I nearly forgot to
post this, just got it in in time before the leg comes off....
Season 9 of Grey’s
Anatomy kicked off with a bang last week giving us heartbreak, humour and
something just a little bit different from the standard Grey’s fair. As premieres
go this one was a milestone.
Not since George’s death and Izzie’s ‘Dead
Denny Brain’ during Seasons 5 and early 6 have we been subjected to such dark
tragedy for multiple series regulars. Where we thought we’d seen the worst of
the crash during 824, ‘Flight’ (though I think during hiatus we all knew we
hadn’t), we really only saw the lesser part of it. 901, ‘Going Going Gone’
proved to be devastating, intriguing and a damn fine episode.
At the heart of ‘Going Going Gone’ was the
untimely death of Mark Sloan with most of the episode’s stories circling around
the 5pm switch-off deadline. I must admit to being very anxious about how
Shonda Rhimes would exit Mark Sloan. As mentioned in my wish list of last week the one reasonable solution could only be character death, which closes both
the ‘Mark and Lexie’ storyline neatly and reassures the viewer that Mark did
not abandon Sofia. But I needn’t have worried. Shonda’s love affair with
McSteamy matches my own and I can honestly say his demise was handled exceptionally
well. As an established character since series two Mark Sloan’s impact at
Seattle Grace Mercy West has been huge. As a side note, in Shonda’s post
episode commentary she classed Mark Sloan as an original character. Often
humorous, sometimes irritating, at one point controversial, but always
loveable, in Season 8 we were treated to perhaps the most character growth
since Meredith. This was clearly a tribute episode to him where the surrounding
characters respectfully stepped back in their stories to make way. That’s not to say the episode was all about
him, it wasn’t but the careful writing of the episode allowed him to be centre
with a lot going on around him.
The two people closest to Mark formed the
inner circle and it was clear in the tone and delivery that Derek and Callie
will be linked for some time to come. Press coverage prior to this episode took
us on the path that Derek’s hand will bring these two together. I would venture
a guess that it is the passing of Mark that forges this friendship; the hand is
just a device for that. In the start of a series of McSteamy flashbacks we were
reintroduced to Mark, the enduring best friend. Time will tell whether Derek
will recover the use of his hand well enough for surgery but this episode was
not the moment to dig further there. It was a moment to remember the strong and
enduring friendship he had with Mark. Sometimes the writing over the last two
seasons has allowed us to forget that these two go back a long way, to
childhood.
In more recent times it is Mark’s
friendship with Callie that has lead to many of his storylines and it’s with Callie
that he leaves his legacy. In a ‘friends with benefits’ flashback sequence
we’re reminded that, good friends they may be but good sex is equally
important. The home video carefully inserted as a lasting reminder to us of his
favourite hobby. And as Callie grew to love and understand herself more so she
moved on and it is her relationship with Arizona that Mark had to navigate out
of, firstly reluctantly and then finally with good grace and friendship, as we
finally see in his wedding speech to camera. Perhaps by telling us the story of
the grandparents and projecting that on to Arizona and Callie the writers can
finally lay to rest some of the anger directed toward the character of Mark.
Throughout the 42 minutes we could feel the
tension build with Callie. The obvious ‘past’ references to her wife, the
arrival of a new paediatric attending and the uncontrolled sobbing triggered by
his appearance, on this day of all days all led to the eventual confrontation
scene with Arizona at the end. It turns out Arizona is not dead, but suffered a
life changing injury for which she blames Callie. It was obvious quite early on
that Jessica Capshaw would not take up much screen time during 901. Having been
filmed only about three or four weeks after the birth of her third child she
can be forgiven for asking Shonda to take it easy and let her rest in bed for a
bit. Though I bet she didn’t bank on Shonda saying – “sure JCap, and I’ve got
just the storyline to make that happen”. Bring it on I say. This story should
be good.
It’s not known when a decision was made to
remove Mark Sloan from Seattle Grace Mercy West. Did they know Eric was leaving
when writing Lexie’s death? We may never know but what we do know now is that
it is forever ‘Mark and Lexie’. And perhaps this goes down in the Grey’s
history books as the only surviving romance of exiting characters. It may not
be a happy ending but they are meant to be and are now together. There’s no
Cristina & Burke. There’s no Izzie & Alex. There’s no George &
Callie. There’s no George & Izzie. There’s no Callie & Erica. There’s
no Meredith and Finn. There’s no Alex with Rebecca or Lucy or Morgan (thank
God). There’s no Jackson & Lexie (even more grateful thanks to God).
There’s no Mark and Teddy. There’s no Mark and Julia. There’s no Mark and
Arizona (okay, my little joke). There’s no Callie & Mark. There is only
Mark and Lexie. Whether this was by accident of the actors wanting to leave at
the same time or design, this was a good call.
Perhaps the deathbed sequence that surprised
me the most, positively, was Mark the teacher. Yes. You are right. This is a
Jackson scene that only mildly irritated. In actual fact I think this was done
very well. I’ve yet to be convinced that Jackson is fit to be a doctor. I sure
wouldn’t want him messin’ with my boobs (oh, okay, in THAT way, not in the
OTHER way, I mean...stop now before you get yourself into trouble Brou
::blushing::). Jackson Avery was quite tolerable and I’m putting it down to 70’s
hair growth. Now, who thinks he’s growing it out into a Michael Jackson Afro?
 |
| Jackson? |
In the end though, the moment of passing
brings with it the lasting image of Mark as a father. Baby Sofia is his legacy.
But that’s not all that happened during
Going Going Gone. In fact this episode was packed with new characters, new
locations and even a pig. If I didn’t have Mark's death to completely ground me
and have me sobbing in my sofa cushions I’d have lost myself in zooming around with Grey’s ADHD.
Medusa Meredith has turned into Bailey’s
Nazi and Bailey’s turned into a hormone fuelled sex machine, Booty Call Bailey.
It is very telling that Meredith abandons her husband just as his best friend
is dying to go and rescue (?) her own best friend. Is this reasonable? No. But
it is understandable. Meredith is carrying the heavy burden of unstructured,
unpredictable and unfamiliar grief. What makes this all so juicy and exciting
is to have two couples (including Callie and Arizona) losing people close to
them and watch how they come to terms with their own pain and their partner’s.
 |
| Meredith - I see the resemblance - okay, maybe not |
Considering the amount of content and the
need to set a completely different tone this episode stood out as one of the
best. However it was let down in two areas.
Alex, looking mighty fine in navy scrubs,
started the episode with his feet firmly placed in man-whore-Mark’s almost
empty, still slightly warm shoes, and still incapable of having an adult
conversation with anyone other than Meredith. I was about to wipe my hands of
him when he suddenly turned it around just at the end. But I expected this to
be honest so this was not the let down. The problem lay with the contrasting
interactions with Callie. First he is sensitive, clearly distressed himself on
finding Callie upset and ultimately protective. In what must have been only
hours later he is somewhat insensitively putting more weight on Callie’s
shoulders apparently clueless of her angst. Was he the only one unaware of the enormity of her day at that
moment?
The second disappointing storyline was with
Cristina. Well, not with her per se but more with the Stepford hospital she’s ended up in. The very fact that she landed
there is a mystery to me and an enormous failing on behalf of her for lack of
research and her new employer for failing to read her file or see if she was a
good cultural fit. That’s basic recruitment criteria. Grey’s is playing the
melodrama with this and watching Cristina in Pleasantville is going to get very old very quickly.
And what of the rest...
Richard was a bit part player, the bad guy,
and the one switching off the machines. Under the circumstances his minor
appearances suited the episode. Someone had to and with Bailey in her happy
place (yay!) this unenviable task was left to the Chief (the one and only
Chief, not the interloper). Speaking of the interloper - Owen wandered around
the corridors like a wounded child, whose Lego has been swiped by the big kids.
He’s not very good at staff retention is he? Three Attendings and three
Residents down, his wife has bolted and Kevin McKidd looks like he’s aged ten
years during hiatus. And right at the end he hops on a plane to rescue
Dorothy and Toto back from the farm. Or in this case April and Babe.
All in all, considering the volume of story
the writers had to tell this was an excellent episode. It also felt different. The tone was reflective,
devastating, and not withstanding Alex, I would say it was grown up.
It was not the best episode technically but
I will admit, that as a devoted McSteamy fan this will rate as my all time favourite episode. I loved it.
