Grey’s Anatomy has featured a character with every type of attribute TV has to offer. We’ve got the good guys, the antagonists, the dreamy boys, the backstabbers, the tough ones, and the bad boys. The most popular tend to be either the dreamy ones i.e. McDreamy, or the bad boys such as Mark Sloan and Alex Karev.
The show plays into the old trope of turning the initial bad boy into someone with a much gentler disposition. Alex Karev has seen his fair share of mellowing down over the last fifteen years we’ve followed him, but there’s still a lot left to mature in this guy. One of the defining aspects of his character is how flawed he is. There’s a definite element of self-righteousness to him as he’s never been the one to blend in a normal crowd because things like making small talk are something Karev can never indulge in. He’s stuck to feeling like a victim of the way the world works and refuses to partake in societal customs, preferring the company of a select few who truly get him like Meredith.
It’s still a fascinating character to follow because you wouldn’t have expected him to have lasted this long upon his initial introduction. At first, he seemed to mainly be a foil to George O’ Malley, but since then Alex has become a standout character in his own right. But there’s no looking past the aspects of him that aren’t the best of him. If you think he’s the best, then looking through this list might convince you otherwise.
Here are 20 Things Wrong With Alex Karev.
He Doesn't Have A Great Personality
Of all the characters on the show, Alex is definitely the least approachable. While people such as George or Izzie were the kind you wanted to approach and could feel comfortable around, Alex is nothing like that. It’s hard to tolerate him for the most part as Karev is hardly ever in a giving mood.
He doesn’t like to put up with people in general and isn’t willing to be humble or a shoulder to cry on. He can be like this to people like Meredith, but it took about a decade before he and Meredith could be like that. For the most part, Alex’s personality isn’t the best.
He used Lexie to get over Izzie
Okay, if you think about it, everyone on the show is pretty flaky, and Lexie is around the top of the bunch, but Alex did still use her to make himself feel better for losing Izzie. He’d sort of used her in Season 4 as well when Lexie was just too eager to get a Resident-Boyfriend.
By Season 6, though, she was likely hoping for more from Alex, who never really took her seriously and itted while in shock, after getting hurt, that he loved Izzie. Once he’d broken up with her, Alex never felt bad about stringing Lexie around either.
His Original Relationship With Jo
Alex and Jo were always headed toward a romantic relationship during Season 9, but attempts were made to make it look like this might not be the case. They hung out, talked about casual stuff, and didn’t show too much romantic interest in one another. While this strategy wasn’t too bad, the writers shouldn’t have had a scene where Jo even called Alex “like my brother”.
In retrospect, that remark doesn’t age well, nor does it look too good either, unless the show wants to convince us a sibling-like relationship can turn into a romantic one between friends.
he still loves izzie
Alex may not be completely in love with Izzie anymore, but there’s no denying he still has a place for her in his heart. Throughout the first six seasons, she was his main love interest. Her influence was such that Alex was still hungover Izzie as late as in Season 12, when she’d been gone years.
To this day, as recently as the 300th episode, Alex keeps mentioning her from time to time. In the most recent instance, Alex revealed he had made up a scenario where Izzie might be today. If that doesn’t tell you he’s been thinking about her all these years nothing will.
His relationship with Jane Doe
During a break between his pursuit of Izzie from Season 3 to Season 4, Alex had a much-maligned storyline with a woman initially only known as Jane Doe. This seemed to be heading toward a sweet Doctor-Patient love story until it became completely messed up.
Out of nowhere, she had a husband, and Alex was in a weird triangle of sorts. To make matters worse, in Season 4 the woman had several mental health problems and was then written out inexplicably. The relationship was barely ever mentioned after that.
How he treated George
Despite whatever he’s done over the years, both good and bad, the worst part about Alex is how he treated George. For reasons never explained, Alex hated George with a ion, who never did anything to warrant such behavior against him.
Alex regularly insulted George, treated him like garbage, and belittled him at every turn. What’s worse is that Alex did it in such a way that he felt it was justified. It was classic bullying, but Karev was adamant in his hatred for George right until the latter’s end. He wasn’t even much sad when George ed away, being mainly concerned over how Izzie felt.
The Callie Retcon
A few years earlier, Grey’s Anatomy’s ratings fell hard from what they had once been. In order to regain that interest, the show had several gimmick episodes that were out of the box. One of them was a flashback episode that showed the doctors in their initial days in the hospital.
A big retcon was there in the form of Karev and Callie Torres having a one-time thing upon their first meeting. This had nothing to do with anything so it was a surprise the show handed us a factoid about the two. Not only did it make no sense, but it also made Alex look like an even bigger hound than he is.
He And Mark Are Similar
Speaking of being a hound, the man with this title was Mark Sloan, who didn’t go two episodes without being with a new girl. Mark was stuck with this tag throughout his tenure and it became a defining character trait of his, but he’s not the only one always around the ladies.
Alex also has a very long list of women he has been with. For starters, the names that pop right up are Izzie, Addison, Callie, Lexie, Jo, and all of these women are the main characters we’ve seen. These women aren’t even a quarter of the ladies we’ve seen Alex with! Poor Mark gets flack for no reason.
He gets crazy jealous
There are several indications in Grey’s Anatomy that Alex and Jo’s relationship isn’t exactly healthy. They both have messed up, even traumatic, pasts before they came across each other and every personal problem has affected their relationship. One of the side effects of enduring his past problems has been Alex’s jealousy.
No matter where he is with Jo, whether with or without her, he finds someone to be jealous of connected to her. This was played off as cute in Season 9 when they hadn’t gotten together but since then the jealousy related incidents don’t come across half as lovey-dovey as they used to.
Hurting Addison
Another person he didn’t show regard for was Addison. In Season 3, when both Addison and Alex weren’t involved in any storylines, the two were randomly matched together. For some reason, it worked great and could’ve become a superb storyline as these two had something that just seemed right. Unfortunately, it wasn’t to be and Alex very offhandedly turned Addison’s attempts of taking it further down.
In the end, Alex basically took advantage of the situation to have some fun and felt no remorse when Addison bailed from the hospital. It worked out for her as she went onto Private Practice, but let’s not forget how little care he showed.
