When I’ve first read that Grey’s Anatomy was planning a musical episode I was torn between “Wow, that’s cool” and “Oh no, how awful”. I’ve always liked and often even loved the music on Grey’s. I wasn’t used to that much music on a regular TV show and they did a wonderful job with setting the mood of a scene or episode with the music they choose. I’ve also discovered a lot of new wonderful artists via the Grey’s soundtrack. All these were reasons for the first “Wow” reaction.
But very soon the “Oh no!” reaction was so much stronger. I feared doctors breaking out into tapdance during rounds and such. Well not quite, but to break into a song during a scene and just… Ugh! It might work on “Glee”, but even there I’m not usual a fan of that. But that’s just me. Anyway, the idea of “Glee M.D.” as Patrick Dempsey joked in one article, seemed horrible to me.
Even though by now it’s at least confirmed that there will be no random breaking into showtunes, the whole idea still seems so awful and ludicrous to me. And the more tidbits are made public, the more I’m expecting an epic failure for this episode. I might be positively suprised later on, but right now I doubt it. Why? Because the only realistic storyline that would allow for the cast singing is a Karoake night at Joe’s, and we all now that’s not going to be the case. Because it’s going to be a “surreal” storyline with hallucinations. WTF?!?! I did enjoy the surreal “Meredith in the afterlife” storyline, but mostly because it had Meredith and it had pre-Ghostsex Denny. So, except for that I’m not a fan of “surreal” stuff on a show that usually deals with pretty realistic and ordinary stuff. Maybe sometimes in a very soap-opera-ish way, but still. Hallucinations of singing doctors? Ehmm, no, thanks!
In the beginning I was also pissed off, that this episode will be all about Callie, because I just don’t want to see that much Torres baby drama on Grey’s Anatomy. There are way too many storylines of every character but Meredith and Derek. The more I find out about this episode though, the happier I actually am, that the Shepherds seem to have only a small part in it. There are rumours of a cute elevator scene, but I really hope that’s all there is of them.
The mere fact, that the producers and Sara and Chandra and Chyler are stating over and over again how “different, awesome, special blablabla” this episode is going to be, makes me think that this episode will be anything but and that they really seem to need to reassure themselves. It might be wrong and mean of me, but right now I really expect this episode to be a disaster and I hope that Ellen and Paddy can safely stay out of the disaster zone by just staying off screen for most of the episode. Who would have thought that one day I’d hope for less MerDer on Grey’s Anatomy ;-)?
I think the last nail to the coffin of my “maybe it won’t be that bad” hope was seeing the Behind the Scenes clip with some of the cast recording their musical parts at the studio and being interviewed about it and such. Because Scott Foley is singing! Scott Who? Yeah, right. He’s got a good voice, so that’s totally fine, but the important information is: Scott Who? If I hadn’t seen him I wouldn’t have known that it’s the name of the actor playing the character I dubbed Henry Whatshisname. Seriously, what on earth was Shonda Rhimes thinking? And why didn’t anybody stop her?
I know I’m going out on a limb here by bashing an un-aired episode in advance. I promise to make amends and to offer my deepest apologies if this episode will turn out to be award-winning and groundbreaking material after all. But right now I doubt it. And even if it does, I can still bitch about the lack of Meredith and Derek… LOL