It’s getting a little dull to start every Grey’s review with and enthusiastic “This episode was so great!” or “How amazing is this season?”, but what else can be said? Every single episode since the end of last season has knocked it out of the park.

This week felt like there was a slight return to the old Grey’s – sexy scenes, dancing it out, love triangles and heartbreak – but we haven’t left the post-shooting pain behind in any way. 

More VIP than Bono

Things started off with Teddy doing a patient presentation on last week’s lung transplant guy. The questions really started flying, though, when the fact that Cristina Yang quit came up. Mark’s reaction was the best, since he’d been totally in the dark about it. The Chief said he had to mail a letter that would officially end things for Cristina, but Teddy and Owen asked for more time. 

Meanwhile, the Chief had issues of his own at the hospital to deal with. There was a super secret VIP patient coming in, and he needed Owen and Teddy to operate. The patient was an important political candidate from a Middle Eastern country about to have their first elections. Only a select few knew that, though, which left Bailey and Avery outside asking “Is it the president? Is it the vice-president? Is it Bono?”

It turned out that the patient had more than heart problems though, so Meredith and Derek were brought in too. Poor Mer-Der, they were having fun in the on-call room too when the official looking government dude showed up and asked for Meredith. Also, totally loved it when Derek turned back to Mer and asked “What did you do?” The fact that the patient had to have simultaneous heart and brain surgery meant that every person who had a personal stake in Cristina Yang’s future was in the OR together. Arguing over how to get her back. Meanwhile, Mark called Callie (who was lying in bed, heartbroken, in a hotel room) and broke the news to her, so she went to talk to Cristina.

The top secret patient made it through surgery and was on a plane leaving the country before the docs could even check up on him – but there was a serious vibe between Teddy and the secret service guy. Will that go anywhere?

Cristina and Callie make a good pair, especially in their current situations. Callie was laying in bed in a hotel room mourning the loss of Arizona. Cristina was in her apartment, dancing like crazy and acting manically, in a way mourning the loss of her career. It was like the two sides of bi-polar disorder meeting.

Callie moped about how she was thinking of cutting her hair, but thought she shouldn’t make any drastic changes right after a break up, and then Cristina went and cut off a chunk of Callie’s hair. Her attempt to fix it just made it worse, until Callie freaked out at the sight of it and Cristina said “Yeah. I sort of can’t believe you let me do that.” I miss old, badass Cristina, but at least new, floundering Cristina still has a sense of humor. The girls went to the mall to get Callie’s hair fixed and buy furniture because Cristina decided to have a housewarming party…that night. 

The scenes of Callie and Cristina at the mall were hilarious. Cristina couldn’t believe that mall people walked to slowly and did nothing but eat pretzels, and Callie couldn’t believe that it sounded like Cristina was going to become a mall person. 

Babysitting

There were two other medical stories this week, and they each ended up being really, really good. April accidentally revealed to Avery that she’s into Alex and he warned her against going there, but April and Alex were in peds together all day. With the new Arizona, a man named Stark who was mean and horrible. Originally it was Alex being mean and horrible – he showed up late, hungover and moody – but when Stark complained that a pair of concerned parents had been consulting “Dr. Internet” too much about their baby’s upcoming surgery, you knew he was an ass. The baby’s name was Lisa, and she was getting a new liver that had been cut out of an adult sized donor liver. 

The surgery didn’t go that well because the liver was too small, and they had to leave the baby open until the swelling could go down. Eek! Is that even a thing? I cannot imagine just leaving a baby cut open! To make matters worse, Dr. Stark/Snark didn’t let the parents in on the problem. Alex eventually came up with a better solution that I didn’t really understand involving a ping pong ball, but I did understand that it was a brilliant idea. So brilliant that Stark tried to take credit for it, but luckily April saw to it that he didn’t.

The third medical story was about Avery. I really like what Grey’s has done with Avery this season. Instead of just being the pretty boy doc who takes his shirt off a lot, he’s become a really compelling character. He lost two friends in the shooting and was there for the emergency operation on Derek, so he’s been damaged more than most. He lost a patient in the documentary episode and thinks that none of the doctors want to work with him. Basically, he’s become really interesting. This week Bailey had him watch a pancreas patient’s fistula fluids for a sign of change, which would be bad. The patient started to crash while Bailey was in another surgery and she told him to open her up. He did everything he could, but lost her and freaked out. Poor Avery. He needed a win. And, so did Bailey. In the end, Bailey told the Chief that she wants to look into why so many pancreas patients get post-op fistulas, and that she wanted to use Avery since he’d been so good. She just needs to tell Avery that, since he totally thinks he’s a failure. I really like the idea of Bailey kind of taking Avery under her wing, so I hope we get to see them work together. 

Fight Club

Everything culminated in Cristina’s housewarming party. Most of the docs were going with the intention of talking to her and trying to convince her not to quit, but Derek knew that that wouldn’t be best for her. He showed up early, warned her, and they went up to the roof and hid from everyone. We haven’t gotten to see Derek and Cristina bond much, but the scene felt so natural. She saved his life. He understands what she’s going through. And they talked about her new apartment and how she absolutely had to keep the original floors. It was perfect. 

While everyone was at the party, April was with Alex in the on-call room. She came in to tell him that she knew the idea had been his, and it was all very sweet. They started to make out, and everything seemed fine. He asked if she wanted to stop and she said no, so Alex kept going…but he was kind of rough. She asked him to slow down and he freaked out, uttering possibly the most asshole-like words anyone has ever said: “You wanna screw, let’s screw. You don’t, then get out. I’m not gonna hold your virgin hand and walk you through it. You’re not a child. I can’t take care of you. I can’t take care of everyone in this frickin’ place.”

Whoa. Meanest thing ever? I think so. Alex them stormed out, leaving April shocked, hurt and topless on the bed. She showed up at the party in tears, apologizing for not bringing a gift, and Avery took care of her. I know he has his eye on Lexie, but there’s also a possibility that he and April could become a thing. Alex showed up to apologize, and before he could Avery beat the crap out of him. Which I was pretty happy about, because if I were April’s friend and had heard what he did to her, I would try to punch him too. 

Of course, it turned out that it wasn’t so simple. The reason Alex had been late that day was because he was in Iowa, not Vegas like he’d told everyone. He had to go have his brother committed, because he’d been diagnosed as schizophrenic…because he’d tried to kill their 16-year-old sister. So now we knew where the “I can’t take care of everyone” comment came from. As bad as the scene between him and April was, there’s still a little part of me that kind of think they could belong together. Maybe it’s because she’s so much like Izzie and that storyline never felt finished, but I can see it working. 

What did you think of the episode? Are you excited about all the possible love connections? Callie’s moving in with Sloan, so you know that will go somewhere. Will Teddy see the secret service guy again? Will Avery hook up with April or Lexie? Will April forgive Alex? Will Cristina come back to the hospital or will the Chief send the letter? And will she be pissed that Avery broke her new coffee table? Share your thoughts below!