Grey’s Anatomy: Hail to the New Chief

We’ve seen many major developments on Grey’s this season. To name a few…George’s tragic death, a merger between Seattle Grace and Mercy West, the firing of Izzie, Richard’s drinking and finally this week the hospital has a new chief of surgery, Derek Shepherd. As Derek tackles his new role, the other doctors must deal with relationships and their patients.

Meredith and Bailey are in an abdominal surgery when all of a sudden the patient wakes up! Scary! Miranda starts screaming at the anesthesiologist, Ben, because she thinks he made a mistake while Meredith tries to calm the patient. Afterwards, Leslie, the patient, remembers everything, is severely traumatized and won’t let Bailey touch her. However because she needs a second operation, Leslie explains that Meredith can perform the surgery because she stayed calm. Meredith is nervous about the solo surgery but is reassured by Bailey who claims Richard is a great judge of talent and the last time Richard mentored someone it was her! The surgery goes smoothly.

Day one for Derek as the new surgical chief and it isn’t an easy one. First, a possible lawsuit because Bailey’s patient wakes up in the middle of surgery. Next, he has a meeting with Richard and presents him with two options: quit or go to rehab and his job will be waiting for him when he’s better (which Derek recommends). Richard says he needs time to think and later that day they have a big blow up. Bailey finally gets through to Richard when she says, “You go get better, you be the chief.” Richard officially takes the rehab option. Derek also decides that he is “neither pro or anti merger. From this point on, everyone has a clean slate.” He even hires some people back, including April.

Alex is placed on Arizona’s rounds in peds. Their patient is a boy named Brad, who has abdominal pain, although his father thinks he is faking. Arizona explains to Alex that in peds you must advocate for the patient because they can’t do it for themselves. Alex is a quick learner and successfully advocates for an exploratory surgery for Brad. However, Brad becomes unstable during surgery and afterwards his aorta ruptures—Alex acts quickly and Teddy performs cardio surgery, which saves Brad’s life. Afterwards, Alex yells at Brad’s parents. Arizona compliments him on his superb natural ability in peds but reminds him, he must only advocate and not judge or berate parents.

An angry Mark ignores Lexie throughout the episode. Lexie asks Callie to talk to him and unfortunately Callie lets it slip that Mark slept with Addison multiple times. Callie talks to Mark and calls him “hypocritical, sexist and immature” and Derek even tells him to forgive Lexie but he refuses. At the end of the episode, Lexie and Mark get stuck on the elevator together and Lexie rushes off crying. The next we see Mark, he is upset and laying in bed with Callie and Arizona.

Mark was not the only guy avoiding someone this week. Owen avoids Teddy and Teddy refuses to put Cristina on her service. On the other hand, Owen and Cristina are inseparable and having as much sex as possible—but when Teddy pages Cristina for help during Alex’s patient’s emergency surgery, Owen convinces her to stay with him. Teddy reprimands Cristina who is then furious with Owen. Back at Cristina’s apartment, Owen confronts her saying that she doesn’t share enough with him and “why won’t she let him love her?” Cristina gets very emotional and says he was “trying to screw me into submission.” She explains that she lost herself when she was with Burke and is scared because she loves him more than Burke. She finally tells him “when you asked me to ignore Teddy’s page, you took a piece of me and I let you and that will never happen again.”

I loved the interaction, dare I say flirting, between Ben and Miranda! Can’t wait to see how/if their relationship develops throughout the rest of the season. Last week, I was annoyed by how Mark treated Lexie and my annoyance continues! He is just being stubborn. I agree with Callie, Mark is acting “hypocritical and immature.” Hope they eventually work it out. I was also surprised to see how much emotion Cristina showed when she was talking to Owen about their relationship. Finally, I am especially curious to see if Derek’s “clean slate” will convince Izzie to return.

Next week: It’s Valentine’s Day! A roof collapses on a popular restaurant. Arizona and Callie play matchmaker with Bailey and Ben. Little Sloan is back and Derek is still adjusting to being Chief.

For more on this episode, check out Tanya Lane’s review here.

Season 6, Episodes 13: State of Love and Trust (originally aired February 4, 2010)

For more Grey’s Anatomy, click here.

Thursdays 9/8c on ABC

Photographs courtesy of ABC and Adam Larkey.