Hali McKinley Lester
Freshman, International Studies
For the past three months, I’ve been a Grey’s Anatomy addict, binge watching on Netflix to have made it through the past nine seasons. If you don’t watch it, I’d highly recommend it, and here are eighteen reasons why.
- It’s educational!
It doesn’t matter if you’re not on the pre-med track, Grey’s Anatomy clearly gives useful information on how to be a doctor. I definitely feel like I could perform an emergency craniotomy in the wilderness, if necessary.
- It provides examples of why it’s always a bad idea to date coworkers.
Seriously, DO THESE CHARACTERS EVER LEARN? Every inter-hospital relationship seems to end badly. It’s like the idea of dating someone who doesn’t work at Seattle Grace never crosses anyone’s mind. Did we not learn when Burke left the hospital when his relationship with Cristina failed or when Meredith had to leave neuro after her fight with Derek?
- But it also appeals to the romantic in you when the relationships work out.
If you don’t think Meredith and Derek are the golden couple, you’re doing it wrong. If you don’t die from the cuteness of Callie and Arizona’s relationship, do you even watch Grey’s Anatomy?
- It shows you how valuable elevator rides are.
George performed open heart surgery in an elevator. It’s also a safe place to cry, and it’s inevitable that serious conversations always seem to occur in the elevator. Of course, an elevator ride down several floors is clearly enough time for a romantic tryst.
- It teaches you to value friendship, even if you’re competing against your friends.
As interns and residents, the characters are all competing against each other, but that doesn’t mean they don’t love and support each other. When Alex betrays Meredith in the competition for chief resident, he learns the price of betraying a friend, incurring the wrath of all of the other doctors at Seattle Grace.
- The characters you want to hate always have some characteristic that also makes you love them.
Meredith is the main character, but let’s be honest, she is really annoying at times. However, as we learn more about her messed-up childhood, she becomes a more likeable and complex character. Alex and Mark are easy to hate in the beginning, but even they become endearing as they reveal their own personal doubts and feelings.
- The show prepares you for the reality that sometimes bad things happen to good people.
SPOILER ALERT DON’T READ THIS IF YOU AREN’T PAST SEASON TWO: Seriously though, George is probably the greatest person on the show, yet they kill him off. Izzie gets cancer, Teddy loses the love of her life, and some of the patients you want to pull through end up dying. It totally fulfills the adage that life isn’t fair.
- It provides life lessons that comfort you when you feel down.
Grey’s Anatomy can’t help but insert some valuable life advice about valuing friendship and love, remembering that nobody is perfect, and chasing your dreams.
- Relationship drama keeps the show spicy and entertaining!
Honestly, every character seems to need to have relationship problems at some time, and the doctors take turns fulfilling that role. Even the most grounded and serious characters of Chief Weber and Bailey contribute their fair share of relationship drama.
10. You learn about medical cases you didn’t even think were possible.
There are at least five incredibly weird medical cases each season, such as the man who gets his hand caught in the meat grinder, the woman with the 70 pound tumor, and the bomb stuck in the man’s stomach
11. You can admire the eye candy of McDreamy and McSteamy.
This needs no explanation.
12. We all want to be Cristina Yang.
She’s probably the most hardcore character in the world, and her confidence and wit make us all want to let our inner Cristina shine.
13. You learn to run away screaming from interns and never ever want them to have any role in your medical care.
The amount of times the interns screw up is unreal, and I wouldn’t let them within 50 feet of me if I were a patient. George’s first patient dies in a simple appendectomy, Alex’s patient dies when he fails to notice her internal bleeding, Izzie cuts Denny’s LVAD wire, and these are just a few of the many mistakes of the interns.
14. You get used to the unexpected because people die ALL THE TIME.
Even the easy cases often end in death, such as when Meredith’s stepmother’s gets a case of the hiccups.
15. Grey’s Anatomy shows it’s viewers that women can both rock a career and be great mothers.
Bailey, Callie, Arizona, and Meredith all have children, yet they are able to maintain successful careers without neglecting their children or loving them any less.
16. Grey’s Anatomy is a show where it’s okay for women to not have—or want—children.
Cristina knows she doesn’t want to have children, and she sticks by this decision, which is completely normal. Cristina shows viewers that it’s ok for women to not want children, for whatever reason. Unlike other hit TV shows, in Grey’s Anatomy the characters recognize time isn’t going to change their minds.
17. Dance parties are a common solution to their problems.
Meredith and Cristina know that sometimes they just need to dance it out, a lesson we could all use.
18. Grey’s Anatomy can’t help but pull at your heartstrings.
It gives me the feels. You are pretty much guaranteed to cry in every season finale, as well as in episodes along the way. The trials and tribulations that the characters face seem so real and heart-wrenching that it’s impossible to not get emotionally attached to the show.
UF PRISM 