‘Grey’s Anatomy’ Sends Meredith Grey Off With a Genius Callback—and a Cliffhanger

It’s been years since Grey’s Anatomy’s theme song featured its original lyrics, but viewers who’ve been following Meredith Grey since 2005 can probably hear them in their heads already. Like a silk scarf weaving its way around those bright xylophone-like tones, there’s a sultry voice crooning on a loop: Nobody knows where they might end up. Nobody knows…

On Thursday night, as Ellen Pompeo staged her long-anticipated “farewell to Seattle,” the lyrics to the full song—“Cosy in the Rocket” by Psapp—came rushing back to my mind. Grey’s Anatomy has spent years exploring the terrifying borderlands that separate self-discovery and self-destruction, all through the eyes of a deeply gifted survivor of family trauma. Meredith’s journey from sheepish intern to medical superhero stands among TV’s most satisfying character arcs, and Thursday’s episode underscored that journey with a brilliant callback as it bid Dr. Grey a warm, intentionally incomplete farewell.

Meredith might be leaving Seattle, but she’s not leaving Grey’s entirely, at least not yet. Deadline reported in November that Pompeo is expected to return in the Season 19 finale and will stay on as an executive producer and provide voiceover narration for the rest of the season. This week, Meredith makes a big move to Boston with her family—leaving Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital, née Seattle Grace Mercy West Hospital, née Seattle Grace behind.

Read more at The Daily Beast.