Episode Report Card Lauren S: C | 2 USERS: A- YOU GRADE IT I Screw Dead People
By Lauren S | Season 5 | Episode 9 | Aired on 11.20.2008
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.Take the worst decision you've ever made. Got it in mind? Now multiply it by a thousand, and you've got the idea just how bad a decision Lexie and Sadie make this week. They decide to up the stakes of the secret intern society and take out Sadie's appendix. It's not a surprise that this goes horribly wrong, and they call Meredith and Cristina to help them out of it, who in turn call Bailey and the Chief. Mere and Cristina, with some coaching from Bailey, save Sadie's life and then all of the residents get together to put all of the interns on probation -- seriously, it seems like you can get away with absolutely anything at Seattle Grace without losing your job. When Lexie tries to take some of the blame with the Chief, she lets it slip that Cristina knew that the interns were up to no good, and Mere is so surprised she turns on Cristina in front of Richard. Cristina is mighty pissed that her best friend didn't stand up for her and have her back, and it kind of seems like the tension might last a while between those two. Fortunately, Cristina at least has a super hot surgeon who thinks she's beautiful -- it's all Hunt is able to finally say after spending the entire episode tongue-tied around her.
The attendings, meanwhile, are treating a man who jumped out a window while sleepwalking. Sloane shows his sensitive side and bonds with the man's 13-year-old daughter, which leads to him figuring out that this happens all the time and the girl barely sleeps. They figure out the problem and while Dad is in surgery, Sloane sits with the girl so that she can finally take a nap with her head resting on his shoulder. He's allowed to relax -- he did his own surgery earlier, on none other than Callie. When the sleepwalking dad was brought in, he woke up and started thrashing so much that he hit Callie in the face and broke her nose. Mark fixes her up, and later that night when Callie is in recovery, Bailey visits and the women both admit they're kind of tired of surgery and adrift at the moment.
And the barfiest storyline is left for last... Izzie is still seeing Denny, and to prove that she's not just reliving moments they had together when he was alive, they have sex. Yes, this show has resorted to ghost sex. Ghost. Sex. Izzie spends a lot of time still trying to figure out what's going on and why she's seeing him all the time, and finally sort of half-heartedly tries to get out of things with Alex. Alex won't break up with her -- he's in it for the crazy, I guess -- so she decides to go to bed with him instead of her dead boyfriend, who assures her that it's okay. It's all as awkward as it sounds.
See who on staff is really a high-schooler in disguise. Come back on Wednesday for our full detailed recap.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Between the title of the episode, the shots of Seattle freeways at night against just a couple of eerie musical notes, and Meredith's night-themed voiceover, it's apparent that this episode is going to center around one crazy night at Seattle Grace, "crazy" being the operative word. "When you're little, nighttime is scary because there are monsters hiding right under the bed." Hmm, might any of those monsters be sharks? Sharks that might need to be jumped over? I'm just speculating, here. "When you get older, the monsters are different." We get some dramatic shots from later in the episode to give us an idea of what events lie in store for us: Cristina looking worried with her hands in a torso while Bailey talks her through, "Self-doubt." Callie lying on the floor with blood coming out her nose, looking scarily dead until she blinks, "Loneliness." Lexie sitting, shell-shocked and silent, "Regret. And though you may be older and wiser, you still find yourself scared of the dark."
It's a little obvious when a roll of thunder is used to usher us in to the first real scene. Izzie is sitting on a chair with her knees drawn up to her chest, panicking and trying to figure out why it is that she's having a conversation with her dead fiancée. She thinks she's crazy, but Denny assures her she isn't. No matter what this turns out to be, this storyline is certainly crazy. She asks him what he is and he tells her, "I'm a dead man who loves you." Funny, I'm a live woman who just threw up a little. She concludes that she touched and kissed him when he was alive, so she's just reliving things. He thinks about that a second and then stands and walks towards her, suggesting that they then should try doing something they never got to do in real life. She stands up, he pulls off his shirt, and after a moment of making out, she pulls hers off too and they fall into bed.
Personally, I can pinpoint this as the exact moment this show jumped the shark. I got through Meredith's dying, Bailey's out-of-thin-air marital problems and all sorts of annoying and ridiculous storylines, but this is just too much for me. And the writers trying to sell us on this being a great love triangle and a brilliant idea just makes me angry. Denny died. His character is gone. I'm sorry that he was a good character and maybe that was a mistake, but that's the choice that was made. So having him come back to follow Izzie around, smirk sexily and then bed her is absolutely ridiculous to me. One thing I liked about this show from the beginning was its portrayal of all sorts of relationships and how nothing is ever black and white (hence the name), good people can be stupid, here are situations you could find yourself in, etc. But ghost sex is for a daytime soap. Ghost sex is completely out of the realm of believability. Ghost sex is a cheap way to bring back a good character and, by the way? Bringing Denny back and keeping him around in such an idiotic storyline is making me not like him so much anymore, which I hate. Because at least with him dying, I had the nice memory of a character that I loved. That is fading really, really fast with this garbage.