‘Grey’s Anatomy’ Kills Off Character in Season 22 Premiere

Grey’s Anatomy’s 22^nd season kicked off with a tragedy.

Thursday’s premiere continued the Season 21 finale cliffhanger, in which there was an explosion on the OR floor.

The ABC medical drama had been teasing that not everyone might make it out alive, and unfortunately, that was the case. Dr. Monica Beltran (Natalie Morales) and Dr. Jules Millin (Adelaide Kane) were doing surgery on a little boy when the blast hit, and while Jules was okay, Monica was pinned by surgical equipment, but she seemed to be doing fine for the most part. After talking Jules through a procedure to save the little boy, Monica ultimately succumbed to her injuries just as firefighters came to rescue them.

“I loved working with Natalie so much,” Chris Carmack, who plays Dr. Atticus “Link” Lincoln, told TVLine. “She’s such a light, funny, wonderful, kind, great actress. Link and Beltran don’t have an extensive history together on screen, but Natalie made a huge impression in the time that she was working on the show, so it definitely hurt to see that Beltran didn’t make it.”

Morales first joined Grey’s Anatomy in Season 20, appearing in six episodes as Grey Sloan’s newest pediatric surgeon. She was added to the recurring cast for Season 21, and fans got to see Monica and Amelia (Caterina Scorsone) have a slow-burn romance. Not only did the show kill off another person close to Amelia, but she’s also likely going to feel guilty for wanting to take on the little boy’s surgery in the first place.

As for how it was decided that Monica was the one to die in the explosion, showrunner Meg Marinis told Variety, “When you sit down to tell a story, you think about everybody who we saw that was in danger, and you go through the chain reactions if you did kill that character off, and who that would affect, and how that would help or derail the next season for us. Obviously, I didn’t want to kill anybody. It’s not a fun thing to do. It’s just sometimes where the story leads. Those decisions are extremely difficult. They’re painful because not only do you love the character, but you love working with the actor. It could have been any of the people that were on that floor – we had discussions about everybody.”

It is never easy when Grey’s Anatomy kills off a character, and the aftermath of the explosion will impact everyone. At the very least, there will be a familiar face returning to Grey Sloan when Kelly McCreary returns next week for the series’ 450^th episode, airing on Thursday at 10 p.m. ET on ABC.