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+--- Thread: Random TV Thoughts (/showthread.php?tid=9)
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RE: Random TV Thoughts - dug11 - 04-25-2015 02:50 AM
It's kind of crazy that Grey's Anatomy is going into its 12th season. Time flies!!
Also, I fell behind so many years ago, but I would eventually like to catch the entire series at some point in the future. I may be better off just waiting until it ends, at this point.
RE: Random TV Thoughts - Above the Title - 04-25-2015 03:05 AM
Dempsey has been openly saying he wanted to leave. So they built him a storyline in which he gets a job in DC doing a government-funded brain surgery research project with the White House. Perfect. Offscreen. Meredith can talk to him on the phone and relay to the other characters that he's doing well. Maybe he does a cameo in the eventual series finale. But the past three weeks has been hinting very strongly at a tragic end for Derek, which was met last night when he saved four people from a fiery car crash, only to be hit head on by a semi when leaving the scene.
I'm just over it. I left five years ago when the ridiculousness became too much for me and got sucked back in because I wanted to see how they wrote off Cristina (my favorite character). I have nothing to stay for now, that's for sure. Every character that I was emotionally attached to has been killed or marred by tragically bad writing (Bailey). It's just particularly punishing as an audience member. I just don't think it's OK to retaliate against your cast members expressing their desire to leave by punishing them all with a violent death. This is my issue with Shonda. I respect very much her dedication to portraying many demographics, but I think she allows her sets to become hostile work environments and then punishes the people who speak up about it or want to leave because of it. TR Knight was bullied and when he asked to leave because of that, bus. Eric Dane wanted to leave to deal with his personal issues, helicopter. Dempsey wants to leave to race expensive cars, killed by a car crash. Others may disagree, and that's fine, I am just over the tragedy porn aspect of it all. Meredith has now lost her husband, her mother, her friend, her half-sister...it never ends. "ER" was also a long-running medical drama but the showrunners actually believed in provided at least some of the people with happy endings (most notably Doug and Carol).
RE: Random TV Thoughts - dug11 - 04-25-2015 03:15 AM
Was I the only one who was never really a fan of Derek (or Dempsey)? He was always tragically boring, probably the least interesting character on the show. So, of course, for a while he had two far more interesting characters (Meredith and Addison) going after him. But maybe he got better after I stopped watching.
RE: Random TV Thoughts - Above the Title - 04-25-2015 03:42 AM
I wasn't a big fan of him as a character. Eye candy, yes. Character, no. He actually got more douchey this season - which was all part of the plan, I suspect. But that is not what my ire is about.
RE: Random TV Thoughts - NUguy514 - 04-25-2015 07:51 AM
(04-25-2015 03:05 AM)Above the Title Wrote: I'm just over it. I left five years ago when the ridiculousness became too much for me and got sucked back in because I wanted to see how they wrote off Cristina (my favorite character). I have nothing to stay for now, that's for sure. Every character that I was emotionally attached to has been killed or marred by tragically bad writing (Bailey). It's just particularly punishing as an audience member. I just don't think it's OK to retaliate against your cast members expressing their desire to leave by punishing them all with a violent death. This is my issue with Shonda. I respect very much her dedication to portraying many demographics, but I think she allows her sets to become hostile work environments and then punishes the people who speak up about it or want to leave because of it. TR Knight was bullied and when he asked to leave because of that, bus. Eric Dane wanted to leave to deal with his personal issues, helicopter. Dempsey wants to leave to race expensive cars, killed by a car crash. Others may disagree, and that's fine, I am just over the tragedy porn aspect of it all. Meredith has now lost her husband, her mother, her friend, her half-sister...it never ends. "ER" was also a long-running medical drama but the showrunners actually believed in provided at least some of the people with happy endings (most notably Doug and Carol).Preach it, sister! I accidentally spoiled myself when I checked my email on my way home from a lesson and saw The Wrap's messages referring to Derek's death. It's shit like this that makes me unable to view Shonda in a positive light. For all she's done with color-blind casting, integrating interesting LGBT characters into her shows, etc., she is the definition of vindictive.
The whole "Chokegate" incident and (especially) its aftermath really laid bare the type of ship she runs. I don't remember one word in support of TR Knight coming from her mouth. Instead, her loyalties seemed to lie with Isaiah Washington; and when he opened his idiotic mouth and lied at the Golden Globes and put ABC in the position of needing him to go and forcing Shonda to write him out (naturally giving him a happy ending, even though his character is the one who really deserved to die in some catastrophe if we're going to play the moral police game), Shonda took it out on Knight (the real victim in this whole thing) and Heigl through her treatment of George and Izzie. It was appalling to me. The way she dispatched Derek is just more of the same.
To top it all off, the episode was terrible, just legitimately terrible, and lazily written. It started with that bullshit shortcut to the Seattle airport, which is IN THE MIDDLE OF SEATTLE AND MANY, MAAAAAANY MILES FROM ANY MOUNTAIN ROADS WITH NO CELL SERVICE, and just devolved from there.
RE: Random TV Thoughts - dug11 - 04-25-2015 07:59 AM
The way she seemed to handle the T.R. Knight thing did bother me a bit.
RE: Random TV Thoughts - pvdk - 04-25-2015 09:18 AM
Nah I really admire and respect what Shonda is doing in general.
RE: Random TV Thoughts - Above the Title - 04-26-2015 02:50 AM
nuboy, THANK YOU. I was just trying to explain to a friend yesterday that if Shonda was really playing retaliation police, Isaiah Washington's character was the only one that she maybe had legitimate reason to kill off in a fire or a shooting or an Ebola outbreak but...he gets to leave with his life still in tact and then - AND THEN - he actually gets to come back and BE THE HERO in the story of Cristina Yang. This is a man who repeatedly bullied and berated a fellow cast member on the show, put him a chokehold on the set, and then lied about it on camera at the Golden Globes. And he gets to walk away and BE THE HERO while TR Knight gets killed off in a bus accident.
And, yes, the episode was terribly written. Again, she could have just left Derek in DC and have him "on the phone" with Meredith every so often so we know he's OK. But even if we have to kill him, WTF. There are no back roads like that on the way to the Seattle airport. Derek had no ID on him or in the car that the doctors would have been able to find? The idiot trauma surgeon at the hospital would really stay for dinner and dessert at a restaurant after getting a 9-1-1 page? Meredith would not immediately call Amelia (WHO IS A REGULAR CHARACTER ON THE SHOW) to go with her? I think it was supposed some ironic "the only brain surgeon good enough to save Derek would be Derek" thing but when you have had FOUR other lead characters on the show killed in similar ways, it definitely does not have any real kind of emotional heft. Not to mention that they did a fake OMGDerekscheating!!! episode two weeks ago, and an OMGMeredithscheating!!! episode two weeks before that, meaning they had a big make-up scene and had what was definitely a telegraphed last scene together. The anvils of his death have been loud for months, including in this very episode, little Zola saying, "When doctors are late, people die." Not only did the actor deserve more respect and the character of Derek deserve more respect but the audience deserved more respect than that. Uggggggh.
RE: Random TV Thoughts - dug11 - 04-26-2015 03:21 AM
The A.V. Club had an article talking about this subject, if you wanted to read it. It has spoilers for both Grey's Anatomy and Scandal. I think it raises some good points, especially in how the deaths on Grey's Anatomy typically don't have much lasting impact on the characters/storytelling.
RE: Random TV Thoughts - misplaced validity - 04-26-2015 07:01 AM
I've watched the latest Inside Amy Schumer 3 times. It's one of the best episodes of comedic television I've seen. Every segment was funny, but also subversive in the political points being made. Loved it.