"Being Chief is about responsibility. Every single surgical patient in the hospital is your patient, whether you're the one who cuts them open or not. The scalpel stops with you. You need to be able to look at a family and tell them your team did everything they could to save someone's child. Their husband. Their wife. You get caught up, taking care of other people's families. And the responsibility, it makes you. . .you take care of other people's families. And you sacrifice your own." - Dr. Richard Webber (James Pickens, Jr.) on the perils of being the Chief of Surgery
Grey's Anatomy: Season Three DVD Review
By Jude Clement
In a late season episode of Grey's Anatomy: Season Three, surgical intern Meredith Grey (Ellen Pompeo) observes that, "too often, the thing you want most is the thing you can't have." Unfortunately, for many fans, this definitely proves to be the case with the series' disappointing junior year. Things start out well enough. Isobel "Izzie" Stevens (Roswell's Katherine Heigl), resplendent in her prom dress, is still in mourning for the patient she risked her career for. Christina Yang (Arli$$' Sandra Oh) coaxes Dr. Preston Burke (Isaiah Washington) back to health and even meets his family as their relationship grows more serious. Things heat up between George O'Malley (T.R. Knight) and Dr. Callie Torres (As the World Turns' Sara Ramirez). Dr. Addison Shepherd (Kate Walsh) is torn between ex-husband Dr. Derek "McDreamy" Shepherd (Once and Again's Patrick Dempsey), ex-lover Dr. Mark "McSteamy" Sloan (Eric Dane), and Alex Karev (Justin Chambers). Dr. Richard Webber (James Pickens, Jr.), the hospital's Chief of Surgery, receives an ultimatum from his wife, and Dr. Miranda "The Nazi" Bailey (Chandra Wilson) struggles with the balance between work and home.
Seems soapy enough, right? Simply lather, rinse, and repeat. Good old Grey's. But by the middle of the season, it becomes obvious that the series has lost its moorings, that the suds have fallen flat, and that the show's creators have seemingly run out of logical things for their characters to do. Especially off-putting is an extended run of episodes in which a ferry accident leads to the drowning of a main character. Well, temporary drowning-she is miraculously brought back to life over the space of several hours and returns to work the next day none the worse for the wear. This entire storyline defies logic and is borderline insulting.
Much of the second half of the season seems to relish making viewers dislike their former favorite characters. Izzie goes from a sympathetic basketcase at the start of the season to a homewrecking harridan at the end...and I'm not even going to get into the physical impossibility of her bone marrow donation storyline. A strong, likeable character is created in Dr. Callie Torres, but she is stepped on so many times it practically becomes masochistic.
The only bright spot post-ferry accident is Karev's gentle relationship with a severely disfigured pregnant amnesia victim he nicknames Ava (Elizabeth Reaser). This alone is a reason to tune in each week.
It's a shame when a guilty pleasure becomes more guilty and less pleasure. Here's hoping that the physicians of Seattle Grace can heal themselves before we change primary care physicians.
Season three's familiar faces include Loretta Devine (Boston Public), Chris O'Donnell (The Company), Kate Burton (Rescue Me), Peter Paige (Queer as Folk), Richard Roundtree (Desperate Housewives), Diahann Carroll (Dynasty), Abigail Breslin (Little Miss Sunshine), Fred Ward, Justina Machado (Six Feet Under), Faith Prince (Huff), Ayre Gross (Ellen), George Dundza (Law & Order), Debra Monk (NYPD Blue), Mare Winningham (The Brotherhood of Poland, NH), Kyle Chandler (Friday Night Lights), Jeff Perry (Nash Bridges), Anna Maria Horsford (Amen), Roger Rees (Cheers), and Mitch Pileggi (The X-Files).
The twenty-five episodes that make up Grey's Anatomy: Season Three are divided onto seven discs. The discs are housed in a foldout case featuring publicity photos and production stills. The seven discs attach to four panels-two of the panels hold two discs one on top of the other in a figure eight pattern while the fourth panel holds only one disc. Another panel of the foldout case includes a booklet which contains an episode guide. The case slides into a cardboard sleeve.
The menus are simple and functional. Viewers can play all of a disc's episodes or choose an individual one. The episodes are divided into chapters, but there are no scene selection menus.
