It's interesting to me that I've actually become embarrassed to admit I still watch Grey's Anatomy. I find it gets a pretty bad rep amongst those who have similar taste in television to me. I'm not sure why that is. I most often hear it criticized for being a medical drama that's more about the drama and less about the medicine.
Well, I say to those people, "A-duh." Do you really want to watch a show about medicine? I know I sure don't. If you do you should be watching the Discovery Channel or Dr. Oz. If this is the big problem with Grey's Anatomy, how come no one ever says Scrubs sucks because they focus more on the comedy than the medical issues.
I've been watching Grey's since the very beginning. Sure, it's had its ups and downs, but all shows have (Okay, all shows except Arrested Development). And pretty much I've learned to groan when I hear the phrase, "A special two hour episode of Grey's Anatomy" because they tend to have a structure problem with those. But altogether, I almost always find Grey's Anatomy to be thoroughly enjoyable.
It is a masterful ensemble piece that really knows the balance between drama and comedy. The characters are all rich, full characters with real flaws and a real sense of humanity. I could do an entire blog post on almost every single character, going into why they do the things they do, what they've been through, and where they might be going. And furthermore, the one episode characters (patients, patient's loved ones, etc) are also easy to connect with and well-developed. You generally get attached to them just for that one episode. I think that really says something about the writing.
And then there was the Season 6 Finale. If you don't watch the show, you may have heard of the Grey's Anatomy hospital shooting. This two hour special (the only one I ever enjoyed) was so captivating, so well-written, so well-shot and edited. It was a crazy, suspenseful, incredibly moving and beautiful two hours of television that was better than a lot of movies I've seen. I honestly don't know how anyone can give this show shit after seeing that episode.
And the aftermath was wonderful. This event really fucked up these characters and the entire hospital, and the tone of the show got really dark in a very Dexter-esque way at the beginning of the new season.
I decided to write this post because I was just watching last week's episode, and thinking how great it was, and how sad it is how many people poke fun at the show. The new episode focused on how much can change in an hour, and had several plots going on at once that all changed realistically within the one hour. I believe it was the first episode of the show that was done in "real time", and it was so well-done and really said something about the world and these characters.
Maybe I'm biased because I'm writer and the most important things to me are plot and character development. But even if you don't pay so close attention to those things, shouldn't they affect your opinion of a show without you realizing it? I think they should. I'm be no means saying that Grey's is the best show ever on TV, but I'm definitely saying that more people should give it a chance and see how much thought goes into it. It's not your typical shock value show. They don't make radical decisions for the sake of creating drama. They make compelling decisions that shape the characters and make them whole. And I think that makes it worth watching every week.
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