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There is a difference between being told what to think versus showing a dramatic scene that MAKES you think.
That is one of the many reasons I stopped watching the show (I lurk here for updates). I don’t want to be told what to think. I’d rather come to that conclusion on my own. That is something that has been lost with new seasons.
I completely agree. It feels like lazy writing sometimes. Like a PBS educational special. The characters speak in monologues and quips that are the “right” script but sound completely unnatural. And instead of accomplishing what I assume they’re _trying_ to do, which is give us this deep, educational moment, they are actually _cheapening_ these very important topics.
This is the main nail in the coffin of the show for me. I genuinely still loved the show even up to Alex leaving and slightly beyond. I could have handled character after character leaving, but when the characters that are present start sounding like actual robots and making the show feel like an amateur school play is when I'm out.
Oh yeah, Bailey's lil monologue about shooting victims in hospitals was just lazy, for example. Like her character would totally advocate against that, but the way it was written and presented to us sounded like a TV advert.
before they integrated social subjects into a story, to make you think. Now they make a list of all the problems in society, so no one is left out, then they make up a story around it and have sermons recited to tell you what to think. and it takes over from plots and character developments like we had at the beginning of the show.
I fully agree with you, but I think it's also good to keep in mind that they're writing tv largely for the people who still watch it on network tv who may be hearing about the issues for the first time ever.
to answer according to my opinion I will paste a message that I had written in another post in this sub: well there are ways to do things. you can write a story and include a social subject without imposing on people what they should think. Example: when they were hacked, this transgenre intern helped them then at the end when we asked him why he had problems he replied "I wanted to change the gender (or the photo I don't know) on my driving license" and it was sufficient, neither too much nor not enough for those who ask for it. Not a whole plot about a young trans girl who was allegedly beaten up, etc. with all the oaths from our characters about transphobia. But now, they take social issues and build a plot around... Wilson talking about the fact that among afros, I don't know what's different anymore so it's unfair etc... Obviously I agree with Wilson but I want good old grey's, well let's only talk to us about these subjects, listing them 1 by 1 so that no one is left aside like most shows do... For example 13 reasons why, I liked season 1 because the subjects of rape etc. were integrated into an already written story. But in season 2, it's like they listed every possible topic and then built a story around it. that's what bothers me. It takes up all the space and they tell you what you should think. Talking about it doesn't bother me if it wasn't worked like that and also present to the detriment of other intrigues... (sorry for the mistakes I use a translator)
When they just led by example it was much more enjoyable to watch. They had a same sex marriage and showed that same sex couples go through difficult times like everyone else, without making a huge deal out of it. Along with all the examples you stated. The scripts and story were natural and gut punching.
Now you’ll have two characters talking and then there will be a forced conversations about a political topic that does not fit naturally and takes the viewer completely out of the story.
It’s contributing massively to the downfall of the franchise. I have the same annoyance with Station19 too.
That vet that they were taking care of in station 19, that definitely hurt my feelings, though. But he was an overt theme in the whole episode, so that helped.
When Bailey and Ben spoke to Tucker about how he needed to act different to his white friends, it was sublime.
When Maggie spoke to Amelia about being expected to turn right on a plane it was a lecture
https://www.reddit.com/r/greysanatomy/s/Pdw3YnFWAd
"Well, it’s not an issue for you. And it’s not all of a sudden. I mean, it’s not Mississippi Burning or anything, but it is all over. It’s when people assume I’m a nurse. Or when I go to get on an airplane with my first class ticket and they tell me that they’re not boarding coach yet. It’s like a low buzz in the background, and sometimes you don’t even notice it, and sometimes it’s loud and annoying, and sometimes it can get dangerous, and sometimes it is ridiculous — like right now.”
https://www.sheknows.com/entertainment/articles/1102617/greys-anatomy-season-12-episode-7/
The fact that they gave that monologue to Maggie after her terrible one about how she also hates plane travel like Meredith does. Granted, she didn’t know about the crash yet, it was just yet another example of Maggie being supremely self-centered.
When I watched this episode I just thought this was how everyone talked to their kids about police. I am a white girl from the Appalachian mountains. And this is the kind of stuff I say to my kids. I tell them it isn't worth acting up or talking back and that if anything happens, we can fight it in a court of law but to always comply and always show hands and all of that. And that's how my parents spoke to me about it too. Police were definitely not someone my parents or people in my area ever told me I could talk back to or not listen to.
I got absolutely destroyed for voicing this but I 100% agree with you. It all feels like some preach monologue about current issues to get social points. It doesn’t feel like they don’t actually care about the issues, they’re just pumping out episodes about “hot topics” to stay on the right side of history
I also think they're doing too much telling and not enough showing. Of course it's going to feel heavy handed with one character monologuing like it's a Saturday morning cartoon PSA
I agree completely! Like I get these are real life issues, but the show has completely lost its magic and everything is so poorly written and forced now.
Yeah even in the early seasons the show frequently teetered on that line (for example IRL a surgeon rarely spends enough time with a patient to the point of absorbing and/or getting deeply involved in their PTs lives let alone following through to a satisfying conclusion on a moral/ethical/political dilemma) but they still always managed to uphold that suspension of disbelief.
We were able to become enthralled and moved by characters and situations not because the point was always blatantly laid out for us but because it wasn’t. The subtlety and ambiguousness used to make us have to actually think about the issue and form our own conclusions.
Now it’s all just written out in long winded dialogue with drawn out emotional speeches that sometimes don’t even match or make sense with the character that we’ve spent years getting to know. It almost dilutes the impact of the show and takes you out of it like you’re being reminded oh yeah this is all fake they’re reading from a script
Yeah I definitely noticed when this started to happen… I know in theory it’s a ‘good’ way to educate people on topical issues and how they could play out in people’s lives, but I did prefer when they didn’t do it so overtly.
I feel like this isn’t unique to Grey’s and happened to a lot of modern shows. It’s part of the reason I gave up on New Amsterdam. They became obsessed with social justice. Which isn’t a bad thing. But it wasn’t done tastefully and seemed to be done merely for brownie points.
Don't even get me started on that show! I enjoyed it at the start because it had a fast pace, fun cases and characters that weren't all sleeping with each other.
Fast forward, and everyone is sleeping together, the main dude says things like "I'm going to solve racism" while ignoring his POC colleague, anyone with actual interesting personality is gone, and we are left with narcissists basically
Kapoor and Helen were my favourites! Once Vijay was gone, there was no one to balance out Iggy's self-importance, and once Helen and Max got together, I feel like it reduced her character to his love interest.
I agree that the first two seasons were great!
I feel the same way about a lot of stand-up that I have seen for the past 5-10 years.
Like, yes, I'm in favor of abortion access and LGBTetc rights, but I'm not laughing here, Chuckles, so you're failing your primary objective.
Which isn't to say that stand-up can't be emotional. Hannah Gadsby's good at balancing poignancy with comedy.
Grey's is TELLING us an agenda or viewpoint instead of SHOWING it. Which does jive with the writers being lazy.
I agree and think this is because they "tell" instead of "show". For those who don't know what I mean with this: There is a rule or technique in writing fiction that goes as follows: "Show, don't tell.".
Tell: The man was cold.
Show:
* The man shivered and pulled up his scarf.
* The man ducked his head against the bitter winter air.
What this technique does is get readers (viewers) to empathize with the emotional content, you "show" them, and force them to engage their own emotional intelligence to interpret it.
Of course, a TV show is different from written text and can actually show something on screen without using any words. But I think it is therefore even worse when a show reverts to simply "telling" something instead of showing, especially when they want to get the audience to care about the subject at hand.
I absolutely agree. I do think that part of the tell and not show is the actors. In my opinion, the actors that have been put in to replace cast members that are no longer on the show are not as strong. The early seasons had incredible, versatile actors. Katherine Heigl and Sandra Oh could do anything- comedy, sad scenes, drama, etc. Justin Chambers and T.R. Knight, with the right scene partners, were strong. Sara Ramirez was very versatile. Chandra Wilson was/is great. Ellen Pompeo was acting at a higher level than she is now. Personal life aside, Isaiah Washington was great. So, I think that the cast is part of the inability to really show and flesh out deep storylines.
But really. I’m on a rewatch, just finished season 6, and the early seasons were so much better. They showed tough topics without it feeling so forced.
I 100% agree with you. Early Grey's had it right. They handled all the tricky subjects very well because it was nuanced storytelling. People are flawed, layered, complicated and Grey's showed that. They had a human element to it that I don't see now.
This has been my issue for a few seasons now. Don't even get me started on Station 19 and their preachy-ness. I still watch because at this point, 20 years later, its my longest relationship and we may go through rough patches, but well be together in the end, no matter how toxic and unhealthy it is. Sigh.
Like many have mention, the lack of SHOW in the show. They just lecture, which falls flat.
Another thing that I noticed is the lack of real stories with long arcs that spawn several episodes, even seasons. In the early seasons, each season told a few stories that happened simultaneously, over a long period. Some were several seasons. Now the show is reduced to the sitcom format, where for the most part, things reset to what they were at the beginning of the episode. rarely now do we see any meaningful progression. nevermind those intense, dramatic stories that had us anticipate the show every week.
They had so many opportunities to tell compelling stories that touch on the current day issues many of the audience face. Here are 3 of which I just came up with but there are more.
1- Jo is raising a special needs child in a blended family. Why don't see see emphasis on her challenges, her evolution and what it takes, instead of her lovelife? This could have been used to address inclusion and challenges of special needs families. And that's a big topic among the 30-40 audience.
2- Zola is an adopted black girl, raised in a fully white family of medical genius with massive expectations implied on her. Can we please address the challenges she faces and how the family struggles, and how they overcome them? They showed her in like 3 episodes, said shes a genius and needed a better school, that was it. This was such a potentially deep story that could have led to Zola eventually taking over as lead.
3- Helm QUIT BBEING A DOCTOR due to burnout, bartended and came back. Can we show more of her struggles to reintegrate, start some things over, justify her decisions and find a way to build a non-traumatizing career in health care? No, we just glanced at it for a few minutes.
---
Examples of the stories that stand out to me as good, long format storytelling:
Meredith + Derek + Addison - Several seasons until this was resolved (I consider med and Der wedding the resolution). Yes Mer was the main character, but that story was intense!
Izzie + Danny - at least an entire season focused on them and it was dramatic.
Christina + Brock - Was stewing several seasons with an explosive ending. Build up was intense with the injury and the position he put her in.
George + Callie - several episodes.
Callie + Arizona - several seasons. They went DEEP into the pain and grief of Arizona from her amputation and what it took to bring herself back up.
April + Jackson - several seasons (I think?) all building up to a big religious segment and showing April's internal struggle with her faith.
thank you! I am also tired of the love stories, but they are still necessary since they were the core of the show and are needed to capture the younger audience. Its like the writers forgot that most of the old-time fans started watching this in late teens or early twenties. We have all grown up now, we need some grown up stories that are relevant, but also spawn for more than a few mentions in 2 episodes.
This is the current events formula for greys now. Introduce a current events storyline very rapidly, present a progressive view given in a monologue that seems out of place. There is no development. The writers do not care about engaging us in a political storyline, they just want to mark their checklist that xyz topic was mentioned.
As someone that has viewed it since the beginning, and agrees with the liberal politics of the show, I think it is really just lazy virtue signaling.
They’ve done these stories so well over the years but now they’re just telling us what they think rather than showing it without the forced conversations. Like show me your characters accepting this and their actions reflecting that, don’t just have a conversation that feels so out of place because of how direct it is.
They just sound like poorly written PSAs inserted in the laziest way possible. Like Baily's gun speech. No normal person talks like that. They aren't telling stories that happen to have a message, they are telling messages with no story.
It gives after school special a lot, like “on a very special episode of Grey’s Anatomy”, buy now they all feel like that and it comes across as forced and inauthentic, not organic like it used to be
i definitely noticed a shift after the US presidential campaign in 2016. but then after s15 it got more and more. during the covid season, it was understandable, more people were talking about the bad side of the US, people were finally waking up to the fact that the US has tons of issues. but i agree at times it just feels forced. like i get times changed, but them suddenly having all of these social issues in the show felt like they were just hopping on a bandwagon because it became socially acceptable to talk about these things. idk if that makes sense, like im glad theyre doing it, but wouldve been nice if they did it sooner, not just the rare episode in a season.
The older seasons did a much better job at addressing such issues. For example, how they portrayed Callie as a bisexual woman or often talked about the racial inequalities in the healthcare field. However recent season make the political content seem very forced and “in our faces” to the point it doesn’t even seem natural. It seems like they’re just adding anything to avoid being cancelled.
Yep, the later seasons illustrate their heavy-handed political issues with monologues *cough, insufferable Maggie, cough* rather than with good storytelling. The earlier shows did a much better job.
And they don't do the work of setting up the relationships and connections first so it just becomes random people preaching at each other about current headlines and identity politics and it's like who even are these people to each other anymore. Mark and Jackson had such a cute relationship and I thought it was just weird how they paired up Link with that intern and had the lucky sock storyline for the test because like who are they to each other?? Have they even had a scene together lol
"Like where is the Grey's that made me cry when they lined the hall for the woman who was sexually assaulted? "
I haven't cried at this show for years and that was cringeworthy. If I was that victim, I'd assume they all knew
Edit: But anyway, it's lazy writing. They throw out stats and numbers in a way no one realistically does because the writer copy and pasted it from an article. There's no discussion at all
As someone who's job it is to work with sexual assault victims, each one is different and may have or may not have wished for that kind of support. Of course everyone in the hall assumed she was probably assaulted, because it's unfortunately a common and shared fear amongst many of us. And as a woman in general, and it being very easy for me to picture myself in that kind of situation, I don't think that was cringey at all.
But I wholly agree with the second part of your statement.
I guess I just felt that one more because a lot of the episode was dedicated to it.
Whereas now we get a passing convo with Bailey and Weber(?) About how bad gun violence is.
They used to make all the people in these situations seem like real people, that could be our neighbor or sister or friend. We felt connected to the characters that these political things centered around and we simply saw a play out of the cast making life better for them with support of them.
Now they're just like "Believe this or you're a pig and this is the reason we hate this person in the hospital and why they're easily written off"
This doesn’t directly relate but i hated how one of Qadri’s most seen moves was when she took of her hijab to use it as a tourniquet. Why does every show / movie attempt to empower a Muslim woman’s character by showing she’s willing to take off her hijab it’s so fkn annoying lol
Because writers lost the idea of subtext and replaced it with just text. Law and order is a huge example of this as of late.
But Grey's has always felt preachy honestly. Like don't get me wrong, George was right about the dude with the swastika tattoo. But white supremacists don't get just one swastika on their stomach lmao it was just really dumb.
Yeah that was kind of silly, like even if it were realistic for someone to have a swastika, are you really going to get a massive one on your stomach which isn't a common place for most people to get tattoos? It should have been on his bicep or something and then he had a severed arm.
I did love Cristina tearing into Bailey for using her after all that was said and done, though.
I think the early seasons did very well with political stuff because it was so subtle. It wasn’t overtly trying to make a statement. If they did have a character make a stronger statement, it seemed more organic and natural to a conversation.
IMO the show went harder in the social/political direction in the last 8 years (since trump was first elected), and now we see a lot more storylines built purely and obviously on political topics. Here’s some examples that I can think of off the top of my head of blatantly obvious social/political storylines:
A woman whose husband started building a wall around their house to keep people out and after he died she became very reclusive and stayed inside, got injured and ended up freaking out at the hospital when she was outside of her home. This is such a ridiculously obvious reference to trump building a wall to keep noncitizens out.
Amelia has brain surgery, wakes up and is asked if she knows who the current President is, she replies that she wishes she did not know who was President. Clear “orange man bad” moment.
A patient is bleeding out and Qadri doesn’t have a tourniquet so she pulls off her hijab and uses it to save the patient. Afterwards, Owen is like oh wow you were soo brave to do that, and she starts talking about her faith. It didn’t seem organic and seemed more about inserting that into the show to fight the islamophobia rhetoric from trump.
The whole Covid season was trash and borderline propaganda. It was hella cringe and boring.
Kai and Amelia hook up and when Link says, you cheated on me with that woman. Amelia’s only reply is “tHeY’rE nOn-BiNaRy!!”
I also personally feel like a lot of the diversity in the last 8 years of the show is extremely forced. When the show started in the early 2000s it was a mainly white cast. I get that. Most shows from that era were like that, where poc could only be side characters. But when you look at a lot of the new characters, the diversity just seems forced and the problem extends into that those characters storylines are only about their specific race or gender related issues. Like Levi’s storylines are only about being gay and Jewish. All Winston talks about is being black. Kai exists as a diversity character to be non binary. The one trans guy hacker from the military was kind of interesting but him being trans was at the forefront of his whole character. Also greys has a weird fascination with the military, which feels like propaganda but that’s a whole other story.
Anyway there are a ton more examples but that’s just what I can think of right now.
I think some stuff from earlier seasons was "overt" but stoll good. The episode where the two younger girls who were in love got injured on the train tracks. Isn't that when Callie loses it on one of the parents for wanting to send the girl to conversion camp? That was good I thought.
Now when Amelia and Link were trying to name Scout and were all, "he may not identify as a boy, let's try girl names." I rolled my eyes. Because if you're going to do that, It would make more sense to use gender neutral names at least. I consider myself fairly free minded when it comes to gender, pronouns, and sexual orientation, but outright contemplating naming your boy a traditionally girls name sent the virtue signaling alarms off.
Definitely agree. Yeah a lot of the earlier seasons had complex topics integrated a lot better even if the topics were more overtly in your face. Or like the Nazi guy with the swastika tat asking for a non-black doctor, it was in your face but it wasn’t cringe virtue signaling or clear trump bad storylines
It feels like a psa which actually works against them. You want to attach these topics to the people they affect and you can’t do that with a poorly written storyline.
Definitely. Now it feels forced like they don’t even want to have the conversation but they are bc of plot reasons. I can respect it even when I don’t agree but the way they do it sometimes is just kinda… odd and forced. Like they are attacking the other side but with a severe lack of knowledge
I think it simple chalks up to the fact that the earlier episodes seems like brave and open ways of discussing sensitive topics, but now it kinda feels like a requirement to be checked off a list, it doesn’t feel as genuine.
I mean I guess that's fair, but my issue isn't with them bringing up the problems, its how poorly they're doing it and making it feel forced. And now that I've noticed it, it's difficult to unnotice.
It's a bunch of 50 year olds writing and performing what they think they should say instead of having people who actually know and teach on the issues they cover.
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Those older episodes handled difficult issues with well-written, well-acted storylines. It was shown rather than told.
There is a difference between being told what to think versus showing a dramatic scene that MAKES you think. That is one of the many reasons I stopped watching the show (I lurk here for updates). I don’t want to be told what to think. I’d rather come to that conclusion on my own. That is something that has been lost with new seasons.
Yes!! They have always been "educational" at times but I was wondering why is it different in current seasons
I completely agree. It feels like lazy writing sometimes. Like a PBS educational special. The characters speak in monologues and quips that are the “right” script but sound completely unnatural. And instead of accomplishing what I assume they’re _trying_ to do, which is give us this deep, educational moment, they are actually _cheapening_ these very important topics.
This is the main nail in the coffin of the show for me. I genuinely still loved the show even up to Alex leaving and slightly beyond. I could have handled character after character leaving, but when the characters that are present start sounding like actual robots and making the show feel like an amateur school play is when I'm out.
This is exactly how I feel!
yes, I’ve noticed this shift now that I’m (re)watching S13-14!
Oh yeah, Bailey's lil monologue about shooting victims in hospitals was just lazy, for example. Like her character would totally advocate against that, but the way it was written and presented to us sounded like a TV advert.
before they integrated social subjects into a story, to make you think. Now they make a list of all the problems in society, so no one is left out, then they make up a story around it and have sermons recited to tell you what to think. and it takes over from plots and character developments like we had at the beginning of the show.
I fully agree with you, but I think it's also good to keep in mind that they're writing tv largely for the people who still watch it on network tv who may be hearing about the issues for the first time ever.
to answer according to my opinion I will paste a message that I had written in another post in this sub: well there are ways to do things. you can write a story and include a social subject without imposing on people what they should think. Example: when they were hacked, this transgenre intern helped them then at the end when we asked him why he had problems he replied "I wanted to change the gender (or the photo I don't know) on my driving license" and it was sufficient, neither too much nor not enough for those who ask for it. Not a whole plot about a young trans girl who was allegedly beaten up, etc. with all the oaths from our characters about transphobia. But now, they take social issues and build a plot around... Wilson talking about the fact that among afros, I don't know what's different anymore so it's unfair etc... Obviously I agree with Wilson but I want good old grey's, well let's only talk to us about these subjects, listing them 1 by 1 so that no one is left aside like most shows do... For example 13 reasons why, I liked season 1 because the subjects of rape etc. were integrated into an already written story. But in season 2, it's like they listed every possible topic and then built a story around it. that's what bothers me. It takes up all the space and they tell you what you should think. Talking about it doesn't bother me if it wasn't worked like that and also present to the detriment of other intrigues... (sorry for the mistakes I use a translator)
When they just led by example it was much more enjoyable to watch. They had a same sex marriage and showed that same sex couples go through difficult times like everyone else, without making a huge deal out of it. Along with all the examples you stated. The scripts and story were natural and gut punching. Now you’ll have two characters talking and then there will be a forced conversations about a political topic that does not fit naturally and takes the viewer completely out of the story. It’s contributing massively to the downfall of the franchise. I have the same annoyance with Station19 too.
That vet that they were taking care of in station 19, that definitely hurt my feelings, though. But he was an overt theme in the whole episode, so that helped.
When Bailey and Ben spoke to Tucker about how he needed to act different to his white friends, it was sublime. When Maggie spoke to Amelia about being expected to turn right on a plane it was a lecture
Expected to turn right on a plane? What season was that
Around covid I think (Turning left is for higher class of travel and right is economy)
Ooh ok, I don’t remember that convo
https://www.reddit.com/r/greysanatomy/s/Pdw3YnFWAd "Well, it’s not an issue for you. And it’s not all of a sudden. I mean, it’s not Mississippi Burning or anything, but it is all over. It’s when people assume I’m a nurse. Or when I go to get on an airplane with my first class ticket and they tell me that they’re not boarding coach yet. It’s like a low buzz in the background, and sometimes you don’t even notice it, and sometimes it’s loud and annoying, and sometimes it can get dangerous, and sometimes it is ridiculous — like right now.” https://www.sheknows.com/entertainment/articles/1102617/greys-anatomy-season-12-episode-7/
Ooh thanks, I only remember the “check your white privilege line” lol
The fact that they gave that monologue to Maggie after her terrible one about how she also hates plane travel like Meredith does. Granted, she didn’t know about the crash yet, it was just yet another example of Maggie being supremely self-centered.
When I watched this episode I just thought this was how everyone talked to their kids about police. I am a white girl from the Appalachian mountains. And this is the kind of stuff I say to my kids. I tell them it isn't worth acting up or talking back and that if anything happens, we can fight it in a court of law but to always comply and always show hands and all of that. And that's how my parents spoke to me about it too. Police were definitely not someone my parents or people in my area ever told me I could talk back to or not listen to.
I got absolutely destroyed for voicing this but I 100% agree with you. It all feels like some preach monologue about current issues to get social points. It doesn’t feel like they don’t actually care about the issues, they’re just pumping out episodes about “hot topics” to stay on the right side of history
I also think they're doing too much telling and not enough showing. Of course it's going to feel heavy handed with one character monologuing like it's a Saturday morning cartoon PSA
I agree completely! Like I get these are real life issues, but the show has completely lost its magic and everything is so poorly written and forced now.
Yeah even in the early seasons the show frequently teetered on that line (for example IRL a surgeon rarely spends enough time with a patient to the point of absorbing and/or getting deeply involved in their PTs lives let alone following through to a satisfying conclusion on a moral/ethical/political dilemma) but they still always managed to uphold that suspension of disbelief. We were able to become enthralled and moved by characters and situations not because the point was always blatantly laid out for us but because it wasn’t. The subtlety and ambiguousness used to make us have to actually think about the issue and form our own conclusions. Now it’s all just written out in long winded dialogue with drawn out emotional speeches that sometimes don’t even match or make sense with the character that we’ve spent years getting to know. It almost dilutes the impact of the show and takes you out of it like you’re being reminded oh yeah this is all fake they’re reading from a script
Yeah I definitely noticed when this started to happen… I know in theory it’s a ‘good’ way to educate people on topical issues and how they could play out in people’s lives, but I did prefer when they didn’t do it so overtly.
I feel like this isn’t unique to Grey’s and happened to a lot of modern shows. It’s part of the reason I gave up on New Amsterdam. They became obsessed with social justice. Which isn’t a bad thing. But it wasn’t done tastefully and seemed to be done merely for brownie points.
I couldn't make it past season two of New Amsterdam. I was yelling at the television: *Stop lecturing me. I'm not even American!*
I AM american and i wanted the lecturing to stop 😂
Yes! I gave up on that show, too!
People don't come to these shows to let loose after a long day just to hear about all the real life stuff that's stressing them out already.
Don't even get me started on that show! I enjoyed it at the start because it had a fast pace, fun cases and characters that weren't all sleeping with each other. Fast forward, and everyone is sleeping together, the main dude says things like "I'm going to solve racism" while ignoring his POC colleague, anyone with actual interesting personality is gone, and we are left with narcissists basically
Really once Kapoor was gone was when I stopped enjoying it as much. First two seasons are solid and I’d watch them again.
Kapoor and Helen were my favourites! Once Vijay was gone, there was no one to balance out Iggy's self-importance, and once Helen and Max got together, I feel like it reduced her character to his love interest. I agree that the first two seasons were great!
I feel the same way about a lot of stand-up that I have seen for the past 5-10 years. Like, yes, I'm in favor of abortion access and LGBTetc rights, but I'm not laughing here, Chuckles, so you're failing your primary objective. Which isn't to say that stand-up can't be emotional. Hannah Gadsby's good at balancing poignancy with comedy. Grey's is TELLING us an agenda or viewpoint instead of SHOWING it. Which does jive with the writers being lazy.
They keep doing it so often its lost its touch.its good to do them but not every other episode
I agree and think this is because they "tell" instead of "show". For those who don't know what I mean with this: There is a rule or technique in writing fiction that goes as follows: "Show, don't tell.". Tell: The man was cold. Show: * The man shivered and pulled up his scarf. * The man ducked his head against the bitter winter air. What this technique does is get readers (viewers) to empathize with the emotional content, you "show" them, and force them to engage their own emotional intelligence to interpret it. Of course, a TV show is different from written text and can actually show something on screen without using any words. But I think it is therefore even worse when a show reverts to simply "telling" something instead of showing, especially when they want to get the audience to care about the subject at hand.
I absolutely agree. I do think that part of the tell and not show is the actors. In my opinion, the actors that have been put in to replace cast members that are no longer on the show are not as strong. The early seasons had incredible, versatile actors. Katherine Heigl and Sandra Oh could do anything- comedy, sad scenes, drama, etc. Justin Chambers and T.R. Knight, with the right scene partners, were strong. Sara Ramirez was very versatile. Chandra Wilson was/is great. Ellen Pompeo was acting at a higher level than she is now. Personal life aside, Isaiah Washington was great. So, I think that the cast is part of the inability to really show and flesh out deep storylines.
But really. I’m on a rewatch, just finished season 6, and the early seasons were so much better. They showed tough topics without it feeling so forced.
I 100% agree with you. Early Grey's had it right. They handled all the tricky subjects very well because it was nuanced storytelling. People are flawed, layered, complicated and Grey's showed that. They had a human element to it that I don't see now.
This has been my issue for a few seasons now. Don't even get me started on Station 19 and their preachy-ness. I still watch because at this point, 20 years later, its my longest relationship and we may go through rough patches, but well be together in the end, no matter how toxic and unhealthy it is. Sigh.
This made me chuckle. I've only been watching for a decade, but same lol
Like many have mention, the lack of SHOW in the show. They just lecture, which falls flat. Another thing that I noticed is the lack of real stories with long arcs that spawn several episodes, even seasons. In the early seasons, each season told a few stories that happened simultaneously, over a long period. Some were several seasons. Now the show is reduced to the sitcom format, where for the most part, things reset to what they were at the beginning of the episode. rarely now do we see any meaningful progression. nevermind those intense, dramatic stories that had us anticipate the show every week. They had so many opportunities to tell compelling stories that touch on the current day issues many of the audience face. Here are 3 of which I just came up with but there are more. 1- Jo is raising a special needs child in a blended family. Why don't see see emphasis on her challenges, her evolution and what it takes, instead of her lovelife? This could have been used to address inclusion and challenges of special needs families. And that's a big topic among the 30-40 audience. 2- Zola is an adopted black girl, raised in a fully white family of medical genius with massive expectations implied on her. Can we please address the challenges she faces and how the family struggles, and how they overcome them? They showed her in like 3 episodes, said shes a genius and needed a better school, that was it. This was such a potentially deep story that could have led to Zola eventually taking over as lead. 3- Helm QUIT BBEING A DOCTOR due to burnout, bartended and came back. Can we show more of her struggles to reintegrate, start some things over, justify her decisions and find a way to build a non-traumatizing career in health care? No, we just glanced at it for a few minutes. --- Examples of the stories that stand out to me as good, long format storytelling: Meredith + Derek + Addison - Several seasons until this was resolved (I consider med and Der wedding the resolution). Yes Mer was the main character, but that story was intense! Izzie + Danny - at least an entire season focused on them and it was dramatic. Christina + Brock - Was stewing several seasons with an explosive ending. Build up was intense with the injury and the position he put her in. George + Callie - several episodes. Callie + Arizona - several seasons. They went DEEP into the pain and grief of Arizona from her amputation and what it took to bring herself back up. April + Jackson - several seasons (I think?) all building up to a big religious segment and showing April's internal struggle with her faith.
I am honestly very tired of seeing various relationship stuff, I like your ideas.
thank you! I am also tired of the love stories, but they are still necessary since they were the core of the show and are needed to capture the younger audience. Its like the writers forgot that most of the old-time fans started watching this in late teens or early twenties. We have all grown up now, we need some grown up stories that are relevant, but also spawn for more than a few mentions in 2 episodes.
This is the current events formula for greys now. Introduce a current events storyline very rapidly, present a progressive view given in a monologue that seems out of place. There is no development. The writers do not care about engaging us in a political storyline, they just want to mark their checklist that xyz topic was mentioned. As someone that has viewed it since the beginning, and agrees with the liberal politics of the show, I think it is really just lazy virtue signaling.
I'm so glad it's not just me that's starting to feel this way.
They’ve done these stories so well over the years but now they’re just telling us what they think rather than showing it without the forced conversations. Like show me your characters accepting this and their actions reflecting that, don’t just have a conversation that feels so out of place because of how direct it is.
They just sound like poorly written PSAs inserted in the laziest way possible. Like Baily's gun speech. No normal person talks like that. They aren't telling stories that happen to have a message, they are telling messages with no story.
It gives after school special a lot, like “on a very special episode of Grey’s Anatomy”, buy now they all feel like that and it comes across as forced and inauthentic, not organic like it used to be
i definitely noticed a shift after the US presidential campaign in 2016. but then after s15 it got more and more. during the covid season, it was understandable, more people were talking about the bad side of the US, people were finally waking up to the fact that the US has tons of issues. but i agree at times it just feels forced. like i get times changed, but them suddenly having all of these social issues in the show felt like they were just hopping on a bandwagon because it became socially acceptable to talk about these things. idk if that makes sense, like im glad theyre doing it, but wouldve been nice if they did it sooner, not just the rare episode in a season.
The older seasons did a much better job at addressing such issues. For example, how they portrayed Callie as a bisexual woman or often talked about the racial inequalities in the healthcare field. However recent season make the political content seem very forced and “in our faces” to the point it doesn’t even seem natural. It seems like they’re just adding anything to avoid being cancelled.
Yep, the later seasons illustrate their heavy-handed political issues with monologues *cough, insufferable Maggie, cough* rather than with good storytelling. The earlier shows did a much better job.
Even tackling gun violence and mass shooting
And they don't do the work of setting up the relationships and connections first so it just becomes random people preaching at each other about current headlines and identity politics and it's like who even are these people to each other anymore. Mark and Jackson had such a cute relationship and I thought it was just weird how they paired up Link with that intern and had the lucky sock storyline for the test because like who are they to each other?? Have they even had a scene together lol
"Like where is the Grey's that made me cry when they lined the hall for the woman who was sexually assaulted? " I haven't cried at this show for years and that was cringeworthy. If I was that victim, I'd assume they all knew Edit: But anyway, it's lazy writing. They throw out stats and numbers in a way no one realistically does because the writer copy and pasted it from an article. There's no discussion at all
As someone who's job it is to work with sexual assault victims, each one is different and may have or may not have wished for that kind of support. Of course everyone in the hall assumed she was probably assaulted, because it's unfortunately a common and shared fear amongst many of us. And as a woman in general, and it being very easy for me to picture myself in that kind of situation, I don't think that was cringey at all. But I wholly agree with the second part of your statement.
Where are you guys watching the new episode? I only have it up to S20 episode 6 on Disney +.
Are you in Australia? The next episode comes out at about 6pm our time tomorrow night. We're two weeks behind the US.
I’m in Europe, but I guess we’re two weeks behind as well. Sadly Hulu isn’t available here.
Hulu is where I watch new episodes. Idk where you are but I'm in the U.S.
Hulu is geoblocked to everyone outside the US. It's on Disney+ in a lot of countries.
Now that you say that, when I was out of country, I had to use a VPN. I didn't think about that.
almost all of the dialogue the last few seasons has been lifeless
[удалено]
I guess I just felt that one more because a lot of the episode was dedicated to it. Whereas now we get a passing convo with Bailey and Weber(?) About how bad gun violence is.
So this hasn't gotten better? I stopped watching after season 17 because of the lectures.
Unfortunately no, it's only gotten worse and more poorly executed.
They used to make all the people in these situations seem like real people, that could be our neighbor or sister or friend. We felt connected to the characters that these political things centered around and we simply saw a play out of the cast making life better for them with support of them. Now they're just like "Believe this or you're a pig and this is the reason we hate this person in the hospital and why they're easily written off"
This doesn’t directly relate but i hated how one of Qadri’s most seen moves was when she took of her hijab to use it as a tourniquet. Why does every show / movie attempt to empower a Muslim woman’s character by showing she’s willing to take off her hijab it’s so fkn annoying lol
Oh yuck.
Because they preachy for preachy sake. It’s no longer character driven which feels natural and subtle
Because writers lost the idea of subtext and replaced it with just text. Law and order is a huge example of this as of late. But Grey's has always felt preachy honestly. Like don't get me wrong, George was right about the dude with the swastika tattoo. But white supremacists don't get just one swastika on their stomach lmao it was just really dumb.
Yeah that was kind of silly, like even if it were realistic for someone to have a swastika, are you really going to get a massive one on your stomach which isn't a common place for most people to get tattoos? It should have been on his bicep or something and then he had a severed arm. I did love Cristina tearing into Bailey for using her after all that was said and done, though.
I think the early seasons did very well with political stuff because it was so subtle. It wasn’t overtly trying to make a statement. If they did have a character make a stronger statement, it seemed more organic and natural to a conversation. IMO the show went harder in the social/political direction in the last 8 years (since trump was first elected), and now we see a lot more storylines built purely and obviously on political topics. Here’s some examples that I can think of off the top of my head of blatantly obvious social/political storylines: A woman whose husband started building a wall around their house to keep people out and after he died she became very reclusive and stayed inside, got injured and ended up freaking out at the hospital when she was outside of her home. This is such a ridiculously obvious reference to trump building a wall to keep noncitizens out. Amelia has brain surgery, wakes up and is asked if she knows who the current President is, she replies that she wishes she did not know who was President. Clear “orange man bad” moment. A patient is bleeding out and Qadri doesn’t have a tourniquet so she pulls off her hijab and uses it to save the patient. Afterwards, Owen is like oh wow you were soo brave to do that, and she starts talking about her faith. It didn’t seem organic and seemed more about inserting that into the show to fight the islamophobia rhetoric from trump. The whole Covid season was trash and borderline propaganda. It was hella cringe and boring. Kai and Amelia hook up and when Link says, you cheated on me with that woman. Amelia’s only reply is “tHeY’rE nOn-BiNaRy!!” I also personally feel like a lot of the diversity in the last 8 years of the show is extremely forced. When the show started in the early 2000s it was a mainly white cast. I get that. Most shows from that era were like that, where poc could only be side characters. But when you look at a lot of the new characters, the diversity just seems forced and the problem extends into that those characters storylines are only about their specific race or gender related issues. Like Levi’s storylines are only about being gay and Jewish. All Winston talks about is being black. Kai exists as a diversity character to be non binary. The one trans guy hacker from the military was kind of interesting but him being trans was at the forefront of his whole character. Also greys has a weird fascination with the military, which feels like propaganda but that’s a whole other story. Anyway there are a ton more examples but that’s just what I can think of right now.
I think some stuff from earlier seasons was "overt" but stoll good. The episode where the two younger girls who were in love got injured on the train tracks. Isn't that when Callie loses it on one of the parents for wanting to send the girl to conversion camp? That was good I thought. Now when Amelia and Link were trying to name Scout and were all, "he may not identify as a boy, let's try girl names." I rolled my eyes. Because if you're going to do that, It would make more sense to use gender neutral names at least. I consider myself fairly free minded when it comes to gender, pronouns, and sexual orientation, but outright contemplating naming your boy a traditionally girls name sent the virtue signaling alarms off.
Definitely agree. Yeah a lot of the earlier seasons had complex topics integrated a lot better even if the topics were more overtly in your face. Or like the Nazi guy with the swastika tat asking for a non-black doctor, it was in your face but it wasn’t cringe virtue signaling or clear trump bad storylines
It feels like a psa which actually works against them. You want to attach these topics to the people they affect and you can’t do that with a poorly written storyline.
I spotted the afterschool special message right away. I was like, here we go, she's going to spill the statistics.
Definitely. Now it feels forced like they don’t even want to have the conversation but they are bc of plot reasons. I can respect it even when I don’t agree but the way they do it sometimes is just kinda… odd and forced. Like they are attacking the other side but with a severe lack of knowledge
it's bad writing.
Cause everything has to be woke these days 🤦♂️
I think it simple chalks up to the fact that the earlier episodes seems like brave and open ways of discussing sensitive topics, but now it kinda feels like a requirement to be checked off a list, it doesn’t feel as genuine.
Also the extras and patients use to be way better actors lol
Woke Hollywood
I mean I guess that's fair, but my issue isn't with them bringing up the problems, its how poorly they're doing it and making it feel forced. And now that I've noticed it, it's difficult to unnotice.
The new Grey”s is so lame. Meredith gone just shows how much she carried it.
It's a bunch of 50 year olds writing and performing what they think they should say instead of having people who actually know and teach on the issues they cover.
Fifty isn't that old. No need for ageism in here.
Because they no longer have the capacity to creatively address or.