BWW Recap: GREY'S ANATOMY Masters the Term 'Bittersweet'

Last night's GREY'S ANATOMY was about reunions. Not necessarily happy reunions, but reunions all the same. No show on TV does 'bittersweet' better than GREY'S ANATOMY and there is a whole lot of bittersweet in this most recent episode, entitled "Back Where You Belong". The episode was written by Jen Klein and directed by Oliver Bokelberg.

The episode opens at Meredith's house. She is attempting to fold laundry and match socks (so basically, she is attempting the impossible) while Alex, Maggie and Amelia (who is 'crashing' but definitely does not live there...according to Amelia) are buzzing around her, preparing for the day. Meredith is still suspended and she is very very bored. "How can she (Bailey) suspend you? Don't you own the hospital?" Asks Amelia on behalf of the viewers who have been wondering the same thing. Meredith assures us that Bailey can indeed suspend her...she read the bylaws and checked. Question: Is there seriously something in a policy book somewhere that says that a doctor who also happens to own a huge percentage of a hospital can still be suspended from said hospital. That is thorough! During this opening scene, Meredith's voiceover is about how she doesn't "do reunions". She says that if she wants to keep people in her life, she keeps them in her life..."or maybe" she says "I just don't know how to get rid of them." Alex, Maggie and Amelia are unequivocally her 'people' now and seeing Amelia back at the house and Alex without the prospect of jail hanging over his head and able to return to work really drives that point home. This gathering in the kitchen, as mundane and routine as it is, feels like a reunion.

Throughout the day, Meredith has some visitors at the house. First, Bailey stops by to try to bury the hatchet, explain why she hired Dr. Minnick and get Meredith to return to work. Meredith is stubborn, but reasonable and states that bringing Minnick in is not so much the problem, but unceremoniously ditching Webber is not cool. She says that she will not return to work until Richard Webber's job running the Residency Program is re-instated. The next visitor that Meredith gets is Richard Webber himself. Bailey has told him why Meredith has not returned and he has come to ask her to come back to work and not put her job at risk on account of him. He is flattered though, and it is very touching when she tells him that each time she thinks about returning to work, she hears her mother's voice saying "Meredith, it's Richard". As a side note, Ellen Pompeo's three word Ellis Grey impression was kind of a highlight of this episode. Richard points out that Ellis would never choose a person over her career and Meredith points out that she is supposed to "do better". At the end of it all, Meredith places a call in to Bailey...perhaps there will be another reunion...at the hospital in the next episode.

Over at the hospital, the rest of the doctors are busy with what are probably two of the strongest patient storylines this season. It is rare for an episode of GREY'S to feature not one but two very detailed, layered patient storylines. There often simply isn't enough time. They made time here though, and it paid off.

The first patients we meet are mother and son, Cynthia and Christopher. Cynthia will be donating one of her kidneys to her 16 year old son. Stephanie and Jo are taking the lead on Christopher's portion of the surgery (as per Dr. Minnick's teaching method). With Christopher being young, Steph is immediately triggered by the events of last week's episode. With Alex being the Attending on the case, Jo isn't exactly relaxed either. It soon becomes apparent though, that there is someone far more triggering evolved in this equation. Christopher's father shows up, having read on Christopher's social media that he was having his transplant today. It turns out that Cynthia had left her husband because he was abusive and she is quite upset to see him today. Given her personal history, Jo is understandably upset as well. To make matters worse, during surgery, Cynthia's remaining kidney dies and the husband offers to donate his to Christopher so that Cynthia can have hers back. This sends Jo into a tailspin. She is horrified that this man would get to control this situation and that his family might feel indebted to him. Jo convinces the father to donate anonymously-hopefully saving his family from further turmoil but Jo is still clearly physically ill that the happy ending for this family came from the father's donation. As Arizona puts it though "the solution where everyone lives is always the right solution". Bittersweet.

Throughout all this, Alex is concerned about Jo because he knows why this would affect her the way it does, but of course, they are on shaky ground right now in their relationship and he doesn't want to overstep. Owen also notices how upset Jo is and he takes the time to check in on her and comfort her a few times throughout the episode. After the transplants, Jo finally breaks down and he is there to give her a hug. This is a sweet new friendship that is developing and it seems only fitting that while Alex has been there for Owen's estranged love, Amelia, Owen can be there for Jo. When (if) these couples get back together, maybe they can go on an adorable double date.

The other patient of the week is Claire. She walks into the hospital disoriented and expressing disorganized thoughts. Her appearance is unkempt and it becomes evident that she is homeless. The doctors don't know who she is and suspect that she is mentally ill. First they take her into surgery to replace a pacemaker that should have been replaced ages ago, but then they call Psychiatry. In between, they find out her name and call her family using the serial number on the pacemaker. We find out from her parents that she had disappeared over a decade ago and they had eventually given up searching and assumed she had died. They even held a funeral for her. The Psychiatrist suspects that Claire has Schizophrenia and starts her on some medications. Maggie doesn't understand why her parents seem so heartbroken. Yes, their daughter is struggling with mental illness, but she is receiving help and she is alive. She thinks they should show some signs of happiness. Riggs tells her that she doesn't "get it" and this isn't a happy ending because those parents now have to live with the fact that their daughter was alive and suffering out on the streets for all this time while they had moved on with their lives. Near the end of the episode when Claire recognizes her parents and the family gets to have a happy moment, it is clear that Riggs is a mix of angry, sad and jealous. He doesn't get to have this happy reunion with Megan and it is clearly tearing him up.

Kudos to the casting people for casting the same actor to play the Psychiatry consult that they have used since the beginning of the series. Actor, Anjul Nigam showed up as Dr. Raj Sen as early as season 1 episode 2 as a psych intern, and now, here he is, all grown up (like the rest of our doctors) and in for a consult with Claire. Considering how Meredith's voiceover is about reunions and discusses how we like to see how people we used to know "turn out" this was a perfect choice.

Outside of the patient stories, the personal drama at the hospital continued in full force as the majority of the Attendings continued to hate on Eliza Minnick behind her back. Arizona pretended to still not like her, but has clearly bonded with her further since last week's episode. The mean words people are saying about Minnick start to wear on Arizona and she tells her that she doesn't like it because she wants people to know what a good, smart, funny person she is, etc. This culminates in a kiss between the two. Although Minnick has not yet won me over, I am happy to see a new romance for Arizona...even a super predictable it-was-only-a-matter-of-time type romance. We shall see where this goes as it is bound to get pretty interesting with all the hospital politics in play.

The episode ends with Maggie joining Meredith and a sleeping Amelia in Meredith's bed. Meredith is reading a book and Amelia is sleeping on the corner of her big brother's side of the bed (I'm assuming that's all the space Meredith let her take, but it is still progress). I really do love these three sisters. Maggie mentions to Meredith how torn up Riggs was about Claire's case and how her parents had given up on ever finding her. Meredith comments that when Derek died, for one day she didn't know where he was and it was horrible and scary and she tried to act normal but inside she was torn up. She suspects Nathan feels that way every day. That's deep. Maggie comments that Meredith "get's" Riggs and though Meredith tries to deflect, it is clear that this love triangle storyline might be rearing its head again soon.

All in all, this was a beautifully devastating episode. As I said, no show does bittersweet better than GREY'S ANATOMY.

GREY'S ANATOMY airs on Thursday nights at 7pm on CTV and 8pm on ABC. The next episode will be Thursday, March 9th.

Photo Credit: ABC/Eric McCandless