With a whopping 20 seasons under its belt and eyeing a 21st, Grey’s Anatomy is ABC’s longest-running medical drama, and shows no signs of stopping. It’s been more than 18 years since fans stepped into the world of Grey’s Anatomy along with Meredith and the chosen few interns. Since then, the fandom has experienced a roller coaster of traumatizing character deaths, intense storylines, and heart-wrenching finales.
When it comes to season finales, Grey’s Anatomy has a fairly impressive track record, with at least one or two fan-favorite characters being killed off or leaving the series. However, there’s one Season Finale that the show has not managed to top even in its 20-season run. This finale belongs to what’s famously known as the Grey’s Anatomy “magic era” when the show was in its prime, and every plotline was a whirlwind of shock and trauma.
Grey’s Anatomy’s Season 6 Finale is the Series’ Highest-Rated Episodes
- “Death and All His Friends” is the highest-rated Grey’s Anatomy episode.
- The episode featured an active shooter in the hospital.
- A few characters were killed in the finale along with several injured.
By Season 6, the audience was pretty much used to seeing their favorite characters get shot, hit by a bus, drown, and get cancer. However, the kind of fight-for-survival storyline that went down in the Season 6 finale is simply outmatched. Fans experienced anxiety and stress on a whole new level the moment Sanctuary began. It’s safe to say that this kind of storyline was unexpected, came out of nowhere, and hit the audience right in the face. The frustration, the grief, the fear, and the intrigue induced by this Grey’s Anatomy finale is perhaps something the show wasn’t able to produce again. It’s not like only the finale shined; rather, the entire season had been so spectacularly setup that everything seemed to be building up to this particular moment. Every character in Grey’s Anatomy Season 6 went through an important phase, whether it was Doctor Webber dealing with alcoholism or Derek coming to terms with his role as Chief. The writers didn’t waste a single scene where a character didn’t have a meaningful setup or growth.
The beauty of this Grey’s Anatomy finale is the intensity that builds up right from Meredith’s monologue in Episode 23. The audience can tell straightaway that something ominous or tragic is about to unfold, and that’s the kind of hook that no other finale in this medical drama has. Yes, George’s elevator scene moved the viewers to tears, but Meredith talking about loving Seattle Grace in the past tense is far scarier and worrisome. Meredith uses the word “sanctuary” to define her safe haven, which is the hospital where she grew up. Before she was playing with dolls, Meredith was up in O.R. galleries and hanging out in the morgue. She considers Seattle Grace her “place,” somewhere she felt at ease, but all that was about to change. A person who decided to play God because of his incapacity to deal with grief was about to turn the lives of countless in Meredith’s “sanctuary” into a living nightmare.
The two-part finale begins with Meredith discovering about her pregnancy and thinking about who to tell first. Besides that, it’s pretty much a normal day at the hospital, with everyone buzzing around to get things done. Amidst all the usual Seattle Grace chaos, a familiar face enters the ER asking for directions to the then Chief of Surgery Derek Shepherd’s office. Gary Clark was the husband of a late patient who died due to surgical complications because of her cancer. Despite signing off advanced directives a few years prior to her death, her husband was unable to deal with the loss and sued the hospital for taking his wife off life support. Unable to get the “justice” he thought he deserved, Gary took matters into his own hands and orchestrated a mass shooting at the hospital as a means of revenge.
Sanctuary/Death and All His Friends Touch on Sensitive Topics
- Gary Clark opened fire in Seattle Grace to take revenge for her wife’s death.
- He blamed Derek, Richard, and Lexie – the surgeons involved in his wife’s surgery for her death.
- Gary shot several surgeons, including Alex and Owen.
Mass shootings have always depicted the lowest side of humanity and are one of the most traumatizing actions to haunt people. Grey’s Anatomy has always had an outstanding quality of expertly addressing several pressing social issues through its characters and storyline. The two-part Season 6 finale is a testament to how deeply embedded this haunting reality is that humans could lose the ability to trust one another even at a place where they save lives. Gary Clark entered Seattle Grace Hospital without trouble because he seemed to be someone who needed help. He passed the corridors seemingly looking like a patient’s attending or someone in grief, but only until he was ticked off. While asking around for Derek’s office, Gary was sidelined by busy surgeons, including Alex and Reed. This triggered his memory of being helpless when his wife was being put off life support by these very surgeons who didn’t care about him or thought little of him.
Doctor Reed was the last straw, as she blew him off, saying she was a surgeon who was too busy for him. In a matter of seconds, Gary shot her right in the head and started his surgeon killing spree. Afterward, he shot Alex, Vivian, and Charles and almost shot Bailey but stopped when she claimed out of fear that she was a nurse and not a surgeon. Doctor Bailey was particularly spectacular in this stressful situation as her ghostly face and fearsome expressions depicted what countless victims have felt in the presence of someone holding a trigger. “Sanctuary” and “Death and All His Friends” don’t shy away from recreating the extremity of such sensitive situations because that’s the only way the audience can really feel the overwhelming emotions of those in such situations.
Season 6 Finale Episodes Had The Best Storyline
- Meredith and the rest suffered great losses in the Season 6 finale.
- The mass shooting became an incredibly traumatizing experience for all the victims.
- Derek sustained an injury which took a toll on him.
Grey’s Anatomy Season 6 finale was vehemently outstanding in terms of storyline. The famed medical drama had many stressful moments and episodes, but nothing as emotionally heavy as this. That’s why, even after 20 seasons, “Sanctuary” and “Death and All His Friends” tops the chart for the highest-rated Grey’s Anatomy episodes. Despite the stakes being high almost every time, there was something that hit deeply with this one. Fans had to sit through two whole episodes at the edge of their seats, thinking they might be seeing their favorite character for the last time. It was not only a test of nerves for the audience, but the finale was also a defining moment for several characters. This was the kind of situation that could’ve brought the worst out of a person. It was possible that any character could’ve thrown someone under the bus out of fear for their lives. Just like how Bailey had to swallow her pride and choose her sense of preservation to admit she was a nurse instead of a surgeon, any doctor from Cristina to Lexie could’ve cracked under pressure.
Cristina could’ve easily walked away from Derek’s surgery, but she would’ve died before she betrayed or left Meredith alone. The situation cemented her character’s superiority and worth, and the audience cheered for her bravery. The finale also highlighted the depth of Meredith and Derek’s love as when McDreamy laid open on the operating table with a gunman on his head, Meredith offered herself up to Gary. She proposed an eye for an eye since Gary wanted to inflict pain on Richard, Derek, and Lexie, and Meredith was related to all of them. So, she was the perfect consolation prize, and that act of desperation showed how much Derek meant to her. On the other hand, this act of giving herself up also seemed like another one of her attempts to forfeit her life like the way she did when she drowned. The situation reflected her still-present lack of value for her life and an underlying problem of her being suicidal.
It’s safe to say that the Season 6 finale was a bittersweet blend of loss and gain. Many characters lost their lives while others almost did; they also found a sense of enlightenment.
Meredith lost her baby, but she got Derek back; Owen being shot improved his and Cristina’s otherwise strained relationship, and Callie and Arizona also made up in the end. Richard Webber found his purpose as the hospital’s “watcher” again, but those were only the outside wins. Despite the finale not indulging in it, the audience understood that such an incident would not be easy for the characters to forget. The emotional onslaught of such a traumatic event would be too big for anyone to handle. One of the reasons why the fans still haven’t recovered from Season 6’s finale is because of the emotional toll it carried. The very thought of an ordinary human being deciding to end another human being’s life is unfathomable and builds a kind of helplessness that takes away a person’s power of hope.
