Grey's Anatomy Fodder

Grey's Anatomy: Where the Boys Are

The other day the Boston Globe wrote " Grey's Anatomy is exhibiting signs of a debilitating illness known as shark-jump-itis waterski-us, more commonly referred to as self-parody" I have to say, the first scene of this week's episode proved to me that the Globe article was dead on. While watching Dr. Burke (Isaiah Washington) and Dr. Shephard (Patrick Dempsey) packing up to head out on a camping trip together, I started to get a sinking feeling. It's a sweeps month after all - and once again the writers feel the need to toss a ho-key story line at us. Preston and Derek are not friends. In fact, the tension between these two characters has always been fun to watch. So why now, suddenly are they being buddy, buddy and heading out for a bit of male bonding? It's ridiculous but not completely. I'm willing to accept that maybe these two have a lot on their minds and and the writers are going to give us something great here that I can't even anticipate - after-all, that's one of the reason why I fell in love with this show in the first place! But then when they stop off and pick up Dr. Webber (James Pickens Jr.) and then George (T.R. Knight) I knew this whole camping trip stunt was nothing more than a desperate sweeps gimmick. It continued to go down hill toward the land of implausibility from there. Adding Alex (Justin Chambers ) to the mix was just bizarre. Then it just even worse. Joe, the bartender AND his boyfriend Walter decide to tag along too. Are they kidding us? I'm devoting no more than 100 words to the camping trip scenes because that's all they deserve.

Burke's hand flutters, George sees. Alex tells George about Callie and McSteamy. They fight. Dr. Webber plays referee. Walter gets sucker punched and needs stitches. George suggest Dr. Burke sew the sutures. Dr. Burke knows George is testing him. He sews Walter up without twitching. Now Burke's mad at George. George is mad at Callie. Dr. Webber misses his wife. Joe and Walter regret going camping with straight men. Derek realizes he invited Burke as a replacement for Dr. Sloan. He missing having a best friend. He misses Meredith. They all pack up and head home.

Back at the hospital the ladies are ruling the roost. Addison (Kate Walsh) catches a whiff of sexual tension between Callie (Sara Ramirez) and McSteamy (Eric Dane). Her facial expression says it all - she's wondering why she lets herself get sucked in by this guy when she's knows he's a leech! (Ah, maybe because he's hot?) Later she and Callie have to work together as they treat a pregnant woman who fell in the shower. Her wrist in broken but she doesn't want pain medication because of the baby. While Callie looks at the x-rays Addison performs an ultrasound and finds out that the woman's fetus has died. Addison sees this loving, happy couple and breaks down because she knows she's about to give them devastating news. She's crying in the bathroom stall when Callie comes in to comfort her. Addison questions why happy people like this couple can't be allowed to just be happy. "Why does life throw a tragedy like this at them" she wonders. As they watch the couple through the hall window Callie suggests they hold off on telling them about the baby. "Just wait a little longer and let them be happy. " Now I may be a stickler for details but by not telling the woman right away they essentially caused her even more pain because Callie went ahead and set her broken wrist without pain medication! Did anyone else pick up on this? She needlessly endured a painful procedure for no reason! Only after the woman says to Callie "Oh my god, please tell me it's going to stop hurting soon" does Addison step in and delivers the terrible news about her baby! Gee, that was great timing! I'm so glad she was able to have those few extra minutes of "happiness" as she suffers through the pain of her wrist being put back together!

Meanwhile Dr. Bailey (Chandra Wilson) is on the war path. She confronts Cristina (Sandra Oh) about taking her name off the surgical board and bans her from the O.R. until she comes clean about why she did it. For now Cristina's answer is "no comment" so Dr. Bailey assigns her to sift through some kids poop for the day, looking for swallowed Monopoly pieces. Half way through her second round of poop, Cristina begins to questions whether protecting Dr. Burke is worth it.

Izzy (Katherine Heigl) gets placed with Sydney, the hyper-cheery doctor from last season. I love this character because we all know someone just like her! She's so happy and cheerful you just want to smack the smile off her face and send it flying clear across the room. Izzy does her best to avoid her - even offering to help Cristina with the poop- but at the end of the day she gets stuck in an O.R. observation room with Sydney who asks her to talk about what happened with Denny. Izzy gives it to her good. "I don't want to share with you. I would rather sit through feces than talk to you. You bring up Denny like you want me to sit here and gossip with you! You think you know how I feel? You have no idea how I feel. Have you ever cut someone's El-vad wire. Fell in love with a man and then watched him die?" She storms off and we see the cheery smile has actually been knocked right off her face! Later Sydney tracks her down in the Intern locker room and explains, "I lost a kid, my first year. It was my fault and I just couldn't..I had a break down and took time off. When I came back I put a smile on my face and everybody thought I was fine. I lost a kid. It comes in waves Izzy. I wasn't trying to pry. I just wanted you to know that it's okay to not be fine sometimes." Izzy responds, "I miss him all the time. It doesn't come in waves it's constant. All the time. I want to be here, I do, but I don't know if I want to be a surgeon again and I can't talk about it because it scares me too much, okay?"

Lastly, Meredith (Ellen Pompeo) is assigned to shadow McSteamy for the day. Before they see their first patient she gives him a list of rules, "no flirting, no talking about Derek and no giving me the face, the McSteamy face! It doesn't work on me, I'm immune!" Of course he breaks every rule and works throughout the day to plant the seed that Derek is damaged goods with too much baggage trailing behind him. They go out for a drink after work and he suggests she "should start over, start fresh" with him. When he walks away to answer a page, Meredith is left alone at the bar. In walks McDreamy. He saunters over to her and introduces himself. "We met at this bar when we started this thing. You didn't know me, you didn't know my name. I want you to know me. I want to start over from the beginning. So Hi. I'm Derek Shepherd." Okay, Meredith, it's the moment you've been obsessing about. Here it is, now get on with it. Say hello to Dr. McDreamy! Of course it doesn't go that way. Instead she responds "You walked away and now it's too late. There's too much water under the thing." Is she crazy? McDreamy can't believe what he's hearing - I can't either! Are they really going to torture us again? Maybe the writers are trying to torture us again by setting up another scenario where she'll double date McDreamy and McSteamy? I can't handle this! But then, it happens. She looks across the bar at McSteamy, who's watching her and hoping she's going to walk away from Derek and it's as if an invisible force reached out and dope slapped her! She takes Derek's hand and says "Hi, I'm Meredith." Thank god. All is right in the world again. Soon their kissing and McSteamy walks out defeated. He'll have to find his sloppy seconds elsewhere!

Your comments are welcome below!

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Posted by Rachel R on November 10, 2006 12:46 PM
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