Monday, February 06, 2006

Surfing Through "Grey's Anatomy"

I've dipped into GA every once in a while, just to keep up. Well-acted and an appealing cast, of course. But the Very Special Episode after the Super Bowl is exactly the sort of stunt episode they shouldn't be doing. And it's the same thing that ruined ER. We don't watch these shows to glimpse outlandish, once in a lifetime medical emergencies like a a guy with an unexploded bazooka shell stuck in his chest. We watch because we care -- or want to care -- about the characters. All this crazy, hard to swallow hyperdrama just spoils our belief that these are real people in a real job. Compare it to Battlestar: Galactica -- they're in space fleeing a clone-like adversary while trying to kill an unkillable opponent and find earth. But because every scene is rooted in realistic details (realistic as far as the universe of the show is concerned), they become real people we care about dealing with real problems -- like coworkers after their job or feeling stressed out over a difficult assignment. It's much more believable than last night's escapades on Grey's Anatomy.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I hadn't thought about it that way, but you're right. Dempsey is still McDreamy though.

Michael in New York said...

Way absurd. They create characters you are sort of interested in and then avoid them by making up all sorts of crazy plot twists. Only a matter of time before a helicopter crash lands there.