Grey’s Anatomy :: What I Did For Love

ABC

Two total seconds of noticing the sisters in the opening sequence in their red, white, and blue tops. Seriously? Seriously. We’re not close enough to Memorial Day for that (or was it filmed/shot around Labor Day?).  

There was a pause last week for ABC to – I don’t know, wash their hair? Walk the dog? Who knows – Grey’s bounded back this week and once again the rebound episode after the gap feels like there was a micro-episode in-between that we have somehow not been privy to. Like with Jo & Alex suddenly seeming fine and talking to one another after that horrifying ultimatum-anger ending from Episode 22. But that’s the least of the problems on this week’s episode.

For those of us not blazing with desire for Station 19 (some of us still haven’t caught up with and let go of Private Practice), the ‘crossover’ portion on the Grey’s side seems minimal, but it is a nice resurgence of Ben. (Judging from the way it tails off, Maggie is likely to be the only GA crossover to S19, though possibly also Bailey.) McFiery – the S19 chief- has a heart problem which Maggie has to address, and he turns out to be a good sounding board for her Jackson ‘move-in-with-me’ issues. Still don’t quite understand the dynamic of Jaggie – as he seems to be making reasonable requests that don’t actually seem to be ‘not accepting her for who she is’, yet she’s still demanding and needing the approval of ‘accept me for who I am.’

Nobody should be surprised that Meredith did what she did or that Webber flipped out about it. The whole ‘I need to be honest for my sobriety’ is a new layer to it. But this is Meredith Grey we’re talking about here … the one who helped Izzie cut Denny’s LVAD wire, the one who threw her hand in a bomb-loaded body cavity, the one who tampered with the Alzheimer’s clinical trial to favor Adele, the one who stole her baby when she thought they were going to take Zola away because she and Derek had a temporary rift in their marriage. Despite being all grown up, whole & healed, everyone backpedals every once in a while when it comes to rash decisions. And like all of Meredith’s rash decisions, this one came with great reasoning, albeit poorly thought-through. (And does no one remember Webber flipping out on Teddy when she married then-patient Henry to give him her insurance?)

Once again TeamShonda has put our hard real-world issues at the front and center of Grey’s. Even more potent as the news broke a few days ago about another youth asylum seeker dying in border control custody. Meredith’s compassion, humanity, and desperate yen to solve the problem – especially when Luis has done everything right but still gets screwed by the system – is the attitude and mentality that the nation should be embracing. Powerful stuff.

Perhaps the end of MerLuca is in sight!!! The men of GA, and particularly the men of Meredith Grey, seem to have no trouble blurting out that potent 3-word-phrase. The women of GA, and particularly Meredith Grey, have a singular MO: RUN. LIKE. HELL. That utter ‘oops-um-thanks’ look on her face was priceless and every ‘run, Meredith, run’ moment that we’ve had over the last 15 seasons (along with everyone else – who’s had not the immediate response of ‘I love you too’) came flooding back with fond hilarity. I do think she did love Riggs. I am convinced that she does not love DeLuca. Bye, DeLuca.

Koracick continues to get cuter. And then we get that end of episode bomb drop from Owen – who’s all half-healed now – that he’s not going to feel bad going after what he wants (like he ever did before) and telling her that he loves her. It’s really a 50/50 at this point (hell, he could come up with some absurd third option that isn’t Teddy or Amelia) especially as both Amelia and Teddy are really happy with Link and Koracick, respectively. I do hope Koracick sticks around, even if he’s only semi-recurring.

It was really touching to see ‘Gramps’ comforting Jo at the end – sort of forgot for a minute there that he was her Stephanie when Stephanie wasn’t her Stephanie before Stephanie left after barbecuing a rapist and before Ben left for his own spin-off. (Jason George should call Kate Walsh and see how that worked out …) and it was also amazing to see Karev reign in his anger. ‘I need to break something!’ and Bailey hands him that mug and he just cools down and laughs it off. Jo is spiraling out of control and I don’t know that there is a solution to that.

There is a land called Passive-Aggressiva and Addison Montgomery-Shepherd passed her crown onto Nico Kim. Woof. Yes, Schmidt is a bit overbearing with the support. Yes, Schmidt is dorktastic. But Schmidt isn’t wrong in wanting an apology. Nico isn’t wrong in his ‘way to take my death-mistake and make it all about you.’ And watch out, Link! Don’t throw yourself in the crossfire like that! DANGEROUS!

Next week’s preview gives us little to go on (except the return of Catherine Fox!) and the description isn’t much help either. But we do know that it’s the penultimate for Season 15 and that Baby Huntaltman is coming!!

Grey’s Anatomy airs Thursday at 8:00 PM on ABC.

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