Grey's Anatomy: Gunpowder and Lead (19x16)

Let's dive right in!

Cons:

This is a small thing but I thought I'd mention it because I noticed it: there's a scene where Addison and Bailey are walking down the hallway having a conversation, catching up on the harassment Bailey has been suffering, and you can see the actors walking super slowly to accommodate the dialogue in the scene. It was just so funny to watch them shuffle in slow-motion and pretend they were walking at a normal pace.

I've... seen Amelia go through this shit before. I've seen her hit her lowest of lows. I don't really want to watch her suffer anymore? I know that drama is inevitable on this show, but there's just something so draining and oppressive about seeing Amelia in this depressive state, and she's surly and snapping and people, and I'm just... already exhausted about it, I guess? Winston getting the brunt of Amelia's wrath because he "let" Maggie move? Like, girl, this was mostly Maggie's fault, let's be real.

Pros:

Kwan jumping on that patient and pinning him to the ground was pretty intense. I love this kind of character, who comes on strong to start as an abrasive, unfeeling sort of too-cool-for-you loner, but we see him trying to connect with Jules, we see him heroically throwing his body on someone to protect Bailey. I'm enjoying him more and more as the show continues. And then of course we see him with an ego boost over his own heroism, which felt appropriate. He's a complicated guy.

It was nice to see Addison! I was surprised, I thought her time on this season had come to an end. This whole story about Bailey is stressful and I'm waiting for things to come to a head even worse than they already have, so it's nice to at least get to see Addison as recompense. I love that Bailey actually froze in the moment when she was under threat, she ran away, she was scared. Then later, as she's processing, she gets angry. Addison gives her the opportunity to feel that anger, which is exactly what she needed! I also liked seeing protective, furious Ben for a second there. I'm worried about these two; they're like the last ongoing romantic relationship on this show I still want to see succeed.

Also, I burst into immediate tears when everybody decided to call Bailey's harassers and treat them with respect. I love how it was framed as a strategy: people have a harder time harassing someone they actually see as human. There was no placating, no promise that it would actually work, or that everyone would back off right away. But just the thought of all these people coming together to put in the effort, just in case it helps a little bit, just in case one or two people are convinced to back off... it was so beautiful and special.

Jules and Lucas spend the episode talking about love. Jules is scoffing at Blue's behavior, and Lucas is pining for Simone. They have a patient who's in the LARPer scene, and can't stop talking about Princess Astrid, who he wishes to confess his love to. I loved that the cynic, Jules, ended up seeing the woman show up because she had feelings for the patient, too. She's maybe starting to doubt some of her boundaries, as she watches Kwan go off on a date with another woman, that he asked her on, first. I'm not mad about it! Meanwhile, Lucas is clearly in love with Simone, and he asks Jules to be her maid of honor, because he's realized he can't stand up with her and watch her get married. Good progress, although I'm sure the odds of this wedding actually happening are pretty low.

Yasuda drops a surgical instrument on the floor during surgery because she's not getting enough sleep, working another job just to afford to live. Amelia reams her out, but Addison interferes. Helm then comes to tell Teddy that Yasuda is burning out and that it's her responsibility to do something about it. I love this! I love seeing Helm stand up for her, I love someone noticing and saying something and hopefully disrupting the cycle.

As much as Amelia annoyed me this week, because I feel like I don't need to watch this story-line with her again, I did like that she got some tough love from Addison, and I liked even more that Richard was there to say that he's also having some abandonment feelings. I hope that Richard stays in this role for as long as he's on the show, of the kindly mentor figure who can be there to comfort the younger doctors. I got a little misty-eyed for the second time in one episode, when Amelia hugged Richard. And it was fun to see a glimpse of Maggie on the phone, too! I like it when the characters who left still feel like they're around. (Speaking of which, Cristina sent supplies from overseas with a note! Yay for a Cristina mention!)

Jules and Lucas perform an emergency surgery and save a patient's life, but Schmitt tells them off for it. Clearly he's remembering his own past trauma of acting without supervision when he was still an intern. I like that he imparted to them the seriousness, he told them to remember how scared they'd felt, but he also didn't overreact, and he reassured them that they did the procedure well and saved a life.

Simone continues to show what a compassionate and thoughtful doctor she's going to be, comforting the wife of a man who is getting bullets removed from a shooting that happened years ago. I was really moved by her comforting the woman, and then the patient, his utter relief at having the physical remnants of that horrific trauma taken out of his body... I loved it!

I'm still kind of on pins and needles about how they will continue with this Luna hearing loss story-line. This episode, I did enjoy, though. We see that Jo is having a really hard time with it, which is understandable if not ideal, and I was at first worried that they seemed to be focusing on how bad and tragic it would be if Luna were to be Deaf. But we see that both Link and Schmitt are trying to be there for her, and Jo reveals her stress is about facing these new parenting challenges. Schmitt assures her that she's a great mother and will continue to be so! And then there's the end moment, where Jo gets test results back and gets the great news that Luna doesn't have a tumor or any other underlying illness that might put her life in danger: she just has progressive hearing loss! I think Jo's reaction of delight and relief here really saves this episode from being kinda gross, because yeah, sure, it makes sense that a mom would have a hard time with her daughter losing her hearing, and being nervous about how to handle it. But if everything was all doom and gloom about Luna going Deaf for very much longer, it would have left a bad taste in my mouth. Instead, we see that a lot of Jo's fears were about Luna's overall health, and she's okay and even kind of excited to take on the new challenge of learning ASL and figuring out how to go forward from here. I'm still watching closely and carefully to see how they handle this story, but I think they're doing an okay job so far.

And that's where I'll stop. I'm kind of already sick of Amelia's grieving cycle, and I'm annoyed if this is really how the Kai/Amelia romance ends. But all in all, I was impressed with this episode, and I'm still super worried about what might happen with Bailey from here!

8/10