Grey's Anatomy recap: 'Hope for the Hopeless'

Despite the dramatic title of last night’s new episode of Grey’s Anatomy, “Hope for the Hopeless” — and the fact that the hour was book-ended by rather tragic circumstances — it wasn’t a totally depressing hour. Largely, yes. But the episode was more of a dichotomy, split between sadness and happiness, despair and celebration, surgeries and tears. In so many ways, it was a rather typical, manic, fast-moving installment of Grey’s Anatomy.

On the sad end of things, we watched as Derek and Lexie couldn’t fix a little boy with a brain tumor; as Adele’s memory problems worsened; and as Owen and Cristina’s union headed for the crapper. But there were happy moments, too: Meredith Grey chose a specialty in general surgery (finally!) and threw a festive birthday party for her daughter Zola; and ex-Chief Webber celebrated the insane milestone of his 10,000th surgery. Webber has clearly been working for decades now, but that number is — in a word — jaw-dropping.

Speaking of Webber’s big day, let’s start there, with his equal-parts happy and sad storyline. He launched the episode with the revelation of his 10,000th surgery, asking Bailey about whether the hospital would be commemorating the event in any way. “I mean, you’ll do something?” he asked, seeming jovial and grinning. “I mean, it is my 10,000th surgery. That’s a lot of surgery.” Thankfully, Bailey had planned a conference room party, complete with red velvet cake, speeches, a banner, and sparkling cider. (Even if it was eventually cancelled because of Webber’s issues with Adele.)

The sad part of the 10,000th celebration was that the surgery he was performing was — and there’s no other way to put this — kind of a total snooze. Webber got a pair of surly sisters, one of which was giving the other a part of her liver. There was some interesting casting. Roz — I mean, Marcy, the annoying character played by Frasier alum Peri Gilpin — wouldn’t give her sister, the equally-as-annoying Marcy (Nia Vardalos), a break about having to giver her a slice of her liver. That’s the most drama they could serve with such an important surgery? Was that the point? Was there some underlying subtext to that that I didn’t pick up on? Unfortunately, the minds behind Grey’s didn’t even make a Frasier or radio joke here — hello, they should have considering both shows were set in Seattle and Roz was lying in a Seattle Grace hospital bed!

I suppose the real drama with Webber’s storyline, however, was ground in the reappearance of his wife, Adele, who resurfaced for the first time since an episode last April during the whole Meredith-corrupting-the-clinical-trial madness. Once again, Adele was confused and disturbed, after being found wandering toward the hospital, nearly seven miles from the Webber home. Kepner tried to keep her at bay while Webber was in surgery, but she eventually made her way into the observation gallery above her husband’s surgery. “Ellis! You let him go” she yelled at Meredith, thinking that she was her mother. “What kind of a woman would break up a marriage?”

NEXT: Adele takes things from heartbreaking to haunting with her rendition of “My Funny Valentine”

The scene then turned from merely heartbreaking to completely haunting, as Webber began singing “My Funny Valentine” through the intercom to the observation gallery to try to calm her down. Apparently, the pair’s first dance as a couple was to the song. “You were the most beautiful bride I’ve ever seen,” he told his distraught wife. Is there anything worse than watching someone descend slowly into madness? Because that’s what happened right before our eyes. And then, watching Adele finish the show tune with tears streaming down her face was sadder than watching any patient at Seattle Grace die, and that even includes Henry.

Speaking of Henry, his still-recent death was still coloring activities at Seattle Grace, mostly the actions of Altman and Cristina. After last week’s odd interactions between the pair, they seemed to have mended fences for the most part and were using back-to-back surgeries to ease the pain of the recent passing, even with all the “widow casseroles” stil piling up. Altman and Cristina actually stole a heart surgery from Dr. McQueen and didn’t tell Owen, which sent him into a rage when he discovered what had happened. Owen wasn’t only mad at Altman, whom he tired to reconcile with, but it set off a fight between him and Cristina, too, as he eventually told her he could fire her. “Her husband’s dead!” she told him. “She’s taking it out on you. You’ve just got to deal with it.”

But the fight escalated further, and it was totally clear something horrible was going to happen the moment Hunt walked into Zola’s birthday party and saw his wife Cristina playing tenderly with the tyke of honor. He was none too happy to witness that. I immediately tensed up when I saw his face. What began as a fight about her taking the surgery without asking and mocking him with Dr. Altman turned into a battle about control and the abortion that Cristina demanded last season.

Cristina tried telling him that he has to let Altman be and allow her to do whatever she wants, after what happened with Henry. “You have no idea what’s going on here, do you?” she said, while in the kitchen at Zola’s birthday party. “You let me operate on her husband and now he’s dead. She gets whatever she wants. Do you understand? Anything she wants from you. Ever.” And then she added: “It’s not my fault Teddy hates you. But don’t take your guilt out on me!” That’s when Hunt finally blew up, and took the fight — err, should I say possible break-up? — to the next level. “This is not one surgery!” he roared, clearly referring to the abortion. And Cristina, in a rage: “It was a horrible situation, but it’s over,” she screamed. “Is it too much to ask that we just try and forget it?” And, finally, Hunt again: “You killed our baby. You don’t ever forget that!” The whole of Seattle Grace heard this in next room over, where Zola’s birthday party was happening. You could have heard a pin drop.

NEXT: Things go from bad to worse for Cristina and Owen, while all of Seattle Grace listens

In so many ways, this blowup was a long time coming. Even though we haven’t revisited the Cristina-Owen storyline in a while, it seemed to have just been put on the backburner. No, it wasn’t even really simmering, instead having just been put on ice for a while. Yah, that’s right — it was totally in the freezer on ice. And with the Altman situation, all that finally thawed, leading to this situation between the couple. Too bad the next new episode is a “What If?” episode, otherwise we’d probably be getting a glimpse into what will happen for these two. I’m dying to know!

And this is where Meredith Grey’s always-wise voiceover came into play. “When do you throw in the towel?” she asked, as Cristina and Owen fought just before the episode ended. “Admit that a lost cause is just that? There come a point when it all becomes too much. That’s where the real work begins — to find hope where there seems to be absolutely none at all.”

And speaking of supposed “lost causes,” that takes us easily to Derek and Lexie, who were handling the episode’s Case of the Week, a little boy needing brain surgery that eight other surgeons had already refused to do. It was a truly unfortunate situation that found the mother hiding the truth from her afflicted 11-year-old son to protect him, but he knew his damage all the while and was really just protecting her from finding out that he knew. Confused yet? It does make sense. Ultimately, Derek and Lexie took the case; went in for surgery; and had to close up without taking out the tumor because it was too risky, ensuring that the kid would die in about three months. After Lexie made an impassioned play to attempt the surgery anyway, Derek offered his own wisdom to the younger Grey: “They’re not called lost causes because they’re fun.” It wasn’t a fun case in any way. The only slightly comforting part, really, was thinking about the poor little guy getting to go to Pearl Harbor in Hawaii before he died — he loved battlefields so. And when he told his mom not to worry because he was going to be in heaven with his father…that’s when I about lost it totally.

The other remotely important storyline of the night was that Meredith finally decided on her specialty — general surgery — after being prodded by Chief Hunt. “You ditched neuro,” he said. “You wasted time in OB. You’re my only fifth year that doesn’t know where they’re going. You’re drowning.” It seems that Bailey might have been the person to finally convince her to follow in both the footsteps of herself and her mother, Ellis Grey. “There’s nothing wrong with knowing one organ and knowing it well,” she said, about to extol the virtues of general surgery and knowing all the organs. “Just like there’s nothing wrong with being fifth chair viola in the back of the orchestra. But it’s a hell of a lot more fun being the conductor.”

NEXT: Meredith Grey: “I don’t want to be like my mother.”

Finally, when she was about to decide, Meredith talked to the ex-chief, bringing up the worry that if she chose general surgery she’d be like her mother. “I don’t want to be like my mother,” she whined to her mother’s ex-lover. “You don’t have to ever worry about being anything like your mother,” he assured her, referencing how good of a mother she was to Zola. “I knew her, and you’re nothing like your mother. You have a gift. Don’t waste it.” I honestly thought we might see Meredith get back to neuro somehow, but this seems like a fitting place for her, too, of course. (But maybe neuro isn’t totally off the table?)

The rest of the evening was peppered with tiny little personal things for some of the characters not enjoying such prominent storylines right now: Kepner, Avery, and Karev decided they’re moving out of Meredith and Derek’s house; and Arizona and Callie pushed Mark to take things to the next level with his new girlfriend Julia. But they saw a crack in that possibility. “Oh no. No, no, no, no, no,” Callie said, upon realizing why he wasn’t telling his likeable new gal “I love you.” “This is classic Mark. He found out Lexie and Jackson broke up and now suddenly he’s getting cold feet about Julia. You and Lexie are over, okay? That ship has sailed. And sank.” Yes! I couldn’t agree with Callie and Arizona more! It’s more than time for Mark to grow up and have a serious, normal, adult relationship with another woman. In this case, I’m not rooting for Lexie and Mark to end up together eventually. But I made that clear in last week’s recap.

A theme of the episode, as I said above, was “lost causes,” and indeed there were many last night. The lost cause of Cristina and Owen’s shaky relationship. The lost cause of the little boy Derek and Lexie were trying to help. The lost cause of Adele Webber. The lost cause of Mark and Lexie as a romantic pairing. The lost cause of Karev ever growing up and stopping his slutty ways. So much sadness! So many lost causes, yes, but – with that 10,000th surgery and Zola’s party — so much to celebrate, too. Not a bad episode of Grey’s.

What did you think, Grey’s Anatomy watchers? Are you worried about Cristina and Owen’s future? Do you think Meredith made the right choice by picking her general surgery specialty? Are you sad thinking about what lies ahead for Adele? And, are you excited — or annoyed — by the upcoming “What If” episode that’s coming when Grey’s returns to new episodes?

Tanner on Twitter: @EWTanStransky