It"s a miracle; after three seasons, a new calendar year is starting at Seattle Grace. But not a ton has changed for our fab five, at least not personally. And for poor George, they also haven"t changed professionally. The other four are now residents and are also in charge of their own interns. Lexie Grey is on Cristina"s team, and George is with Meredith. There"s an awkward Meredith-Lexie meeting in the ambulance bay, but as they"re escorting in multiple victims of a car crash, it"s fairly brief (but annoying). Cristina gets a guy they think is dead until he takes a breath, and it turns out he"s been internally decapitated. Alex gets the guy with a crushed knee who also turns out to have a psych disorder in which he eats everything around him, including scissors and spare change. Meredith gets the pregnant single mother whose arm is severed, and Izzie gets the deer that caused the accident. She also has a bunch of interns who think she"s a lunatic, and while they"re all awful themselves, she"s not doing a lot to disprove this theory.
While they"re all dealing with these various patients, there"s naturally lots of behind-the-scenes drama. Derek tells Cristina that Burke has resigned from the hospital. Izzie bitches a lot about George ignoring her and eventually corners him to ask why he didn"t say anything when she declared her love. Meredith is Meredith about having her estranged boyfriend and her sister who tried to pick him up in a bar working in the hospital at the same time. Alex wants an actual surgery (before he realizes that his patient has a taste for binder clips) and keeps trying to undermine Callie, who is struggling with a bunch of residents that don"t listen to her. Bailey is mad about not being named Chief Resident herself, and George is struggling with his second first intern day. Ultimately, Lexie tells George to suck it up and they strike up the beginning of a friendship. Alex admits he misses Rebecca and Cristina admits she misses Burke in a rare but awesome moment between just the two of them. And George surprises Izzie by showing up at her front door and telling her he loves her too. I throw up a little. But the biggest news is that Derek and Meredith actually decide to officially break up?and then make it official with some break-up break-room sex.