To finish catching up with this Grey’s Anatomy season, here are episodes 9-15 of season 18! You can catch my review of the first half of the season here.
No Time to Die
This episode picks up directly from Station 19’s, and the firefighters have managed to rescue Owen from the car. Unfortunately, his leg is shattered, and it will require surgery but other than that, he seems fine. Hayes is struggling with the information that Owen told him in the car, and he wants Owen to tell the truth or threaten that he will report him. Hayes ends up resigning and tells Bailey that he’s taking his children back to Ireland.
The donor’s heart ended up getting bruised in the car accident, which caused difficulties, but with Maggie’s assistance, Winston is able to perform a successful transplant on Farouk. While Farouk is in surgery, Hayes makes Megan promise that she will not harm herself and to call her therapist if something were to happen to Farouk.
Amelia and Link share a heated exchange after he saw Amelia and Kai kiss. This leads to Link finding comfort in Jo and having sex with her. Kai and Amelia go out together.
Levi has a breakdown after losing his patient and begins to clean and scrub his hands until they’re bleeding. Unfortunately, he has to be stopped by other doctors, and Bailey cancels the Webber method. Richard struggles with this, and Meredith tells him that if the method had existed when her class was residents, then neither her, Alex, nor Cristina would have waited either.
Meredith and Nick’s relationship seems to get more serious, and he comes to Seattle to be there for Meredith after Dr. Hamilton almost died on her table from a bowel obstruction.
Living in a House Divided
This episode served as Cormac Hayes’ goodbye episode, which is something Grey’s normally does well, but this one just didn’t feel like it fit quite right. Maybe it’s because of the potential that there was for Hayes’ character that never got explored or the other things going on in the episode, but it just felt off. However, the episode did pay tribute to Meredith and Hayes’ “relationship’ with Hayes telling Meredith that without her, he would have never believed in love again.
Teddy is still concerned about what Owen told Hayes in the car, and she confronts Hayes right before he leaves. She even follows Noah’s wife out to the parking lot to ask her.
M&M’s (morbidity and mortality conferences) are back! This one is about Levi’s past surgery, but the focus is more on the Webber Method. Levi shows up (looking like a shell of Levi), but he eventually runs out. This leads to the conversation turning to Webber. First, Maggie brings attention to the fact that they pushed the Webber Method without consulting with others. Later, Maggie and Richard try to talk about it, but things blow out of proportion.
It turns out Levi ran to his mother’s basement, which we find out because Nico goes looking for him. Levi claims that he’s never going back to Grey-Sloan, and they’re breaking up.
There’s a very heartwarming scene amongst all of this, though. Richard is sitting in a room with Maggie, Meredith, and Amelia. During this scene, he talks about how he considers them his daughters, and he understands what needs to come next. They remind him that the residents don’t need cool new methods. They only need Richard Webber.
There’s also a talk with Bailey and Webber. She tells him that they’re doing away with the Webber Method, and he’s fine with it. He apologizes for forcing her in the first place.
Nick helps out around the hospital this episode, and we finally get Amelia and Maggie’s approval of Nick. When he’s leaving for Minnesota, she turns his offer to go with him. Everything that has happened has made her realize she needs to be in Seattle more. However, she makes it clear doesn’t want to be away from him either.
Legacy
This is the episode where we see the big surgery that they’ve been planning for the whole season happen. It’s finally time for Meredith, Amelia, and Kai to perform what they’ve been practicing on David Hamilton, and even Tom Koracick has flown in to help. He even pitches the idea of opening up the gallery to let the residents watch.
The surgery is going extremely well until Owen develops a CSF leak during a physical therapy session with Link. After hearing that it’s Owen, Amelia comes extremely close to scrubbing out to work on him, but she’s stopped when Meredith tells her that they’ll lose their FDA funding. Koracick does it instead.
Kai and Amelia develop even further after the surgery. It’s obvious Kai is in awe of Amelia’s ability to care. They even say, “You are someone who loves her people so hard and so much that the second they’re in trouble, everything else just falls away.” This is something that is so important to Amelia’s character, and it’s nice to see Kai recognize it.
Richard is in Levi’s mom’s basement with him trying to get him back. However, Levi is still playing video games and doesn’t seem to want to budge.
Jo and Teddy are at Joe’s Bar. They talk in-depth about their lives, specifically their love lives and parenting. Teddy now knows about what Owen did, and she’s having trouble with it. After getting the call about him being in the hospital, we get a bedside scene of them. She’s willing to talk now, but he still stands by everything that he chooses to do. Meanwhile, Jo walks in on Link naked in her shower, which leads to a kiss which leads to her asking him to move out.
The new resident, Jordan Wright, ends up getting the wrong impression from Bailey and kisses her. This leads to both of them being shocked, and Jordan walks away very quickly.
During all of this, the show is also jumping to Minnesota, where we see Nick working on a liver transplant case. He spends the episode recognizing that giving a person a new liver is exciting, but it’s sad what had to happen for it. Meredith ends up flying to Minnesota at the end of the episode.
The Makings of You
This episode is solely focused on the sisters. Meredith, Amelia, and Maggie each had their own storyline for this episode, and it was refreshing to see.
Meredith is on vacation with Nick at his cabin in Minnesota. While they think they’ll have the weekend to themselves, they are proved wrong when his niece, Charlotte, walks in with her lover, Silver. Charlotte manages to step on Nick’s toes in a way that only family can. She announces that she’s dropping out of school to live in Costa Rica with Silver. This leads to Meredith and Nick having an important conversation. He says that he thinks Charlotte is making a huge mistake, while Meredith tries to convince him that he needs to let Charlotte decide for herself. This leads to tension between the two. Later, Nick and Charlotte talk and come to a compromise, and Meredith and Nick do the same while learning about each other. Also, there is a feelings realization type moment when he announces that he’s falling in love.
Meanwhile, Kai takes Amelia to watch their band play that night. They sing to Amelia, and Amelia is obviously loving it all. Later, Kai and Amelia hook up and have a heart-to-heart. It definitely seems like Kai could be the person for Amelia to end up with. However, it wouldn’t be Grey’s Anatomy if they were just allowed to be happy. Amelia admits to missing her son with every cell of her being when she’s away from him, but Kai doesn’t want children. When Amelia leaves the next morning, she mentions that she hopes her devotion to Scout won’t be an issue.
Maggie and Winston spend the episode at Meredith’s with her children. Maggie is sick with the flu, and she should absolutely be resting, but she doesn’t. So when Zola comes across a box of Ellis Grey’s stuff, Maggie is there to find a letter addressed to her. Maggie ends up going to her bedroom to read the letter, and due to her current state, Maggie starts to see Ellis in the room with her as if she’s speaking to Maggie. Unfortunately, the letter is cold, and it’s not easy for Maggie to read. Maggie also learns that Ellis actually chose who adopted her. However, Maggie also learns that Ellis is denied the chance to be in Maggie’s life, which leaves Maggie feeling left behind. Ellis dreamed of Maggie, Meredith, Richard, and herself all being a happy family, but it just couldn’t happen. She knew Maggie would be better off with Bill and Diane, who adopted her. Maggie agrees with this. She wakes up and sees Diane comforting her (also due to the mental state the flu has left her in).
At the end of the episode, we get a sister scene with Zola and Scout joining them on the couch. Maggie burns the letter, but she doesn’t know if she’s glad that she read it. However, she no longer has that hole in her life that she had before. She has some sort of closure now.
Put the Squeeze On Me
It was only a matter of time, but Dr. Hamilton finally offered Meredith a job in Minnesota. He wants her to be the director and the chief of surgery. However, Meredith is unsure. It’s a lot to take on, and she would have to leave Seattle. At the end of the episode, Nick finally meets Meredith’s kids.
Back in Seattle, a man comes in and says his boyfriend was wrapped up and bitten by their pet python. It turned into a moment where we got to see more glimpses of Dr. Winston Ndugu’s personality. He is a huge fan of snakes, and it ended up being Bailey, Link, and Winston, who got the snake unwrapped from around the patient.
Farouk is healthy, and he and Megan are heading back home. Before their departure, Megan makes sure to tell Owen to talk things out with Teddy. This leads to a huge argument between Teddy and Owen later. When this leads to Teddy storming out, Owen gets up and tries to go after him. These are his first steps since the accident, and it leads to a touching moment between the two. Later, Owen and Teddy have a heart-to-heart, and things finally seem okay between the two again.
In the hospital, Maggie and Jo are working with a pregnant woman, Laura, who has her brother, Todd (played by Skylar Astin), with her. Laura suggests that Jo dates Todd, and the stage is definitely set for them to have a thing. But unfortunately, Laura’s surgery failed, and they had to postpone it. When Jo goes to tell Todd this, she ends up inviting him to Joe’s bar across the street.
Amelia and Link are still in an awkward limbo. After an attempt from Amelia at making conversation, Link tells her that he needs to be angry with her right now. It definitely feels like a turning point for the both of them.
Jordan ends up apologizing about what happened with Bailey, and we finally get to see some Benley again. Miranda goes home and talks to Ben about how they could be sending mixed signals to others. He reassures her that she is the only one for him.
Richard tells Catherine that he wants a reassessment of his skills, and he fears he’s no longer capable. If he’s right, he will step down.
Road Trippin’
Owen is desperate to get back to work, but Amelia doesn’t think he’s ready yet. However, he finds a place for himself when Bailey finds herself stretched too thin. He offers to step in as chief while she goes and does some surgeries. However, it’s not the best time for Owen to be doing this. A woman shows up and tells him that they’ve received multiple complaints about their residency program.
We meet another sibling in this episode and learn even more about Winston. His brother, Wendell, shows up, and it’s obvious they aren’t the close and loving type of sibling duo right now. There’s obvious tension, and Wendell is working a job where he sells medical supplies. Later, Amelia and Winston walk in on Wendell trying to sell drones to Owen, which leads to an argument between the brothers. Finally, Wendell admits to using Winston’s name, and he says that his father has warned him not to come to Grey Sloan. However, he only came because he thought Winston would be proud of him.
Even with all the family drama, Winston and Maggie are performing groundbreaking heart surgery on 13-year-old Fernanda, who is riding in an RV across the country. Unfortunately, Fernanda shows up with issues, and Maggie and Winston are both scared that they can no longer perform the operation. In addition, the family is worried that they worsened Fernanda’s condition by stopping to sightsee. With his own family issues at the front of his mind, Winston calls the family selfish. They change the procedure to an even riskier one, and the family is obviously feeling scared. When Winston finds Fernanda’s brother having a panic attack, he takes him into a room and talks with him.
Before the surgery, Winston tells Maggie about his past. He says that his father ended up getting put in jail after his mother got cancer. His mother used her treatment money to bail him out. This led to Winston having panic attacks, and everything was a mess. He’s afraid of Wendell ruining more things. They have a moment at the end of the episode and end up going out together.
Todd and Jo’s relationship continues to take off, with Todd bringing her roses and study snacks while she’s preparing for her test. It’s a really cute scene, and Jo seems genuinely happy for the first time in a while.
Zola and Meredith are spending some quality time together while being sick at home. This leads to Zola realizing that her mom is purposely avoiding calls. Meredith tells her about the job offer, and Zola says that she, Bailey, and Ellis would go with her anywhere.
Put It To the Test
This episode really lived up to its title and put a lot of things, well, to the test. I remember thinking that Meredith would never actually go through with her decision to leave Grey Sloan. However, here we are.
The Medical Accreditation Council is visiting Grey Sloan to see if their residency program needs to shut down or not, and Bailey is very obviously stressed. She has been trying to hold things together this whole season, but it seems like everything just keeps slipping through her fingers. The residents and doctors are all visibly nervous and don’t exactly give the most redeeming words to the Council.
Meanwhile, Nick is there to perform a never-done-before operation on a brain-dead patient, Mason, who donated his body to science, to switch his kidney out for a pig kidney.
With all of this going down, Richard is also talking about his reassessment, which will be administered by David Hamilton and Kai Bartley. While doing so, he eventually figures out that Hamilton is trying to poach Meredith, and word travels fast straight to Bailey.
When Meredith is comforting Nick because Mason’s kidney isn’t producing enough urine, Bailey walks in. She doesn’t know that Meredith hasn’t chosen the job in Minnesota yet. So, she’s obviously upset and makes it known, even throwing it out there that Meredith hasn’t changed and that she’s just the girl who slept with an attending even though he was married. Meredith is getting ready to say her thoughts on the matter just as Bailey begins to clutch her heart.
Thankfully, Bailey ends up okay. It was just a panic attack, but Maggie warns her that she’s on her way to something worse. It almost feels like foreshadowing with the way Bailey is seen putting her hand over her chest at the end of the episode.
Meredith and Nick are talking about everything that went down, and Nick asks about Meredith dating a married man. All these mentions of Derek come to a head at the end of the episode when Meredith, while looking at Mason, agrees to take the job in Minnesota. She needs something new that doesn’t have so much of her history attached to it. As much as I personally despise change, I can’t blame her completely.
As if there are not enough stressful situations happening, Levi and his mom get into an argument because she’s the one who’s been slandering Grey Sloan’s residency program online. When she goes to walk back up the basement steps, she ends up falling, and Levi is forced to operate on his mother in their house. Honestly, it’s a classic Grey’s way to get a surgeon back in the hospital. His mom ends up okay, and Levi ends up talking to David and Kai about how great of a teacher Richard is while Richard tells the Council how much he loves teaching. During all of this, we see flashbacks to young Bailey, Meredith, and even younger Richard. It reminds us all just how much has really changed.
The council loves everything Richard says, they love the feeling of family and belonging at the hospital, and Richard even passes his assessment! However, this feeling of joy doesn’t last long because the residency program has been put on probation due to the lack of physicians to teach the residents.
