Sympathy for the not-so Devil...

So...tonight, I went into Grey's Anatomy with a new attitude. I decided that I wasn't being fair on Izzie, that just because if I knew her in life, she'd drive me to the edge, it wasn't fair to be so harsh on her. She is, after all, dying.

Mostly, I went into it with the attitude that her impending health decline was going to affect her friends and I do care about them. George, for example. He and Izzie have been best friends, soul mates in compassion and caring. Yes, they had the ill fortune to have an affair but, in all honesty, in real life...that happens. Friends mistake friendship for...something more. It's a nice bond; sex is just the sealant on an already strong relationship. But it also becomes a corrosive, wearing away at the bonds of friendship; perhaps it wasn't good sex, perhaps the deep feeling of connection didn't last beyond the last passionate embrace. Whatever it was, their friendship suffered because of their attempt to take it further. He's hurting because he feels as though he's lost touch with Izzie. Only Callie, once the victim of George/Izzie's ill-fated relationship, could make George see how much Izzie really meant...to both of them.

I care about Christina's reaction to Izzie. Christina "the Robot" as Izzie dubbed her. Christina is a strong, amazing doctor but she's used to detaching from a patient so that she can be a better doctor. Try as she might, she can't do that with Izzie, for better or for worse. Izzie and Christina have always been polar opposites, one feeling too much, one feeling too little. Now, at last, they're finding a way to balance each other out which is, in my opinion, a reason to not hate Izzie. Christina is strong, so strong she's allowed Owen to hurt her, to strangle her and still she forgives him. Yet, alone in the dark with him, she realizes that even she, as strong as she is, is afraid. So she does the only thing she has the power to do, she lets go. It hurts...but she lets go.

Then there's Meredith who struggles to be a better, stronger person, a strong, smart doctor and a girlfriend who isn't imprisoned by her past mistakes. She's always tried to extend the hand of friendship to Izzie but has never understood her; Izzie found light in darkness, Meredith absorbed the darkness and let it become her. Yet tonight, Derek finally proposed the right way, the only way that he could possibly have done in order to get Meredith to say yes. I admit, I knew it was coming but...yet...I can't help but be ecstatic. The elevator non-proposal, the recap of their amazing moments together in surgery...everything about that was right and so I look to these two in the future to guide the show, to continue to make us care.

And Alex...poor Alex. He's opened himself up, fought his natural instincts to let Izzie into his heart. He fell for her, completely and utterly. He's never had anything to hold onto; his family was abusive and cruel, providing little foundation for healthy romantic relationships. Yet Izzie provided the stability he needed and, at last, Alex found sure footing on which to build hopes and dreams. I love how he struggled tonight; he wanted to run but he couldn't. He cares too much. He knows Izzie is the best woman he's ever had and so, rather than cut and run, he's there, sitting by her bedside, ensuring a future life will be made of their union. He's trying...and Izzie is the reason.

So, you see, I can't hate Izzie, no matter how irritating she can be. Her character has had an influence on everyone, good and bad. Yes, mostly, I want to make her stop talking, even before she had cancer that affected her brain, I wanted someone to take away her medical license so she couldn't hurt anyone else. I always though Izzie would make a fine social worker, her do-good nature perfectly placed to help others without the risk of killing them accidentally.

Yet that's not going to happen. I don't know what will happen to Izzie, whether Derek's skills as a brain surgeon will truly give her more time or if, as I suspect, they just postpone the inevitable. Last week, I pleaded for Izzie to die. I've had a change of heart. I do want Katherine Heigl to leave the show because I think it needs changes and I think she's bringing it down. I don't know if I want Izzie to die; it would make sense but it might not be right. The odds are against her, whether or not Derek gave her more time to live her life and, perhaps, say goodbye.

Here's what I suspect...Izzie will have a new lease on life. She will seize the day with Alex; I wouldn't be surprised if a wedding is in their future. Yet I also suspect the happiness will be brief. We may not be witness to Izzie's sad death but, then again, I don't rule anything out. I do think Alex will be crushed and have to rise out of the ashes to regain his grasp on life. I hope he does. I hope all of my troubled yet brilliant residents at Seattle Grace can deal with Izzie's illness properly...by appreciating that which she gave them but knowing that they have to carry on, no matter what the outcome.

So, you see, for once, I'm not rooting against Izzie Stevens. Instead, I'm rooting for her. I did feel sorry for her tonight, she sat alone in her hospital room, terrified but trying to be brave. Bailey was there for her, reassuring her through science, comforting her with facts. Her friends were too scared, too afraid of what Izzie's illness means to them. Yet, in the end, they were there, terrified with her, hoping that she would be ok, proving that they are truly the 'people' that Izzie needs.

It took a while but I might be finally jumping on the bandwagon. Don't get me wrong, it still doesn't excuse Dead Denny but it does, at last, make me care about Izzie. It took long enough and it's scary but...it's happening. I just hope it lasts.

Christina Yang...Episode Redeemer

It's another Grey's Anatomy post. I do have the intention of writing about different shows but somehow it's Grey's that inspires me to write. Or, lately, complain.

You see, I think they want me to feel sorry for Izzie. Poor Izzie Stevens, Izzie who's dying, Izzie who has some horrible form of cancer that's in her brain. I tried. It lasted about one minute.

The rest of the episode, I seriously had this feeling that if I had to work at Seattle Grace with Izzie Stevens, I would have pushed her down the infamous staircase that is the scene of so many dramas that don't happen in the elevator. No, seriously.

On the other hand, if I worked with her and if she actually liked to be hugged, I would hug Christina Yang for being herself.

Tonight's episode was...interesting. It had one of the most disgusting surgical procedures that they've ever simulated on the show. Seriously, a face transplant? I'm not that squeamish but....ugh! I think it was the peeling skin sound effects. I could have lived without that.

I did like that patient though. He had a horrific face as a result of a horrible accident and, yet, by the end of the show, I was used to it. It wasn't hideous anymore. I loved that his online friends could see past the horrific face and see the person within but I think that was the point. It worked well.

What didn't work well was Izzie seeing it as a parallel to her own condition. I know, I know, I seem heartless. I should feel bad for this beautiful woman who just found out she's potentially dying.

Yet...it's Izzie. Everything is about her. In her world, it's always been about her. This poor man, hideously deformed because of a car accident, who has been waiting 12 years to be able to look something close to normal again is suddenly in the hospital in order to teach Izzie a lesson. What he has to live with on the outside of his body, she's living with on the inside of her body. If she shares that with her friends, she's afraid they'll run away, afraid to get close.

To be honest, I was afraid that Izzie was going to drag this out, to make it such a secret that we'd spend the next couple of episodes wanting her to tell someone, just to move the plot along. Fortunately, there is Christina Yang who likes to deal with facts, figures and surgical truth and doesn't like to mess with emotion. She has emotion for Izzie because as much as she'd hate to admit it, Izzie is part of Christina's world; a flesh and blood representation of a habit. Christina doesn't like that Izzie is willing to wilt away quietly or, as Izzie would probably perceive it, nobly. Yet it's not noble, it's almost pathetic. Again, it makes me sound cruel but she's always been so self-righteous that it's hard to seperate that. Even when faced with a life-threatening disease, Izzie can't just do the right thing, she has to internalize everything, make herself a victim and wait until someone stronger comes along to push her forward, as Christina did tonight.

I'm glad everyone knows now. It's about time. No more will we have to live with Izzie being Patient X. Hopefully that means no more Dead-Denny (note to Jeffrey Dean Morgan: You were GREAT as The Comedian in "Watchmen", do NOT let the Grey's folks persuade you to come back to their show. Do NOT allow yourself to step backwards and become annoying again).

This is going to sound really cruel but I hope Izzie dies. If she doesn't, Grey's will truly be resorting to the soap-opera-y plots that it's been accused of all along. Yes, there are soap-opera tendencies of the show but because of the strong acting and writing, they're forgiveable. If Derek Shepherd manages to save Izzie and thus complete his own journey through darkness to light, I will be furious, and I mean that. I get that Derek is lost and needs something to put him back on track. I get that a successful surgery would help that. Yet Izzie has a less than 5% survival rate. If she makes it, it'll be so unrealistic that it exceeds even the ferryboat disaster that happened in Season 3.

The truth is, in my opinion, Izzie needs to die. Katherine Heigl needs to get off the show. I find myself despising Izzie more every week even though I'm supposed to feel sympathy for her. I don' t know if that's Izzie or Katherine Heigl that's doing that to me anymore. I used to know. I used to be able to seperate fact from fiction. Lately, though, I just want Grey's to get back on track and I think without that character/actress, things might settle down a little. I know George might also leave. I don't really want that because I like George but if it's his time, so be it.

All I ask is that we get some of the old tone/theme/feel of the show back. There are parts of this season I like: Meredith and Derek, for example. Meredith has grown up. She's not running scared but running towards the danger of commitment. I like Christina; she's grown up but let some humanity colour her personality a little, no longer a full robot. I like that Alex, also, has become more human; he's no longer a cocky frat-boy but a doctor who actually lets himself care. I just hate that he finally lets himself fall in love and it's with Izzie. He deserves better.

I think you've probably figured out that I don't like Izzie. I've tried, believe me, I've tried. Yet even when she's dying, I find myself having this urge to shake her, to make her wake-up and realize that not everything in the universe is about her. That she's not some wounded soul, seperated from those around her. That isolation is her own doing; she's condemned Meredith and Christina multiple times for their choice of romantic partners, for their friendship, for their choices. She's fallen in love with a patient, stolen another patient's heart (literally, not figueratively), seduced her best friend, caused him to divorce his wife, only to discover that they're not a match made in heaven, after all. She's condemned Alex, used him as a sex toy, condemned him again and then, finally, decide he's worthwhile and used his crush on her to make him her own. She's had sex with a ghost. She's lied, a lot. She's killed a couple of patients. She's betrayed her friends. I could keep going but you get the idea. When it comes down to it, Izzie doesn't do much good. She's a bad doctor, friend, lover and girlfriend.

So, now that she might be dying, I find myself watching Grey's with new hope. The hope is that they won't be wimps and let Izzie live. I know that it depends on the behind-the-scenes stuff, whether Katherine Heigl can wiggle out of her contract and, thus, leave the show. I hope she does. I think the show will be better for it. I've said that before and I'm saying it again. I just hope that if, Izzie does leave, it's a realistic leave-taking, not some Meredith-having-a-fatal-drowning-accident-in-which-she-ends-up-talking-to-Dead-Denny,-Pink-Mist-That-Girl-Who-Was-Impaled-in-the-Train-Episode-and-her-mother-and-realizing-that-life-is-worth-living-after-all episode. That was NOT good Grey's. Good Grey's are the moments like yucky-face-transplant-man getting to look at his new face and realizing that even if he hadn't have had the surgery, his friends don't care how he looks. It sounds trite but that was a good storyline because it makes me care.

It's not too late to make me care about Izzie. Trust me, I'll care if she knows she's dying. I'll root for her to keep going with that and I might even promise to be sad. As long as she doesn't come back as a ghost to have sex with Alex.

Because that would be a ridiculous storyline...right?

Depressed Derek, Soft Bailey...What's Happening to Grey's Anatomy?

So, it seems that unless I'm blogging about Grey's Anatomy, I don't blog much on Captain TV. Sad, really. It's not like I'm not watching any TV. Currently, my roster of shows is down to: 24, Lost, Grey's Anatomy, The Office and Dollhouse. This is a rather shocking thing to realize. I usually watch much more TV than that. Of course, I'm not admitting that I do, occasionally, get horribly and reluctantly sucked into The Ghost Whisperer but I promise you, afterwards I feel guilty, as though I should take a shower or something.

However, Grey's was back this week and, naturally, I have to blog about it. It used to be my favourite evening of TV. I won't say that I don't enjoy it anymore but it feels a little more like work and a little less like a way to unwind.

I don't like angry Derek. From the moment he sat on the sofa eating Alex's cereal, I wanted to smack him. I'm sure that killing that pregnant woman accidentally in the last episode had to have been hard but you'd think his high level of self-righteousness that surrounds him like a cloud would at least assist him in accepting his mistake. After all, when Meredith was trying to be a good human being and give the benefit-of-the-doubt to Eric Stoltz's serial killer character a few weeks ago, Derek was quite happy to condemn the prisoner and satisfy his own ego instead of doing what would have been the best action for the greater good. Machiavelli has been coming up a lot in my life lately and whether the end truly justifies the means. It does in TV shows, I can tell you that. Just watch 24 sometime. Jack Bauer's rather brutal torture methods are effective and usually assist in saving the U.S. from a rather nasty attack of some kind or another.

I think Derek is feeling sorry for himself. He has a right to, I suppose. His death toll is greater than the lives he's saved. He gets to wallow for one week, in my book. This has been his week. Next week, he better suck it up and start acting decently again or I'm going to dislike him even more than I ever have before. As I've said, I have a soft spot for Meredith. I'm not as dark and twisty but there are aspects of Meredith I can relate to just because I get her. I don't like Derek treating her badly. I was angry when he threw away that ring but I'm proud of her for not leaving him. I just hope they find that ring. When I was a little kid, I used to like to play hide and seek with objects. I once had a Snoopy ring that I loved. I thought it'd be fun to 'lose' it and then find it again so I tossed it into the long grass of our backyard. I never did find that damn ring and to this day, I kick myself for being so stupid that I threw it in the first place. Maybe I'm a little too invested in that ring of Derek's but not because I want him to propose; rather, I just want him to find the damn thing before it's lost because he'll wake up 20 years later and still wonder where the heck it went to.

But I digress. I haven't even begun to talk about Izzie yet. For a few moments, I actually felt sorry for her. She has cancer. She wasn't supposed to have cancer, if you believe the early spoilers for the show but I'm guessing that it was the only diagnosis that made sense. It's fine with me just as long as she doesn't start hallucinating about Dead Denny* again.

(*side note: Dead Denny, aka Jeffrey Dean Morgan, was in "The Watchmen" which I saw this weekend. I wasn't sure if I'd be able to deal with him given how much you know I adored him when he was haunting Izzie (yes, sarcasm intended). I will say he was excellent and not, for one moment, did he act like Dead Denny. I like him again now. Just as long as he doesn't come back to Grey's Anatomy.)

Anyway, I feel a little bad for Izzie. I get that she's not ready to tell Alex that she's sick. He's finally getting respect as a doctor and it suits him. She doesn't want to bring him back down again when he's finally getting to move up. I even get why she's not ready to tell George; he's her best friend. Telling him makes it real. So she told Christina. I get that, I suppose. Christina will digest the news and process it but she won't let it get in the way of her being a good doctor. Everyone else would be too emotional. It makes sense.

Yet there was still a little part of me that wondered why she was going through such drama with the interns. Did she know her diagnosis or did their discovery of her disease provide the answer that she sought? If so, honestly, did she really trust those interns and their accuracy? Seriously? They're the lamest, most generic group of characters on any show since Season 7 of Buffy when the Slayerettes invaded Sunnydale.

I wanted her to tell Lexie. I used to think Lexie was a stupid plot device yet somehow over the course of a season, she's become a real character and I like her. She's the new George O'Malley only, you know, smarter. George is pretty useless these days. He pops up, interjects a few lines of dialogue and then he's gone.

I would have liked to have seen Izzie be honest with someone who would have probably had an emotional reaction in the beginning but would have been able to pull it together enough to figure out what Izzie's best course of action should be. I think Lexie could have been that person. I was ok with it being Christina until I saw the previews for next week. It looks like Izzie is going to swear Christina to secrecy which is going to annoy the crap out of me. We had to endure weeks of Dead Denny, can we not move Izzie's plot along any faster? If Katherine Heigl is leaving, I say just get rid of her now. Let her go forth and make more generic romantic comedies like "27 Dresses" that are entertaining but would be the exact same movie if she were replaced by Reese Witherspoon, Kate Hudson, Anne Hathaway or even Anna Faris.

I know it sounds mean but I really hope they follow through and kill Izzie. There's rumours that Shonda Rhimes is going to pull a bait-and-switch and kill George and let Izzie live. That would annoy me a lot. Kill Izzie. Seriously. Really. She's annoying. She's a terrible doctor. She's kind of stupid. Mostly, I just don't like Izzie and I think it'd be a more interesting show without her.

The rest of the characters were a little bland tonight. I normally like Bailey but I hate that she had to enlist the aid of the Chief's wife to get him to listen to her. The old Bailey, the one who hadn't suddenly decided she wanted to be a pediatric surgeon even though she crumbles at the thought of a child dying, the old Bailey would have made the Chief respect her decision. She wouldn't have needed help in getting him to listen to her. I don't like that she's softening up. I love Miranda Bailey because she doesn't take crap from anyone. Or, at least, she didn't used to.

I can't say I don't like the show anymore because if I didn't, I wouldn't still watch it or spend the time blogging about it. What I will say is that I recently rewatched Seasons 1 and 2. I wish Shonda and her team of writers would do the same thing. Those seasons were excellent. Season 3 wasn't bad but it had a few mistakes. Since then, the characters have evolved but not in the way you want them to evolve. The only character change I like is Meredith because hers has been a natural growth, a move from being isolated to being part of something. Sometimes it's best to stick with a good thing. Shonda, you don't need to make crazy things happen. The best moments of the show are when the doctors are being good doctors and they have good patients. There are fewer and fewer of those. I live in hope that we'll have more again but I'm starting to lose my faith again.

But, as I remind myself, there's no more Denny and that, at least, scores some points with me.

Izzie Stevens, it Really is Time to Go....

I have a confession to make. I'm starting to like Lexie Grey and Mark Sloane as a couple. I admit, in the beginning, I thought it was a gimmick, just another inappropriate pairing to try to bring ratings.

For weeks, I thought it was contrived and now, a few weeks later, I'm starting to think it could work. I'm starting to think that Lexie in all her sweet neurosis is the calmness that Mark Sloane, Dr. McSteamy himself, needs in order to stop being a cliche and start being a real man.

I'm not sure I like my change of heart. It could mean that I might have to doubt some of my earlier opinions on Grey's Anatomy. For example, I might rethink that Denny coming back from the dead and being the Most Smugly Annoying Ghost Ever was a good idea after all. I might think that maybe, just maybe, I misunderstood Izzie Stevens, that her do-good but act-stupid nature was actually compelling rather than groan-worthy annoyance. I might start thinking that it's ok that George O'Malley doesn't do much at Seattle Grace anymore.

However, I think I'm safe for now. I know it sounds mean but I'm actually hoping beyond hope that the rumours behind the scenes are true, that Katherine Heigl is going to be let out of her contract as she's been wanting for a while now. I think Grey's would be the better for it. It's obvious that Katherine thinks she's better than TV, that she believes her Oscar is waiting. Unfortunately, what she doesn't seem to realize is that any young female actress in Hollywood could play the roles she's choosing. Seriously, think about "27 Dresses". Now, replace Katherine Heigl with, say, Anne Hathaway, Reese Witherspoon, Isla Fisher....not much different, huh?

Seriously, I think Grey's needs to lose Izzie. It's time. She's a whiny pain who does nothing but complain and try to get other people to solve her problems. She judges others for the same things she, herself, does on a regular basis. She's been relagated to the clinic, rarely does she interact with Alex, Meredith, Christina or even George anymore. She somehow ended up with ALL of the interns (who knows how and why that happened) and she's now realizing she's dying of some as-of-yet undiagnosed condition.

I should feel sorry for her but I don't. I feel sorry for Alex who might have be losing the first women he's really let himself love. I feel sorry for George who could be losing his best friend, the inevitable confused relationship that male/female friends inevitably explore. I feel sorry for Meredith who has tried to stop and be friends with Izzie even though Dr. Stevens has ignored her, embarrassed her, exploited her and used her.

Yet there's little sorrow for Izzie herself.

Aside from Izzie, tonight's episode was better. I think it was better because I realized that I didn't have to watch Private Practice too. The storyline was resolved on Grey's and Addison Montgomery got to go back to Los Angeles to the stereotypical new-agey lifestyle that Southern Californian's exude and escape the misery of Derek Shepherd.

And he has misery. Poor Derek. He lost a lot of patients on his clinical trial and, even though, in the end, he succeeded, he can't forget those deaths he caused in trying to be the best, to be better than a man, to be a god. He tried so hard to save his patient tonight, even trying to save her life though she'd live as a vegetable, a near-monster, unrecognizable to anyone who'd ever known her. In the end, he lost his fight. He's not used to that. He's a broken man, now a mere mortal when before, he'd been a god, the best of the best.

I'm just glad he has Meredith. She's come so far over the past couple of years. Though she's still neurotic enough to be bothered by Derek working with his ex-wife, she's now mature enough to be there for him, to recognize that now, she's the one he listens to, the one who can pull him out of his own mind and bring him back to earth.

And, when he crashes, she's there to catch him, to bandage his wounds and give him a drink and just hold him, to let him know it's ok to just be a man. Meredith has matured over the past seasons and Grey's is the better for it.

I can't say there aren't flaws in the show. I mean, Izzie IS still on the show. I wasn't sure about Dr. Hunt and Christina but these last episodes have shown that they need each other. His hardness brings out her softness and, for Christina Yang, that's definitely an admirable feat.

I'm still not sure about Bailey going to Pediatrics. I like the idea of her becoming Chief some day. Yet she wants it and, maybe, it'll work. I'm also still not sure about Callie; one minutes she's experimenting with being bi-sexual and the next, she's fully gay. I think Callie needs to focus on medicine for a while, to let herself figure out who she is instead of jumping from relationship to relationship.

And Sloane and Lexie....they're swaying me. Ever since she broke his penis, she's been good for him, slowing him down and making him realize that there's more to life than sex. She's a good fit for him as long as she doesn't tame him completely. Grey's wouldn't be Grey's without a little McSteamy. Just because he's experimenting with being tamed doesn't mean he's completely ready.

And while the show continues to lose me one minute and hook me the next, I still live in hope that'll it'll find its footing again. I just hope it doesn't mean I have to keep watching Private Practice because, seriously, I can't...I've tried, oh, I've tried. And I can't. Not for Piz, not for Taye Diggs and not even for Addison Montgomery. No more crossover 'events'. Please.

An Ode to Benjamin Linus

I like dark characters. You've probably got that from reading my Dexter posts. I have a fondness for the complicated and shadowy non-black-and-white world. I like that while Dexter Morgan does what is regarded as wrong and inherantly evil by taking human lives, his moral code complicates matters and turns it into an act of heroism, ridding the world of the rubbish that preys on it.

This is probably why I'm enamoured with Benjamin Linus from Lost. I have a confession; I was a fickle viewer back in Season 3. I quit Lost, cast it aside like an old boyfriend that no longer fit me. I don't remember where exactly I gave it up but the show was starting to wear on me and I couldn't be bothered anymore. My giving it up also can be blamed on J.J. Abrams. Since he had helped create the show and it was going into inevitable decline, i assumed it was going to go the way of all J.J. Abrams shows- a great premise, exciting action and then a complete and utter jaunt into the ridiculous that took away from everything I'd originally loved about the show*

(*For a prime example, see Alias)

Yet then came the writer's strike and there was nothing on. I had friends who said that season 3 of Lost had the coolest ending ever. So I Netflixed the rest of the season from the point at which I'd quit.

And I realized then that I shouldn't have given it up. Realizing that the flashback was a flashforward was genius.

Since then, my admiration for the show has grown. Every moment is carefully choreographed like an elaborate dance, weaving in and out of mythologies, creating intricate connections between all of the characters in some way or another. It's amazing, compelling TV.

For me, every week, though, it's Ben Linus who has me truly hooked. He's a perfect villain, the Keyser Soze of the small screen, complicated, manipulative and so full of lies that it's impossible to know when he's telling the truth.

I love him for that. The actor, Michael Emerson, plays him with brilliance; he's both creepy and compelling. I don't want him to be the bad guy because I don't want him to lose. How's that for screwy thinking? The villain always loses at the end of every heroic tale. It's hard to say if Ben is really the true villain of Lost or if he's just an ambassador. Yet most of the time, especially to the Oceanic Six, he is the villain. He's a chessplayer moving all of his pieces exactly where he wants them even though even Ben may not know what the endgame is. He never misses a beat. One of my favourite scenes is where he gets transported off the island into Tunisia. He's instantly assailed by would-be attackers. Ben doesn't miss a beat, deftly beating the crap out of the men with his telescopic beating-rod (sorry, I don't know the technical name for it). He then walks into a hotel as though that happens every day. Who knows, for Ben, it probably does.

Every week, we learn more about the Island, more about the characters. I love that the stakes are raised, everything is changing all the time. The time travel is brilliance and being executed perfectly, revealing the truth about events that happened clear back in Season 1, events that, on any other show, would have been forgotten, abandoned in hopes of a more sensational plot. Not with Lost, however. Lost is a show for the nerds of the world, the geeks who thrive on details that most people would miss. I confess, I'm one of them. I live for the "holy crap!" moments that the show delivers every week. It's a puzzle and even though it seems as though we're getting closer to solving it, instead we're seeing that it's not just one puzzle but an artful weaving that goes on indefinitely.

At the heart of it is Ben. We still don't know if he's good or bad, not really. We know he lies but only at times because at other times, he's brutally honest. For example, a couple of weeks ago, Kate confronted Ben and accused him of trying to take Aaron away to manipulate her. Jack, not wanting to believe that even Ben could be that cruel, tries to defend him and, in response, Ben simply says, something along the lines of, "no, that was me." Cruel, blunt and precise, Ben never minces words. He can be snarky, particularly with John Locke. He always gets what he wants.

While this week's episode, "316" had a lot of unanswered questions, where is Aaron?, why is Jin in a Dharma jumpsuit driving a Dharma van?, why are Sayid and Hurley on the plane, the one question that I want to know is this: Benjamin, who did you kill and who dared beat you up this time?

There's only one and a half seasons left of Lost, the writer's endgame is moving forward. I hope that means Ben's is too, no matter how grisly and dark it gets. The darker Ben is revealed to be, the more compelling the show and the more I'm hooked on watching it. In a way, I can't wait for the end of the show, to see how it plays out.

On the other hand, I don't want it to ever end, the ride is too much fun. Especially when Ben is the driver.

So...Exactly...What WAS the Point of the spinoff?

So, I'm currently watching the Private Practice/Grey's Anatomy crossover. It's the Private Practice half now. During the Grey's portion, I did, at least feel like I was interested. I mean, in spite of some horrid mistakes over the past two seasons, Grey's still continues to compell me.

I admit, when I sat down to watch the two hours of television, I did wonder if I'd have quitter's remorse towards Private Practice. I gave it up a few months ago and still remember the show, the characters and the reason that I quit in the first place.

Then I watched tonight's crossover and I realized that no, in fact, I did not miss this awful show.

I do miss Dr. Cooper, the unlucky-in-love pediatrician. But I don't actually miss Dr. Cooper, I miss Agent Kellerman from Prison Break, also played by Paul Adelstein. I miss Kellerman's ruthlessness, his backbone, his vicious sense of purpose. I do not, however, miss Dr. Cooper's drippy world of Oceanside Wellness.

I miss Addison Montgomery but not the Addison from Private Practice. I miss the Addison from Grey's Anatomy. Seeing her back at Seattle Grace again reminded me why I missed the old days of Grey's. These days, the hallways are filled with too much drama that seems so farfetched, it's hard to relate. Tonight, I hated watching Meredith, who has come so far over the past season, who has confronted her demons and named them, watch the love of her life morph into a different man, a man she doesn't know.

Because tonight, Derek became a character on Private Practice and that was ugly. I don't care that he wrote a song for Addison for their wedding. I don't care that his oldest, dearest friends are suddenly back in his life. I like Derek with Meredith. I like the Derek who remains steadfastedly a part of Seattle Grace, not the one who's caught in the half-life between Oceanside Wellness and the world we've seen him occupy for the past four years.

Mostly, I confess, I hate that I'm being suckered into watching the insipidly annoying characters of Private Practice. I want to like them....but I can't. I find myself wondering how Dr. Charlotte can have such terrible hair. I wonder how Taye Diggs can pick such bad roles (Kevin Hill, anyone?) and still remain attractive. I wonder how Tim Daly can be so bland. Then Dell, the midwife-receptionist-whatever-he-is-these-days, wanders on screen and suddenly I find myself missing Veronica Mars with a longing that only the best TV can fulfill.

I can't complain, really. At times, Grey's still fulfills that longing. These days, Lost is blowing me away with its intricate genius. I'm watching 24 and enjoying Jack Bauer's breathless sense of action for the first time in several seasons. And tomorrow, I have the first episode of Joss Whedon's Dollhouse to look forward to. So there is good TV to watch. I'm just not watching it at the moment, no matter how much they try to throw Alex Karev, Derek Shepard or Dr. Bailey at us during an episode of Private Practice. I mean, seriously, isn't the whole reason Addison left in the first place was to try something new?

Clearly, if that something new has to rely on the something old to get some ratings, something is wrong. I gave Private Practice a fair shake, a season and a half of watching. Yet it annoyed me and I quit. Now I'm watching it for the first time in weeks just because it's gone back to the world that gave it life in the first place.

It's like trying to take a cutting from a plant. Sometimes, it can thrive on its own and grow into something unique, something different. Yet sometimes that cutting can't survive on its own, it has to go back to its source to survive and renew it.

And that is where we are with Private Practice. It was a noble experiment but it just didn't work. It's time to either take the transplant back to its roots or put it out of its misery. Addison is a strong character but she's not enough to support a dying show. She needs to go back to Seattle Grace. She can take the place of Izzie and George, if the rumours are true that Katherine Heigl and T.R Knight are really leaving. I think Grey's would be better for it. If not, at least the 10 p.m. slot behind Grey's could be filled with something new.

I gave Private Practice a fair shot. I even tried tonight but when I'm spending the hour blogging instead of watching, you know something's wrong. I hate this Archer character. He's annoying. I think I'm supposed to, actually. Yet when he's just one of a roster of annoying characters, it's nothing special.

Also, I hate being manipulated in having to watch a show because otherwise, a story is not complete. Seriously, Private Practice, if you need Grey's Anatomy to give you life, it's time to let go. Seriously. Seriously.

But I Don't WANT to Watch "Private Practice"!

I apologize for not having any new posts for a while. I thought about blogging about Lost but there are far better, far more loyal bloggers who already cover that. I could have covered the super-bizarro dream I had last night in which I was on a Lost-esque island that turned out to have strange 'stations' which were more like something out of Stephen King's The Waste Lands than Lost. The same dream also featured Weevil, a character from Veronica Mars trying to attack Logan Echolls (also from Veronica Mars, lately of Moonlight) with Heroes' Ando/Elle powers of super electricical impulses and then being sucked onto the Lost-esque isle in order to help solve the mysteries. I mean, this is a TV blog and wow, my subconscious did seem to tell me that maybe I watch too much TV.

However, rather than expose you to the minutae of my addled brain, I thought I'd wait until this week's Grey's Anatomy since that seems to be the main theme of this blog lately.

On a side note, I read a spoiler/article that mentioned that Denny is NOT 'dead' as I had celebrated in the last blog but will appear until March. I'm ignoring that because tonight's episode had no Denny and no Denny is as good as Dead-Denny but not the haunting-Izzie-Dead-Denny but the good Dead-Denny who died at the end of Season 2. You know the Denny I mean, the charming one who made you sad when they played "Chasing Cars" and saw Izzie in her prom dress.

I digress. Onto tonight's episode. It wasn't bad, actually. Especially in light of some of the more recent episodes. I will say that until next week, I'm choosing NOT to acknowledge the big Private Practice/Grey's Anatomy crossover. It happened at the very, very end of this week's Grey's and one minute into Private Practice when the "Fourteen Hours Earlier" flashed across my screen, I realized that this week's PP was probably going to do something very similar and involve Grey's at the very last minute. Thus, I refuse to watch it. I already blogged about how I gave up watching that show. I don't care how much you try to tie Addison back into Grey's; if she comes with that super-sexed, super-annoying, super-smarmy lot from L.A., I'm not watching until I have to. For now, I'm going to try to skip the PP part of the crossover and try to stick solely to Grey's. It'll probably be a bit like trying to eat vegetable soup and picking out everything but the carrots but still, I'll try it.

Yet tonight episode of Grey's had some good moments. I'm so relieved that Christina and Meredith are friends again. I'm loving that Meredith is treating Lexie almost like a sister rather than an abhorred stranger. I'm enjoying that Christina is giving Dr. Hunt a chance, even if he is a little spazzo and very, very much Dr. McPTSD at the moment. I like that Derek is going to propose although I hate that the uber-dramatic PP/Grey's crossover "event" is getting in the way.

The things I'm not sure about is Callie and Arizona, the 'new' pediatrician. See, I though Callie wasn't sure she WAS gay. I thought Callie had decided she would never be gay in the way that Erica Hahn realized she was. I thought Erica Hahn left the show because ABC decided that the gay relationship was too much. Now, suddenly, Callie is gay. And she has a new love interest. I'm not sure where this is coming from. I'm not against gay relationships and actually, I quite like Arizona. I'm just confused, like I'm sure so many other viewers are as to why Erica got left behind, inexplicably and permanently in the allegorical parking lot of Seattle Grace and now, suddenly, it's ok for Callie to keep having flings with other women. I actually liked Hahn. I thought she was growing as a character but...whatever. I'll follow this storyline for now and hope that it grows and becomes something and isn't another excuse for Callie to be bitter and hurt by the cards that Shonda Rhimes deals her.

I'm also not sure about Bailey's newfound aptitude for pediatric surgery. I think that's a bad idea. Yes, she's good with kids but she gets WAY too emotionally involved and that's dangerous. She became much less Bailey and far more Izzie during the storyline with Jackson, the kid who was dying for the past three weeks. I don't like seeing Bailey falter and become unsure; I like my Bailey confident and secure. I think she should stick with General Surgery. It suits her.

And then there's Izzie. Now that Denny's 'gone', I thought she'd be better. Instead, she wastes hundreds, even thousands, of dollars having the interns run tests on her under the guise that she's teaching them because she knows she's sick but doesn't want to admit it. Once more, Izzie proves to be a financial drain on Seattle Grace and a drain on my patience.

Of course, she did get a lot more screen time than George who made a cameo this week. Yes, readers, George O'Malley appeared long enough to provoke our thought processes to respond: "Oh, hey, I forgot he worked here" and then he vanished. I like George. My advice to the Grey's powers-that-be, save George, lose Izzie. Not that they'll listen but I live in hope.

So, next week it looks like Addison's back, bringing her cronies from L.A. I know they're all friends with Derek so it'll probably make sense. I even think bringing Addie back to Seattle Grace makes sense. I just wish that would mean that her stint in Private Practice is over and she's realized that she belongs in the far more interesting world of Grey's Anatomy. However, I'll watch, hoping that Grey's will continue to make a come back into the world of good TV and finally leave behind the dangers of shark-jumping.

Because when Grey's is good, it is very, very good. It makes you count down until the next episode. It makes you compare people you know to characters on the show. It makes you smile when you remember quirky moments, sad when you recall the poignancy that stellar storylines can give you.

Yet when it's bad, it's scary. And when it's bad, it brings back Denny. And if he comes back, he'll probably tell Izzie: "I'm here for you". And we all know how Captain Monkeypants feels about that. It inspires anger and a tightly-gripped remote control. I've already worn off the writing below the buttons, don't make me break it too.

But this week had no Denny. And no Denny is good.

I live in hope.