What if... there were no hairdressers?

I won't be watching tonight's episode of Grey's Anatomy for a while, but based on the ads I can one thing for sure: the greatest change if the doctors had made different decisions in their lives seems to be their hair.  There are some fugly 'dos on tap, and I don't know if I'll be able to focus when I finally do watch the episode as I'll be too distracted.

Don't McDream It's Over

I've been meaning to say something about Patrick Dempsey's departure from Grey's Anatomy, I find it more interesting that they may wind up cashiering all of the original characters.

You can argue whether or not the show would survive without Dempsey (though I think losing Ellen Pompeo, whose character the show is named for, is a bigger problem). But losing just a significant chunk of original characters makes me think of those last, lame years of prime time soaps like Dallas and, even more chilling, the entirely unnecessary last season of Scrubs.

This is a case where a large-scale cast change should either trigger a new series (such as how The Practice begat Boston Legal) or a wrapping up of the show entirely. Shonda Rhimes shows no remorse when killing off characters, and I hope she'll be similarly decisive when it comes time to determine the fate of the entire show.

Annoying

I know I'm several weeks behind Grey's Anatomy and Private Practice due to our DVRing habits, but I did want to mention that I find myself unusually irritated by Amelia Shepherd. I don't know if it's the character, the actress, or an overall annoyance with the combined Grey's universe. I'd say it's 60 percent character (she has an unfortunate combination of brattiness and ego), 10 percent actress (Caterina Scorsone, who I think I've only previously seen in the UPN by way of CBC hockey drama Power Play), and 30 percent the show universe (which seems to favor whinier, needier characters over people I'd rather not see get hit by buses).

It may also be that I'm annoyed with Private Practice in general, as it's given up pretty much any pretense at being a medical drama. I'm pretty sure they only see patients who are lost or looking for a bathroom or something. There is part of me that expects that the show won't end until all the main characters have had sex with each other, which we're about one good sweeps episode away from seeing. Get working, writers!

Cop No Killer

So we finally watched the Grey's Anatomy finale a couple of weeks ago, and for all of the upheaval (for those who don't watch, a gunman was loose in the hospital and shot a number of people, killing many, including two of the new supporting characters) there was one scene that really irritated me.

One of the main characters was trying to sneak out and get blood for her boyfriend when she encountered the shooter. He was planning on killing her (she unplugged his wife from life support), but the gunshot we hear wasn't from his gun, but from a SWAT team member. The shooter takes the bullet to the left shoulder. After which the shooter gets up continues to wander the hospital, shooting at least one more person before taking his own life - seconds before a phalanx of SWAT cops enter the ward where he's holed up (in the room where his wife died, which seems like the first place you'd station someone once you learn the identity of the shooter).

While I'm not an expert on SWAT procedure, it seems kind of odd to me that the cop that shot the gunman didn't advance, either to help protect the doctor or to check the status of the gunman. At the least, he'd radio in a position so his colleagues could move in. But neither seemed to happen.

This just seems careless, either for the writer who stuck it in here to add a little tension or for the director/producer for perhaps not ordering scenes in a way that would make sense. It's kind of a thankless task to expect logical thought from this show - seeing as logical thought would have prevented something like 95% of the romantic entanglements from ever happening - but this once, it wouldn't have hurt.