Here’s a very selective list of moments and items of interest that jumped out at me this week.

Instant Classic Episode of the Week: Bashing Grey’s Anatomy in recent seasons has been such a popular sport—especially during the dregs of the Denny’s-ghost period—that it seems only fair to recognize when the show achieves a personal best. That happened this week with a taut, emotionally riveting episode that put personal stories on the back burner for a welcome change of pace. It felt more like something from the golden age of ER, as a burn patient’s unexplained and unnecessary death in Seattle Grace’s own ER spun into a medical mystery with someone’s career on the line. The tension was already high between the Seattle Grace and Mercy West docs, all fighting to preserve their careers. No one was willing to take responsibility for what happened to this patient, a lovely and loving mom (Erinn Hayes from Worst Week) who kept falling between the cracks during an all-hands-on-deck trauma crisis. (Comparisons to ER’s legendary “Love’s Labour Lost” episode are perhaps inevitable.) We’re mesmerized as the story keeps shifting points of view, playing moments over from various characters’ perspectives: including Alex, still distracted by the missing Izzie; Lexie, trying to keep it together while a severely burned patient howls in agony; the Mercy Grace interlopers, who can’t even find their way around the place yet. As often happens, the simplest mistake (failing to look inside the patient’s throat) had the deadliest consequences. Later, April. (And wasn't Sarah Drew heartbreakingly good?) But when the chief tells Derek he needed to know “who finally was responsible” for this, he has to face the fact that he’s as much at fault as anyone, for the chaos he has engineered at his own hospital in the wake of the merger. Powerful storytelling that reminds us how great Grey’s still can be.

Cliffhanger of the Week: On Dexter, sister Deb and retired FBI guy Lundy are shot, post-tryst, in the parking lot of his hotel. Is Trinity responsible (the creepy killer having bumped into Lundy on purpose during a scouting mission)? Or the Tourist Killer, maybe? Whoever pulled the trigger, Deb’s whispered whimper “Stay with me” as she watched the light ebb from Lundy’s eyes was absolutely chilling. Also enjoyed Dexter’s own plot du jour. With Rita and kids away off to a wedding, he hunts down a lady cop who offed her own family, a chance for Dexter to have an epiphany about what matters most: “I’d rather risk [wife and kids] knowing the truth than lose them,” he says before snuffing the bad cop. How’s he going to feel when he learns his other closest family member has been shot down?

Reveal of the Week: Betty Draper learns more than she bargained for about husband Don as she opens the drawer to his past on Mad Men, finding the divorce papers, the dual dog tags, the old family photos of “Dick and Adam” Whitman. And so Don’s compartmentalized life threatens to shatter anew. Betty’s chomping for a confrontation, but Don’s still too busy tending to Miss Farrell and her epileptic brother—who reminds Don uncomfortably of how he abandoned his own needy sibling: “I swore to myself I would try to do this right once.” The look on trophy wife Betty’s face could frost a baked Alaska as she accompanies her husband to Sterling Cooper’s 40th-anniversary party, where he basks in the attention. “I’m honored,” he says. Not for long, Don. In the best subplot, from the nightmares-I-can-relate-to department: Paul Kinsey failing to write down his inspired idea, waking up from a drunken slumber having lost it. [This is why I have a pad and pen on my bedside table.] Thankfully, Peggy is on hand to turn his Chinese proverb—“The faintest ink is better than the best memory”—into Western Union gold. She really is better at this game than he is. Biggest laugh: Roger’s dowager mother asking, “Does Mona know?” when told she’s attending the dinner with her new daughter-in-law, Jane. As the old lady notes, restating the theme of this season: “Enjoy the world as it is. They’ll change it and never give you a reason.”

A Leader Falls: In a wrenching twist on Survivor: Samoa, Galu leader Russell Swan collapses during a grueling challenge after giving 110% at camp and in competition, his body finally failing him. Jeff Probst calls it “the scariest moment I’ve ever had on this show” as Russell’s blood pressure and heart rate plummet and he lays back, eyes glassy, unresponsive, until the medical team forces him to bow out. Though devastated, Russell’s last words on the show are inspiring: “To do it and fail is better than to never try.” No eliminations at a joint tribal council, but in the wake of Erik’s direct challenge to the underdog Foa Foa, Jeff notes, “The events of today have only intensified the rivalry between these two tribes.” Game on. Russell wouldn’t have it any other way.

Pie in the Sky: A fond farewell to Soupy Sales, the slapstick comedian who died this week at 83 after a lifetime of giving as well as he got when it came to his trademark pie in the face. At the height of his fame in the ’50s and ’60s, superstars like Frank Sinatra agreed to come on his chaotic funhouse show only if they were guaranteed some whipped (or shaving) cream in the kisser. Sales’ wacky children’s show was catnip not only to kids but to grown-ups who appreciated his rambunctious, irreverent energy (even if they weren’t so keen when, as a stunt, he asked kids to send him dollar bills from their parents’ pockets). His spirit can be felt in more modern incarnations of lunatic comedy-for-all-ages as Pee-wee’s Playhouse and the buckets-of-slime antics on Nickelodeon.

Two Eternal Snaps Up: If you’re of a certain age—say, growing up on TV in the ’60s—you can’t think of comedy classics The Addams Family and Green Acres without their catchy theme songs bouncing off the brain and lodging there for days. For that, our altogether ooky thanks go to songwriter Vic Mizzy, who died this week at 93. On those moments when this transplanted Hoosier finds himself thinking “Good bye, city life” or “Keep Manhattan, just give me that countryside,” Mizzy’s music is waiting to take me back to a simpler, happier time.

A Crown Jewel: Not that I doubted it would happen, but ABC’s full-season pickup of Monday-night sleeper Castle was very happy news. The fun Nathan Fillion is having as the novelist-turned-sleuth is infectious, and it’s becoming one of the few hours of laid-back escapist pleasure I look most forward to many weeks.

Swinging Sue: I’m still in the camp that Jane Lynch can do no wrong on Glee as Sue Sylvester, but even so, this week’s subplot—in which she was making googly-eyes at an obviously smarmy local-news anchor, than swing-dancing with former nemesis Will to Benny Goodman—was awfully out of character for this usually no-nonsense scene-stealer. (Loved seeing her kick up her heels, though, even if it didn’t make much sense.) By episode’s end, she was snarling at Will again and kicking pregnant Quinn off the Cheerios in a public scene of humiliation. You could get whiplash following this show’s inconsistent mood swings. An off episode all around, save for the Puck-Rachel “hot Jew” flirtation, and his unexpected solo serenade of “Sweet Caroline.” Two moratoriums, please: No more storylines involving major characters quitting and rejoining the glee club in the same episode; and please, dear show, I beg you, a cease-fire already on the tiresome slushee-in-the-face war.

Great Guests: Wil Wheaton as himself on The Big Bang Theory, tricking Sheldon into losing a geek-game contest with a story about his “mee-maw” and remaining a wrath-of-Khan-sized nemesis. ... Eric McCormack (Will & Grace) beginning a run on The New Adventures of Old Christine as a shrink with sexual impulse-control issues who’s Matthew’s mentor and Christine’s new love interest, although he’s the first to agree with her that “I might need a therapist more than a boyfriend.” ... Rosie Perez giving a remarkable performance as an anguished mother of an abused boy on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. My full review can be found here, and my rave for this week’s Law & Order can be found in a weekend-TV roundup here.

Great Moments in Comedy: Another winner this week for ABC’s Modern Family, as hot-tempered Gloria bristles at learning that Claire once referred to her hot new stepmother as a “coal digger.” (It takes a communal jump in the pool to smooth things over.) Meanwhile, football novice Mitchell thinks Dick Butkis is a gay slur, and is horrified when his dad asks him and Cameron to check him out: “You guys basically are like women, you look at guys, so what do you think?” To which Mitchell moans, “You’re really close to ruining gay for me.” Meanwhile, Phil finds himself covered in Gloria’s colorful underwear as she vents to her smitten stepson-in-law in her boudoir. As Phil tells his prickly wife, “I just hate it when my two girls aren’t getting along.”

Runner-up in the sitcom sweepstakes this week: NBC’s up-and-comer Community, with this inspired volley as Jeff selfishly tries to convince Troy to play football again. “It’s in your blood.” “That’s racist.” “Your soul.” “That’s racist.” “Your eyes?” “That’s gay?” “That’s homophobic.” “That’s black.” “That’s racist!” “Damn.” Also bringing the funny big time: Jim (“that dude looks like Moby”) Rash as the school’s nebbishy dean, who’s renamed Greendale’s football team The Human Beings because “a lot of these students have been called animals their whole lives.”

Hell Hath No Fury: You go, Jenna Fischer! Pam went all primal-scream freak-out on The Office upon learning that while she and Jim were in Puerto Rico, Michael had taken her mother (shudder) as a lover. Quite the funny spectacle as she openly revolts against her boss and this revolting development, telling Jim, “You need to be more upset about this” and the rest of the staff, “Welcome to my personal hell!” As Michael tries to take charge again, telling her, “I am your boss and may someday be your father,” her “You get out!” rebellion leads him to his nemesis Toby in HR, seeking conflict resolution from this hostile work environment. Toby thinks he might actually be able to earn Michael’s friendship, but as he soon learns, and we all already know, no good can come from this.

The Unkindest Cut: On House, Foreman slices into the chest of their dead patient (living life as a death wish, convinced he would die by 40) while House observes the autopsy, only to see the body start bleeding and the patient wake up with a scream. Or maybe that was my scream as the docs recoil in horror. Not exactly a Halloween episode, but there were ghosts afoot: Chase having visions of the genocidal dictator he was responsible for killing (he confesses to a priest but, not yet, to Cameron) and House hearing spooky whispers as he tries to sleep in Wilson’s shrine to Amber. (Turns out it’s just Wilson pillow-talking to his dead lover, which inspires House to do the same to his dad.)

They Said It: “I never even had a dog because as my mom would say, ‘You can’t eat love.’”—30 Rock’s Kenneth the Page volunteering at the animal shelter. … “Can you still love a man who’s half beer?”—Homer on The Simpsons’ 20th-anniversary “Treehouse of Horror” episode, in a parody of Sweeney Todd where his blood mixes with Mo’s beer. … “That’s not hate, it’s foreplay.”—An intern observing a Huddy moment on House. … “I’m feeling pretty broken right now.”—Jennifer reacting to a harsh critique after losing the Restaurant Wars challenge on another terrific episode of Top Chef, the week’s top reality hour after Survivor. Glad they didn’t send her home. Despite this setback, I still think Jennifer should be in the finals against Kevin and at least one of the Voltaggio brothers.

So what jazzed you this week, for better or worse? Share your thoughts in the comments below, and keep following me at twitter.com/roushTVGuideMag