Ok I admit it, once again here on my blog, that I watch some ‘prime time TV’. I’m sure my fellow vegetarian, Unitarian, green party, community radio lovin’, Antioch College friends are shocked and now think lesser of me, but it’s true. The fact that I’m writing a blog entry about the death of a fictional character in a prime time show is even a deeper admission of how far I’ve drifted into non-crunchy-granola-coolness. But bear with me, I have some deeper points in here once you get passed the shallow TV stuff.
Thanks to my wife’s selection of the show for our Thursday night TV viewing I’ve watched Grey’s Anatomy since it’s premier episode. I can’t say it’s my favorite show but I got into the story line and enjoy the show for the most part.
However, last spring they just killed off one of the only characters I really cared about, George O’Malley , portrayed by actor T.R. Knight, They left it hanging over the summer if he was dead or not but it’s now out that he is indeed gone. (Well I guess if I was a ‘real’ fan I’d have known this in June, but it wasn’t until the previews for this fall’s premier started showing up that it was clear what they had done)
Why am I ‘upset’ about this ? Cause I don’t ‘relate’ to any of the other characters. They have the stereotypical George was a ‘Pretty Good Guy’, meant well, but was a bit awkward socially and wasn’t always perfect. He was the ‘nerd’ of the show, had trouble dealing with his macho older brothers, wasn’t very successful with women, was confused and overwhelmed at times but kept picking himself up and kept trying.
Yes all the characters on this show have dramatic ‘tragic flaws’ and are awkward in their own way, so it’s unfair for me to paint George as the only one with this kind of baggage, but really for the most part they are all ‘pretty’ people so I never felt any bond with them the same way I did with George. George was never particularly ‘sexy’ in the traditional hollywood model and his character certainly wasn’t ‘swoon’ worthy. He was ‘average’ and his character was well crafted as the guy who worked hard but wasn’t brilliant, wasn’t gifted, wasn’t sexy or super socially adept.. he was just an average person making the best of life, rolling with the punches, screwing up at times but never giving up. His character seemed the closest to how I have felt in life at times and I felt the most empathy for him. They had him enlist in the army to go be a doctor in Iraq since he felt he needed a place to be needed and where he could be part of something bigger, which if he was going to leave the show would have at least been more in character and a nice way to have him leave .. but no they needed to do the extra drama so they ran him over with a bus and had his mangled body being cared for by his co-doctors for a 75% of the show until they realized it was him.
I suspect the show writers felt he was expendable, in fact we should have seen this coming cause the last season they didn’t really know what to do with his character so they all but left him out of a number of episodes. I guess they assumed killing him off would just add some drama to the other characters but folks would keep watching to see the core group of ‘pretty people’.
In fact I just did a search about his character and found this
“Show creator Shonda Rhimes told Ausiello that she intentionally cut back on George’s plotlines in this last season to make her final-episode twist work. Her theory is supposedly that fans were used to not seeing George, so when he didn’t show up much in the episode, no one would make the leap that he was the disfigured John Doe who saved a woman from death by bus.”
Ah mess up an entire character for a whole season for dramatic effect for the last episode. Nice to see they valued this character that much. Though really they’ve been pretty clueless what to do with his character for a few seasons now, which is sad because imho his character had a lot of potential. I ‘cared’ about George, even when he did things I wouldn’t were I in his shoes, I could believe it.. I could relate and empathized.
T.R. Knight, The actor portraying him came out as being gay a few years ago and had to endure anti-gay slurs made to him by former Grey’s co-star Isaiah Washington, whose character left the show not too long after that happened (hah!). So human believeable flawed but lovable character played by openly gay actor.. that’s pretty good in my book.
I guess the soccer moms and others will keep watching to find out what happens with poor wounded Izzie, the ongoing saga Meredith and McDreamy, Christina and Owen, and the other couples and plot lines. But there’s no one left on this show I care that much about, no one I find any paralells too. For all I care at this point they can all have helicopters dropped on them like Dr. Romano on E.R. many years ago.
I’d be much happier if George was left healing post accident and Izzie Stevens was dead. Come on.. she’s done the whole tragic flaw and recovery thing with Denny, she even got a whole season with him as a ghost, and even inexplicably fell for and married perpetual jerk with a hidden seldom-seen sensitive soul, Alex. Most of the past few seasons seemed to be focused around her, she’s had her moment in the sun, let her leave for Hollywood.. good riddance. Heck if she had died it might have finally given Alex the final real slap in the face to stop being such an ass and find a purpose in life. Now he just gets play poor oppressed asshat who has to care for someone else while doing a hard job. Poor him. Boo Hoo. Can I nominate him for a bus or helicopter encounter too?
Save the nerds, kill of the blonds who are too busy doing campy Hollywood romantic comedies. 🙂
… by the way, what is it with nerdy characters and buses? I remember years ago watching an episode of Felicity (yes, I watched that too {bows head in shame}) where a nerdy character follows her to NYC because he’s convinced they’ll fall in love after one kiss. She politely tells him to go away and POOF he’s immediately run over by a speeding bus. At least in this episode he wasn’t a main character and he actually lives through the experience (and finds that kissing her isnt’ magical at all). Oh and while I’m ranting about Felicity, she picks the macho jock/jerk character instead of the more nerdy sensitive Noel at the end of the series there too.. Silly fictional TV women, when will you ever learn?
So hey.. ABC.. I’m sure you dutifully read my blog and really care about my opinion … but for the record you just lost a 40 year old geeky dad in Maine as a viewer. Please consider adding more ‘human’ characters to your TV shows. I’m sick of ‘pretty people’ on my TV, give me real, human, and believable characters.
{raises glass} In memory of George O’Malley, I’ll prove my geekyness and quote Kirk at the end of Star Trek II;
“Of my friend, I can only say this: of all the souls I have encountered in my travels, his was the most… human.”
He will be missed.