Mommy Dearest

After a little checking, I realized that this is my first summary of this show since 5/21/2007, when I summarized the 3rd season finale.

Now this is my Grey's.

Eric Stoltz Serial Killer and Kid Who Needs Organs playing off each other — and more importantly, playing the doctors off each other — perfectly. Ponytail humor. Interesting secondary medical cases that also illuminate the human condition. Tyne Daly guest starring as Derek's mom.

Yes.

Okay, so it wasn't perfect. So Denny was still lingering, and the annoying blond pediatric doctor was still annoying, and Lexie and Mark were still hooking up. But if you ignore those little lingering problems, things went great. So that's what we're going to do. We're going to ignore those things today and focus on the good stuff, because the good was so good, and my complaints about the aforementioned have been aforementioned to death.

So onto the greatness. Bailey's prized kid patient, Jackson, needed a liver and intestines so badly that she was obsessing about it in the middle of the night, even paging the Blond Doctor Who Shall Not Be Named to chat about it. Eric Stoltz was pondering the fact that his execution would be in five days, and he'd rather die in the hospital. We could see where this was going.

Everyone else, however, was quite focused on the impending arrival of Derek's mom. So was I, honestly — I've been convinced since last week's teaser scenes that Tyne Daly would fix everything. And I was correct. If I were acknowledging Lexie and Sloan's right to exist, I'd mention that even they were talking about her coming visit as they also discussed Lexie's insanely young age of 24 in a post-coital chat. And if I were recognizing Denny, I'd say that he was right there with Izzie when she told Meredith she shouldn't wear her hair all down and regular and Meredith-y if she wanted to impress Derek's mom. Cut to Meredith with a teenybopper hairdo, complete with pink awful-scrunchie-thing. And Derek walking in to say, ''You're wearing an alarmingly high ponytail.'' And me, celebrating the return of Grey's.

Of course with the fun comes the drama — and the gore. As in, dude who went to Hong Kong to get his legs surgically lengthened came in with some seriously mashed up calves. ''They said it'd give me a whole 2 inches,'' he explained. (He even made me really, really feel for guys for a moment. Sure, they look ridiculously sexy with gray hair, wrinkles suit them just fine — see Dr. Hunt here for prime example — and they rarely have to wax or tweeze a thing. But I felt it.) Bailey, meanwhile, was gamely setting up the impending departure of Melissa George's Sadie, reading her the riot act for being a teeny bit encouraging to Jackson's mother about his chances of getting a transplant. Bailey even went so far as to call her ''squirrelly.'' Seriously. A little much.

Eric Stoltz continued to be riveting as the serial killer whom we can never really get a read on. Is he repentant? Did he really do what he says he did? What does he want, anyway? He told Meredith a story that may or may not have been true about being beaten as a kid and learning to read on the detergent bottles while he hid under the sink. Right about then his gurney crossed paths with Jackson's, amping up the tension even more. Would he tell the kid about his heinous crimes when the kid asked? No. Would he say something else horrible? No. But when Jackson said he needed organs, he did say, ''Want mine?''

Then we were back to the lighter side as we ignored Denny saying that not having to meet the family was one of the perks of dating a dead guy, and as we cheered when Hunt awkwardly asked Cristina out in the middle of the work day, then scampered off. ''I think you and the pig murderer make a really good couple,'' Izzie gushed to Cristina at lunch afterwards. And then I officially decided to break my earlier rule and full-out acknowledge Lexie and Mark's coupling. Because I must admit, it got pretty good in the cafeteria. She laid down the law, telling him, ''You sleep with me, you lunch with me.'' Which caused all the other interns to enthusiastically join them, thrilled that he was letting his underlings join him for a meal, and squealing things like, ''They have tater tots!'' He freaked so much that he not only fled the scene, he immediately went and confessed his affair to Tyne Daly. ''Which one is she?'' Mama Shepherd asked. ''The one with the juice box,'' he answered. She then tracked Lexie down later in the hallway for a mom-tacular confrontation in which she asked her if she was ''a good girl.'' ''How many sexual partners have you had?'' (The answer: ''Six. Seven. Kinda six. Kinda seven.'' BTW, I was once informed by several guy friends that seven is the perfect number, if you're ever going to tell a guy a number. Just a tip.) ''Criminal record?'' (Answer: Speeding ticket, ''12 miles over.'' As Tyne said, ''That's fast.'') And just like that, I joined team Mark-and-Lexie. For now, anyway.

As for our other couples, Cristina and Owen (we're going to try his first name now that there's real live dating going on, because I don't like calling the girls by first names and guys by last names — gender parity, y'all) plunged into further awkwardness when she tried out one of Izzie's dating tips on him. All wrong, of course: ''I finished your post-ops,'' she told him. Then stared at him in silence. Then added, ''So, what was your best surgery ever?'' Then he didn't answer. Back in the serial killer room, Eric Stoltz was unconscious and Meredith was refusing to sign the consent form — the one that needs two doctors' signatures to operate when the patient is out — for Derek, which could not bode well. Cristina stepped in and signed, and thus got to scrub in on his surgery instead. Just before the surgery, Cristina and Meredith ran into each other and seemed to strike the closest they could get to a truce. ''That ponytail looks ridiculous,'' Cristina told Meredith, and Meredith took her hair down. This, friends, is why we love Grey's.

We also love it for the following reasons: Mrs. Shepherd gave Mark a good talking to and making, I'll once again admit, a good case for him trying things with Lexie. Short Guy's brother laid into him for using his shortness as an excuse for everything: ''No one knows how short you are except for you, dude.'' Mrs. Shepherd gave Major Hunt unsolicited advice about taking Valerian Root to sleep. Basically, a lot of Mrs. Shepherd.

Oh, and I just realized Patrick Dempsey is finally getting to act! (That is, act something other than sappy and sorry for Meredith.) That's why he suddenly got a sad backstory about his dad being shot by robbers! So he could get material worthy of an Emmy reel! ''There's no way in hell I'm gonna let you die in this hospital,'' he growled to Eric Stoltz, setting up the conflict sure to ensue next week since we learned Jackson's first set of donated organs wasn't working. Thanks to the prisoner, Meredith also got to confess her emo tendencies to Mama Shepherd. ''I'm dark and cloudy,'' she told her, ''because I'm the type of person who feels bad for serial killers.'' Mom seemed to walk off in a snit of disappointment, but — ah, there it was — she told Derek later that she knew Meredith was the one for him. Awww. Of course, Meredith also hinted strongly to Eric Stoltz that if he bumped his head post-surgery it'd probably kill him, and then we had to actually see him repeatedly bang his bandaged head against the back of his bed, but, well, that's a mess to be sorted out next week, too.

The better news: Izzie broke up with the person we're no longer acknowledging! Because he's dead! And Alex wanted Izzie to meet his mom! And PLEASE TELL ME DENNY IS NOT THERE WHY DO I STILL SEE DENNY IF ALEX STARTS TALKING TO HIM NOW I AM DONE. Okay, Alex didn't talk to him. But really. Let's wrap it up now.

And best yet: Owen showed up to Cristina's for their date hours late and drunk. Okay, that's not really the good part. The good part starts with the fact that he brought her flowers and wore a suit. The good part continued with Cristina telling him he needed a shower. So, of course, he headed right for hers, fully clothed. And he stood there, under the water stream, and he told her about his best surgery, something about a guy he saved who then later killed himself. It sounds sort of ridiculous, but in the hands of these two, it was masterful, riveting. And it's worth noting that Hunt is also a wonderfully nuanced depiction of a veteran. No annoying flag-waving and histrionic heroics, just a guy who somehow survived an unbelievable job, and was destroyed by it in some ways, but is still muddling through back in real life now, and still needs love. Anyway, then she stepped into the shower with him, also fully clothed.

And, wow, that was good.

Spoilers Time!

Lost:

1. The finale is nuts. There is at least one death and also that big "game changer." That one death is a huge shocker and will require lots of kleenex.

2. The format of the show is completely changing thanks to the events in tomorrow's sure-to-be-awesome finale.

3. Three main actors might not be in every episode next season.

Grey's Anatomy:

1. Isaiah Washington has been taking meetings in New York and Los Angeles in search of a new job that would take place during the coming TV season, so it certainly appears that Isaiah's Grey's days are over. Insiders at ABC say that "not everyone will be coming back" to Grey's this fall, and although T.R. Knight's fate was also left hanging in the balance after the season finale, it seems like he will be back. However, Isaiah looks to be a goner. It kind of makes that scene of Cristina ripping the shackle off her neck while sobbing "I'm free" and the Chief's lecture to Burke that he's "disappointed" in him this year all the more poignant.

Heroes:

1. Both Milo Ventimiglia (Peter) and Adrian Pasdar (Nathan) are series regulars next season. The question regarding Peter is not, did he survive? It's, can he swim?

2. Hiro will starts next season in 17th-century Japan in the midst of a war, and it takes him about 6 episodes to get back to present-day NYC. And by the way, those last few minutes of tonight's finale are the first few minutes of season two's premiere.

3. Next season begins four months into the future, and two of the main characters are in deep despair—one having completely lost his memory and the other having developed a major drinking problem.

Nip/Tuck:

1. Not only are Christian and Sean dipping their toes into showbiz, the entire series is diving into the world of Hollyweird. There will be a new major recurring character who plays a hit TV show runner (like Damon Lindelof or Tim Kring)! They're also bringing in a powerful studio exec, who lives a bit of an alternative lifestyle on the down low.

Back to Form

So Thursday's Grey's Anatomy season finale bought the show back to form after a few missteps the past few episodes. Nearly all the characters ended up practically miserable when the fadeout came. Really, except for Addison — who, glowing like a woman set to stride off to her own whole new show, sweetly shot down glum Karev's romantic advances at the end of the evening — no character came out on top as the series closed up for the summer. And that made for a great finale.

A lot happened. There was a variety of good scenes. One thing's for sure: Cristina and Burke saved a helluva date for their wedding. It coincided with picking-the-new-chief day. And getting-the-results-of-the-intern-exam day. And even meeting-a-few-of-the-new-interns day. So much was going on last night that when aliens come to earth a few years from now, they will turn on Lifetime one Wednesday afternoon and know, just from all the plots and climaxes piling up, that they're watching no normal episode of Grey's Anatomy — this, earthlings, was a 75-minute mega-finale.

Let's start with Mere and Dere. The first big scene of the evening witnessed Meredith sidling up to Derek (''I'm me again''), with a bristling Derek then bragging to Mere that he ''met a woman'' last night. ''So I should I be worried or something?'' Meredith said, kind of nonplussed. And Derek said she shouldn't worry about the woman; she should worry that flirting with her was the highlight of his week. Oh, come on, dude! Let's skip past the fact that the woman who Derek flirted with last week was Lexie, Meredith's half-sister and (as we discovered in the last moments of last night) a season-4 Seattle Grace intern.

Focus, for now, just on Derek's feeble attempt to make Meredith jealous. That's not a guy move. I was ashamed of and embarrassed for him. Meredith, brilliantly, called Derek out on it later, when they were powwowing briefly in their formal wear before heading out to Cristina and Burke's wedding. ''If you want to break up with me so you can see other women, just do it,'' she said, all tough. Just say, she advised, ''Meredith, I don't love you anymore.'' Exactly right. I dig this brassy broad.

You figured she had him, but give it up for Derek and his reply. ''Meredith, I do love you,'' droopy-lidded Hangdog said. ''You're the love of my life. I can't leave you. But you're constantly leaving me. You walk away when you want, you come back when you want....So I'm asking you, if you don't see a future for us, if you're not in this, please, please just end it, because I can't. I'm in it. Put me out of my misery.''

So much longing! This is the show at its best. Easily, it was the highlight of the finale. Three whole seasons in, I still love watching these two flailing hot people — he soft, she hard — trade well-turned TV wooing dialogue. It still works; it's still romantic. Now, unfortunately, there's a flip side to that, something not at all romantic is exactly what happened next.

Meredith didn't say a gussied-up version of ''I'm in it, too,'' as she should've. Instead, she didn't say anything except that it was time to go to the wedding. And there was Derek, hanging. Last night, where was it coming from that she was having her doubts about him? I mean, trying to scare her by bragging about the girl he chatted up in the bar was unsmooth, but it wasn't a capital crime. As much as I like their goo-goo courtship scenes together, and as hard as it might be to make compelling television out of it, the time is now for these two to be happy together for a long while.

Anyway, everywhere you looked last night, there were unhappy females. Ava's husband showed up to take her away, but the facially reconstructed cutie made a heartfelt play for Alex. (''You named me Ava, and I was more me as Ava than I'll ever be as Rebecca!'') Karev, however, played noble and stoic and turned her down, at least until, sitting in a pew a few scenes later at the wedding, Addison made him see that he likes Ava more than he likes her. (We left Karev for the season running after Ava, but she had already packed up at the hospital and gone.) Karev was well matched with Izzie earlier this season — why can't those two get together? — but Izzie's still improbably stuck on George, and last night Katherine Heigl did well with yet another Izzie speech. ''If what you want is to be with Callie, then I will do everything in my power to support you and help you make your marriage work,'' Izzie told George. ''Because I'm your best friend and because I love you. I also have to say that I'm in love with you.''

George himself didn't say much because he'd just decided that afternoon to try and have a baby with Callie (who asked him for one in a ditzy speech of stammerings and repeated words that made it seem — don't you think? — as if Sara Ramirez were channeling Chandra Wilson at her most excitable). He also didn't say much at the end of the episode because he was shocked to discover that (uh-oh) he was the one intern who failed the exam. That led to an excellent scene outside the hospital where Bailey — love ya, Bailey! — told him he either had to repeat his internship or leave the hospital, right before she put her meaningful hand on his arm. Bailey, meanwhile, was in a blue mood because she was passed up for chief resident; Calliope Torres'' got the gig.

And that made no sense. How does Callie beat Bailey in the race for anything? It got me trying to outthink the show midway through. Sprinkled throughout the night were scenes of the Chief turning down candidates for his job — first Mark, then Addison, then Burke. When Burke got rejected, I thought, ''They won't give it to Derek. That's too predictable. They'll give it to Dr. Hahn, that dragon lady from the other hospital.'' Then, when Callie got the chief-resident gig, I switched that up. ''They'll give chief of surgery to Bailey!'' I thought. ''Huge surprise, and a promising sign that we'll see more of the underused Chandra Wilson in season 4.'' But in the very end, the Chief offered the chiefship to...okay, we'll get to that in a second.

First we gotta talk about Cristina and Burke and the wedding. Let's be quick about it. Cristina put on the dress. She even put on the choker. And she got her eyebrows shaved or plucked out or whatever. (Did I miss something? Ladies, people do that?) Meanwhile, Burke recited his vows for the woman surgeons in the OR, and it was yet more proof that Isaiah Washington gets to deliver the best speeches on this show after Ellen Pompeo and Patrick Dempsey. (''I am not optimistic. I am not hopeful. I am sure. I am steady.'') But at the chapel, pre-march, Cristina freaked out because she had accidentally washed off the vows written on her hand, and the lag time spent talking her down was enough to convince Burke that she didn't want to get married. So after another big speech from him to her in the entrance to the chapel, he dumped her! No kidding. And I wonder if, when the writers wrote the scene, they realized how good Sandra Oh was going to be at pleading with Burke; it seems to me no real groom who'd written vows as loving as Burke's would give up on his bride in that moment, especially if she could do that worried tick-tocking thing with her eyeballs that helped make Oh's performance here so affecting.

Perhaps that was the one big problem with this gloomy but otherwise surprising and eventful season finale: One of these long-suffering couples should've ridden off into, if not the sunset, then at least the summer. (Adele and the Chief, reunited after her miscarriage, don't count.) Even after Burke ran out on Cristina, I thought that Mere and Dere might've been headed toward bliss, but again I was wrong. Post-Burke-breakup, when Meredith walked into the chapel and we followed her every step down the aisle, presumably to announce that the wedding was off, I thought to myself, ''A wedding is not off. She's gonna get up there and marry the best man!'' Instead, she took the floor and, barely looking at Derek, said, ''It's over. It's so over.'' And it was clear somehow that she was talking about her and Hangdog. Double wipeout.

All that was left was to find out who the new chief of surgery was. And, it turned out, Derek did get the offer, but we watched him, in a flashback, turn it down and tell the Chief that he (that is, the Chief) should keep being the Chief. There was O. Henry irony in this that seemed strangely undercooked: We intuited, based on things he'd said a couple of episodes ago, that Derek was turning down the job so he could keep his girl, the one who'd go on to pull away from him at the wedding, but the show didn't play up the tragedy of that as much as it could have. To make up for it, Sandra Oh had an amazing breakdown on screen in her last scene, as Cristina got home and realized Burke had taken his trumpet, vinyls, and picture of Grandma and moved out. ''I'm free!'' she cried, before she started yanking off her dress and freaking out with such amazing fury that it became impossible to know quite what Cristina meant by that line. The ambivalence of it was electrifying and it's the single best thing to mull over while you're waiting for the show to come back again for season 4.

Show Summaries

Here are recaps of the shows I would have covered over the past week that I did not get a chance to do:

Ugly Betty: Our heroine tracks down her grandmother in Mexico and learns valuable lessons about fighting for love. Plus, Marc stands up for Amanda. I Really love how the Ignacious/immigration storyline played out now. It was boring but now I'm into it. The episode rocked as usual. Best lines:

1. Marc, to Amanda, after she broke their date: "Don't tell me you forgot we were gonna rent 300 and enjoy the mildly homophobic-slash-homoerotic content!"

2. Justin, complaining about the bad timing of the trip to Mexico: "Doesn't anyone care that I am understudying the lead in West Side Story? God forbid Joey Colano takes ill and I don't know my finger snaps for the rumble."

3. Willy, worrying about getting wrinkles from smiling: "You really can't see those lines can you?" Marc: "Nope. You're as dead on the outside as you are on the inside."

Grey's Anatomy: Meredith refuses to answer anything on the big intern exam. Plus, the Chief's wife is pregnant, and George gets a job offer. Good, but not great. I fear my favorite show is slipping??? I think today's season finale will reverse that.

Desperate Housewives: Susan and Gaby battle over the same day for their weddings. Plus, Edie manipulates Carlos, and Lynette gets some bad news. The show is starting to improve and I have even higher hopes for the season finale. I thought Mike's proposal was cute but predictable. I'm excited for Marcia Cross' return on Sunday. Who thinks Bree is pregnant?

Entourage: They are back to form! After the Amanda debacle, things are looking up. Johnny gets a hit show after getting depressed by the bad reviews. Plus Vince and E give Ari one more chance, and Turtle meets a girl! The ep rocked and I'm anxious to see how the Medellin movie will turn out after the risk Vince and E took in buying the script.

Dancing With the Stars: Awesome episode! Everyone really danced great. My favorite Laila did awesome and was so sexy. I also enjoyed Apolo's dance and thought it was very sexy. I felt bad that Ian had to go after scoring his first perfect score, but after the couples left, he and Cheryl were the weakest. Go Laila!

Heroes: The next to last episode ruled! Deep breathe, here we go. Hiro learned samurai skills from his father (although strange he did so fast) just as the good guys join forces against Linderman and Sylar. Nathan told DL and Jessica where to find Linderman. Once there, Linderman shot DL but DL managed to kill him by sticking his hand into his head, ew. Niki finally made a comeback. Proving my theory wrong, Micah's role was to fix the election so Nathan could win by a landslide. Also, HRG showed his badass side, killing Thompson. Will he kill little Molly too or use her to find Sylar. Speaking of Sylar, he got hotter...uh more powerful...by munching on Ted's brains and stealing his power. Claire and Peter are right on his tail. Next week, it looks like it will be one hell of a showdown of hotties with Peter vs Sylar. I can't wait.

American Idol: So I tuned in on Tuesday night expecting Jordin to rule the house. However, she was saddled by two crappy songs chosen by Simon and the producers. She picked things up with a replay of "I Who Have Nothing." Blake also struggled with the choices made for him. However, Melinda nailed it with 3 perfect songs, of course. It was obvious she was safe, or was she...we'll talk about that in a bit.

Veronica Mars: It's obvious I'm no longer digging this once glorious show. The network has completely killed it! First they changed the format and took away the mysteries, leaving only a mysetry an episode. Things are looking like the show will be cancelled and to be honest, I'd rather have it cancelled than continue in this sad state. So very, very sad. This show ruled.

Spoilers Time!

Dirt:

1. The show has been renewed for another season! It will be back in early 2008.

Grey's Anatomy:

1. You know that girl we saw in last week's previews, making googly eyes at McDreamy? Well, she is played by former Reunion star, Chyler Leigh and has been offered a multiple-episode arc for next season. I love her, and it seems she may be sinking her slutty little paws into Mer’s man.

2. The intern's first year will finally come to an end with the intern exam, a chief will be named, Christina and Burke will make it to the church, Meredith and Derek will face an uncertain future, and the triangle that is Callie, Izzie and George will become more complex. Plus there will be surgeries and sex. Lots of surgeries and sex.

Lost:

1. The game-changer involves Jack and someone else.

2. A fan favorite will sacrifice himself for the good of the rest of the Losties.

3. This week ww will earn who really is in charge of the Others and more about Jacob.

4. Some mysteries will be resolved by the end of the season: what was up with the guys in the arctic, Walt's ability to rejuvenate animals, the "magic box" idea. They also said that Patchy's resurrection will be explained within the next couple of weeks. The smoke monster will not be explained until the end of the series.

Desperate Housewives:

1. In the season finale, Susan and Mike are set to wed in the forest and it seems that Susan lured Mike there without him knowing they would get married. When Gaby rethinks marrying Victor, Milton (his father) convinces her to give his son another chance. Soon after she does, Gaby learns that Victor marrying her may all have been to do better in polls (married man seen with a Latina wife.)

Heroes:

1. The May 21 season capper will set up two big ideas for the second volume of Heroes, to be titled "Generations." The new saga will focus on putting the Heroes mythology in a grand historical context of superpowered family dynasties. It focuses on heritage, the family line, and the source of the powers. That means the "older" generation of heroes — including George Takei's Papa Nakamura and especially Cristine Rose's Mama Petrelli — should expect more screen time.

2. Instead of just a cheerleader or a city, "Volume 2: Generations" will concern a plot to save the entire planet. Also, Suresh will learn crucial info about his Indian past and his dead (or is she?) sister in the finale that helps set up next season.

Spin Off Doctors

While watching last night's two-hour Grey's Anatomy, I found myself enjoying the scenes introducing Addison's spinoff more than the regular storylines, which seemed a bit repetitive. Three-fourths of the episode was devoted to Kate Walsh as Addison, who went down to Santa Monica on a leave of absence to visit old friends and meet her new costars. It started out a bit cheesy, with the very first scene edited in '80s-music-video style so that Addison was shifting the gears of her lipstick-red convertible to the beat of the New Wave-y soundtrack as she drove along the ocean. Thinks picked up right away when she rolled up to the Oceanside Wellness Group, the swank-hippie New Age medicine hut where, before too long, she'll presumably be hanging her shingle.

The characters look older than the cast of Grey's and they're hornier too. So far it's a funky combo. The place is run by Sam (Taye Diggs), a health guru who just divorced Addison's med-school classmate Naomi (Merrin Dungey). In an early scene, regarding his and Addison's divorces, Sam actually used the line "Smelt it, dealt it" to support some point he was making, and Addison replied, "You're using fart logic?" That almost ruined it but it was just a blip. Also, both of the Oceanside medical cases this evening were about sex: One was about a guy who didn't want to sleep with his wife ("No wood?" Sam asked sensitively); the other was about a surrogate mom who had sex with three guys. Sex, sex, sex, dirty, dirty, dirty.

While this new setting isn't yet at Seattle Grace, status, it shows great potential. It does seem a bit more frothier, brighter, and sometimes funnier. I never knew Kate Walsh could be funny. She was also affecting when Addison found out she can't have kids. In the elevator on her first trip into the Oceanside building, Addison started babbling to a doc (played by Tim Daly) about how it's nice, for once, to be in an "unhorny" elevator. It was hilarious because of how "out there" it was. There was also that bit where the lady doctors — including Amy Brenneman as the in-house shrink — ogled the shirtless desk clerk while his right pec pumped in time with his strokes as he waxed his surfboard in the lobby. That was funny and kind of hot.

Now over to Seattle Grace. Okay, there's Bailey. As always, there's Bailey. As underutilized as ever, she essentially had one scene. And it was good. Mopey O'Malley was eating his own organs up over Izzie again this week, and at the clinic he came right out and asked Bailey if she ever had any doubts about her marriage. She ran away from him fast. Then Burke, deep into planning his own wedding with the uncooperative Cristina, came in a scene or two later and asked Bailey a marriage question of his own. So she called O'Malley over, worked up a head of steam, and told the boys, Bailey-style, to talk to each other, "and leave my marriage out of it!"

Chandra Wilson is — I think it's safe to call it now, two eps from the finale — season 3's MVP. Her version of "God Bless the Child" from last fall is one of the season's top moments, and throughout the year she's reliably delivered. Unfortunately, Bailey has dropped out of the picture for much of the second half of the season, but Wilson's managed to steal most of the few scenes she's still in. (Standing among her castmates as the pants went down last week, her reaction shot to Grapefruit Testicles' displayed goods was the keeper of the pack.) Last night's freak-out at O'Malley and Burke wasn't a classic Bailey bit, and it wouldn't be worth singling out like this except that it was, like, the only good moment in the Grey's part of the whole two-hour epic.

Maybe I exaggerate. Some of the other scenes at Seattle Grace hit par. Izzie and George kissed some more in the elevator, and — to all of America's shock, I'm sure — Callie didn't catch them in the act when the doors opened. (She was right there, of course, when the doors opened, but George had pulled himself off Izzie by then.) Meredith, meanwhile, tossed off a few well-turned lines to Derek at the beginning of the episode about how he shouldn't give up on her because she wants to let him in. He smiled, she smiled. Then her stepmom got the hiccups and died. Meredith had to tell her dad, whom she'd been bonding with all night, and Jeff Perry, who plays Thatcher, did some of the most realistic breaking down I've ever seen on TV, at least until he slapped Meredith. ("I trusted you!) What an ass.

That's my take. I'm just wondering if Burke and Cristina will really be together forever and make it down the aisle. I also want Callie to find out about George and Izzie next week, or at least realize she already know because I think she is in denial about ti. Or do we have to wait until the season finale for that?

A Perfect Day for Penisfish

Since I did not watch Grey's Anatomy and it is sitting on my TiVo, I borrowed this from EW. Judging by the title, it looks very interesting.

by Gregory Kirschling


The voice-mail arrived in my voice-mailbox at 9:09 p.m. EDT last night.

''Hi, Greg! It's Mom. I know you're watching Grey's Anatomy. So am I. The guy with the grapefruit testicles has epididymitis. Just thought you'd like to be the first to know!''

Wrong, Ma, wrong. Why, if you are Shonda Rhimes, would you give Grapefruit Testicles epididymitis (whatever that is, meh) when you could ratchet up the wow factor and give him penisfish? He had ''penisfish.'' I think this was my favorite wacky medical case of all three Grey's seasons. Can't stop marveling at it. Grapefruit Testicles — who was actually chairman of the board of Seattle Grace, and thus the guy who gets to pick the new chief or surgery — checked in with testicles the size of grapefruits.

A big reveal of sorts followed, and it was scarring. We were treated, just before the opening titles, to a shot of Grapefruit Testicles dropping trou for the docs, with the camera planted upward between his legs. At the very top of the frame, just for an instant, we glimpsed a splotchy, mangled, beehive-y giant boysenberry that could only be a pair of diseased supertesticles! Disgusting! I had to play my DVR back a half dozen times — which, I assure you, I did only for research purposes for this column — before I realized that that globby pustule at the top of my screen was just the bottom of Grapefruit Testicles' scruffy head, and not his actual grapefruit testicles. But I think by that point the damage was done.

Thanks to that fake-out alone, none of us will ever micturate straight into the Amazon for the rest of our lives. A penisfish, it turns out, is an actual fish called a candirú that swims upstream — that is, up the stream of one's urine — and lodges in your urethra. We saw one at the end of the episode, when the docs pulled out the big fella from inside Grapefruit Testicles: It was as fat as a night crawler. Yuck. Naturally — and this was where the Grey's writers earned their big money — the penisfish was George.

Let's hear it from lovelorn Izzie.

''You're my penisfish,'' she told George at the end of the night in what, we can only hope, was also the launching of the next great American catchphrase. ''You've crawled in and latched on, and now I can't move or talk or think or even pee without the nagging feeling that something is eating through my organs.''

So Izzie is in love. George is eating through her organs. I still don't completely buy it, even though every other medical case tonight — the guy with the stuffy nose turned brain drip, Grapefruit Testicles' mistress — also had metaphorical moments meant to show us that these two belong together. Subtle, it wasn't. But overall the week was an entertaining reprieve from last weeks' episode, which I found fundamentally botched because it dared to bring back Izzie's lost kid, who should've stayed ghostly and lost, at least until the girl turned up in season 8 as a smoking-hot 19-year-old medical prodigy. I'm all for the focus on Izzie this season, but in last week's episode we once again witnessed Izzie getting blown up too big, and she finally popped like a balloon. A little less drama for this baby mama! Appropriately, the writers took it down several notches this week (''eating my organs'' speeches aside), and Izzie was effective again. You were so worried she was gonna say something stupid in that fine scene in the elevator where Callie demanded she give her her husband back, but Izzie kept it zipped. And that scene at the end over wedding cake when Izzie confessed that she slept with George to Burke — because Burke's ''a vault'' — was affectingly played by Heigl, who's still an excellent actress. That said, two questions: (1) What was up with Izzie's League of Their Own hairdo this week? And (2) where'd her kid go? A one-episode arc is all the little baldy is good for for now?

Elsewhere on Grey's, I saw a little more clearly why so many of you hate Meredith. For one thing, she compared Addison (or the Addison who came to Seattle to win back Derek, anyway) to a penisfish. For one more — well, that might be it. It's not nice to compare Addison to a penisfish, but otherwise Meredith remains all right by me. I don't hate her for walking away from Derek for a while, then sidling back up to him this episode. But now I do hate this new development where he's second-guessing the relationship because supposedly it hurts his chances to be Chief. I wanted to be moved at the end of tonight, when Derek professed that he's not sure about Meredith anymore because she didn't fight and swim when she fell in the drink back in those stupid ferry episodes, but the way it was set up was all wrong. Given the Chief stuff, Derek didn't seem to be baring his soul when he wondered about her will to live; he just seemed to be lying. It played as if he were making up another reason to toss her out, one that sounded heavier and less asinine than ''I just wanna be Chief, and it ain't gonna happen with you around.'' Guys like Derek lie all the time during a breakup, but it isn't the stuff of great drama.

Meanwhile, Addison ended the night with one foot out the door, didn't she? And we didn't necessarily see that coming. Midway through the night, she couldn't resist sensitive Karev's warm-bath bedside manner with Ava the amnesiac any longer, so she pushed him off into the sex room, and that was that. They finally hooked up. Her deal with Sloan was off, those two were done, but then Karev at the end of the night played super hard to get — is he in love with Ava (who cleans up nicely, I admit) or just playing tough with his boss? — and so Addison walked out of Seattle Grace alone and presumably (based on the clips from next week's show) straight onto the set of her spin-off. After their season-long flirtation, will it be cold, hard Karev who sends Addison off to another show?

And will that show be called Mercy West? That's a good title. It's also the name of the hospital that George announced he was transferring to at the end of the night, to get away from Izzie. But we all know he isn't going anywhere.

Spoilers Time!

Grey's Anatomy:

1. Studio insiders say the first hour of Private Practice’s pilot (which airs as a Grey’s episode in May) is close to completion and is so "fearlessly good" it’s the most likely of all ABC pilots to receive a pickup.

2. Regarding George and Izzie, their secret will stay hidden from Callie for at least a few more weeks, though she knows something's not right.

3. Cristina and Burke really are going to make it to the altar in the season finale, and the wedding will be everything Cristina did not want, including the big dress, having bridesmaids, and writing her own vows.

4. In a few weeks, the interns will take the biggest test of their careers, their first-year medical exams

Heroes:

1. Mastermind Tim Kring says that for season two, "There are plans to add one new, one big character next season." The character is female—to even out the gender ranks a wee bit. Tim also said that those Heroes who remain are likely to stick around, 'cause he's changed his m.o. "I thought Heroes was going to have an ever-shifting cast," he says, "but the cast hit in such big ways that now the challenge is to figure out how to use them all and still fold in a couple of new people, because I still think that the origin stories are the most fascinating, in some ways."

2. Regarding Nathan becoming president, sources are saying that visions from the future are not always as they seem.

3. Thrown five years in the future, Hiro and Ando discover that people with extraordinary abilities are not only widely known about -- after the destruction of New York City and the deaths of millions -- but are being registered, imprisoned, hunted and even killed as "terrorists." As the President takes his first step towards a "final solution," the pair get swept up in what could be the "Heroes" final battle and encounter a range of new and darkly familiar faces.

Lost:

1. There's a lot going on as far as that mysterious visitor from last week. She is a major twist to the plot. Supposedly, there will be a shocking moment when she tells Hurley the fate of the real (wtf?!) Oceanic Flight 815.

2. We'll definitely see more of Sawyer and Sayid working together. Plus, sounds like Penny's dad, Charles Widmore, may be seen again.

3. There will be a showdown in the season finale. Yhe beach occupants divide into two camps: one run by Jack and the other Sawyer or Locke. It seems that Jack will definately be facing off against one of them. The survivors will also have another showdown with the Others and the origins of the Dharma Initiative will be explained.

Desperate Housewives:

1. Susan will marry Mike, and Gaby is rushing into a big wedding extravaganza with just-elected mayor Victor. But all, unfortunately, is not well on Wisteria Lane: Lynette (and not Susan as previously believed) finds out she has cancer and Mike's shady brother Terry moves in, which opens the door to a new mystery to solve in 2007-08. Bree fans will be happy to know that the hostess extraordinaire will be back for the season finale on May 20.

2. It seems that Ms. McClusky came home from vacation and found her husband dead on the couch. Since it was 2am, she decided to wait until morning. However, when she looked through his desk, she found that she was not named beneficiary of his estate, but his first wife. So instead, she stuffed him in the freezer so that she can keep the money.

What Goes Around, Comes Around

Last night, the docs of Seattle Grace played a little game of musical chairs — Meredith officially relinquished her position as resident drama queen to Izzie; George picked up Derek's slack as the show's emotionally unavailable husband; and McDreamy became our career-obsessed narcissist du jour as we greeted a newly soft (and manicured) Cristina.

In the words of Justin Timberlake, what goes around, comes around — starting with Izzie's long-lost daughter, brought to Seattle Grace under the guise of that old ER standby, youth leukemia. True, birth mothers give up all rights to a child when they put them up for adoption, but was I the only one who thought Hannah's parents treated Izzie like dirt, guilting her into saying the kid had cancer because of Izzie's genes, then demanding marrow and denying her a chance to meet the girl to whom she gave life?

Over at the coziest house ever, Meredith's mother issues once more took center stage. Since our skinny heroine clearly doesn't eat, Susan's weekly grocery deliveries went unappreciated and pushed Meredith to the breaking point. Susan's whole interaction with her stepdaughter seemed so underhanded. She didn't want much to do with her while Ellis was alive, and admittedly kept Thatcher away from his daughter in order to enjoy marriage without any added complication. Yet now that Ellis is dead, she tried to fill the "mommy" role? Meredith's abrupt dismissal could be deemed rude, but I think she's finally moving past that whole "dark and twisty, I can't swim, pick-me-choose-me-love me" stage and becoming confident, independent, and self-sufficient.

Good timing, too, because tonight marked the series debut of the new McDreamy, a cold-hearted, career-obsessed version of his former self. Ladies and gents, I give you a brand new hurdle for the would-be Mr. and Mrs. McDreamy, as Derek decided that the real reason he'd come to Seattle was not to escape his troubled marriage and start afresh, as he'd been preaching all along. Nope, he really came west because the Chief promised him that he would one day run the ship. Derek became a total drama queen and became an angry, yelling jerk who put his career above the girlfriend he supposedly loved. Well, I guess it can't be happiness all the time.

Meanwhile, it seems old Cristina's gone and that might not be such a bad thing. Tonight, she finally made it clear to Burke and Colin Marlowe that she loved Preston, he was the best damn cardio surgeon in this room, and that coral, was, like, perfect for a spring wedding. The scenes between the three of them were funny, but I was glad to see Cristina become serious, swallow a little pride, and ask Burke for an answer to a medical question she already knew. It proved she was finally willing to put him first (a trend which began when she endangered her own status to become his surgical aide) and that at long last, she realized her ego wasn't more important than her love for Burke — in sharp contrast to petulant Derek's refusal to answer Meredith's call.

In a bar and a hospital bathroom, two doctors became unlikely mother hens. Bailey acted as a surrogate mom to Izzie (anyone else well up a bit during the latter's powder-room confession?), while Sloane decided to get the Chief back in on the market. Interesting parallel between the navigation required in the dating and surgical games, as Sloane took Richard out to a bar in hopes of getting the boss some action (and, in classic McSteamy fashion, thereby advancing his own campaign for the top job.) It was cute to see Mark and Addison band together and keep an eye on Mr. "It's Lonely at the Top."

Yet the show's two ball-busters, Addison and Callie, barely registered tonight. Instead, we got a drawn-out routine between sinful friends George and Izzie, complete with overwrought glances at each other and at Hannah. George continued on his downward spiral, blowing off coffee with his wife to help Izzie get dressed. At this point, George and Izzie need to seriously understand that they did wrong (worse, even, than the Meredith pity sex). I know it's wrong, but in a way, I want to see them come together, no pun intended.

Meanwhile, if I were to one day wake up an amnesiac with a crushed face, please, God in heaven, let me wake up to Karev. His flirtation with Addison has derailed a bit, thanks to his fixation on the disfigured boat crash victim. Tonight, she proved she has a good pair of lungs but she still seems a contrived plot device designed to show the softer side of Alex.

Spoilers Time!

Veronica Mars:

1. The jury is still out on our girl. There had been rumors that the show has been cancelled. However, according to creator Rob Thomas, "That's simply not true. I'm the one who called them. I didn't say we were canceled. We're not." Rob is hard at work on his season-four pitch, which sounds mind-blowingly good as you saw a few weeks back here on the blog. The CW would be completely moronic not to pick it up!

Lost:

1. The Lost finale will be the finale that everyone will be talking about all summer. Not Grey's. Not Heroes. Rumors are rampant that Lost's season-ender will "change the show for good"— possibly in sort of an Alias-y Super Bowl episode kinda way. So get ready.

2. The upcoming episode "D.O.C." explores Sun's pregnancy, and I'm told the initials in the title stand for "date of conception." So I'm guessing we'll get answers regarding the baby's father. The flashbacks in the episode include more scenes with Sun's father, Mr. Paik.

Brothers & Sisters:

1. Emily VanCamp (Rebecca) is now a series regular. Producer Greg Berlanti says that: "She's gonna be around, so we're gonna have to kill off a few people at the end of the year to make space for everybody! No, I'm kidding. You know, she definitely is, in fact, a Walker. It's not a fraud, and that's important to know. But I think the obvious thing would be to sort of try and integrate her in a happy, healthy way and make her one of the family. We really don't take that route. There are a lot of surprises coming up for her character in terms of just who she is. And you know, the person who knows the most about her is the person the Walkers trust the least, and that's Holly. In some ways, [Rebecca's presence] will make them relate to [Holly] more. But mostly, it just drives them all crazy that they have to continue to be associated with [her and vice versa]."

2. Dave Annable says that Justin may just ship off right around season finale time. But before he goes, Greg tells me he gets quite chummy with his new sis, Rebecca: "Justin is sort of the family member who takes the lead in terms of bringing her into the fold. Partially because he’s closest to her in age and partially because his sense of going back to the war and going back to Iraq makes him a little bit more determined to make his family whole before he leaves. We definitely get into what the family dynamics were and how can they be shifted now that there’s a new member."

Grey's Anatomy:

1. The death of someone close to Meredith is not her father, but someone pretty close. The really wretched thing is that it will be Meredith's fault. Or, at least, it will be perceived that way.

Ugly Betty:

1. We meet more members of the Suarez family before the season ends. In fact, I think we may be taking a trip to Mexico.

2. Before the end of the season, we meet Nikki, Alexis' sexy and fearless ex-girlfriend, who works for an extreme sports magazine. Word is she's hanging with the Meade boys again, but now that Alex(is) is no longer "available," she starts getting close to Daniel.

Heroes:

1. The symbol on Niki's back, Isaac's paintings, Hiro's sword and Mohinder's computer mean certainly is a good mystery. According to creator Tim Kring, a third meaning for the Heroes symbol soon emerges, in addition to the description of the symbol as either a helix or a combination of two Japanese characters.

Spoilers Time!

lIf you don't want to know whats coming up in a few shows, don't read.

Grey's Anatomy:

1. Hector Elizondo does play Callie's dad, and yes, he is in the spinoff setup episode, but no, Hector is not involved in the spinoff itself, as had been reported in many outlets. So, Mr. Torres and Addison are not running away together. However, she'll have her eye on the sexed up receptionist, hottie Sean Faris.

2. The death of someone very close to Meredith brings her and McDreamy closer together—and tears her apart (again) from her father.

3. George and Izzie are really in love. There are also rumblings that Sara Ramirez (Callie) might not be coming back as a series regular next season.

4. Cristina and Burke are headed for the altar! They'll have a full-on traditional wedding with the big dress and bridesmaids and everything—at the insistence of both her mother and Burke's mother.

Lost:

1. This week, Maggie Grace (Shannon) returns, Sun goes all nutty and punchy on someone and someone else is going to die. Someone who is not that beloved by fans. Regardless, how this person dies is perhaps the most disturbing death ever.

2. It looks like there will be more action in Hurley's van. Producers are currently casting for a "Roger," a working-class janitor in his early forties who is bitter about his place in life but has higher aspirations. The notice says of the character, "He has troubled and complex relationship with his son; [he] finds himself caught up in a mysterious situation beyond his imaginings; [and the] actor must not be claustrophobic." Pretty sure this is the skeleton—"Roger Work Man"—from Hurley's episode.

Prison Break:

1. Sadly, more than one will bite the dust soon. I'm guessing it's Kellerman and C-Note, since both Paul Adelstein and Rockmond Dunbar have new jobs for the fall.

2. There will be a role reversal at the end of this season, with Michael in a prison in Panama and Lincoln charged with having to bust him out. Dominic Purcell says, "Everything is resolved. Everything. Expect a massive shock, the final one, a massive, huge shock."

Heroes:

1. The next death is April 23. It's the one that's been rumored forever, because originally, it was supposed to happen a little earlier. The Hero who will be killed is a series regular and has an important power that will live on in Sylar

2. Look for lots more Heroic relatives (like Shanti, Mohinder's sister) and family history next season, because the second season is called Volume Two: Generations, and it's all about the ancestors and descendants of the Heroes we know and love.

The Morning After

Last night, I thought we had another good episode of Grey's Anatomy. It dealt a lot with the fallout from Izzie and George's night of sex.

The night began with Izzie waking up and realizing that she'd slept with George. "Wow, you and George were really going at it last night," said Meredith in the kitchen — funny line, shocking even, but it turned out Meredith meant drinking! Nobody knew they slept together except Izzie. George, we learn upon his awakening, blacked out the entire hookup. Now, what's great about Izzie, she seems to have fallen in love with George somewhere along the road to morning without even realizing it. However, now we can make sense of why she was so angry over his marriage to Callie. For them it may not make sense, though, because to paraphrase George, he's George, and she's Izzie.

Izzie shined today, because her speeches were so well written, and Katherine Heigl is a fantastic actress. "Hours of our lives, many hours that are all I can think about," Izzie wailed to George the next morning, "and you seriously don't remember?" The tears that dotted Heigl's eyes for one shot before this outburst were an emotional highpoint of the show. No, this hookup doesn't make much sense, but damned if Izzie and Heigl aren't out to make you buy it.

Katherine Heigl had a bunch of great scenes tonight; she was alternately goofy and tragic as Izzie confessed her liaison to Addison, quizzed her fellow interns on the science of blacking out, and tried unsuccessfully to sidle up to George after he finally remembered what had happened the night before. At the end of the night she gave a speech to a girl named Nina, a dead ringer for a young Angela from The Office whose mother just died of statue disease, or some ailment like that. "If you fall down, you won't turn to stone," said Izzie to Nina, but really to George. "Messing up, it's what makes a person." After that, she wanted to tell Callie, but George said no way. So they're keeping it a secret. I give it an episode and a half before it's out, tops. Grey's can't resist drama like that.

So Heigl had another wild, ultimately stellar night, ably managing to go wherever the writers wanted her to go. Mostly everyone else was good. I really like what ther are doing with Karev his devotion to Jane Doe. Sure he may have gone too soft right now, but it's good to see another side of him. When Addison dropped in on him late in the night, the fire between them was so doused it was hard to remember that they'd almost hooked up, which made me wonder if Kate Walsh will have anything left to do on this show before she decamps for her own spin-off later this year. Burke also gave ominous rumblings about not wanting to go back to the way things were with the now-antsy Cristina; she wants to "rewind," while he wants to "'go forward."' She did seem to acquiesce at the end, as she laid out Cristina-ish conditions for their wedding. Frankly, I'm tired of this push-pull between the two. We get it, Christina is the way she is and Burke is the opposite, let's move on now.

I am really missing Bailey, though. Why has she been missing so much from the last few episodes? She had one good speech tonight, yapping at Mark about not being able to focus on the future because she has to work in the "right now." Mark had a great episode tonight — bumbling and funny. He aced his interview for the Chief's job by stealing Bailey's "right now" idea. I hope we get to learn more about him other than he is self-proclaimed man-whore and in love with Addison.

Meanwhile, Derek was distracted from the interview process because he is concerned with Meredith. He feels worried that Meredith, who is a very strong swimmer, wanted to "give up" when she fell in the river an allowed herself to nearly drown. I wonder what they intend to do with this. Is he afraid Meredith is on the verge of some sort of breakdown or something?

Well guys, that's it for now. See you at the next episode!

Heroes and Grey's Spoilers

Thanks to Kristin from E! Online for these great spoilers on two of my favorite shows!

Grey's Anatomy:

1. Someone close to Meredith is going to die. A family member. And it'll wreak havoc on Meredith's relationship with her dad.

2. George and Izzie will fall in love.


Heroes:

1. Adrian Pasdar (Nathan) says that the question of how Nathan's father died is something that gets answered in Chapter 22. It wasn't Sylar, but it's not what we were told. He turns out to be somebody we don't expect.

2. Also from Adrian, there's an episode (called "String Theory") that happens five years in the future, and it's a possible outcome of what situations now might dictate in the future. It's not a definite, finite reality, but it's a possibility."

Bringing Sexy Back

After the ferry disaster, the doctors of "Grey's Anatomy" go back to being fun, sexy, and ambitious -- and, by the way, Izzie sleeps with George. Finally the show is back! It seemed like forever. The last new episode, part 3 of ferryboat disaster was three weeks ago. It definately looks like the show has ditched the disaster-movie drama and gone back to its sexy, normal self.

In a clever trick that signaled the show's return to its titillating roots, the episode was bookended by opening and closing scenes featuring Izzie naked. All before the opening titles, the show quickly sloughed off the heavy robes of February-sweeps seriousness and reassured us that we were back to the good times. Karev had quit brooding about dead women long enough to move in with the girls and walk in on Izzie in the shower. Meredith — showing not the slightest blip of brain damage — took a quick moment in the locker room to announce that Mom, currently hanging out in an urn in Meredith's closet, was fine, so they should all get back to work. And Cristina got her ass grabbed just in time for the first commercial. The culprit was Colin Marlow, the renowned doc from Stanford who knew Cristina from their old teacher-student affair and has now popped up to interview for the Chief's job.

In what seemed like old times, office politics came back into play as the grown-up doctors positioned themselves to become chief of surgery and a fresh guard of curiously ailing patients checked in. Shohreh Aghdashloo played a doc friend of Derek's who was suffering from a brain tumor of some kind. When her character announced she wanted to go to the beach and relax and let go until the tumor killed her, it sounded like such a sad way to go. But Derek intervened and ultimately saved her life. Which is of course exactly what he just did for Meredith.

The other inpatient whose illness mirrored an intern's was an with an infected bullet from Korea still lodged in his back. Shot by his own men, he had carried the slug in him forever, and when the docs finally plucked it out, he railed on feebly about how he'd been stewing over the wound inside him for 50 years, and for what? Izzie, with her own old wound inside, was of course listening, and the talk seemed to help propel her toward a wild ending to the episode that we'll get to in a minute.

First, we gotta back up and go through George and Callie. The two fo them were, for once, very credible as a couple last night. At the beginning of the show, Callie had to confess that she's an heiress who's been shelling out $2500 a week to put herself and George up in a luxury hotel. George felt deceived: "I've been paying you $200 a week for what, fun?" "No," said Callie, "I use it to tip housekeeping!" Best line of the show. In a funny bit of business, George slapped himself on the back of the head and promptly went and told Meredith, who told Izzie, who, in the OR, let on to Callie that she knew she's an heiress, which led to some great eyeball acting from Katherine Heigl and Sara Ramirez above their surgical masks.

How often do George and Callie steal the show? It happened last night. Their final angry confrontation at the hotel was the episode's highlight. The great drama of it arose out of trying to figure out who would come out the winner. Callie opened with "You choose your friends over me," and George countered with "You lied to me!" He was more right than she was.. "And still," he added quickly, "I'm the dog that gets whacked on the nose with the newspaper all the time." Absolutely perfect metaphor, George. "[Izzie] has feelings for you!" said Callie. "'She wants you....That's why she hates me. George, do not laugh at me." And here's where George majorly blew it. "She's Izzie!" he says. "She's blond, she's stacked" — uh-oh —"she's a supermodel. And I'm George." Great speech, there is much truth in it, but not the kind of truth you throw at your wife. Game over for him. Callie, a teardrop leaking down her face, kicked him out.

The exciting finale took place back at Meredith and Izzie's house. Unfortunately, Meredith's dad, Thatcher, was there, eating dinner with Mere and Dere. Who is this doofus? Honestly, does anybody buy this weakling as Meredith's dad or Meredith's mom's husband? It was effective drama when, at the dinner table, he told a story in which he mistook Meredith for his other daughter, but I just wish the character were more sharply defined.

Much better things were happening in the kitchen, where Izzie wondered to Karev if she was going to be pining for a dead guy forever, and he told her she'd move on when she was ready, right before he pecked her on the cheek. Karev is always so smooth. Then he walked out and George stormed in with a bottle of whiskey and said to Izzie, "I need you to start liking my wife!" Okay, she said. Sometimes he doesn't know if getting married was a good idea and, he said, "I need you to talk me back into it." Okay, she said. And both of Heigl's "okays" were highly expressive, instant concessions drained of all fight. They suggested a lot: Izzie was done with their feud, she wanted her friend back, she wanted to come back to life, and she wanted it all right now. Heigl came back tonight with a wide-ranging performance, sometimes high-spirited and full of bite, other times very soft and potent. Izzie is one of the best characters on the show right now, for better or worse, because Heigl is often so good and because the writers have Izzie all over the place. She's fascinating to try and track.

What to make of her in the last scene? To send us out, Izzie and George drank a lot of whiskey, George drunkenly wondered if Callie was onto something, Izzie laughed and laughed at him, and yet she still somehow woke up naked next to George in the morning. Now, this is some development. This show is clearly not going to stop until the Chief beds Joe the Bartender, or Karev seduces the ghost of Ellis Grey. It made me smile, I'll go along with it. I don't know why we couldn't have predicted it, but I also worry a little bit. George and Izzie hooking up makes me worry for Isaiah Washington. He is a strong part of the show. Tonight, I enjoyed Burke's speeches to Cristina about wanting her to want to marry him. But I worry that by the time everybody's hooked up with everybody, Shonda's eventually gonna need some new characters, some fresh booty for fresh couplings, and some players are gonna get cut to make room on the crowded full-cast bus ads. Washington feels like the one who might be first to go. I hope it doesn't happen.

So now that our beloved show is back to normal, how long will we have to wait for another new episode?

Even More Grey's Drama

I found this article over at Entertainment Weekly. Apparently, the drama continues behind the scenes:

Finally, some good news for Isaiah Washington. Seven weeks after he stepped on a land mine at the Golden Globes by uttering an antigay slur he'd been accused of using on the set of Grey's Anatomy last fall, the beleaguered star received an NAACP Image Award on March 2 for best actor in a drama series. ''The first time I was up here I felt deserving of something,'' he told the audience at L.A.'s Shrine Auditorium. ''This time, I feel privileged.'' If only he were informed, too. When EW tracked him down after the ceremony to ask whether he'll be back at Seattle Grace next season, Washington was noticeably cryptic: ''I don't know the facts of what's going on.''

When it comes to Grey's Anatomy these days, very few people do. Washington's future employment — which has been endlessly debated since the f-word incident — is just one of the many mysteries swirling around ABC's top-rated drama. The first involves a war of words over money between costar Katherine Heigl and ABC Television Studio, which quietly offered salary increases to the cast earlier this season. One insider familiar with the negotiations says the studio first considered rewarding stars Patrick Dempsey, Ellen Pompeo, Sandra Oh, and Washington with bigger raises than other cast members. That likely prompted Heigl to pull out of the renegotiation Feb. 27 because, according to an unnamed source who spoke to People.com, ''[the studio] doesn't value her as much as her costars....''

ABC fired back a day later, arguing it had ''approached Katherine with an offer to raise her compensation significantly above the terms of her current contract'' and was ''surprised to see this gesture reported negatively in the press.'' Not to be outmaneuvered, Heigl countered with a statement a day later saying ''I am embarrassed this has become a public matter.'' Heigl — like her costars — is under a traditional, multiyear deal and is not guaranteed a raise at all, but when a show is successful, studios often reward their talent with pay increases. Most of the Grey's actors are expected to sign new deals by month's end: Dempsey is poised to make around $200K an episode, while Oh should earn more than $100K per week. Even after her very public display of discontent, it seems highly unlikely that Heigl would walk away from a gig on one of TV's most buzzed-about series.

One person who might be bolting, however, is Kate Walsh, who's been tapped to headline a potential Grey's spin-off featuring Taye Diggs. According to one report, her fellow actors were angry after being caught off-guard by the news of the project on Feb. 21, but insiders dispute that notion: ''They were told,'' insists one person close to the show. Creator Shonda Rhimes has submitted the two-hour script, while The Nine's Tim Daly and Prison Break's Paul Adelstein — who, ironically, was cast as the original Dr. Burke on Grey's — have also signed on. Filming is set to begin in the next few weeks.

As for Washington's future, his comment to EW seems to cast doubt on whether he'll return for season 4, but the studio (along with Washington's newly hired publicist, noted crisis manager Howard Bragman) says he's not going anywhere. Still, it's telling that his name has reportedly been absent during the recent salary renegotiations. Bragman says that ''we are going to do our business in private, not in the press,'' adding, ''I'm looking at the bigger picture. I will not let [the f-word incident] define him. He will not let it define him.'' We'll see whether he gets his wish in the coming weeks. The show is set to film its season finale in late April, and ABC will announce its fall schedule on May 15. In the meantime, the notoriously tight-lipped Rhimes is keeping viewers, the press, and apparently her cast in the dark about any future plans for the medical drama. When asked about the spin-off at the Image Awards, Washington demurred: ''I don't know when it came about — or why. They don't tell me anything!''

More Trouble at Grey's

Katherine Heigl has just released a statement, responding to the statement ABC/Touchstone gave a couple days ago regarding her contract snafu. Here it is:

"I am embarrassed that this has become a public matter and disappointed that Touchstone felt it necessary to divulge private employment information. I had hoped I would be able to deal with this issue confidentially with my bosses. I dropped out of the renegotiation simply because I wanted to treat myself with the respect I was not getting from them. No matter how unhappy I am about their decision to respond to this publicly, I continue to be passionate about and committed to this character."

Seriously, the drama behind the scenes at Grey's Anatomy is starting to get even better than what's on the screen! (And that's sayin' something!) Interesting sidenote: I'm also told by sources that Heigl had a similar experience when she worked at Roswell-- she stood up for herself for not making the same as her costars.

Still, bottom line, Heigl is under contract for three more seasons at Grey's. And according to my inside sources, even if she did leave the show, she could not work anywhere else without being penalized a hefty sum. So it looks like Izzie Stevens will be staying put.

Life and Death

Last night was the final episode of Grey's ferry disaster arc and the climax ended things perfectly. It was an excellent night in spite of the fact that most of the scenes with Meredith in the afterlife were kind of cheesy. I did enjoy the past guest stars that showed up. Dylan (Kyle Chandler) and Denny (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) picked up with Meredith in the heavenly, hyper-lit O.R. of the gods, and these two fine actors were immediately asked to fall back on the kind of painful wisecracking shtick such as "Meredith, this is not your brain on drugs," said Dylan. "This is death." Denny piped in: "Whoa! Way too harsh." At least, the actors did a good job.

What was with that ghost woman who kept bleeding from the stomach right before the commercial breaks? I remember her as the girl from long ago who came into Seattle Grace impaled on a pole. But isn't it awfully random? What purpose did she serve last night? It was all too abstract, pretentious even. The bleeder was far and away the weakest link in the episode.

This afterlife stuff climaxed in that heavenly and hyper-lit hallways of the gods, where Meredith briefly met her Mom. I knew this was coming beforehand because of some spoilers I read online. Yes, Meredith's mom died — Kate Burton turned out to be the cast member whose death on the show had been correctly rumored in the spoilers. She entered limbo only to give Meredith her Get-Out-of-Jail-Free-and-Go-Back-to-Real-Life card. The brief, otherworldly reunion of mother and daughter really was touching. However, it had nothing on the scene three episodes ago where living Meredith faced off against living Ellis, and Ellen Pompeo's tragic voice broke like the ice under a doomed ice-skating 6 year-old. What that scene provided was some closure for Meredith and the viewers when Ellis told her she is anything but ordinary.

Things went great in the real world. Last night, every single scene actually set at Seattle Grace provided exactly the kind of catnip that fans come to the show to get hooked on. The reason last night's episode totally worked was quite simple: Grey's stopped trying to be what I think of when I think of ER, and went back to being Grey's. And last night it excelled at being Grey's. Each great Seattle Grace scene seemed to improve on the last great Seattle Grace scene. I'll pull out just a couple that featured our main players.

(1) Izzie: She stealthily ruled the backroads of last night's episode. When she sassed her enemy Callie early on, Callie was so incensed she ripped the drip she was donating blood into and got up to say, "I will not run off!" Katherine Heigl showed the great actress she is. Watching her bobble her eyebrows and half-cross her eyes and dip — in this scene with Callie alone — into a rich, unspoken register of Izzie's hurt, shows us how great she truly is.

(2) Cristina. Last night was a great night for her. Cristina can't deal with a dying Meredith, who is her "person," so she jets work and goes shopping, zombie-like, at the dollar store. Then she hangs out at Joe's bar doing Sudoku until Burke comes to get her and give her a great talk: "Listen to me. This is about you and the woman you call the 'person'... If she dies, and you are sitting here when it happens, I can't see you coming back from that. Come and say goodbye to your friend." Powerful speech. I liked Isaiah Washington last night. Then Cristina goes and yells at the Chief and Bailey until they attempt to save flatlining Meredith again, and I liked the highly dramatic moment of Sandra Oh's barking.

(3) Derek. This episode was nothing less than Patrick Dempsey's finest hour in season 3. Strangely underutilized so far this season, Dempsey had an awful lot to do as Derek had a lot to cry about. He was breaking out in quivers most of the night. The highlight was when Derek huffily faced off with Ellis in her sickbed: "You broke her," he charged, speaking of half-dead Meredith. "She may not survive this, and that's on you." I thought it was blistering stuff. Dempsey affirmed he can act, and then some, while Kate Burton's reaction shots were totally pro. Ironically enough, he ended up pumping Ellis's chest trying to bring her back to life.

And more great, finely scripted things were littered throughout. Bravo to George putting Izzie in her place ("If I'm not making a mistake, you're gonna look like a jerk. And if I am, I'm gonna need you."). And three cheers to the soapiest scene of the trilogy, when, towards the end of last night, Addison said if Mark can go 60 days without sex, then she'll try to be together forever with him, and he takes her up on it. The cut straight to Karev after this exchange was a sharp moment of high Grey's comedy.

All told, this episode created great TV out of jeopardizing the life of the main character, even as we all knew that main character wouldn't die. Meredith is with us for good but tonight, the writers built good drama out of her near-expiration. It was about time. Ellen Pompeo is a great actress and the show wouldn't obviously be the same without her. Also, it was so touching in the last scene where Izzie pauses momentarily alongside the feeling ghost of Denny Duquette.

A Grey's Spinoff?

I'm not sure how I feel about this but according to the Wall Street Journal, ABC is attempting to duplicate the juggernaut success the network has achieved with Grey's Anatomy by moving forward on a spinoff centering on Kate Walsh's character of Dr. Addison Montgomery-Shepherd. A spokesperson for the network told the paper that a series title has not yet been determined, nor has a general plot—whether Walsh's character will remain in Seattle, move back to New York or do something else entirely is still up in the air.

The show will apparently give plenty of screen time to Addison, who has emerged from hated third party in Grey's Anatomy's central love triangle to become one of the most popular characters on the show. The spinoff would allow Rhimes to be able to focus on a single character, something that is hard to do on the current show, where story lines and screen time are divvied up among 12 regular characters, something Rhimes herself has said is hard to juggle.

Per the Wall Street Journal, Rhimes is writing a special two-hour episode of Grey's Anatomy that will effectively serve as the Addison-centric series' pilot. The episode is expected to air during May sweeps, allowing time for the network to decide whether or not to pick up the show for placement on its fall schedule.

Beautiful Disaster

So, how awesome was Grey's Anatomy last night? Last night was the first-of-three extra-special Grey's. I'm pressed for time so this will be quicker than usual.

This show is too good. This three-episode arc looks like it will incredible in typical Grey's fashion. The show always manages to mix the snappy, human, sexy, and frivolous while our favorite doctors go out and save countless bleeders, burn victims, catatonic children, and men trapped under cars whose dripping blood artfully mixes with dripping water leaks. I have been looking forward to this "Grey's Anatomy Event" since last week's preview. I couldn't wait to see what made the interns and Bailey drop their jaws. It turned out to be a busted ferry that had been clipped by a container ship in the fog and burst into flames. Bodies were everywhere, burned and bloody.

The show was able to mix in its regular frothy Grey's melodrama as the doctors saved lives. The central relationships were in trouble. Burke got testy because Cristina is reluctant to tell anyone about their engagement. In her defense, she did try to tell Meredith before she left but wasn't able to. Then Derek is wondering why he found Meredith hanging out under the water in her bathtub like a crazy person. Thinking she knew about Burke and Christina's engagement, he asked her if she was acting strange because she wants to get married. Earlier on, there was a funny scene in the elevator with Derek, Burke, Addison, Mark, and the Chief. It seems the Chief dyed his hair to cover the gray to compensate for his divorce. Later, Addison compliments the Chief on his attractive new dyed hair, and shares a story about how she went blond after Derek left her.

Karev rescued and then bonded with a pregnant lady buried under a pylon who was also suffering from hypothermia. I thought his little subplot was sweet. Izzie went back to being a doctor and tried to save a man trapped under a car. She was clearly overwhelmed by the situation. Meredith took charge of a strange little girl while caring for an injured man. I started to think that maybe the girl was a figment of her imagination representing her and her fears perhaps. Then in th final moments of this episode, Meredith got shoved into the harbor by the convulsing guy she was treating at dock's edge. That was the cliff-hanger. The preview for next week's episode has her bobbing sleekly underwater.

Thanks for the Memories

By Gregory Kirschling at Entertainment Weekly


It was the best of Grey's, it was the worst of Grey's.

The best in last night's episode included Kate Burton's performance as Ellis, Meredith's Alzheimer's-addled mother. In a fantastic conceit, her character snapped back into full consciousness; that is, she could remember everything again, except for — okay — stuff that happened in the past five years. The scenario created such a compelling tension in the episode, because suddenly Ellis was alive, but not wholly so. She was there but not there. And it really was like a visit from a ghost. A nasty yet slightly appealing ghost, sort of like Slimer from Ghostbusters. ''So tell me about yourself,'' she said early on to Meredith. ''I'm really happy now,'' replied Meredith, mentioning a man in there somewhere. ''You've gone soft!'' barked Mom. ''Anyone can be in love and be blindly happy, but not everyone can pick up a scalpel and save a life?.What happened to you?'' How much of this was the old crackerjack Ellis Grey, and how much of it was still the ramblings of a senile woman? That was the tension.

Either way, be grateful to this episode for finding a way to bring back the old Ellis. We'd heard so much about how this raving taskmaster actually used to possess killer instincts, plus a pointy intelligence, and it was a pleasure to actually see the old Ellis, and not just deduce all those traits out of the dark corners of Ellis' dementia. Loved that early scene where she drew a bead on Cristina and instantly saw that she was friends with Meredith, because she noticed Cristina was afraid to look at her, ''as if I'll ask you a personal question and you'll accidentally slip.'' And it was delicious and fitting, later, to watch the old Ellis roll her eyes when Cristina asked her if it was possible to have a life and a career — there was something so flip and unforgiving about Ellis' eye roll, even if she caved and gave Cristina the answer she wanted. (Of course you can have both: It's TV!)

All this Ellis stuff was also a blessing because it drew more sensational acting out of Ellen Pompeo, but I'll get to that in a minute. First I have to talk about the worst of Grey's.

A raging neurotoxin? One that a patient who mixed her herbal supplement with ''chemo chemicals'' was exuding, dropping doctors like they were played by Lillian Gish in a silent melodrama out of 1924? Didn't we cover the plague back in episode 1 of this season, and wasn't that silly enough? We had to go here? In the dumbest Grey's scene in maybe ever, the three lady interns had to take turns donning a mask and running into the OR to do something doctor-y to the infected lady on the cutting table, which they gamely attempted till they got woozy and had to run back to tag-team out. (All this was after Burke and Derek passed out in the OR in their Outbreak suits and bicycle helmets. Not even Cristina, watching from the observation tower right before the dramatic commercial break, took this seriously.) Honestly, the whole thing reminded me of that occasional EW feature in the TV section where the producers of one popular show write the script for an episode of another, and here, it was as if the people behind Survivor had decided it would be cool on Grey's if Izzie, Meredith, and Cristina, rather than running out in bikinis one by one into the South Pacific to dig up some underwater puzzle pieces hooked on an anchor 10 feet under and 50 yards out, instead had to don surgical masks and race into the OR and take turns applying an inflatable tarp onto some unconscious toxic girl's guts. (In my head at the end, I saw Probst throw his arms up and yell, ''Meredith wins reward!'')

So that part was lame. Other parts not yet mentioned were not lame. Following his proposal last week, George and Callie got married in Vegas. ''Dude,'' said Karev in one of the funniest lines ever written on this show, ''she's Callie O'Malley!'' Shortly after they announced their union, of course, George caught the plague, and that created all sorts of false drama because Callie guessed it was the thought of being married to her, and all the disapproval from his ''weird and judge-y'' friends, that made him sick. (Neurotoxin = dumb!) But a few other moments in this shotgun-wedding story line did click, totally. First was when George told Meredith about his marriage, and they stared at each other a little long, a little hard, just enough to mean something to all of us who've been following these two since the very beginning. And then the subplot ended nicely last night with George defending his new bride in front of those ''weird and judge-y'' friends in the locker room. Be nice to her, he insisted, because ''if she's gone, I'm gone.'' He even revealed to everyone Callie's middle name, which is Iphigenia. At that news (which is not so embarrassing; Mrs. Doubtfire, you'll recall, was named Iphigenia too), we got three separate incredulous reaction shots from the gals, with Sandra Oh narrowly beating out Pompeo and Katherine Heigl in the funny smirk-off contest.

Now back to Pompeo. I don't know how many times I have to write how great she is; it's beyond self-evident to me. Yet every week, and everywhere, there are haters. This is to them: You weren't in the bathroom, or refilling your bowl of mustard pretzels, were you, when Meredith answered her mother's hard dis that she's weak (recounted above) with an amazing monologue marked by the way that Pompeo kept cracking her throaty voice for a fuller effect than she's ever achieved before in a breakdown scene? ''You wanna know why I'm so unfocused, so ordinary?'' Meredith howled. ''You wanna know what happened to me? You! You happened to me.'' Ellis angrily wanted Meredith to let her pass on an important heart surgery she needed for something-or-other, and Meredith said no, insisted no. ''Why not?'' Ellis demanded. ''Because killing my mother,'' replied Meredith, as — right then, timed to a slight pause — a tear fell down her cheek, ''is not going to be another thing that happens to me.'' Did that teardrop strike anybody else as amazing? You're working sweatshop-hour days to give the world an hour of drama a week, starring you, and one afternoon you have to show up and drop a real tear right in the middle of a ''killing my mother'' cue? I don't know, Grey's fans: It's not chain-gang work, or brain surgery, but that still sounds like a tough day at the office to me. And Pompeo aced it. What will it take for this actress to get some respect? If her name were Helen Mirren, she'd have another Golden Globe or two thrown at her by now.

And on top of that, this scene was only a lead-up to the best scene of the episode, which was also the last scene of the episode. Meredith — having survived the plague and the revelation of Callie's absolutely shocking middle name — burst in on her mother and the Chief, and (not pausing at the Chief's foreshadowy ''Meredith!'') laid into a heartfelt bit about how she wants Mom to have the MacGuffin heart surgery because what if there's an Alzheimer's breakthrough in the next couple of years? Then they could start over. ''You'll have another chance to get to know me,'' said Meredith, ''to see I'm not even remotely ordinary.'' And to that, Ellis stared at her with a blankness not seen up till now in the episode and said, ''You remind me of my daughter.'' And Pompeo used her wet and tired eyes exquisitely, landing them eventually in the direction of the Chief, who explained that Ellis had reverted back to la-la land about an hour before. It was a near-shattering, surprising, emotion-tugging ending the likes of which Grey's had not delivered to us for the past couple of weeks straight, and it made everything about the episode all right. It, too, was best of Grey's.

What about Addison and Karev? How in hell, given she was rubbing her teeth at Karev for most of the night, did she end up in a naked clinch with Mark by episode's end? Don't look at me: I gotta save it for another week, because, in deference to the grumpy, literacy-averse message posters who bitch that this TV Watch is always too long, I'm cutting out! (Gonna use the time to watch tonight's 30 Rock on DVR instead.) See you next week for the first of an apparent three-parter about imperiled greater Seattle.

Until then, what did you think of this episode? Is Ellen excellent or what? Are you happy that Cristina, in her own weird way and in her own sweet time, finally accepted Burke's wedding proposal? And are you amazed that Izzie blew her $8 million on a free clinic? Were you not surprised that the clinic's first patient turned out to have a problem that was more TV dramatic than not knowing how to insert a tampon, but aren't you glad it gave the wonderful Chandra Wilson another chance to light up the screen?