Season Finale Reviews: Ugly Betty, Grey's Anatomy, Scrubs

Ugly Betty [s1 ep23]: "East Side Story"

*** Spoiler Warning ***

In Brief: What's Good

• Excellent performances all around.


• In general, a lot of twists and turns. For a comedy/drama/soap opera, there is plenty of suspense and intrigue.


• I'm not positive, but I think Ana Ortiz, who normally plays Betty's "fashionable" sister Hilda, was made to look very different for a bit part as a nerdy dental hygentist (or maybe just an office assistant) at Betty's orthodontist's office. This is reminiscent of Becki Newton, who plays the witchy receptionist Amanda, one time appearing--under heavy disguise--as a geeky office assistant in a previous episode.

In Brief: What's Not So Good

• Daniel's on-and-off-again relationship with his brother/sister Alex/Alexis is getting a little old, as is his growing dependency on sex, alcohol, and pills.


• The "romance" between Bradford and Wilhelmina is just creepy.


• The episode does not address the possibility that Ignacio's life may be in danger because the family of the man he accidentally killed long ago knows he's back in Mexico while waiting to complete his visa back into the U.S. This subplot was hinted at in the previous episode, but in the finale, Ignacio only appears in a brief phone conversation with Betty.

8	Story
8	Performances
7	Drama/Intensity
8	Suspense/Cliffhanging
6	Nostalgia/Coolness
7.4	AVERAGE

Plot Points

• Betty is back from Mexico and decides to pursue Henry, even if she must compete against Henry's current girlfriend Charlie.


• Bradford asks Wilhelmina to marry him.


• Alex/Alexis has hired someone to kill his/her father.


• Claire is included in on plans for four women to escape, in transit, from a prison van.


• Betty confesses her feelings to Henry. He says he broke up with Charlie, so they are free to go out on their first date.


• Hilda is planning her wedding to Santos.


• Alex/Alexis embarrasses Daniel in the press by calling him on his lie about saving a girl scout form drowning in the lake.


• Wilhelmina is competing with Fabia (Gina Gershon) for a wedding location. The only way to get it is to give her assistant Marc to Fabia.


• Charlie tells Betty and Henry that she's pregnaant. Henry goes to make plans with Charlie instead of having his first date with Betty.


• Justin is the understudy for the part of Tony in West Side Story at his school. When he gives the primary actor a sandwich that has walnuts in it, he gets sick, forcing the role to fall to Justin.


• Christina finds out about Fey's "love dungeon," and she and Amanda get locked in. While stuck inside, they get drunk and find a safe. They crack the safe and find documentation inside showing that Fey Summers is actually Amanda's biological mother. If there's any chance that Bradford could be Amanda's father (since Bradford and Fey had an affair long ago), then that means Daniel and Amanda--who have dated and had sex multiple times--could be half-siblings.


• Fabia mistreats Marc. Wilhelmina remembers the good times having him as an assistant and gives up on the wedding location to get Marc back.


• Daniel tells Alexis that he's quitting his job instead of continuing to compete with him/her. Daniels's high from pills and alcohol. Alexis takes Daniel in their father's car to get medical help. The brake lines have been cut (as a result of Alexis plotting to kill her father), and the car crashes with both of them unconscious.


• Betty finds out that her orthodontist and Charlie have been dating, so Charlie is using her pregnancy with another man as a way of holding onto Henry.


• On his way to see his son in West Side Story, Santos stops at a convenience store to get Justin teeth whitening strips as a gift. He has walked in on a robbery, and the robber holds Santos at gunpoint.


• Claire and a fellow inmate she's chained to are able to escape from the prison van.


• Santos is shot in the store robbery.


• Receiving the news about Santos at home, Betty is interrupted from her plans to track down Henry.


• The episode ends with Betty going to Justin's school to tell Hilda about Santos being killed.

Grey's Anatomy [s1 ep25]: "Didn't We Almost Have It All?"

*** Spoiler Warning ***

In Brief: What's Good

• Intercut throughout the episodes are scenes of Chief Webber having meetings with attendings to tell them whether he's chosen them to replace him as chief of surgery.


• Nice scene between George and Dr. Bailey when they talk about George failing his intern exam.


• I am *sooo* glad that Burke and Yang did not get married. That relationship has seemed doomed from the beginning.


• I'm glad that the Chief Webber character is not leaving the show, even though he was trying to retire.

In Brief: What's Not So Good

• Neither the marriage between George and Callie nor the restrained attration between George and Izzie are particularly believable or enjoyable to watch. So, when Callie says she wants to a have a baby with George, it comes off as forced and far too sudden for that character to be thinking about such things. Izzie's confession to George also comes off as forced.


• A scene of Yang freaking out near the end of the episode seems a bit over-acted.


• I was hoping that Dr. Bailey would get the Chief of Surgery position. That may be unrealistic, since she's apparently a resident instead of an attending, but she's also very capable and the most emotionally grounded. I thought she deserved it the most and that it would be ironic if she got since she everyone else was fighting so hard for it and all she wanted was Chief Resident. Things didn't work out my way.

7	Story
7	Performances
6	Drama/Intensity
6	Suspense/Cliffhanging
6	Nostalgia/Coolness
6.4	AVERAGE

Plot Points

• Burke and Yang are getting married in 24 hours, and Christina still seems more concerned with being a surgeon. Burke is needed for surgery, but he's confident he'll be on time for the wedding. Bailey sends Yang home to prepare for the wedding.


• Chief Webber's estranged wife has collapsed in the hospital with complications from her pregancy. Webber stands by her side.


• Several of the doctors are trying to determine what happened among four mountain climbers that led to one of them having an ice axe embedded in the back of his head.


• Jeff Pope, the husband of Rebecca Pope, shows up to re-unite with his wife who has been missing and has had amnesia and facial reconstruction.


• Derek throws in Meredith's face that he met a woman at the bar last night and that he enjoyed flirting with her.


• Callie tells George that she wants to have a baby with him.


• In surgery on ice-axe-in-the-head guy, Derek determines that the axe did not go in by accident. The climbers are lying about what happened.


• For practice, Burke recites his wedding vows, from memory, in the operating room, and all the women in the room are thoroughly impressed by his words.


• Karev confronts Jeff Pope about why he didn't look for his wife sooner. He says they had a fight before she left, and Jeff thought she didn't want to be with him any more.


• Burke's mother has had Yang's eyebrows ?waxed? off.


• When Derek confronts the climbers, they're forced to reveal the truth to the cops.


• Yang *begs* Bailey to let her operate on someone so she can feel like herself again.


• Webber's wife Adele has complications from pregnancy at 52, and the baby is lost. Adele tells Webber that the baby was actually his.


• Izzie confesses to George that she's in love with him.


• All the interns are given their final medical exam scores. They all claim to have passed.


• Rebecca Pope has been discharged from the hospital. She tells Karev how good a man her husband Jeff is, but she also says she wants Karev to give her a reason to stay. Karev says he thinks she "should stay with the decent guy."


• Derek discusses his and Meredith's relationship with Meredith and then with Burke.


• Addison tells Karev that she can tell he wants Rebecca (a.k.a. Eva) and that he should fight for her.


• Dr. Bailey finds out that Callie got the Chief Resident position.
  
• George and Dr. Bailey didn't go to the wedding. They're both depressed. George has failed his intern exam. Bailey says he can walk away or do the internship all over again. Bailey asks, almost tearfully, "Did I... Did I fail you, George?" He replies, "No, I failed you." She puts her hand on his arm as if to say, "No, you didn't."


• Karev leaves the wedding early to see if he can stop Rebecca before she leaves.


• Callie tells Izzie that she and George are going to try for a baby; she kind of rubs it in Izzie's face.


• Yang had written her vows on her hands but realizes they've been washed off. She panics which delays the wedding long enough to make Burke question whether Yang is ready.


• Meredith talks Yang into being ready even without the vows written down.


• Burke goes to the doors at the back of the church to check on Yang. Once he's back there, Yang says she had a snag but that she's ready. But, in a sudden switch, Burke is the one that says he can't get married. He doesn't believe Yang wants to get married. Meredith walks down the aisle, gives Derek a weird look, and says, "It's over. You can all go home. It's over," and then under her breath, as if talking to Derek or at least about her and Derek, "So over."


• Karev is too late to catch up to Derek.


• Meredith goes to Burke's apartment where Yang is noticing that certain prized possessions of Burke's are gone. Yang thinks Burke is gone despite how much other stuff he let behind. Then Yang says, "He's gone. I'm free. Dammit. Dammit. Dammit. Dammit. Get this off. Get this off. Get this off." And, then Meredith takes off the choker necklace that Burke's mother gave her and gets scissors to cut Yang out of her dress as Yang cries and gasps for air.


• Izzie and Callie are both still at the empty church waiting for George.


• As George cleans out his locker. The next year's new interns come in. One new intern introduces herself to George. Her name is Lexie Grey (played by Chyler Leigh). I'm assuming that Lexie Grey is Meredith Grey's half sister (who doesn't know that she has a half sister).


• In the final scene, we see Webber try to give the chief position to Derek. Derek says that he's still trying to learn from his mistakes, something Webber is already good at. He says that the chief should be able to do it all over again. Derek says that Webber should keep the job because he is the best man for it.

Scrubs [s6 ep21/22]: "My Rabbit" / "My Point of No Return"

*** Spoiler Warning ***

In Brief: What's Good

• Elizabeth Banks does an excellent job playing Dr. Kim Briggs, the pregnant mother of J.D.'s child. Her performance made it really believable that Kim felt bad lying to J.D. and that she wanted to try for a lasting relationship with J.D.


• Bunny-headed gym-teacher conscience is yet another funny sight gag from J.D.'s inner psyche.


• When Jordan refers to her and Dr. Cox's newborn daughter (Jennifer Dillon) as J.D., it drives Dr. Cox nuts.


• Love Ted's way of getting warmed up to role-play as Elliot in a demonstration for Keith.

In Brief: What's Not So Good

• I'm not an expert on weddings, but is it unusual that Elliot's bachelorette party is approximately four weeks before her wedding (at the beginning of the Part 2 episode, Elliot says he and Kim have been growing closer over the last three weeks and then says Elliot's wedding is a week away)? That seems like a long gap between party and wedding.


• It's still creepy as always whenever The Todd rips his pants off to expose his filled-to-capacity "banana hammock" underwear.

8	Story
9	Performances
8	Comedy/Drama
8	Suspense/Cliffhanging
8	Nostalgia/Coolness
8.2	AVERAGE

Plot Points

• Carla has to reassure Elliot as she starts to have second thoughts about marrying Keith.


• J.D. continually avoids Kim because he's still in shock over the fact that she did *not* have a miscarriage and is still pregnant with his baby.


• Eventually J.D. gives in and agrees to let Kim stay with him. Their relationship gets better the longer that she's there.


• Many people are mad at Kim for what she did to J.D. Because of that, she agrees to let J.D. name their son whathever he likes. He wants to name it Sam Perry Gilligan (Sam after his father, Perry after Dr. Cox, and Gilligan because he lost a bet to Turk). Kim says at long as it isn't nerdy like Aragorn or Chewbacca. J.D. says Turk already has dibs on Chewie.


• Turk has second thoughts about doing non-critical vascular surgery on an older patient after he finds out the patient is the father of a very young child.


• Carla gets upset when Elliot starts taking over more and more control over the bachelorette party that Carla wanted to plan for her.


• To accommodate for Elliot's control freak nature, Carla plans a multiple-choice bachelorette party in which they can do virtually anything Elliot wants to.


• J.D. has a vision of a future with he and Kim together with their son, and he realizes he needs to give the relationship a chance.


• For the next three weeks, J.D. and Kim stay up nights talking, they get the baby's crib ready, and they're a couple again.


• J.D. convinces Kim to give up her old apartment and move in permanently with him. He also convinces her to quit her old job and look for one locally, since her old hospital will only grant her a six-week leave of absence and Dr. Kelso hates the new urologist at Sacred Heart.


• Janitor gathers the braintrust to help pick a wedding gift for "blonde doctor" (Elliot). They decide they should try to control what kind of husband Keith should be.


• Dr. Cox tries to make a deal with J.D. to get him to relinquish his status as his daughter's godfather. J.D. turns it down. But then Dr. Cox makes a deal with Jordan to let relinquish J.D., and she agrees after a list of demands. At the christening, they pick Carla to be the godmother.


• At the christening, Elliot starts to have doubts about marrying Keith, and J.D. starts to have doubts about being with Kim. Later, they both avoid their troubles by hanging out in the doctors' sleep room and talk about their problems.


• Keith refuses "help" from the braintrust, stating that he'll be the best husband to Elliot that he can be without anyone's help.


• In the final scene, J.D. and Elliot are lying next to each other. They're done talking. They hold hands and lean in like they're going to kiss before the screen goes to black.