TV Squad

Grey's Anatomy: Losing My Mind

Jonathan Toomey — Fri, 16 May 2008 00:50:00 EST

Filed under: OpEd, Grey's Anatomy, Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Episode Recaps

(S04E15) "Tell her... tell her the train is leaving the station and she better get on it... yeah." - Webber

I don't know what to think anymore. You know, at the end of Grey's Anatomy when you see the title card for Shonda Rhimes' production company? Have you noticed what it is? Shondaland? It's a roller coaster. How appropriate. I mean, don't get me wrong. Even though I feel like everything on TV is still getting sort of a free pass to some extent due to post writer's strike "hey, at least it's new" syndrome, this was actually a great episode... for the most part. Which I suppose could be interpreted as getting a free pass due to "hey, at least there was a lesbian kiss" syndrome.

Gallery: Grey's Anatomy: Losing My Mind

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More Grey's Anatomy drama involving Isaiah Washington

Isabelle Carreau — Sun, 11 May 2008 19:01:00 EST

Filed under: Grey's Anatomy, Celebrities, Reality-Free

Even if Isaiah Washington is not longer part of the Grey's Anatomy cast, that doesn't mean he can't be at the center of more behind the scenes drama surrounding the show. This time, the actor is suing because the ABC show used a picture of himself portraying his Grey's character in last week's episode, "The Becoming."

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the actor filed a complaint with SAG because the show used his picture without permission.

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Grey's Anatomy: The Becoming

Jonathan Toomey — Fri, 09 May 2008 01:02:00 EST

Filed under: OpEd, Grey's Anatomy, Episode Reviews, Reality-Free

(S04E14) "Hey, everything I did was consensual. In fact, some of 'em even begged for it." - Sloan

I'm gonna start at the end. Why? Because I loved it. More often than not Grey's Anatomy gets awfully convoluted; full of itself even. It makes me just want to yell at the TV and scream, "Get to the point already!" Then Dr. Wyatt did just that. She cut the crap! She finally came out and made an obvious statement. We don't get those too often on Grey's. It was refreshing. Makes me feel like I'm not crazy.

Gallery: Grey's Anatomy: The Becoming

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Send an ABC e-card for Mother's Day

Erin Martell — Tue, 06 May 2008 09:02:00 EST

Filed under: Desperate Housewives, Lost, Grey's Anatomy, Celebrities, Ugly Betty, Brothers and Sisters, Pushing Daisies, Dirty Sexy Money, Samantha Who?, Reality-Free

ABC offered a set of fun Valentine's Day e-cards earlier this year, and they're at it again with a more extensive set of Mother's Day e-cards. More of my favorite ABC shows were let in on the fun this time, including Pushing Daisies, Dirty Sexy Money, and Samantha Who?. Show Mom your love with a clever message from Lost's Claire, Susan from Desperate Housewives, or Hilda from Ugly Betty.

The cards are one part of a "Guide to Motherhood" page on ABC's website. You can watch clips from ABC's hit shows based on four motherhood themes: New Moms, Nesting, Words of Wisdom, and Letting Go. It's an amusing way to look back at some of the unconventional approaches to parenting taken in the last season.

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It's finale time again! No, really.

Richard Keller — Mon, 05 May 2008 15:39:00 EST

Filed under: Programming, American Idol, Battlestar Galactica, Boston Legal, CSI, Desperate Housewives, ER, House, Law and Order, Lost, Scrubs, The Simpsons, Smallville, Survivor, Grey's Anatomy, Family Guy, My Name Is Earl, Bones, Supernatural, Numb3rs, Criminal Minds, How I Met Your Mother, King of the Hill, The Office, America's Next Top Model, Dancing With The Stars, Shark, 30 Rock, Ugly Betty, Brothers and Sisters, NCIS, TV Squad Lists, Reaper, Moonlight, Samantha Who?, Reality-Free, Gossip Girl

Holy frik! We've only just started to embrace the return of our shows after a shortened strike season. Now, they are almost over. In the next few weeks all of our network favorites will say good-bye for the summer to be replaced with reality shows, reality game shows, reality soap operas, and Regis on primetime (again).

Needless to say, I'm a bit depressed. As I am sure you are as well. But, we will do our duty and press on. Thusly, we here at the sprawling lakefront offices of TV Squad (you choose the lakefront) have compiled list of when your favorite, and not so favorite, shows will be saying good-bye for their summer vacation. As usual, taking the fickleness of the networks, these times and days can change at a moment's notices. We will try to update you of those changes as quickly as our little fingers can type it out.

So, with a leaden heart, here are your season and series finales.

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Grey's Anatomy: Pieces of My Heart

Jonathan Toomey — Fri, 02 May 2008 07:21:00 EST

Filed under: OpEd, Grey's Anatomy, Episode Reviews, Reality-Free

(S04E13) "It's like I never left." - Addison

She's baaaaaack. The triumphant return of Addison. And yes I do mean triumphant - this was arguably the best episode of the season and it's funny if you think about it. Had the WGA Strike not happened, Private Practice wouldn't have gotten shelved until the fall season (only 9 season one eps aired), and Kate Walsh wouldn't have had all that free time to guest star. With her return came the Grey's Anatomy I remember. Snappy dialogue, good character development, and lots of laughs. Despite the annoying recurrence of all the cases eerily mirroring what's going on in their respective doctors' lives, I loved this episode.

Gallery: Grey's Anatomy: Pieces of My Heart

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Grey's Anatomy: Where The Wild Things Are

Jonathan Toomey — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 01:17:00 EST

Filed under: OpEd, Grey's Anatomy, Episode Reviews, Reality-Free

(S04E12) "C'mon, lady on the streets, tramp in the sheets. Am I right?" - Sloan

Hey! Remember this show? Grey's Anatomy hasn't had a new episode since January 10th. So naturally, I was pumped for this one. In fairness, though, I've felt that way about anything new since the writer's strike. Bit of a mixed bag here. Part of me loved it because like I said, it was new. But at the same time, the episode was still laden with far too much of the excessive over-dramatic crap that's plagued most of this season. At the most basic level, this show works. But Shonda Rhimes and Co. love to push it and the problem is that they're not always headed in the right direction.

Gallery: Grey's Anatomy: Where The Wild Things Are

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Ten awkward TV moments

Jane Boursaw — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 11:01:00 EST

Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Other Comedy Shows, OpEd, 24, Desperate Housewives, Grey's Anatomy, The Office, TV Squad Lists, Lipstick Jungle, Reality-Free

Last week's episode of The Office now ranks high on my list of Awkward TV Moments. It got me thinking about other all-time great awkward TV moments. Sure, we've all seen the episode where a disheveled Mary Richards shows up at the awards banquet wearing one fuzzy pink slipper. And the one where Frasier and Roz nearly do it on a cruise ship. But let's take a look at a few recent awkward TV moments.

1. Jan heaves a Dundee at Michael's flat-screen TV. Okay, we'll start with last week's episode of The Office, in which Michael coerces Jim and Pam into attending a couples-only dinner party at his and Jan's condo. The entire episode is one long awkward moment, from Dwight showing up with his former babysitter as his date to Pam realizing she'll be held hostage for three hours, thanks to Jan's poor culinary planning. But the topper is when Michael and Jan's love spat escalates into a huge fight, ending with her heaving one of his treasured Dundee awards at his new (and tiny) flat-screen TV. The cops show up after the neighbors report a disturbance, and Michael ends up going home with Dwight.

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It's official: Lost and Grey's finales get an extra hour

Erin Martell — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 19:25:00 EST

Filed under: Programming, Lost, Grey's Anatomy, Ugly Betty, Reality-Free

The rumored fourteenth hour of Lost is happening! E!'s Kristin Dos Santos confirmed that there will be an extended Lost finale this season. The two-hour finale has become a whopping three-hour episode. Executive producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse felt that an extra hour was crucial to wrapping up the season four storylines, and ABC agreed. According to Kristin, the script for part two of the finale was 80 pages long. Imagine cramming all of that into one hour!

As I mentioned in my earlier post, the return of Grey's Anatomy and Ugly Betty to the Thursday night lineup does make scheduling this additional hour a bit tricky. The original plan was for the two-part Lost finale to air over two nights, and have all three shows end on May 22. TV Guide's Michael Ausiello is reporting that the Lost finale has been rescheduled, making room for a two-hour Grey's Anatomy season finale.

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Amy Madigan cast on Grey's Anatomy

Allison Waldman — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 10:20:00 EST

Filed under: Grey's Anatomy, Casting

If you want great acting, she will come. The Field of Dreams allusion is purposeful. The leading lady from that film, Amy Madigan, is joining ABC's Grey's Anatomy. The actress who's a past Oscar-nominee for Twice in a Lifetime will have a recurring role, becoming part of the Seattle Grace Hospital coterie on April 24 when the show returns with new episodes.

Last year, Amy was seen in Ben Affleck's Gone Baby Gone, which interestingly came out soon after she appeared on CBS's Criminal Minds for two shows. Going from features to television is clearly not a problem for the gifted actress. In fact, she won a Golden Globe for the TV movie Roe vs. Wade in 1990.

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TV Squad presents the rest of the 2007-08 season

Richard Keller — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 10:04:00 EST

Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Other Comedy Shows, Other Reality Shows, Other Sci-Fi/Supernatural Shows, Industry, Programming, Battlestar Galactica, Boston Legal, CSI, Desperate Housewives, ER, House, Law and Order, Lost, Scrubs, Grey's Anatomy, Bones, Supernatural, Numb3rs, Criminal Minds, Doctor Who, The Office, Last Comic Standing, Shark, 30 Rock, Ugly Betty, Brothers and Sisters, NCIS, Moonlight, Samantha Who?

Hear that sound -- a nearly inaudible rumbling coming over the horizon? Everyday it is getting louder and louder. Soon, the stampede that is the return of scripted series back from the depths of the WGA strike will overrun our televisions and computer screens, bringing overwhelming joy to our lives.

Okay, that statement may be a little flowery, but the sentiment is still there. After a very long dry period a good many of our favorite comedies and dramas are returning to the television landscape. We've had a taste of it these last few weeks with the return of shows like The Big Bang Theory, How I Met Your Mother, Dirt, The Riches and Smallville. That was just a preview of what is to come. Over the next few weeks we will see the return of The Office, Scrubs, Ugly Betty, all of the CSIs, Battlestar Galactica, and Lost, among others.

Gallery: 2007-08 Season: After-strike series returns

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Eight real world moments in reel TV

Allison Waldman — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 14:02:00 EST

Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Other Comedy Shows, OpEd, CSI, House, Law and Order, Lost, Grey's Anatomy, 30 Rock, Ugly Betty, NCIS, TV Squad Lists, Lipstick Jungle, Eli Stone

The world of primetime TV are primarily set in the real world. The real world based on the fiction they create. So, Law and Order -- in all its incarnations -- is set in New York City, but it's not the real five boroughs. The newspapers they read are not The New York Times, the Post or the Daily News. For contemporary TV fiction, reality is on the margins of the storytelling because you can't really set those characters in a real world. However, when the two worlds intersect, the results can be magic. Here's 8 big-time, primetime examples:

1) Cowboy Up Time
Remember the episode of Lost when Ben wanted to convince Jack that he was in communication with the world outside the island? To prove that he was telling the truth, he showed Jack a video of the Boston Red Sox winning the world series in 2004. You can't get more real than that, right? And yet it was used in one of the most out of this world shows on the air. In fact, using Lost's own terminology, the Red Sox video is a constant truth in a universe that's a complete fiction.

Gallery: Fact in Fiction

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Be our guest: Kate Walsh returning to Grey's

Allison Waldman — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 11:05:00 EST

Filed under: Grey's Anatomy, Pickups and Renewals, Private Practice

A familiar face will be popping up at Seattle Grace before Grey's Anatomy goes on hiatus at the end of the season. Kate Walsh, a.k.a. Addison Montgomery, M.D., will return to the medical drama when her character makes a visit to the Emerald City. It'll be for just one episode, though. ABC has already picked up Kate's spin-off series, Private Practice, for the fall.

Executive producer/writer Shonda Rhimes confirmed that Kate Walsh will return to Grey's Anatomy for a guest bit this spring, but a definite date has not been pinned down. Five new episodes of GA are set to air starting April 24.

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ABC has lots of new episodes scheduled; Lost moves to 10 PM

Allison Waldman — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 17:39:00 EST

Filed under: Programming, Boston Legal, Desperate Housewives, Lost, Grey's Anatomy, Pickups and Renewals, Ugly Betty, Pushing Daisies, Private Practice, Dirty Sexy Money, WGA Strike, Samantha Who?

It's so nice now that the WGA strike is over and all the shows are coming back, isn't it? It's like we're suddenly inundated with presents galore. Just the idea of new shows puts a smile on my face; let's hope it's still there once the shows air!

ABC has announced that Samantha Who?, their most promising new sitcom of the season, will be returning with six new episodes on Monday, April 7 (at 9:30). But maybe the network's biggest news is a time shift. Starting April 24, Lost will commence five new episodes at 10:00, rather than 9:00. Also on April 24, Ugly Betty and Grey's Anatomy both return with five new episodes each.

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Watching TV on the job

Allison Waldman — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 17:02:00 EST

Filed under: Lost, Grey's Anatomy, Ugly Betty

Uh-o, somebody just blew the whistle. You know how you were spending your lunch hour (or however many minutes you can get away with while eating your tuna fish sandwich) in your office cubicle catching up on that episode of Ugly Betty or Grey's Anatomy you missed? Well, you're not alone. Nielsen Online has measured Internet traffic and just released data that indicates that peak viewing time is weekdays between noon and 2:00 p.m. Moreover, the number of people watching TV episodes online during these lunchtime hours is 50% higher than the average of all other times.

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Give a Lost, Grey's, or Ugly Betty valentine

Erin Martell — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 09:28:00 EST

Filed under: Lost, Grey's Anatomy, Ugly Betty

If you're frugal, TV-obsessed, and in a relationship (a winning combination if there ever was one), you might want to check out ABC.com's free Valentine's Day e-cards. You can use your favorite characters from Grey's Anatomy, Ugly Betty, and Lost to express your love for that special someone. Tell your significant other that you're McDreamin' of them, send a post-it note from Henry Grubstick, or impart a creepy--but loving--message from Benjamin Linus. My only complaint is that more ABC shows, like Pushing Daisies and Dirty Sexy Money, weren't included. Who wouldn't want a valentine from Olive Snook or Clark the driver?

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Second batch of Lost episodes will follow Grey's Anatomy

Erin Martell — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 17:01:00 EST

Filed under: Programming, Lost, Grey's Anatomy, Ugly Betty

When Lost's post-strike episodes come out later this spring, they will air after Grey's Anatomy on Thursday nights. TV Guide's Michael Ausiello is reporting that ABC's new Thursday schedule will feature Grey's in its previous time slot of 9pm ET (in which Lost currently airs), with Lost in the 10pm time slot. These changes will take effect in late April, once both shows have completed new, post-strike episodes.

This announcement does impact Lost's current run, however. Instead of airing all eight pre-strike episodes in a row, the plan is for the show to take a month-long break after Episode Seven. Apparently the producers felt that this was a better way to separate each block of episodes. The first installment of the season will end in mid-March, and the show will return with new episodes in late April. If the new schedule is successful, we could end up with a permanent Ugly Betty-Grey's-Lost lineup on Thursdays. How does that sound?

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With strike over, ABC decides to renew nine shows for 2008-09

Joel Keller — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 17:42:00 EST

Filed under: Industry, Desperate Housewives, Lost, Grey's Anatomy, Pickups and Renewals, Ugly Betty, Brothers and Sisters, Pushing Daisies, Private Practice, Dirty Sexy Money, WGA Strike, Samantha Who?

ABC decided to use the expected end of the writers' strike to announce the renewal of nine shows for the 2008-09 season. The list of returning series are mostly those you'd expect to see: Grey's Anatomy, Brothers & Sisters, Desperate Housewives, Ugly Betty, and Lost are the veteran shows on the list, joined by rookie shows Pushing Daisies, Samantha Who?, Private Practice and Dirty Sexy Money. Unchanged is the speculation that most of the newer shows won't have a spring return, as ABC will hold them for a more publicized fall re-launch.

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Pacey returns to TV in Abrams latest project

Isabelle Carreau — Sat, 09 Feb 2008 15:36:00 EST

Filed under: Other Sci-Fi/Supernatural Shows, Grey's Anatomy, Celebrities, Casting

According to Entertainment Weekly, Joshua Jackson, better known for his role as Pacey Witter in Dawson's Creek, has just been cast as one of the leading men in J.J. Abrams' latest TV project, Fringe. Fear not Grey's Anatomy fans, Fringe is shooting its 2-hour pilot this month (with a tiny budget of $10 million dollars), so it's likely that the actor will be able to free himself to shoot his guest stint on the ABC show when production resumes.

Around mid-November, it was revealed that the actor was set to guest star in a few episodes of Grey's Anatomy as a potential love interest for Cristina. When news of the strike arrived, his stint was delayed. As of mid-January, insiders were reporting that Jackson was still set to appear on the show. But now that he is officially attached to the new sci-fi mystery FOX series, I guess his storyline on GA may be trashed or that they will recast the role if they can't make shooting schedules match.

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Grey's Anatomy: Lay Your Hands On Me

Jonathan Toomey — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 23:41:00 EST

Filed under: OpEd, Grey's Anatomy, Episode Reviews

(S04E11) "Call me when she codes." - Hahn

The power of healing. Does it work? Perhaps. I think it went a little too far when everyone who "the healing lady" touched got better, but I prefer to play the skeptic and Hahn's line did it for me. You're a kook and I'll be back when you're on the verge of death.

Healing took center stage in this episode though. Along with redemption, lying, cheating, and neglect. Just like every other episode of Grey's Anatomy. To be honest, I was really pumped for this one. We've been reading for months about this Bailey narrated episode (she really didn't have much to say), but once it got going I found it a little stale. Maybe it's because it's been over a month since the last episode and the story wasn't exactly fresh in my mind. Maybe it's because this is the last pre-WGA Strike episode. Or maybe it's because I'm finding myself less and less drawn to these characters. Either way, I hope this forced time off gives the show a chance re-invent itself.

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