The balance between medical cases and touches of personal storylines continues.
The interns were mostly endearing during Grey's Anatomy Season 20 Episode 7, but the connections to the medical cases were most compelling.
If it slipped anyone's mind that the new batch of interns has shades of the OG interns, then this installment was a reminder of how much Simone Griffith is her class' Meredith Grey.
Most of the season has focused on the interns simply navigating life at Grey Sloan.
And sometimes, we don't delve into their personal elements nearly as much as we should.
The balance between giving us more insight into these new characters and providing surface-level connections to medical cases has been challenging.
But the installment revisited not only the pain of Simone dealing with a grandmother with dementia who still looks at Simione and sees the daughter she lost but also Simone's harrowing backstory.
She confided in Meredith and Richard Webber about how her mother died giving birth to her right at Grey Sloan.
Lauren's case would get to her no matter what the outcome. But thank goodness, the mother survived. If she hadn't, there wouldn't be any getting past that for Simone.
The whole situation was way too triggering.
Simone is one of those characters who is lovable or annoying on any given day, but that's what makes her so interesting. It's her complexities and trying to figure things out and get by.
She's messy, confused, and flawed, and that's so beautiful to see. It's great that Grey's gives her the space to be all these things.
It's better when the series peels back more layers to her (or any of the interns) rather than keeping things at surface level.
Lauren's case had the potential to be devasting, and it's a relief that they didn't go down the darkest possible path.
But they easily could have. Grey's can sometimes get incredibly preachy regarding the topics it chooses to dig into.
Subtlety works better than when they hammer us over the head with a specific issue and spout off facts and figures, not allowing the story they're telling to do the heavy work or trusting the audience's intelligence to infer things.
With Lauren's case and Simone's connection to it, they delved into the maternal mortality rate.
Dorian: Are they in trouble, or am I?
Bailey: They're interns. They're always in trouble.
For a "first-world country," America's maternal mortality rate is shocking, but what's even more appalling is the stats on how Black women specifically fare.
The disparity between Black women and others in that regard is downright disturbing and speaks to an intersectional issue that has yet to be adequately addressed.
It's what made every second of Lauren's storyline so daunting. From the second she complained of indigestion, it was evident that there was far more going on with her.
Yet, she fell through the cracks, even at Grey Sloan, with some of the best and a staff who tends to consider themselves hyperaware and active in combatting these issues.
Jo was reeling from realizing she was unwittingly complicit in the process. And that was an excellent way for them to approach this situation.
I think I need to quite General Surgery and focus all of my time on OB.
Jo
They could've easily used this incident to villanize some random person or paint a popular character negatively.
Instead, they showed how easy it is to overlook a woman. Jo prides herself on being sympathetic and observant, and she never envisioned she'd be one of those doctors, but it happened anyway.
She wants to do and be better, though. And to add to the laundry list of life changes she wants to make, she wants to fully commit to being an OBGYN rather than splitting her time between that and General Surgery.
It's always rewarding when a specialty clicks into place for a character 00 when they've found their passion and purpose. And now, she can ensure that what happened to Lauren won't keep happening.
She can do better now.
One minute, Lauren was fine, but then she wasn't. And next thing you know, we sorely missed Carina DeLuca in the OR doing what she does best: ultimately owning her element and working to save Lauren after the baby was delivered.
The longer we heard the monitor flatlining and saw Carina going through endless amounts of gauze soaked in blood, the more nerve-wracking things were.
You can't be blamed if you held your breath during those moments. It was touch and go for a while, and it felt as if Lauren would, as her husband so astutely put it, become another statistic despite their diligence in ensuring she wouldn't be.
The entire situation was emotional. It wasn't nearly as devastatingly haunting and raw as The Resident's "If Not Now, Then When" (an installment that is effortlessly the series' best), but it evoked what it needed.
Simone seeing her mother lying on that table rather than Lauren added something extra to that scene.
And who could she not see her mother during that situation? She thought she and the others were doing what they could to ensure Lauren would be okay, yet she was dangerously close to having the same fate as her mother.
Later, we learned she felt guilty for not vocalizing her concerns and pushing back against Jo and her superiors.
Her drunken moments at Joe's were heartbreaking, but the scene with Bailey was the most beautiful. It was poignant to see a motherless child getting comfort from a maternal figure and mentor like Bailey after that case.
Jules: If I lose, we have sex in a car. That's how confident I am.
Blue: Or how much you want to have sex with me in a car.
Through Bailey, she was experiencing the mom she didn't have.
However, they could also bond as two Black women who partially got into the fields they did, so they could be a beacon of hope and advocate for patients like Lauren and women like them.
It's a responsibility and sometimes even a burden but essential, and it was nice to have the two women convene over that because that sense of purpose and responsibility transcended their power dynamics.
Simone is clearly battling some unresolved issues regarding losing her mother, her grandmother fading away, and so much more.
No wonder she's not prepared to be in a classic Grey's 'ship right now.
But she is prime for great friendship, and again, it seemed as if we were getting that with her bond with Blue. They're very attuned to one another.
He's the sometimes Alex to her Meredith.
Meanwhile, Jules is the Izzie to his Alex. Their friendly competition via a bet was amusing because things had cooled between them for a while.
But then they veered right back up again because they can't stay away from one another for long, and it takes sneaking looks at one or the other to notice that they're still into each other.
Sex in the car as a bet is amusing. No one really loses in that situation, right?
I'm afraid of losing you, Teddy.
Owen
Their case was entertaining. Of all the ways to land in a hospital, make out with the woman you're having an affair with at some high school makeout point, and accidentally hit the gear shift, eliciting an accident is the worst.
Jillian was a standout patient. Her loudly confessing to cheating on her husband with the woman he can barely stand while the entire ER stops in its tracks at the tea was madness!
Worse yet, she didn't even seem to care about how he felt after that confession because she was too relieved over not experiencing as much pain when she yelled.
Jillian yelling in the scan and thanking Amelia for figuring out what was wrong with her was so funny, and the whole situation felt like something ripped from early Grey's.
Something that is also entertaining is how Owen has forged this fascinating circle with his ex-wife and current one. How has Amelia become both Owen and Teddy's confidant?
Towen is best friends, and they also share a bestie with Amelia. Owen has basically been using Amelia as his sounding board because he's been too afraid to confide in Teddy and stress her out.
While Amelia certainly needs her own storyline, it's no less precious that they all have a healthy respect for one another and lean on each other.
Once Owen Hunt opened up about his hard time, it made more sense why he's been treating Teddy as he has. She died right in front of him; you don't easily get over that.
Usually, Towen's marital issues are annoying or a slog, but this is rather sweet and handled well.
Lucas and Mika's makeup also felt cute and true to form.
Lucas spent the entire installment in his feelings about the girls letting Blue move in and feeling as if he's been replaced.
Never mind that it was his own doing that any of this even happened. He felt as if Blue took his spot, and he got left in the cold.
And he brought some of that into how he handled Dorian's friends.
You can understand Lucas' frustration. Dorian has been in the hospital for two months, and only recently did these friends show up.
And they didn't understand much about the severity of what he's dealing with and what his future looks like.
Lucas going off on them was unprofessional, but it was also a mood. But he was projecting his situation with Simone and Mika onto them.
Dorian has a long road ahead, and by now, they've focused on him enough extensively that he's destined to get killed off.
Every time he takes a step forward, he takes another back. The poor guy can't catch a break.
But at least Lucas' connection to him is endearing.
It was a relief that he and Mika made up, and how they did it via bickering was cute. They've quickly become each other's person.
Lucas didn't outright say it, but he's realizing that fact because it wasn't so much his messy love life that's had him reeling, but not having Mika's friendship.
The bonds forged amongst the interns only add to the nostalgic feel in the best possible way.
Over to you, Grey's Fanatics. How do you feel about Simone's emotional response to the case? Are you happy Mika and Lucas made up? Sound off below!
Grey's Anatomy airs on Thursdays on ABC. You can stream the following day on Hulu.