The hospital drama returns in all its melodramatic glory to depict pandemic life, from PPE shortages to the logistics behind its medics’ romantic trysts
I always thought of Grey’s Anatomy (Sky Witness) as an easy option, a sprawling soap built for a casual viewing relationship. It was convenient – you could get what you needed from it, but you didn’t have to love it. It begins its 17th season with a double bill, and so much happens that I am starting to think I was wrong to neglect it. Not only is its labyrinth of storylines and characters tricky to keep up with if you haven’t done your homework, but it has started to feel as if it rewards commitment. By the end of the second episode, I was reconsidering my in-out approach.
It is April 2020, and the staff at Grey Sloan Memorial hospital are in the stormy early stages of the pandemic. They are taking Covid cases only, with the rarest of exceptions, and the days have turned into one long hunt for PPE, and one enormous nightmare of new, stringent regulations. It would have been strange, and not very Grey’s-like, to avoid depicting the current crisis completely, but it certainly jumps right into the thick of it. “Madhouse. On fire,” is Bailey’s succinct assessment. Even Richard Webber is back at work after his cobalt-poisoning saga.
