Grey's Anatomy: Bottle Up and Explode! (18x05)

Koracick my love!

Cons:

I will continually register my complaints that the powers that be are trying to con me into watching Station 19. Not gonna happen. They could at least do a "previously on" to let me know about any characters who I care about on Grey's, so I can bridge the gap... so like, I'm sure the death of Dean Miller is a real tragedy. I do love Okieriete Onaodowan (Hercules Mulligan!), so if I watched this whole other show, maybe I'd be all caught up in the emotion and the drama. But I don't know this dude! I can't borrow emotional resonance from something I know nothing about.

I liked a lot of the stuff with Meredith in this episode, but I still find her romance very... boring? I want something stable and simple and comfortable for Meredith, I really do, but I thought Hayes could have been that for her. There's still the tension and drama of blending families with kids, both of them having lost their spouse, etc. etc. But instead we get this random pivot to someone else, who has very little in the way of personality. I just don't really feel connected to that story-line as of yet.

Pros:

Okay Tom Koracick is just... inexplicably one of my favorite characters on Grey's Anatomy. You know when people talk about how women always fall for jerks, or guys who aren't good to them? I have never once understood the appeal, or felt attraction towards someone like that, but Tom Koracick like... I get it? Which is so funny to me, I mean, I'm not generally even attracted to men. He's just so funny and quippy and charming, and I'm not saying I'd fall in love with him, he's a real slime ball, I'm just saying I get why he's so successful with the ladies.

And the whole story, with Hamilton having an ego trip but Meredith talking to him and sympathizing with his fear and helplessness, I thought that was such a good example of how much Meredith has grown as a professional since her earlier more dramatic days. She was able to do good medical work and also solve for some interpersonal drama. I loved the moment when Meredith said: "so you don't want to work with Tom Koracick because your adult daughter had consensual sex?" That was so funny and just spot-on.

Despite my frustration with the forced crossover thing, I do love Miranda and Ben, so I am interested in the new baby drama situation. It will probably play out mostly on Station 19, since we don't see much of Miranda and Ben on Grey's Anatomy these days, but I am invested and I'll want to check in on that for sure.

I wish Amelia and Link weren't... being Amelia and Link about all this, but sure, I do think Amelia and Kai have promise and it could be a fun relationship to explore. Not much more to say about that just yet. There was some flirting happening!

To my infinite surprise, I do have a positive thing to say about Owen and Teddy this week. I find them insufferable characters and their relationship annoys the shit out of me, but I've always found the treatment of Owen's PTSD on this show to be interesting and sympathetic and I feel a real connection to him as he's suffering here. There's a lot you can say about Owen, and I've said it, for sure, but the guy really does care deeply about other people and he wants to do the right thing. Teddy comforting him there at the end was a nice little moment, as was the scene where the two of them told Megan that they'd always be there for her and her son, as her family.

They seem to be setting up Hayes/Megan, which is like... eh... okay, I guess? I do like Megan just fine, so I wouldn't be mad about her sticking around, it's just such a bummer that the epic reunion of Megan and Riggs didn't last. Every once in a while I want a fairytale that sticks around, and we haven't really gotten an example of that on this show in quite some time.

In a very minor subplot, things are still going well with Richard's training of the interns, and he and Winston have some bonding time over missing their wives who are out of town. I like the mentor/mentee, father/son vibes these two have going, it's a nice way to make Winston feel more tied in with the core of things. I like him, he's been a good and mostly un-stressful addition to the show thus far.

There you have it. I felt a lot of distant empathy for the Station 19 characters as they processed their grief, but I'm never going to feel as invested in an episode that relies so heavily on my having preexisting feels for characters I don't really know.

7/10