Grey’s Premier: George Is Dead, Does Anyone Care?
So as with most of the 2-hour premiers, these are thoughts rather than a recap.
First up, I expected the show to be way more sad than it was. I guess I shouldn’t have been so shocked that in true “Grey’s” fashion it was more dark and twisted than anything. People almost immediately went on with their lives and their problems. Now yes, by the end of the show we got the message, they were avoiding the reality that George was dead and had to grieve in their own time. It was just odd to see Yang only focused on how horny she was because Owen’s shrink is making them wait to have sex, or how Meredith was so focused on how many places she could have sex in her house. And that laughing scene at the funeral with Izzie and the others was just totally inappropriate!
Callie was one of the few who broke down immediately, but she soon focused on her promotion to attending and when she didn’t get it, quit to work at the competition Mercy West. Yeah I think a lot of it was not wanting to work where George’s ghost was all around.
Speaking of Mercy West, this was the one part of the show I was not getting at all. Granted I had a huge migraine so that wasn’t helping. The Chief learned he was in danger of being replaced by Derrick for not pulling up the rankings of Seattle Grace, along with apparently not managing his current staff so well (letting them spend money like it grew on trees). Well on his way to meet with the board he gets in a car accident and is taken to Mercy West, where he apparently gets an idea?
The Chief met with the board, then broke the news to the staff. Seattle Grace and Mercy West are merging, and becomes of the economic times, there will be staff cuts. Okay . . . what? First of all didn’t Seattle Grace’s rankings fall below Mercy West’s last season? When the Chief was there I thought they were making the place out to be a crap hospital, not a rock star one. Second, how on earth does a merger of hospitals make sense in hard economic times, as I would assume one would have to buy out the other? Oh I’m sorry we can’t afford good supplies, to run tests, we can’t afford to give you a promotion . . . but we can buy another hospital and merge them!
I just didn’t get it . . . .
One of my most favorite things in the episode was Alex telling Derrick that his silly post-it note in fact doesn’t count as a marriage. No it doesn’t, and it pisses me off! We the fans deserve a real wedding, not this post-it crap!
Anyway, what did you like or not like about the premier?
I also expected it to be way more sad. I didn’t even cry, which is odd for me. It ran a bit too slow so I was a little disappointed. Although I agree that the laughing at the funeral was extremely inappropriate, I actually enjoyed it because it was fitting and reminded me of the chemistry of that core group of people. It was them. Had George been alive, you could imagine him with the group too, not laughing because he was too nice but looking uncomfortable like he usually did and probably telling them how inappropriate they were being. McSteamy was the only one who provided any comic relief. I guess we are just supposed to buy the Mercy West thing, merging would be able to combine resources, cut staff, less costs from both buildings and I think Chief was actually intrigued by the thought of letting interns do things unattended faster. It would cut costs by freeing up time of the other doctors to work on other patients and make interns more responsible faster. I do hope the season is better than the premier.
09.26.2009 at 8:52 am
I don’t get the whole merger thing. I mean, they are probably still going to keep both hospitals open. Wasn’t Mercy West on the other side of town, so closing down one wouldn’t make too much sense. I guess I was thinking that maybe they would combine the hospitals, making them one system, rather than shutting one down and combining. While yes, the laughing scene did seem rude, but sometimes that is how one handles grief by laughing. Actually, laughing and crying aren’t really all that different. I know I have found myself in situations were I really should have been crying, but instead was laughing hysterically, it is just a coping mechanism.
09.26.2009 at 12:17 pm
I thought the finale last season was genius…the way they did the elevator scene…I was at least hoping TR would make a small appearance on the premiere so they could continue with that scene. If they had done something along those lines, I would have been happy with the rest of it. Or if they had made the scene where they were asking Meredith how she really knew it was George a little longer, played it out a little differently…that could have made George dying a little better. I just thought there were SO MANY different and better ways to do the episode!! I didn’t entirely understand the whole merger either. The only thing I could think of was that Mercy West didn’t have the money and the board didn’t really like the way Seattle Grace was being run, so the Chief came up with an idea to merge the 2 to take the best from both. I can’t think that they would fire any of the main people though. They are all too vital.
09.26.2009 at 4:08 pm
I don’t understand the reason for needing the merger story line. We watch the show for the relationships (and some cool medical stuff), but hardly for boring semi-political boardroom-like material. Yawn!
09.27.2009 at 12:23 am
I work in a hospital and we merged with other area hospitals to combine services. It supposedly saves money in the long run. Also read that the merger will allow the Grey’s stars to be off for long periods making movies (Derek, Izzy) and having a baby (Meredith) while “New” characters are introduced from Mercy West. I like my old characters. Not sure I’m interested in “meeting new people!” LOL!
09.27.2009 at 1:31 pm