Erica Hahn - Reception

Reception

Mary Macnamara of the Los Angeles Times has praised the character highly, writing: "Hahn is a terrific character, sassy and professional, with an appropriately acerbic view of the various romantic shenanigans. She also seems to be a carefully considered stand-in for viewers choking on the soapy silt of last season, a way for the writers to move forward without messing with the hugely successful brand. (Don’t get too nervous, Brooke, but the future of TV’s once highest-rated drama may be in your hands.)" Discussing the character in terms of her relationship with Callie Torres, AfterEllen.com were also largely positive, assessing that: "The story line offered both the drama Grey's is known for and — despite some marginally exploitative threesome talk — a truthfulness network television has rarely achieved when it comes to lesbian relationships." Trish Doolan and Nikki Weiss, invited by GLAAD to consult with Grey's Anatomy producers on the storyline, praised the effort put in to researching the issue by the writers and actors involved, though were more negative on the scene which saw Hahn kiss Callie in an elevator in front of Mark Sloan. Weiss commented: "I just felt like, if they really cared about each other, I don't think they would do that as a stunt. That seemed a little, I don't know, forced. was more like a conquest, like he could have too or something." AfterEllen.com agreed with this view, criticizing the way the scene was edited so as to keep cutting to Mark's point of view, as though "privileging the male gaze." Smith, however, has refuted this interpretation, stating that; "Frankly, when I played that scene, I played it as, "You think that if you walked in the room and we were together, we would just be on you, but we wouldn't." So that's why I kissed her. In that moment, I swear to God, when I was playing it, that's what I was thinking. You know there's a bit of a competition between all the guys in the boys club and my character anyway, so when that happened it was sort of like, "Oh yeah, you wouldn't be intimidated, uh huh. OK, well, check this out."

Following the announcement that the character had been written out of Grey's Anatomy, Mary Macnamara wrote a critical LA Times editorial on the decision. She deemed Smith's firing: "a grim reminder that certain prejudices are still ascendant in television", writing that "most gay characters are allowed to have sex on network television only if they are part of a single-episode story line, and all actively sexual lesbian characters must be sylphlike, gorgeous and preferably under 30." She went on to assess that: "Smith probably got the boot not because her character wasn't interesting enough or sympathetic enough but because she, especially when paired with Ramirez, just didn't fit the visual template of "Grey's" or indeed, of most of network television. She is a character actress, not a tabloid star. In other words, and they are words I deeply regret, Ramirez, with all her lipglossed lusciousness, may be beautiful enough to be bi, but Smith is not beautiful enough to be gay. At least not on network TV. Some ground, it would appear, is too calcified to be broken." After Ellen's Dorothy Snarker was similarly critical of the decision, explaining that: "Smith’s dismissal means the loss of American broadcast TV’s only lesbian/bisexual couple in primetime. It was also the first significant gay relationship portrayed on the hit ABC series. The handful of remaining lesbian/bisexual relationships on TV are on cable, premium channels and daytime television." Detailing the decision to also change a new character's orientation from bisexual to heterosexual, Snarker added: "Besides striking a serious blow for queer women’s visibility on the small screen, the moves seem to signal a significant setback in the industry’s acceptance of mainstream gay and lesbian storylines." She concluded that: "While Callie had fleeting moments of gay panic where she slept with friend and fellow surgeon Mark Sloan (Eric Dane), the interaction between the two women was both organic and romantic. Callie and Erica's relationship stood out as one of the few bright spots for lesbian and bisexual characters on primetime TV. Now it seems all we’re left with is taillights."