)
  • Liposuction on a morbidly obese man on death row so the state will be able to execute him by lethal injection. (S6, E10)

Face (general)

  • Facial reconstruction on a Colombian drug dealer. Post-surgery, they discover he wanted a new face because he is a child molester. (S1, E1)
  • Facial reconstruction on a girl hit by a car. (S1, E8)
  • Facial reconstruction on a wanted Colombian drug lord’s face. The doctors transform his face into the face of another man on the FBI’s most wanted list. That’s what you get for trying to scam two plastic surgeons. (S1, E13)
  • Facial reconstruction on a woman who shot herself in the face on her birthday with a loaded 45. (S2, E1)
  • Face-lift and botox on Sean’s mother-in-law. (S2, E1)
  • Siamese twin separation and face reshaping. Girls connected at the head are separated, the doctors are brought in to reshape their faces and attempt to make them look as similar as possible. One of the twins dies on the operating table. (S2, E9)
  • Scar removal from the face of Sean’s estranged wife after she falls through a window. (S2, E12)
  • Scar removal on a gorilla who can sign over 1,000 words and understand English. She needs her scar removed to overcome her self-image problem and mate with a male gorilla. (S3,  E2)
  • Scar removal and nose resetting on Matt after he is gang beaten by a group of queer students. (S3, E3)
  • Facial reconstruction on a woman whose husband has Alzheimer’s. She wants her face to look like an old photograph of herself. Her husband doesn’t remember her, claiming his wife, the woman in the old photograph, ran away. (S3, E4)
  • Facial reconstruction on an AIDS patient who wants to look the way he did before he became sick. (S3, E5)
  • Face-lift on an elderly woman. (S3, E6)
  • Facial reconstruction on a mother and son who are entering the witness protection program. (S3, E7)
  • Facial reconstruction on a boy with Down syndrome to make him look like his family. (S3, E8)
  • Face transplant. Two mothers come into the office, one has a daughter in a diabetic coma who will die in six months; the other has a daughter whose face was ripped off when her hair got stuck in a carnival ride. The mothers request the daughter in the coma is used as a transplant for the girl with no face. Surgery is successful, but the girl’s body rejects the tissue. (S3, E9)
  • Shrapnel and scar removal on a soldier the army is turning into a recruiter. (S3, E11)
  • Pro bono facial reconstruction on the transsexual who had her face bashed in by Sean’s son Matt. (S3, E14)
  • Face-lifts on an elderly couple. (S4, E1)
  • Facial reconstruction on a boy with severe facial deformations. (S4, E2)
  • Nose and chin enhancements on a beautiful woman who has “compromised” a client of the escort service she works for. (S4, E4)
  • Facial hair removal on a woman, done pro bono. (S4, E7)
  • Facial reconstruction on a man who suffered a stroke while having sex. Christian operates to restore the face to its  pre-paralysis appearance. (S4, E7)
  • Facial reconstruction on the Colombian drug lord from season one. He has been imprisoned and his body is covered in third-degree burns. The face the doctors gave him was the face of the child molester. He wants his old face back. (S4, E10)
  • Facial reconstruction on a ventriloquist who wants to look more like his dummy. (S4, E14)
  • Facial reconstruction on a woman attacked by an eagle while hang gliding. (S5, E4)
  • Facial rejuvenation via eye-lift and neck tightening on a male escort. (S5, E6)
  • Facial rejuvenation on Kimber, who spent time as a meth addict and needs surgery to remove the damage done by the drugs. (S5, E7)
  • Tooth from face removal on a woman whose entire body was badly burned by a suicide bomber. She undergoes facial surgery to remove a tooth of the suicide bomber. It had been lodged in her face since the incident. (S5, E9)
  • Facial reconstruction on the woman who survived the suicide bomber. (S5, E9)
  • Facial and chest hair implants on a middle-aged man who had electrolysis to remove his body hair in the eighties at the request of his elderly wife. Now she wants her lover hairy. He gets facial rejuvenation, too. (S5, E10)
  • Face re-sculpting to make a woman look more like a cat. (S5, E12)
  • Face re-sculpting to make a woman look less like a cat — turns out she was bipolar and had gone off her meds. (S5, E12)
  • Birthmark removal from a young woman’s face. (S5, E13)
  • Facial reconstruction on the critic who gave Sean a scathing review on his television performance. (S5, E13)
  • Face-lift on a woman Christian slept with 25 years earlier and fathered a child with. (S5, E14)
  • Scar removal from Sean’s daughter who was involved in a car accident. (S5, E14)
  • Face-lift on Sean’s ex-wife’s new girlfriend. There are complications during the surgery and the woman ends up in the ER and dies. (S5, E17)
  • Facial reconstruction on an 18-year-old who had an affair with his teacher in middle school. She lost her job and went to prison, but now that he is 18, they have gotten married and are expecting a child. The boy wants to look older, so he isn’t confused for his wife’s son or the older brother of his unborn child. (S5, E18)
  • Facial scar and tattoo removal on a boy who has carved “666” into his forehead and tattooed a giant skull on the back of his head. (S6, E2)
  • Facial rejuvenation on a plastic surgery addict (paying in cash) who wants leeches applied to her face to expedite healing.(S6, E3)
  • Facial scar and lesion removal from the face of Sean’s long-lost brother. He was addicted to meth and wants the evidence erased from his face. (S6, E9)
  • Facial reconstruction on a boy who wants to look more like his adopted father. Later Christian finds out the boy is sexually assaulted by his adopted father for money. The boy had surgery so their clients would believe they are related and they could make more money. Creepy!  (S6, E9)
  • Facial rejuvenation on a man who spent 22 years of his life in a coma and wants to look 18 again. (S6, E12)
  • Facial reconstruction on a man who attempted suicide by jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge. (S6, E13)
  • Scar removal from the face of a 12-year-old girl who was attacked with a machete when she tried to fight off a rape attempt. (S6, E13)
  • Facial reconstruction on a woman who was mauled by a chimp (S6, E14)
  • Face feather lift performed on Christian then posted on You Tube in hopes it would go viral and boost business. (S6, E17)
  • Facial lesions removal from an infant. (S6, E19)

Forehead

  • A woman who had fake Botox injected into her forehead comes in with massive scarring on her face. (S2, E13)

Eyes

  • Eye reshaping on a white man who wants to appear more Japanese to gain approval from his fianée’s Japanese mother. (S1, E5)
  • Synthetic eyeball implants on a woman who was born blind. (S2, E11)
  • Eye-lift on Matt’s principal— to keep him from being suspended from school for a month. (S2, E13)
  • Eye-lift on the doctors’ first patient in Hollywood. (S4, E15)
  • Eye-socket reconstruction on a girl who had her eye busted open while filming a sex scene with Kimber. (S5, E12)

Nose

  • A woman comes in with a broken nose. She says it is from a car accident. Doctors discover she has had surgery before. They suspect her husband broke it. He did, but she admits she made him do it (with a hammer!) because she hated her nose. (S1, E5)
  • Christian breaks his nose while having oral sex with a woman. Sean redoes it without anesthesia. (S2, E2)
  • Cartilage is removed from Kimber’s ear to rebuild collapsed cartilage in her nose from years of cocaine abuse. (S2, E4)
  • A man who climbed Mt. Everest comes in with severe frostbite to his nose and hands. The doctors harvest skin on his chest to graft to his face. (S2, E5)
  • A woman whose husband broke her nose sixteen years earlier, then killed her child, comes in wanting a nose job as a way to move on from her tragic past. (S2, E14)
  • The woman returns, with another broken nose that needs to be repaired. (S2, E14)
  • Nose job on a girl Sean was considering hiring to care for his unborn child … until he slept with her. He bribes her with free work to keep her quiet. (S4, E3)
  • Nose reconstruction on a man who lost all of his cartilage because of cocaine abuse. (S6, E9)
  • Two-for-one birthday nose jobs on a pair of 16-year-old twins. (S6, E10)

Ears

  • Ear pinning on a morbidly obese man. (S2, E6)
  • Ear transplant on a woman whose ear was ripped off while wearing expensive earrings. An ear is grown on a mouse and then attached to her head. (S4, E7)
  • Stretched ear lobes are returned to a normal size after a drummer gets kicked out of his band. (S5, E15)

Cheeks

  • A woman has her face sliced open by a serial rapist known as “the Carver.” She comes in for cheek reconstruction. Her nerves have been severed and she is unable to smile. Nerves are used from her thigh to replace the damaged nerves in her face. (S2, E7)
  • Sean has his face repaired after he is slashed open by the Carver. (S2, E15)
  • Sean repairs the cheeks of another Carver victim. (S2, E15)
  • Another Carver victim ends up in the office. She starts asking about a nose job and lip enhancements. During the surgery it appears that the “victim” butchered her own face. (S3, E4)
  • The doctors repair another Carver cheek slash job. (S3, E15)
  • And another Carver slash job. (S3, E15)
  • Bullet-wound-scar removal on a mall Santa who was shot in the face by an unhappy child.  (S5, E8)
  • Scar removal on a psychotherapist shot in the face by a former patient. (S6, E16)

Mouth

  • Lip reconstruction on a woman who lost her lips in a kitchen accident. She has skin transplanted from her labia to her face, but tells her husband it’s from the back of her knees. (S2, E6)
  • The doctors repair a botched lip job done by another plastic surgeon. (S2, E12)
  • Baby collagen injections on Kimber’s toddler. She manipulates Christian into administering the injections. (S5, E19)
  • Lip reconstruction on a man who chewed his lips off because of a genetic disease that causes him to be self-destructive.  (S6, E11)

Chin

  • Chin clefting on a plastic surgery addict looking to create perfect symmetry on his face. (S5, E3)

Neck

  • Tracheal shave on a transgender woman. (S1, E4)
  • A man has a giant neck hematoma lanced. He almost dies. (S2, E2)
  • Neck liposuction on a German tourist who doesn’t speak English. (S3, E6)
  • Vocal cord lift on a woman who works as a phone sex operator. (S4, E1)
  • Vampire neck bite removal on a couple of “vampires” who get off by drinking each other’s blood. (S5, E22)
  • Scar removal on a man who was practicing auto-erotic asphyxiation with a studded belt.  (S6, E13)

Shoulder

  • Parasitic twin removal from a woman’s shoulder. While still healing, the woman slices her shoulder open and places the twin’s arm back into her body. (S6, E5)

Arms

  • Arm and back fat removal on a woman who has lost a significant amount of weight and is going on a blind date with a man she met on J-date. (S1, E6)
  • Scar and burn removal on a cutter who faked stigmata. (S2, E8)
  • Scar removal on a woman who is a cutter. (S3, E4)
  • Double arm amputation on a plane crash victim who is bleeding out. Man dies. (S3, E12)
  • Skin graft over cigarette burns on a girl who just got out of rehab. (S5, E6)
  • Skin grafts on a man who fed his wife chunks of his arm to keep her from dying when they were trapped in their car on their way to a honeymoon skiing trip. (S5, E11)
  • Skin grafts on the wife’s arms. While her husband was in recovery from surgery, she gouged out chunks of her arm and fed them to him. He gets sick. (S5, E11)
  • Tattoo removal from the arms of two Holocaust survivors. (S6, E18)

Hands

  • Thumb and finger reattachment on a plumber who lost them in a garbage disposal. (S1, E10)
  • Palm surgery on Kimber’s “love line” so she can feel more confident about her relationship with Sean. (S2, E14)
  • Hand rejuvenation on the female owner of an escort service who is blackmailing the doctors. (S4, E5)
  • Finger separation on Sean’s infant son whose fingers were fused together at birth. (S4, E8)
  • Finger separation in 2026, performed by Matt, on his younger brother’s other hand. (S4, E11)
  • Hand reconstruction on Sean and Christian’s intern after he has Matt smash his hand in a car door. (S5, E18)

Chest

  • Male breast reduction on a swinger who complains that he was rejected by 30 women in one night. Despite working out, he can’t lose his man boobs. (S1, E7)
  • Third nipple removal. (S2, E2)
  • Pit hair and pubic hair transplants on a man with alopecia. (S2, E3)
  • Breast implants on a man, with a book deal, called Walk a Mile in My Boobs. Proceeds from the book are going to his wife’s cancer recovery center. (S2, E10)
  • Implant removal on the male author writing the book. (S2, E10)
  • Bite mark removal from the chest of a Hollywood studio exec given. The marks were given to him by his dominatrix. (S5, E1)
  • Nipple reduction on a man with one abnormally large nipple. (S5, E5)
  • Pec implants on Christian, after undergoing surgery and chemo to treat his breast cancer. (S5, E18)
  • Scar removal on an elderly Japanese sex star with a gruesome scar left behind after his heart attack. (S6, E19)

Breasts

  • Breast enhancement on a breast cancer survivor with whom Sean is having an affair. (S1, E8)
  • Breast reduction on a woman with multiple personalities. The little girl inside her head thinks her breasts are too large. (S1, E11)
  • Breast implant removal, but these aren’t normal breast implants. Surprise! They’re heroin-filled breast implants! (S1, E12)
  • Breast implant removal on another girl with heroin implants. The Colombian drug lord brings the doctors to a creepy hotel to remove this pair. (S1, E12)
  • Breast implant removal, filled with more heroin and coming out of the chest of another pretty Colombian girl. (S1, E13)  
  • Breast implant removal, you guessed it, filled with more heroin! (S1, E13)
  • Leaky breast implant removal on a woman whose implants have been leaking for three years. (S3, E1)
  • Breast reduction, on a stripper, pro bono. (S4, E2)
  • Nipple reconstruction on a woman who has her nipple torn off by her dog and needs it reattached. (S4, E4)
  • Breast implant removal on Kimber in preparation to give birth … to Matt’s child. (S4, E10)
  • Breast implant replacement with a side of “dead husband” on a French woman who wants her husband’s ashes diluted in saline solution and then used to replace her current breast implants. (S4, E12)
  • Breast implants, just normal ones. (S4, E14)
  • Reconstructive breast surgery on the Colombian drug lord’s wife. Her breasts were hacked off by one of her husband’s enemies. (S4, E15)
  • Double mastectomy on an anonymous patient. (S4, E15)
  • Breast implants on a Marilyn Monroe impersonator. (S5, E2)
  • Breast reduction on a nun. (S5, E4)
  • Double mastectomy as a precaution on a woman whose mother died of breast cancer. Christian initially refuses so she shows up in the office with an electric knife and lobs one off herself. Christian removes the second breast. Angelina probably didn’t have to put up with that… (S5, E17)
  • Breast reduction on Liz so she can fit into her mother’s wedding gown. (S5, E21)
  • Breast reduction on a stripper named “Jenny Jugs” with giant breasts. (S6, E4)
  • Breast implants on an individual who was born a man, became a female, and went back to being a man. (S6, E7)
  • Nipple removal on a woman who wants to be more like her idol, the Barbie doll. (S6, E8)
  • Breast implants on a struggling actress. After the surgery, the doctors discover the woman stole someone else’s identity. (S6, E15)
  • Breast implant removal on the woman who committed identity theft. (S6, E15) 

Stomach

  • Kidney removal on a girl with heroin-filled implants  … because the real cash is in organ harvesting. (S1, E13)
  • Tummy tuck on an incredibly skinny older woman so she can feel more confident about getting a job at Saks. (S2, E6)
  • Micro-liposuction on Kimber’s stomach so she will fit into her size 0 wedding dress. (S3, E10)
  • Micro-liposuction and surprise fetus removal on a woman looking to drop about fifteen pounds. Turns out the extra weight was coming from a fossilized fetus. (S3, E13)
  • Kidney removal, to sell on the black market. (S4, E12)
  • Organ removal from a homeless man whom Sean offers a place to sleep for the night, not knowing that the owner of the escort service who is recovering in the office has been harvesting organs for the Colombian drug lord. (S4, E13)
  • Tummy tuck in which an exhausted Sean accidentally leaves an instrument in the patient. (S6, E1)
  • Abdominal etching on a man who wants beach abs. (S6, E1)
  • Hairball removal from Sean’s daughter’s stomach. She has been eating her own hair.  (S6, E3)
  • Bullet removal from Matt’s gut after he attempts to rob someone and gets shot. (S6, E5)

Back

  • Tattoo removal on a sexually compulsive woman who had “Property of Marco” tattooed on her lower back. (S4, E6)
  • Fingernail scar removal from the back of a man who hosts swingers parties. (S5, E5)
  • Alien probe removal from the back of an old man. The doctors agree to surgery, despite not believing his abduction story, and find a microchip without a serial number in his body. (S5, E7)
  • Mole removal from the back of an overweight nudist. (S6, E8)

Genitals

  • Circumcision on Sean’s son Matt after the teen tries to do it himself. (S1, E3)
  • Gender reassignment surgery on a man looking to become a woman. (S1, E9)
  • Vaginal reconstruction on a Somalian woman who underwent female circumcision as a young girl. The doctors remove part of her toe and sew a piece of it to her crotch in an attempt restore her lady bits. (S2, E3)
  • Vaginalplasty on a woman who was actually born a man. (S2, E16)
  • Testicle implants on an older man recovering from prostate cancer. (S4, E1)
  • Orgasm enhancement surgery on a woman going through a divorce. An intoxicated Sean injects her with restylane. (S4, E13)
  • Hymen reconstruction on an 18 -year-old who ripped her hymen while riding her horse. (S5, E3)
  • Penis reduction on a yogi who can’t stop giving himself oral sex in his apartment. (S5, E19)
  • Penis enlargement and scar removal on an actor who meets the yogi. The actor breaks his neck trying to give himself oral sex. When the brace comes off, he needs scars removed from his temples and requests a few extra inches, too. (S5, E19)
  • Gender reassignment reversal on a woman who was actually born a man and wants her penis rebuilt. (S6, E6)
  • Vasectomy on Christian so he won’t produce anymore children. (S6, E11)

Butt

  • Tail removal on a baby, whose mother thinks it is possessed. (S2, E8)
  • Couch removal from a morbidly obese woman whose skin has fused to the furniture. She dies during the operation. (S3, E1)
  • Butt-lift, so routine. (S3, E2)  
  • Face from butt removal at a college party where two men have had their faces glued to another man’s butt cheeks. The doctor’s re-graft the super-glued skin back on to the man’s body. (S3, E3)
  • Lunchtime liposuction on Christian’s behind. (S4, E3)
  • Anal retread on Dr. Merrill, who spent some time in prison. (S4, E10)
  • Butt-lift on a man nicknamed “Mr. Waffle Butt.” (S5, E4)
  • Butt implants on a white woman who wants a Beyoncé butt in time for her hip-hop album to drop. (S5, E17)

Legs

  • Ankle reshaping on a woman who says she has “piano legs.” (S1, E11)
  • Knee-lift on an older woman, because being able to wear miniskirts after menopause is important … (S2, E4)
  • Leg amputation on an architect who suffers from BIID. The doctor refuse, but later the man shoots himself in the leg and Christian removes it in the O.R. — even though it’s technically salvageable. (S3, E7)
  • Burn treatment on a man playing Santa whose legs were severely burnt when his ex-wife lit a fire as he came down the chimney. (S4, E13)

Feet

  • Toe separation on a woman whose toes were fused together at birth. (S5, E11)

A Complete List of All 196 Nip/Tuck Surgeries