Grey's Anatomy: Got to Be Real (11x03)

I don't know what to feel right now... well, yes, actually I do. I'm kind of pissed off. By two things in this episode in particular. But let's do the plot first.

Alex and Bailey are getting ready to present to the board, who will vote on which of them will take Cristina's vacant seat. Stephanie Edwards continually tries to express to Bailey the dangers of Alex Karev's friendships with the board members, but Bailey remains calm and outwardly confident that she deserves the seat.

Meanwhile, Meredith distracts Alex from preparing his speech to the board. She stays home, claiming to be sick, and gripes to Alex about Maggie's confession. Alex and Meredith do some digging, and find out that Ellis Grey was indeed pregnant when she was admitted to the hospital for attempted suicide. It's true - Maggie really is Meredith's sister. Meredith hasn't talked to Derek about any of this, since she's resentful of him for turning down the DC job. She thinks that he wants her to feel grateful, but of course she feels that her career is just as important as his, and that he didn't have to turn down the job.

Meredith has Richard come over, and the two of them discuss Maggie. Richard promises Meredith that he didn't know about Maggie until Maggie showed up at the hospital and said that her biological mother was Ellis Grey. He's furious with Ellis for taking away his chance to be a father. Meredith encourages Richard to tell Maggie the truth, since he shouldn't take away Maggie's choice, the way that Ellis took away Richard's.

Derek has been butting heads with Amy. The two of them are fighting over being Chief of Neuro, and things get particularly bad when they squabble over a patient admitted after a bad crash. Amy initially treats the patient, but then Derek takes over. The patient dies on the operating table, and Amy is furious at Derek for taking over. When the two of them fight, Derek reveals that he resents Meredith for backing him into a corner, making him choose between an amazing work opportunity and his family. Meredith comes in to the hospital to vote for the new board member. When Derek realizes that Meredith is drunk, and not in fact at home sick, he's furious at her for being so careless, when the whole reason they didn't move to DC is so that she could have her career. Meredith, on the verge of telling Derek about Maggie, decides not to.

Meanwhile, Arizona is swamped with her new fellowship, while Callie is reluctantly drawn into a new set of patients for her robotic leg - all of them war veterans. Owen is insistent that she help the patients, and the two of them get into a huge argument when Callie says that she can't help one of the patients because his nerves aren't connecting to the sensors. Jackson, who has been swamped with administrative duties and misses being an actual surgeon, has a way to fix Callie's problem. Owen apologizes to Callie, saying that he needed something to be good, since everything has been hard since Cristina left. The two of them work out their problems, and Owen is thrilled to hear about Callie and Jackson's solution to the problem with the nerves.

When Callie and Arizona go to meet with a surrogacy agency, Callie can't stop talking about the exciting new changes to her robotic leg program. Since Arizona is already so overwhelmed by the fellowship, she asks Callie if she wants to hold off on having another baby. Callie is shocked, and says of course she wants another baby. However, she suddenly realizes that Arizona has been making excuses not to have another kid, and she demands that Arizona tell her the truth about not wanting a baby.

The board vote on the new member, and they end up choosing Bailey, leaving Alex without a job. Richard tells Maggie the truth, but Maggie does not take it well. She is furious that Richard didn't say something sooner, and she deduces that it must be because Richard knew about her all along, and didn't want anything to do with her. She storms off.

Okay. I started this review by saying that I was pissed off. Let's talk about why.

Bailey gets the job over Alex?! Seriously? I'm not that surprised, given the way the whole episode was setting you up to trick you about this. But at the same time, I don't understand. Alex is a brilliant surgeon, with just as many qualifications as Bailey, even if he does have less experience. I could have seen it being a pretty even match, but Alex had a word-of-God blessing from Cristina to take the spot! One of the reasons this annoys me so much is that I feel like Alex would call Cristina and complain to her about this, if we were being realistic here, and then Cristina would call Jackson and yell at him until she got what she wanted. But because Cristina is out of the picture, we're not going to see this logical next step. I don't know... it just bothers me.

The other part of the episode that made me irrationally angry was Richard and Maggie's talk at the end. Maybe it was just a badly written section of the script or something, but I was getting annoyed with both of them. Maggie, for not letting Richard even get the words out, and Richard, for not trying harder. Maggie walked away from that exchange believing that Richard had known about her for her whole life. And that's simply not the case! Don't get me wrong, Maggie has every right to be pissed. But at the same time, Richard needed to work a bit harder to assure her that even though he screwed up, he really didn't know about her the whole time! That's important! I felt like the utter drama of the scene was a bit forced. Maggie wouldn't be that obstinate. Richard wouldn't be that shell-shocked. Richard would try harder to tell Maggie the full story.

But, oddly, these things that piss me off don't exactly make for terrible flaws in the episode as a whole. Especially Bailey getting the job. It will add for good future drama for Alex, since now he's entirely jobless. Also, since Alex is so close to some members of the board, particularly Meredith and Arizona, he'll inevitably have a lot of feelings of betrayal. Since I love Alex to pieces, I'm looking forward to what's next for his character.

There were lots of good things going on here - I think my favorite parts of the episode were Alex and Meredith's scenes together. The bit in the shower was hilarious, especially with Jo and Stephanie hovering outside of the door, each of them insisting that they're not afraid of Meredith. And Meredith's utter unconcern with Alex being naked was also great. Even though Alex isn't Cristina, he still tries his hardest to be there for Meredith - and it's not an obligation, it's a true desire to help. Meredith, even while being preoccupied about Maggie, still reassures Alex that he'll do a great job in his presentation to the board.

I like Dr. Herman - she's the woman in charge of Arizona's new fellowship. It's an interesting position for Arizona to be in. She's this woman's peer, but now she's the student and she has to learn how to behave as such. I think it will make for an interesting subplot. Also, how did they get Geena Davis to be in this show? She's awesome!

Even though I'm not sure about Amy Shepherd as a character yet, I really did enjoy the plot thread between her and Derek. They were fighting like immature siblings, and yet they were also both making some good, professional points. Derek does have more experience than Amy, but Amy is very talented - and the job would have been hers had Derek gone to DC. It's an interesting tension. I feel more loyalty to Derek as a character - I never watched Private Practice, so I guess it's hard for me to be on Amy's side. But I'm still interested to watch all of this unfold.

I think I'll leave it there. This episode made me feel strong feelings - while I'm still annoyed with some of the goings on here, I think it's a good sign that I'm feeling invested. Can't wait for next week!

8/10