Maybe I should stop watching complete Grey’s episodes in the future and just watch the MerDer clips on youtube later. It would save me a lot of time and I wouldn’t have to suffer through storylines I just not care about. But I’d also have a lot less to write about in this category of my blog and I think I’d miss that. And I guess I’m too sentimental to stop watching or to just watch the MerDer tidbits in the future. Watching it on Fridays and writing about it became such a habit :-)
At least I’m not as invested emotionally in this show as I was in the early seasons. I’m disappointed about what the show has turned into, but I’m not upset to such a degree, that I will spend my time and energy bitching about it or getting worked up and in the end still be frustrated. Because no matter how mad some or a lot of fans might be, Shonda will still do what she wants to do and there is nothing we can do about it. Except to just stop watching the show and I’m just not ready to do that yet. I’m disappointed though and I’ll spend my time and energy voicing my disappointment. Because if I don’t, this disappointment might turn into rage and that would be a waste of energy :-)
It wasn’t all bad in this episode. In my first reaction on twitter this morning I said “New ep. of “Torres’ Anatomy” had a crap/ok/yay ratio of 70/20/10. Starting to wonder if the 10% are worth continuing to watch whole episodes.” So I’ll start with these 10%.
There were quite a few of Derek and Meredith and Derek & Meredith scenes. Yes, I’m content with so little these days :-) I liked Derek’s scruffy look and I think it’s worth mentioning that the hair is back after the disaster in the beginning of the season. I still have to get used to Meredith bangs though.
So, Derek finally starts his Alzheimers trial and in a way I liked to see how well Meredith handled the situation with the Alzheimers patient, but it also was sad to see, because it made me remember what Meredith has been through with Ellis. Derek himself so far seems to be doing ok, emotionally, compared to how much it stressed him out, when he came up with this idea and did all the research. Maybe he has learned to deal with these fears and emotions. Or maybe the writers just forgot about this bit of character development they had started earlier this season. Wouldn’t be the first time *sigh* Or maybe I’m being unfair and it will be addressed later on, but for now I honestly doubt that. I also wish he and Meredith would have talked a bit more about his feelings and her feelings instead of him just letting her now that she’s in.
But of course there are other more important and urgent storylines on the show, so there wasn’t time on Grey’s Anatomy for a longer talk between Meredith Grey and her husband. *ironymodeoff* I might be in the minority of MerDer fans, when I say I can’t really get upset that Callie got pregnant instead of Meredith. It’s a typical „Shonda does to them whatever she wants and she likes to let them suffer” thing. I got used to that. What bothers me with this pregnant Callie storyline is that it is so poorly executed. It’s an idea fit for a soap opera. A bad soap opera. It’s so bad that it’s really not even funny and it bothers me that it got the center stage in this episode and from what I can gather from the spoilers also for the rest of the season.
At least Callie and Arizona are back together. The rest… Ugh! If the writers really wanted to break up Mark and Lexie again, couldn’t they have come up with a new idea instead the old „Mark has a kid” storyline? And I was already annoyed by the Mark as a father idea during the original storyline in season 6, so I why should I want to see that now?
I’m wondering (but doubting it actually) if Mer’s hostile uterus will ever be mentioned again or if that was just one of the many meaningless plotdevices they’ve thrown at us over the years. Like Nurse Rose and such. When Derek reacted irritated about Mark’s fertility, I wanted to grab and shake him. Then I remembered that it’s not Derek’s fault, that the writers botched up his character :-) But seriously: it was his decision to ignore the „ hostile uterus = possibly/probably infertile” diagnosis and to keep trying instead of getting help from a fertility specialist. So he really shouldn’t complain. Unless he wants to complain to Shonda herself, but I guess that kind of self-awareness of fictional characters is yet limited to work like the wonderful Thursday Next novel series. But I wander from the subject.
The whole twitter story: Out of character and out of place. I say that as an avid twitter user. But surgeons tweeting during a surgery? Come on! I at least hope that real surgeons don’t do that, teaching hospital or not. If it were me on that table I would want my surgeons to concentrate on their work and their work only. To prove that twitter or any other kind of social network can save lives, this was a rather blunt and thus stupid way to demonstrate it. If that was the purpose of this storyline at all. Or was there another purpose? I somehow don’t really care. And whatever happened to the ban of cell phones in hospital wings like the ICU or cardiac monitoring rooms because the phone’s electromagnetic radiation might mess with the machines? Or was this explanation always just an excuse from the hospital’s administrations? If they really mess with the machines, how could they be allowed inside an OR?
When I first heard about this storyline I was sure the chief would shut it down and it would be a one-time thing like so many other things that were mentioned just once to prompt a storyline or special scenes and then are never mentioned again. My favourite example: Derek’s need for earplugs because of Meredith’s snoring, He never seemed to need or use them after these two episodes in season 3. It wouldn’t have been a big deal to incorporate that as a tiny detail (only noticeable by the crazy fans like me) in some bedroom scene. But it was just forgotten about. I’m wandering off subject again…
So Bailey seems to keep tweeting and I’m already feeling sorry for the poor intern at the production company or ABCs press office, who has to feed medical tweets into this account for the next weeks/months.
A few more thoughts: The new (semi-temporary?) addition to the cast, Callie’s OB seems likeable enough, but this hospital is crowded already, so I’m hoping she doesn’t get her own storylines soon as well. Teddy and her what’s-his-name-again husband were bad enough. I was actually glad that we just saw a professional side of Teddy this week and am equally bemused, that I obviously find the abscene of a crappy storyline already positively noteworthy.
I enjoyed the competition between Cristina and Jackson and I do believe that Cristina’s sympathy for her patient in that last scene before the surgery was an honest emotion. She’s shown these kind of emotions before. This competition shows that she really is back to her old self, but that still leaves me a bit wondering what was the point of the first half of the season ?
Last thing: There seems to be a secret, but direct passageway between „the island” and SGH :-) Bernard as father of Owen’s ex-fiance in season 5. Now Rose as wife of an Alzheimers patient. Seeing her makes me miss LOST a little bit. Even though I had some complaints about the final season of that show, at least Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof early on had a plan when and how to end their show and how to develop the characters and storylines. I very much doubt a similar plan exists in Shonda’s mind…
I thought the Twitter storyline was so lame. I love Twitter and advocate its use in a lot of professional situations, but the OR is not one of them. For one, would patients really agree to that? Actually sign a release saying “Yes, you may live Tweet my surgery”?
Here’s my thing with the Mark/Lexi stuff — I liked the show a lot more when Meredith and Derek weren’t together. I LOVED the drama that surrounded them and their whole struggle to have a relationship. Now they are together, the big “will they or won’t they” question has been answered, so it seems like they are trying to make Mark and Lexie the next couple to carry that on-again, off-again drama. And they can’t. We barely even saw them together and then she’s storming out again because Mark is bringing a kid into the situation. Again.
I just don’t think the writing is very good anymore. A few years ago, they might have been able to make the Callie/Arizona/Mark/Baby story compelling, but they’re doing a poor job of it now.
I agree 100% to everything you said! They really should have ended the show a few seasons ago, after Meredith and Derek got together. Give them a few episodes to settle into this new shared life and that’s it! Sadly enough, despite all that I still can’t stop watching :-).
I somehow started checking the quality of any Greys episode by two questions: Any MerDer scenes? Any ghosts? If nobody else annoys me during the 42 minutes, the episode is okay for me. I also stopped putting to much emotion in it or I would constantly complain that the cast is too big and I’m not interested in Teddy’s storyline or the baby-triangle. Or that I knew from the start how the twitter-story would end (and I didn’t even thought about the messing up with or-machines but about the paperwork to get stuff from another hospital). And I also knew that the husband will get the placebo stuff. I’m now just wendering whether the show was always this predictable … Anyway, as I said some tiny MerDer-moments, no ghosts – an okay episode for me.
I’m happy about all the MerDer scenes we get too, but I’m also still a tiny bit disappointed that they are just one of many couples nowadays and that we don’t get to see more of their relationship. Shouldn’t he explained / talked a bit more about why he lets her be on the trial after all?
No ghosts? I like that :-) This storyline was so so so bad. Ugh, I don’t want to remember that.