As Grey’s Anatomy Braces for a Mass Exodus, a Look Back at How the Series Has Handled Past Exits
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Grey’s Anatomy had better get the defibrillator paddles charged up stat, because Season 21 promises to be business as most unusual at Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital.
Already, two series regulars are confirmed to be scrubbing out from the long-running medical drama (with yet another former cast member also set to return full-time). Meanwhile, the contract status of virtually all of the vets remains up in the air.
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It would be easy to say — and heaven knows that many a grumpy viewer has said — it’s time to pull the plug. But just because we’re seeing some significant cast turnover doesn’t mean that the show should be given last rites. Over the course of its storied history, it has weathered countless changes to its lineup and come out the other side largely no worse for wear.
Doubt it? Just take a gander at the below list of goodbyes that Grey’s Anatomy has had to say since its 2005 debut and see whether, when you’re done, you can still argue that, “Well, without so-and-so, the show simply can’t go on.”
Keep in mind, though, as you embark on your scroller derby, that we’ve included in our rundown of sendoffs the series’ next departures even though at best we can for the moment guess how the docs will be hanging up their lab coats.
Jake Borelli (Dr. Levi Schmitt)
Final Airdate: TBD
Reason for Exit: Our sister site Deadline suggests that Grey’s Anatomy’s Season 21 renewal was predicated on budget cuts — cuts that may have taken a scalpel to the groundbreaking character that Borelli had played for the past seven seasons. (Back in Season 15, Levi’s kiss with Alex Landi’s Nico Kim was the first between two male doctors at the hospital.)
How He Left: Given Schmitt’s keen interest in a peds fellowship, he is likely to depart from Grey Sloan and Seattle to pursue that goal. But we won’t find out for sure until Season 21; Borelli is reportedly in negotiations to continue on until Levi’s story can be sutured up.
Jessica Capshaw (Dr. Arizona Robbins)
Final Airdate: May 17, 2018
Reason for Exit: The decision to pink-slip Capshaw along with Sarah Drew as Season 14 neared its conclusion “was a creative one,” insisted showrunner Krista Vernoff, adding that “the only thing as constant on Grey’s as Ellen Pompeo is our penchant for reinvention.”
How She Left: Raising “Calzona” fans’ hopes for a reunion — if only off screen — the erstwhile Roller Girl followed her ex Callie’s tracks to New York to open the Robbins-Herman Center for Women’s Health with former mentor Nicole.
Justin Chambers (Dr. Alex Karev)
Final Airdate: March 5, 2020
Reason for Exit: Two months after his last appearance on the show, Chambers issued a statement in which he revealed that “for some time… I have hoped to diversify my acting roles and career choices… Now is that time.”
How He Left: After telling bride Jo that he was going to care for his ailing mother — and never returning — Alex sent not only her but Meredith, Richard and Bailey letters explaining that he’d actually reunited with old flame Izzie, who since leaving Seattle had settled in Kansas with their children. Yes, children!
Gaius Charles (Dr. Shane Ross)
Final Airdate: May 15, 2014
Reason for Exit: Introduced in Season 9 as an ambitious new intern, the Friday Night Lights grad was promoted to series regular the following season and then… altogether dropped.
How He Left: Shane implored mentor and onetime lover Cristina to take him with her when she left to revolutionize medicine in Zurich — and she did.
Eric Dane (Dr. Mark Sloan)
Final Airdate: Oct. 4, 2012
Reason for Exit: Back then, Shonda Rhimes said in a statement that “after much discussion and conversations, [Dane] and I have decided that this is the right time for his storyline to end.” Shortly thereafter, the actor set sail on TNT’s The Last Ship. “I would’ve done [Grey’s] until the final episode,” he told Entertainment Weekly, “but this was something I couldn’t pass up.”
How He Left: Though Mark survived the plane crash that ended Season 8, he didn’t survive for long. McSteamy succumbed to his injuries shortly after Season 9 began, in a way — a really tragic way! — reuniting him with his late true love, Lexie.
Patrick Dempsey (Dr. Derek Shepherd)
Final Airdate: May 14, 2015
Reason for Exit: Shonda Rhimes said it “wasn’t easy or fun” reaching the decision to part ways with Dempsey after 11 seasons — and while he still had a season left on his contract. But, as the actor told People.com, “it was time for me to move on with other things and other interests. I stayed a bit longer than I should have.”
How He Left: In the April 23, 2015, episode, “How to Save a Life,” Derek treated victims of a car accident at the site of the wreck, only to have his own vehicle slammed by a semi. The shoddy medical care that he received at nearby Dillard Medical Center left him brain-dead before Meredith could even arrive on the scene.
Sarah Drew (Dr. April Kepner)
Final Airdate: May 17, 2018
Reason for Exit: When Drew was axed with Jessica Capshaw at the end of Season 14, showrunner Krista Vernoff made it clear that their dismissals had nothing to do with castmate Ellen Pompeo’s raise; the suggestion “is wrong and hurtful,” she tweeted. Rather, the changes to the series’ lineup were creatively dictated. “And that,” Vernoff added, “is the whole story.” Well, aside from the fact that Drew didn’t seem to see it coming. “I know you’re sad,” she tweeted to her fans. “I’m sad, too.”
How She Left: When Alex and Jo’s planned nuptials went off the rails in Season 14’s finale, April and ex-fiancé Matthew stepped in, got married in their place. and took up residence in a part of Seattle that was never shown on Grey’s Anatomy. Three seasons later, April agreed to move with her and former husband Jackson’s daughter Harriet to Boston, where a happy new beginning awaited.
Richard Flood (Dr. Cormac Hayes)
Final Airdate: March 3, 2022
Reason for Exit: “Having three years on the show felt right for me,” the actor told Deadline, “and I think that the arc of the character with all the developments in the story was probably coming to its natural end… I was very happy that everybody felt the same.”
How He Left: After Owen confessed in Season 18 that he’d been helping terminally ill veterans end their lives, Cormac packed up his sons and left Seattle rather than risk losing his medical license over his accidental complicity in his colleague’s well-intentioned crime.
Midori Francis (Dr. Mika Yasuda)
Final Airdate: TBD
Reason for Exit: After only two seasons at Grey Sloan, the Sex Lives of College Girls vet was eager to broaden her horizons, per our sister site Deadline. So she and Grey’s Anatomy reached what was said to be “an amicable decision” to allow her to scrub out.
How She Left: We won’t find out until Season 21, when Francis is expected to return, however briefly, to wrap up Mika’s storyline.
Jason George (Dr. Ben Warren)
Final Airdate: May 17, 2018
Reason for Exit: Though the actor continued to guest-star on Grey’s Anatomy as Bailey’s husband, he had been tapped to entice the series’ fans to first-responders spinoff Station 19. At first, though, as he told Getting Grilled With Curtis Stone, he feared the call that he received from Shonda Rhimes was going to be along the lines of “‘Sorry, we’re going to kill Ben off this season.’… [When] they were like, ‘How would you feel about Ben going over to this new show?’ I was like, ‘Are you offering me another job? I could roll with that.’”
How He Left: For seven seasons, Ben traded his lab coat for a firehose on Grey’s second offshoot. But with the cancellation of Station 19, George was set to return his character to Grey Sloan to finish out his surgical residency.
Greg Germann (Dr. Tom Koracick)
Final Airdate: May 20, 2021
Reason for Exit: Beats the hell out of us. In announcing to our sister site Deadline that the actor wouldn’t be returning as a series regular in Season 18, showrunner Krista Vernoff called him “a comic genius” who would be missed “terribly in the day to day — but we plan to see Tom Koracick again!”
How He Left: After watching roommate of color after roommate of color succumb to COVID during his hospital stay, Tom decided that he wanted to become worthy of having been spared the same fate. So he joined Jackson in relocating to Boston to, in essence, change the world for the better.
Giacomo Gianniotti (Dr. Andrew DeLuca)
Final Airdate: March 11, 2021
Reason for Exit: Inspiration, EP Krista Vernoff told TVLine. When she began brainstorming Season 17 stories, “this one was the first and most powerful one that came to my mind sort of wholly realized. I knew… why we had to do it,” however reluctantly.
How He Left: While pursuing sex trafficker Opal, DeLuca was stabbed by one of her accomplices. Later, he succumbed to his injuries at Grey Sloan — and was reunited with his late mother on Meredith’s limbo beach between life and death.
Katherine Heigl (Dr. Izzie Stevens)
Final Airdate: Jan. 21, 2010
Reason for Exit: With her movie career on the upswing, the 2008 Emmy winner declined to submit herself for consideration the following year because “I did not feel,” she said in a statement, “that I was given the material this season to warrant a… nomination.” The dis did not go unnoticed by Shonda Rhimes, who shared on Oprah’s Next Chapter that “on some level, [Heigl’s remark] stung, and on some level, I was not surprised.” Ultimately, the actress asked to be released 18 months early from her contract to spend more time with her family.
How She Left: When husband Alex refused to let Izzie take back the Dear John letter she’d written when she believed he was responsible for her firing, she declined a chance to scrub back in and left Seattle to start over.
Martin Henderson (Dr. Nathan Riggs)
Final Airdate: Oct. 26, 2017
Reason for Exit: After Patrick Dempsey’s Derek was killed off, “I couldn’t believe how fast the studio and the network felt like they had to get a penis in there,” Ellen Pompeo told The Hollywood Reporter. “We brought in Martin Henderson, but they didn’t love the storyline, so that ended.” At least Henderson wasn’t blindsided. He “only had a short-term contract,” he told our sister site Deadline. “This [was] my final year, so I was expecting Nathan’s storyline to be wrapped up.”
How He Left: The resurrection of Riggs’ lost love — and Owen’s sister — Megan drove the final nail into the coffin of his budding romance with Mer. Early on in Season 14, Nathan and Megan not only reunited but moved to Malibu with her son Farouk.
Jerrika Hinton (Dr. Stephanie Edwards)
Final Airdate: May 18, 2017
Reason for Exit: Three words — Here and Now. When Hinton landed a role on Alan Ball’s short-lived HBO series, she asked to be released from her Grey’s contract. “And when an actor like Jerrika comes to me and says she wants to try something new,” Shonda Rhimes said in a statement, “creatively, I like to honor that.”
How She Left: After nearly going up in smoke in the Grey Sloan blaze that ended Season 13, Stephanie quit not only her job but medicine altogether. “I need to travel and… explore… and hike… and breathe,” she told Richard, “away from the monitors and the blood.”
T.R. Knight (Dr. George O’Malley)
Final Airdate: May 14, 2009
Reason for Exit: After the Season 3 incident with Isaiah Washington that led to Knight’s public coming-out, George, his portrayer told Entertainment Weekly in 2009, “just kind of disappeared.” So the actor asked to be let out of his contract — with no discussion whatsoever about his character’s fate. “My five-year experience,” he said, “proved to me that I could not trust any answer that was given” about George.
How He Left: No sooner had George suddenly decided to join the Army than he was disfigured playing hero to save a woman from being hit by a bus. By the time Meredith realized who her John Doe patient was, he was as good as dead.
Alex Landi (Dr. Nico Kim)
Final Airdate: March 2, 2023
Reason for Exit: None was given… although it wouldn’t be hard to make a case for the fact that Nico and Levi’s once-sweet and sexy romance had turned terribly toxic.
How He Left: Following “Schmico’s” breakup, Nico exited Grey Sloan to pick up where Link left off working for the Seattle Mariners. In Season 20, we learned that he and his new partner were starting a family via a surrogate.
Chyler Leigh (Dr. Lexie Grey)
Final Airdate: May 17, 2012
Reason for Exit: As if to brace viewers for her imminent departure, Leigh sat out the start of Season 8 to enjoy the extended summer hiatus she’d been granted to spend more time with her family. Later, she revealed that “earlier this year, I made the decision that Season 8 would be my last” and that she’d worked with Shonda Rhimes “to give Lexie’s story appropriate closure.”
How She Left: If by “appropriate,” she meant “heartrending,” they sure nailed it. While imagining a future with soulmate Mark that would never come to pass, Lexie succumbed to injuries sustained in Season 8’s legendary plane crash.
Tina Majorino (Dr. Heather Brooks)
Final Airdate: Sept. 26, 2013
Reason for Exit: Majorino was already attached to TNT’s Legends when she began recurring as the intern that Cristina dubbed Mousey. When the spy drama was picked up, the actress was shipped out.
How She Left: Though Season 9’s finale left Richard lying face down in a pool of water after he was electrocuted in the hospital’s boiler room, it was actually Heather who wound up dying from the shock she got running to his rescue in Season 10’s premiere.
Kelly McCreary (Dr. Maggie Pierce)
Final Airdate: April 13, 2023
Reason for Exit: After nine seasons as Richard and Ellis’ surprise daughter, McCreary was eager to explore other options, reported our sister site Deadline.
How She Left: After a partial heart transplant made Maggie an extra hot commodity, she left behind Seattle and husband Winston to accept a job offer from the Heart Center of Chicago.
Sandra Oh (Dr. Cristina Yang)
Final Airdate: May 15, 2014
Reason for Exit: After 10 seasons, Oh told The Hollywood Reporter that “creatively, I really feel like I gave it my all, and I feel ready to let [Cristina] go… [I] actually get the sense that she wants to be let go as well.”
How She Left: To give Cristina “that full-circle moment we need,” Shonda Rhimes brought back Isaiah Washington as Yang’s ex-fiancé Burke and had him hire her to run the fancypants Klausman Institute for Medical Research in Zurich. Thankfully, her presence is still occasionally felt in Seattle; in Season 16, for instance, she sent Meredith sexy “McWidow” as a gift.
Ellen Pompeo (Dr. Meredith Grey)
Final Airdate: February 23, 2023
Reason for Exit: Eager to explore other opportunities after nearly two decades in scrubs, the original cast member returned for Season 19 (and beyond) in only a limited capacity. But the show “is going to be just fine without me,” she assured our sister site Deadline. Not that it would ever be entirely without Pompeo; she was continuing on as an executive producer, guest-starring now and then and providing the voiceover narration that wraps around each episode.
How She Left: Hoping to ease daughter Zola’s anxiety attacks, Meredith relocated with her children to Boston, where she’d been offered a job at the Catherine Fox Foundation by former colleague Jackson.
Sara Ramirez (Dr. Callie Torres)
Final Airdate: May 19, 2016
Reason for Exit: A month after Ramirez set the rumor mill abuzz by cryptically tweeting, “That’s a wrap for Dr. Callie Torres,” they confirmed that they were leaving Grey’s. “I’m taking some welcome time off,” they said in a statement. But “I look forward to always being a part of the Shondaland family.”
How She Left: In the wake of an acrimonious custody battle with Arizona, Callie was encouraged by her ex-wife to follow her new girlfriend Penny to New York; Sofia’s moms would work out the rest later. In Season 14’s finale, it was strongly hinted that, upon Arizona’s relocation to the Big Apple, “Calzona” would reunite.
Scott Speedman (Dr. Nick Marsh)
Final Airdate: May 18, 2023
Reason for Exit: After leading lady Pompeo stepped down as a series regular, so did Speedman, who played (and still occasionally plays) Meredith’s significant other.
How He Left: Though the actor has continued to recur after Season 19’s finale, that episode marked the moment that Nick went all-in with his lady love. Nick ultimately followed Meredith to Boston and, no matter how many hurdles she threw up, he leapt over them all — and bless his heart, seemed determined to keep right on doing so.
Brooke Smith (Dr. Erica Hahn)
Final Airdate: Nov. 6, 2008
Reason for Exit: Simply put, ABC didn’t like the character, and Shonda Rhimes seemed to agree, telling EW.com in a statement at the time that she wasn’t feeling the “magic” between Smith’s Hahn and Sara Ramirez’s Callie. However, Rhimes denied that Smith’s pink slip resulted from gay panic.
How She Left: In what endures as a Grey’s punchline to this day, Dr. Hahn ventured out to the hospital’s parking garage to head home for the night and was never seen or heard from again.
Stefania Spampinato (Dr. Carina DeLuca)
Final Airdate: N/A as she’s technically been recurring since her debut in Season 14
Reason for Exit: After popping up on Station 19 more and more since its third season, Spampinato was made a series regular on the spinoff in Season 4.
How She Left: Technically, Carina still works at Grey Sloan. It’s just that for the last few years, viewers saw more of her on Station 19 as Carina tied the knot with firefighter Maya, overcame countless obstacles to keep their relationship intact and started a family that seemed tailor-made for a spinoff.
Kate Walsh (Dr. Addison Montgomery)
Final Airdate: May 17, 2007
Reason for Exit: Addison was such a hit that, after only two seasons as a Grey’s regular, Walsh was tapped for her own spinoff, Private Practice. “I was shocked and excited and mostly blown away” when Shonda Rhimes made the offer, Walsh told TV Guide. “I was so flattered that they would think of my character to take off for greener pastures.”
How She Left: Though Walsh would still guest-star on Grey’s now and then, Addison took off from Seattle to join the Oceanside Wellness Group in L.A.
Isaiah Washington (Dr. Preston Burke)
Final Airdate: May 17, 2007
Reason for Exit: During Season 3, Washington was alleged to have used a homophobic slur on the set to refer to castmate T.R. Knight — a slur that he then repeated at the Golden Globes. Washington was subsequently let go. “Season 4 is going to be stronger, better, wiser and smarter,” he told Entertainment Weekly at the time. “I had hoped to be a contributor to that.”
How He Left: On the day that he was to marry Cristina, Burke left her at the wedding chapel, packed up and departed from Seattle. Seven seasons later, he summoned his ex to Zurich to ask her to take over his prestigious hospital there, as he and his family were looking to relocate to Milan.
Jesse Williams (Dr. Jackson Avery)
Final Airdate: May 20, 2021
Reason for Exit: None was given. Instead, as he departed the show after 12 years, Williams merely expressed his gratitude for his long run. “I have been obscenely lucky to learn so much from so many,” he said in a statement. “I am immensely proud of our work, our impact and to be moving forward with so many tools, opportunities, allies and dear friends.”
How He Left: Intent on creating real racial equality in healthcare, Jackson relocated from Seattle to Boston in order to take over the Catherine Fox Foundation. He didn’t go alone, either; to the delight of “Japril” shippers, he convinced newly-single ex-wife April to move, too, with their daughter, Harriet.
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