Change is hard, as Meredith Grey has observed more than once in the signature voice-over of “Grey’s Anatomy.” After the show’s strange slide into bathos last season, everyone involved, including show runner Shonda Rhimes and pin-up star Patrick Dempsey, acknowledged a certain creative downturn, a gloomy earnestness that would, they swore, be rectified.
Eight episodes in, things have happened, of course. George (T.R. Knight) told new wife, Callie (Sara Ramirez), that he cheated on her, so that marriage is over and George is officially in love with former best friend Izzie (Katherine Heigl), though if the fans have anything to say about it that won’t last long either. The suddenly single Callie moved in with the suddenly jilted Cristina (Sandra Oh). Derek (Dempsey) and Meredith (Ellen Pompeo) continue their dance of longing and leaving.
But the only real change is that Isaiah Washington is still gone, and the fabulous Brooke Smith, playing Dr. Erica Hahn, has taken his place. Hahn is a terrific character, sassy and professional, with an appropriately acerbic view of the various romantic shenanigans.
Changing a big hit television show is a tricky business. It’s easier to tinker, though often not as effective. And while “Grey’s” remains a big hit, its ratings continue to slide; a few weeks ago, they hit an all-time low.
At Fox, on the other hand, the creators of “House” have gone with a bolder approach — bringing in a whole new set of ancillary characters to cure the increasingly myopic focus on the lead (Hugh Laurie, looking increasingly haggard) — with more satisfying results. Likewise “Nip/Tuck,” on FX decided to forego the Botox and give itself the big midlife lift. But the writers of all three shows have apparently remembered that the only thing people like to talk about more than their love lives is their ailments.
In other words, while viewers like the romance and character development, they need to have their medical shows rooted in, well, medicine.
Doctors, cops and lawyers dominate network TV for a reason. Their jobs, by their very nature, provide the exact ingredients of a successful TV show: smart, professional main characters; a high turnover of interesting ancillary characters (patients, clients, criminals, etc.) and, of course, that life-or-death tension that eludes most of us keyboard-rattling, cellphone-wielding normal folk.
What made “Grey’s Anatomy” so successful in the first place was its creation of prickly yet still sympathetic characters, people you might actually know, who were then put into an extraordinary circumstance: the first year of residency at a high-pressure hospital. There was friendship, but there was competition; there were bad decisions and panic, but lives were saved and careers begun.
The problems of last season, which have unfortunately trickled into this season, were not about losing sight of the fun, but of the medicine — the dramatic possibilities of medicine.
The second season of “House” was even more successful than the first, but it was clear that the increasingly intense focus on the foibles of Gregory House (Laurie) and his strained relations with his team was limiting the show. Having run out of things for House to “battle” (authority, Vicodin dependency, his ex-wife, his team, the cops), the writers decided to start all over again. Literally.
At the end of last season, Drs. Foreman, Cameron and Chase had either quit or been fired. This season opened with House vainly attempting to go it alone. After hilariously turning to a janitor for help, House, rather than weeding through job applicants, accepts them all. Then he eliminates most of them as if he were the medical Heidi Klum of “Project Runway.”
What seemed like shtick turned out to be a brilliant move. The original team is still around with different duties, but half a dozen new people have brought in new stories, new ways of dealing with patients and new psyches for House to explore with his Holmesian insight and his venomous tongue.
Likewise, “Nip/Tuck” dragged itself out of a self-involved rut by hauling Drs. McNamara and Troy from the sultry madness of Miami to the City of Angels. This gave the creators not just a great billboard image but also a whole new playpen to roll around in, not to mention a legitimate call for main character development.
