Grey's Anatomy: Reunited (16x03)

I'm going to try and rapid-fire this review... there is always so much to talk about!

Cons:

Maggie continues to make everything about her. There's a moment when she's lamenting to her octogenarian patient that love isn't worth all of the backstabbing and pain, and it's like... Maggie, honey. This isn't about you. This is about an old man reminiscing about his life. Calm the heck down. I like Jackson and his new girlfriend fine, but mixing in the drama with Maggie is unnecessary.

I have been a Tom Koracick fan for a long while, but now he's acting like a whiny little baby. I don't really get his game here. When he was meeting Teddy's baby, he was totally sweet to her and said he'd wait for her when Teddy and Owen's relationship fell apart. But now he's behaving in such a way that it's hard to imagine Teddy taking him back, no matter what. The restraining order thing is mostly being played for laughs, but that doesn't really work. It's absurd.

I'm always glad to see Schmitt get some material, but this week he messed up something simple in a surgery and DeLuca had to swoop in and save the day. DeLuca is acting like a bit of a dick also. He's mad at Bailey for effectively benching him, because he believes it's on account of his relationship with Meredith. But he's coming across really condescending to his peers. I don't care if he is better than all of them. The way he behaved with Helm and now with Schmitt is not painting him in a very good light.

I also must say, I'm waiting for some more clarity on Bailey vs. Meredith. Bailey seems personally angry with her. I could see it as a thing where she's upset because Meredith basically forced her to fire her best doctors, but even that doesn't fully explain the vitriol. Maybe Bailey is annoyed because she agrees with Meredith's principles, but isn't allowed to say anything? I'm willing to give this the benefit of the doubt, as I bet we'll see this story develop over the season, but so far I'm lacking some clarity.

Pros:

Amelia and Link continue to be kind of adorable. After watching a couple be reunited after sixty years apart, Amelia decides that keeping the news of her pregnancy a secret is a bad idea - it's scary, but she wants to share this joy with the world. She and Link tell Meredith and DeLuca, and Meredith seems genuinely excited for her. This could really wind up being a cute story!

I'm still not on board with Owen and Teddy, but I do like that Teddy is coming back to work, and that she is not being demonized in the slightest for this decision. As Owen says, happy moms are better moms. You go, Teddy!

Meredith seems happy. She's obviously a little bit manic, as I'm sure she's extremely nervous about her medical license. But at the same time, she's standing up for what she believes is wrong with the medical system, and is getting ready to expose the nitty gritty truth. This could end up blowing up in her face, but she's standing up for her principles, and it seems to be making her really happy. It's also fun to see her and Andrew as such a well-adjusted and happy couple.

It's also cool to see Jo being such a bad-ass! She performs a surgery that Meredith was supposed to do. Bailey consents to have Meredith assist through an iPad, since she won't allow her to set foot in the hospital. There's a brief scare where it looks like Jo may have made a mistake, but she pulls through and saves the day. It was a cool moment of triumph for her, undercut by Bailey hanging up on Meredith as soon as the hard part of the surgery is over, and the fact that Qadri tries to stand up for Meredith by saying that she only came to this hospital to work with Meredith Grey. She gets fired for her trouble, which is a serious bummer, and I hope we see more of her anyway.

The plot thread with Richard and the two sisters with their brain-dead third sister was really interesting and ended up being a comedy of errors, when they discover that the mutilated brain-dead woman that they've been crying over is actually a stranger who stole their sister's purse, and not their sister. This was an odd plot thread, probably mostly there to showcase the guest stars, but I thought it worked pretty well. Especially the bait and switch at the end, with the reveal that Richard has just pulled the plug on a Jane Doe instead of an identified person. There's a moment where you think that maybe the hospital is on the upswing, but then another big mistake like this happens and you see that Richard and Alex have a long way to go. I hope Richard isn't about to be an adulterer again, as he tries calling his wife but doesn't get an answer, and decides instead to go out to dinner with an old friend who he finds working at the hospital.

See, this review isn't too long! I limited myself! I'm sure I've missed tons of details along the way, but this is about as good as I can do right now. This was a solid episode, even as the various relationship dramas continue to annoy the heck out of me.

8/10