Greetings, Grey’s Anatomy fans! This week’s installment was a bit retro, didn’t you think? Kinda light, kinda fun, lots of humor…there was even a goofy patient with a bizarre medical condition! Set on the day of Richard Webber’s birthday, “We Gotta Get Out Of This Place” was old-school Grey’s with plenty of meaty substance disguised as a frothy confection. 

“I have no idea what you’re after, dear…”

Catherine Avery was back in town and she was not happy that Jackson and April eloped. Subtlety has never been Mama Bear’s strong point, but I really wanted to remind her that one catches more bees with honey than with vinegar. I mean, really, did she think that bursting onto the scene and steamrolling her son and his new wife was a good plan? Really? Overbearing much?

The ironic thing is that Catherine had many valid points. Jackson and April did rush into marriage without talking about a lot of important things. For example, what religion would their children be raised? What activities and lifestyle would they pursue? And what would happen when those children come of age and become managing board members of a foundation valued in the hundreds of millions of dollars? In the end, April was willing to sign a post-nuptial agreement, Jackson apologized to Catherine for excluding her from the wedding, and Catherine admitted to Richard that she was proud of Jackson for accepting nothing less than true love. But is the honeymoon over for Japril? They have vastly different views on many subjects. 

“This is 100% wrong!”

Callie went toe-to-toe with Derek over the research they had been doing together (for more details, see last week’s recap). After a couple of fairly ugly scenes during which I fretted that these good friends would end up hating each other (not to mention suing each other), Callie convinced Derek that what he was doing was wrong and he knew it. That’s why he felt so badly about the situation. To his credit, Derek told the White House team that they would have to find a way to share the research with Callie or Derek would walk. They shared. Score!

“I’m not signing that!”

Just as Alex feared, Jo freaked out over the Love Contract. She refused to sign as a matter of principle. With some encouragement from Meredith, Alex didn’t give up. Assuring Jo that this paper meant nothing (people die, people get sick, accidents happen, he’s completely unreliable…LOL!), his light-hearted approach finally won her over and she signed the paper. Thank heavens. Now Alex can kiss Jo whenever he wants to and we can move on to other story lines.

“You don’t meet the criteria.”

Despite the endless begging and pleading from a 17-year-old pregnant girl with a heart condition to be included in Dr. Yang’s trial, Shane finally manned up and told her she could not be a part of the study. Bonus points to Cristina for not backing down. Enough already.

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“He touches nothing.”

Meredith hired a bio-engineer to assist with her research project. Except she wouldn’t let him do anything. Fortunately, between Derek’s brain mapping initiative for the President and Cristina’s high-profile heart valve thingy trial, Meredith finally saw the light. She needed help to be able to take her portal vein research to the next level. She promptly began bossing Eric and Stephanie around. Hee. 

“Speak to no one of this.”

If there is one thing that is certain, it’s that any secret doesn’t stay a secret for very long at Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital. After Miranda Bailey stumbled upon the case of a lifetime (a man absorbed his own twin while in utero), she offered to let Richard in on the surgery, too, as a birthday gift. This was a good thing because Dr. Webber’s birthday hadn’t been going so well up to that point. Richard was in a mood since A) he thought no one remembered his birthday and B) he thought Owen was trying to put him out to pasture and get him to retire. 

Fortunately, the evidence turned out to be circumstantial. The retirement packet was routine paperwork from HR. The only reason Owen wanted to reduce Richard’s surgical hours was to free him up to become the director of the residency program, a job he was born to do.  And, despite blatant lies right to the man’s face, everyone remembered Richard’s birthday and they gave him a party. Surprise!!!

“I don’t need a date!”

Finally, Cristina spent most of the episode continuing her quest to fix Owen up with the Perfect Woman. She even filled out an online dating profile for him, sorted through the responses, and told him to pick three of her top ten candidates to meet for coffee. There’s only one problem: Owen’s description of the woman he wants sounds an awful lot like Cristina. By the episode’s end, my inference was that they would be spending another night together. Thus continues the push-pull between these two. What will become of my favorite pair? If the promo is any indication, that very question will be explored in great depth next week. Is it Thursday yet?

The next all-new episode of Grey’s Anatomy, “Do You Know?”, airs March 27th on ABC.

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(image courtesy of ABC)

Janalen Samson

Contributing Writer, BuddyTV