Grey's Anatomy 10.05 Review: Back to the Beginning

Anyone that has yet to watch last night’s episode of Grey’s Anatomy, titled ‘I Bet It Stung’, then I suggest you either do so now or exit the screen. This is not a spoiler free blog. THIS REVIEW MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS! You’ve been warned.

Decent episode this week, much better than the two hundredth episode of last week, which was lackluster for such a monumental occasion. There was some good progression with a lot of the characters, most notably Meredith, and her friendship with Cristina, as well as Richard, Edwards with Jackson’s mom, and Callie. It was great to see that argument between Meredith and Derek at the end, especially since she had valid reasons. It was also really great to see Callie’s development toward being a happier person with her own life. No, it’s not possible to go backwards in time, but you can try to be the person you were at a happier time in your life.

There were some nice, easy, funny moments to this episode. The first was most the randomly peculiar moment at the beginning of the episode when Meredith kisses Callie goodbye much the same she does with Derek. The other comedic moment was the cliché meeting between Edwards and Jackson’s mom. I knew it was coming, but it was still a light moment to the episode that spiraled into drama. The third one was the whole thing where Arizona couldn’t remember what had happened the night of the gala with Murphy. The whole bit where she gave Arizona coffee but April got nothing was great.

It was nice to see the growth of Meredith’s character come to a head. The constant battle for women to decide what do they give themselves more to: work or kids. I definitely think she made the right decisions, that her kids come first, much better than a lot of the mother’s on this series. Which is why it was such a valid argument between her and Derek at the end. He’d chosen his surgery, something that wasn’t a once in a lifetime experience like Meredith’s, and had the nerve to say it wasn’t his fault that she’d had to give up her’s. I most assuredly look forward to seeing how that comes across next week.

So, there are still a lot of interesting things going on in Grey’s Anatomy, but a lot of it is becoming tired. No, the writing is no where near as bad as The Vampire Diaries, or even this year’s American Horror Story: Coven, but it’s not at all close to how ripe with intrigue and drama from years past. I did think it was a very My Sister’s Keeper moment when we learned the other sister was a donor baby, but I suppose we haven’t seen that on this series yet. I do wish this series had ended a few years ago, though. Still, I think as long as Meredith’s in it a lot and McDreamy’s still there, I’ll stick around.

My rating: 7 out of 10.

Best Lines:

“I named my son after you, you can’t be mad at me.” – Meredith tells Bailey.

“Besides, she’s not going to be alone. She’s going to be with me, who she loves more than her own parents.” – Karev says to Meredith, referring to Zola.

Okay, I’m off to watch The Crazy Ones now. Stay tuned.

Grey's Anatomy 10.04 Review: Ain't No Party Like a Hospital's Party

For any of you that have yet to watch Thursday’s episode of Grey’s Anatomy, titled ‘Puttin’ On the Ritz’, than now would be a good time to exit this screen. This is not a spoiler free blog. THIS REVIEW MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS! You’ve been warned.

So, this week the Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital threw a party in order to get donations for the hospital in light of the massive storm they’d just gone through. There were definitely a nice amount of throwbacks to the last party the hospital threw, but I do have to say that episode was much better.

I know the series ER went on for a very long time, but I desperately don’t want this series to go that way. When that’s done, there are always actors and actresses circling in and out, and so the characters can’t realistically stay in this one place, thus the writing benefits the actors and not the characters. I mean there’s a reason Karev called it Seattle Grace Mercy Death (when it still had the better hospital name), and incredible amount of characters have died throughout the years, too many characters. It’s disappointing to think it will keep doing that.

There were definitely some nice moments, but there wasn’t an incredible amount of progression in this episode. It was nice to see how Callie has been brought into the friendship group with Meredith and Christina. The last time there was a party thrown at the hospital, Callie was snide and didn’t much care for Meredith, though she did claim the black panties on the bulletin board as her’s.

Christina was a bit of a shining beacon in this episode. She was all so very happy and upbeat in trying to get people to give up their money to the hospital. It’s so unusual from the Christina of years ago, but it’s nice to see her happy. Although, I really do think they’re just dragging their tale around with this whole Christina and Owen story; when they said they were done, they really should have stayed done, this is just dishonest storytelling. When your audience is trusting you with a story, they need to be able to depend that you’ll give everything you can into the writing, and not to do all the back and forth development for characters.

My last note is about Bailey being smart about putting the dying man in with Richard, one man that’s going to die but doesn’t want to and the other man that wants to die but shouldn’t have to. Sure, I saw this bit coming as soon as we learn how much the man wanted to fight the cancer, despite his late age, but it was still a decently done thing.

Overall, this episode is more of the same that I’ve come to expect of the later years of Grey’s Anatomy, but it still has its quaint moments. It’ll be interesting to see how it’ll go with Alex’s dad, but I don’t know if I’ll be able to see the actor as anyone other than Dexter and Deb’s dad over on Dexter. This really does need to be the last year though; this series doesn’t have much in the way of great stories left for it.

My rating: 6.5 out of 10.

Best Lines:

“Bailey’s going to lose her mind, she hates clowns. It’s going to be hilarious.” – Callie remarking on the theme of the party.

“I know you know how to do that.” – Christina says to Meredith, referring to how she met Derek.

“And snacks!” – a drunk April shouts after Leah.

All right, stick around and wait for my weekly update of Best Performances of the Week shortly. Then it’s reviews of Haven followed by Once Upon A Time and Revenge. Sorry for the lateness of this!