Grey's Anatomy is going on hiatus until March, which means we were left with a blood-pressure-spiking cliffhanger in Thursday's fall finale. A heatwave hit Seattle, and Grey Sloan quickly became overloaded with patients as temperatures outside peaked at 108 degrees.
The other hospitals in the area lost power or were having mainframe issues that diverted their patients to Grey Sloan. Teddy (Kim Ravers) appointed Ben (Jason George) to handle triage, and Ben sent Jo (Camilla Luddington) and Lucas (Niko Terho) to a nearby convenience store to grab ice when the hospital ran out. The convenience store only had one bag, but the unlikely duo didn't make it to any other location. As they were leaving, a masked gunman entered the store and held the cashier at gunpoint.
It's important to remember that Jo is currently pregnant with twins. And Lucas is the nephew of Derek (Patrick Dempsey) and Amelia (Caterina Scorsone) Shepherd. That means that his grandfather was shot and killed during a convenience store robbery when Derek was a teenager, while Amela and Lucas' mother were just children. The death of the Shepherd family patriarch is a legend within the Grey's Anatomy lore, a defining life incident for both Derek and Amelia which both characters have discussed at length.
Lucas attempted to sneak Jo out of the store, but they were ultimately spotted by the thief, and forced to sit in the corner while he attempted to force the terrified cashier to open the safe in the back of the store. Lucas revealed to Jo how his grandfather died. As the thief's temper continued to boil, Jo discovered that she was bleeding and had to tell Lucas that she was pregnant, adding a new emergent status to their already bleak situation.
This is not the first time that Grey's Anatomy has showcased a potential miscarriage due to the stress of being held at gunpoint. Meredith (Ellen Pompeo) lost her and Derek's baby when Gary Clark (Michael O'Neil) came to the then-named Seattle Grace Hospital. He not only shot Derek, but held Meredith and Cristina (Sandra Oh) at gunpoint, triggering Meredith's miscarriage. Every long-time Grey's Anatomy fan–or those who have binged the series in recent years–remember that massive event in the MerDer lexicon. It's impossible not to draw similarities to what happened to Jo in this fall finale.
Lucas eventually seizes an opportunity to tackle the gunman, but it's not an easy task. They wrestle with the gun for several tense moments before it finally goes off, and the credits roll. The last seconds of the episode imply that Lucas was shot in the abdomen. Is Grey's Anatomy setting Lucas up to suffer the same fate as his grandfather? We absolutely hope not! The residency program can't stand to lose another person after Schmitt (Jake Borelli) and Yasuda (Midori Francis) have already left. What's worse is that Amelia absolutely could not stomach losing her nephew in the same way that she lost her father. It would absolutely desolate her.
That's not all the bad news from the Season 21 fall finale. Sophia Bush returned as Dr. Cass Beckman, a trauma surgeon from Seattle Pres who stepped in to help Grey Sloan with their overflow of patients. The last time we saw Cass, she locked lips with Teddy in a misunderstanding during a dinner date. She spent most of this episode paired up with Owen (Kevin McKidd) in the operating room. She explained that the kiss was entirely her fault and he shouldn't hold it against Teddy. It took a little convincing, but Owen eventually let his guard down, until he saw Teddy and Cass in the elevator as Cass squeezed Teddy's shoulder. There was nothing sexual about it. It was a friendly touch of solidarity over Teddy's stressful day as chief. But Owen immediately went to a bad place in his brain.
He didn't explode on Cass or Teddy, but he did immediately leave the hospital. He offered Nora (Floriana Lima), his old friend and Teddy's patient who was in town for a check-up, a ride back to her hotel so she could get out of the exhausting heat. We don't see what happened after they left the hospital ground. But, knowing what Owen was thinking about Cass and Teddy in that elevator, and given his history, he's about to do something incredibly stupid, and it is going to be so unbearable to watch.
We'll have to see if Lucas and Jo can survive these Shepherd-related tragedies and if Owen and Teddy can get over yet another marriage hurdle when Grey's Anatomy Season 21 returns on ABC in March. The previous episodes of Season 21 are now available to watch on Hulu.
