We’ve waited all summer to find out who would die in the Grey’s Anatomy season 22 premiere. It’s time to get those answers.
Caution: This post contains SPOILERS from the Grey’s Anatomy season 22 premiere.
Throughout the summer, there have been fears that we’d lose someone from the hospital. I went into this episode thinking that Link being the casualty was too obvious, but I still watched worried that we would lose him. It’s time to break down the premiere to see how it all played out.
The aftermath of the blast in the Grey’s Anatomy season 22 premiere
Grey’s Anatomy season 22, episode 1 opens straight off the back of the explosion from the Grey’s Anatomy season 21 finale. The firefighters are in, and Ben tries to get in, but it’s not going to happen. He’s no longer on that side of the career.
We cut to the OR next to where the explosion happened. Jules gets up to look around at the distruction, seeing Beltran pinned against a wall, and rubble everywhere. In another OR, Link and others are in various states.
Out of everyone in the hospital, Webber is the one able to call out orders. He’s been through plenty of emergencies like this before, and he’s still standing. Teddy is also taking charge, and as a former Army medical officer, of course she can take this responsibility.
It’s all hands on deck, and that includes outside the hospital. Meredith is prevented from being able to get in, where she runs into the new interns and Simone. With patients outside, Meredith decides to get into the clinic to help treat them, even if it means breaking the glass to break in.
Inside the hospital, Owen is on the OR floor, handing out his own orders. Ben rushes to the floor to find out if Bailey has been seen, but Owen hasn’t seen her. Fortunately, Bailey rushes out to hug her husband, sharing the bad news that Link is in trouble. He’s trapped under rubble, and while he’s awake, it’s clear that he’s in trouble. Link even seems to know considering he can’t save his right arm, and it looks like part of the beam has penetrated the clavicle.
Is Beltran a little too calm?
In the OR with Beltran and Jules, we learn that Beltran is fine. She’s pinned down right now, but she can breathe. She’s more worried about her patient, who is currently okay despite everything. They’re trapped in the OR, and suddenly, they realize they need to do everything they can alone to keep their patient alive.
Meanwhile, Catherine is updated with casualties. So far, there’s only one, a patient from the OR floor, and Catherine will call the patient herself. Catherine also makes it clear to Webber that he needs to get his own injuries treated, which gives him chance to tell Jo that Link was on the OR floor at the time of the blast.
How is Link doing? The doctors work as fast as they can to get the beam off him and treat the damage to his shoulder.
Back in Beltran’s OR, she has to tell Jules what to do while still trapped under equipment. It’s interesting to see how these two women react so differently to the situation. Jules is angry and panicking (although still able to focus on the patient) while Beltran is completely calm, and I can’t help but wonder if there’s a reason for this.
Elsewhere in the hospital, Blue is treating a patient, while Adams comes in to ask about Simone. Blue hasn’t seen her, but he’s clearly not impressed that Adams and Simone are back together, and we’re not that surprised considering what Blue saw in the house.
Speaking of Simone, she is trying to work with the guy that she slept with after finding out that he’s a new intern. Meredith isn’t bothered about personal situations, but she does want the interns to show her why she was matched with Grey Sloan. However, things take a turn when one of the patients collapses from delayed pain from the accident.
Is there any hope for Link?
Needing to get Link to Seattle Press, the doctors decide to take the stairs. However, Bailey realizes that he’s losing way too much blood to make it, so they need to figure out a new plan.
Meanwhile, Blue and Adams are still working on Nora, trying to keep her alive. We get to see Blue’s ability to take risks to help her as machines start to signal problems.
In the clinic, Meredith is treating the intern who has been injured, Dani. She’s more worried about still being able to start the next day, but as Meredith points out, they need to make sure the hospital is still standing!
Then there’s Beltran and Jules’ patient, who Jules has been closing. When his machines start to sound, Beltran tells Jules that she needs to open up the patient and figure out where the internal bleed is coming from. Jules starts to panic spiral, but Beltran makes it clear that there isn’t time for that. They’re running out of anesthetic, so Jules needs to act fast.
There is some good news in the hospital, as Webber’s scan comes back clear. This is the first time Amelia hears about Link.
Back with Link in the stairwell, Link is able to call from Bailey’s phone. Is this really a goodbye call, because it seems like it? While on the phone, he starts to crash. I’m so glad Webber is there for Jo as she fears the worst.
Multiple emergencies within the hospital
It’s certainly all hands on deck to save Link, but they need to do all the live-saving treatment in the hospital stairwell. With Bailey, Winston, Hunt, and Ben, he does have the best people to help.
Back in Beltran’s OR, Jules continues to panic while she works. To help, Beltran decides to tell Jules of a story of her first solo surgery, but definitely not under the same circumstances! She points out that while the surgery was scary, she had the opportunity to tell her patient’s parents that the boy was fine. It helps to calm Jules down, and she can find the bleed and save the patient. I still think there are a lot of hints that something is going to happen to Beltran.
Webber sits with Jo, who is struggling to deal with everything that’s happening. As Jo says that Link is the only family she has, Webber reminds her that it’s not true. And it’s definitely not.
Back in the clinic, Dani starts to crash. She even diagnoses herself, making sure that she stands out. Meredith knows that she needs to operate in the clinic. Well, where else is she going to do it?
Back with Blue and Adams, Nora starts to wake up, and neither of them have any idea what to really do.
We don’t stay with them long, as the focus needs to be on Link, who is losing a lot of blood. Amelia tries to treat Link, but Owen wants her out. It’s Winston who has to get her out of the room, realizing that she’s going to start freaking out.
The (first?) casualty of Grey's Anatomy season 22 is confirmed
Meredith spends her time in surgery continuing to teach the interns, and she shows them how sometimes you just have to work with the tools you have. In this case, it’s the hands.
Back with Blue and Adam, they do whatever they can to save Nora. Of course, there’s a risk, but they have no other choice. It turns out that Nora could hear them the whole time, and now she’s confused about why they’re in the hallway. While she heard everything, she doesn’t know everything that has gone on.
With Link, Bailey continues to encourage everyone to work on Link, focusing on what they can do. Teddy doesn’t want to do any of the work where they are, and she wants to get Link to Seattle Press. It’s actually Ben who manages to get through to her that this would be a bad idea. It takes eight minutes at best to get to Seattle Press, so the work has to be done where they are.
Now with Jules, she’s able to close up her patient. All they can now do is cover things up and wait. If you thought that something was going to happen to Beltran (like me), then you’d be right. Knowing the patient made it through, Beltran is able to give in to her injuries. Jules looks around to see Beltran has closed her eyes and there’s no pulse. I thought that she was too calm!
Amelia can just wait to hear what’s happened to Link, where she shares her real fear. She knows what it’s like to lose a dad as a kid, and she doesn’t want that for Scout. She doesn’t want Jo to be a widow. Winston is there to support her, but what are the two going to be like when they find out what happened to Beltran?
As for Link, Owen does everything he can and then lets Teddy take over. Can they save him?
We cut back to Jules and Beltran, as firefighters finally break through the door. It’s too late for Beltran, though, and all Jules could do was hug the body of the woman who could have been her mentor. I feel like Jules has been through enough now.
How does it end for Link?
There seems to be a bit of hope at the end of the Grey’s Anatomy season 22 premiere. Link has made it through surgery, but Owen warns that this could be a tough recovery.
If you forgot, at the end of the Grey’s Anatomy season 21 finale, Ben had been let go from the hospital. However, with the current situation, Teddy realizes that Ben is the right person to have a spot with the rest of the residents. She’s going to allow him to finish up his residency program at Grey Sloan Memorial.
While Jules gets a chance to deliver good news to the parents of her patient, she is breaking on the inside. Winston is the one there to comfort her as she break so down, and just as it looks like it could lead to a kiss, she rushes out of the supply closet.
Back in the clinic, Dani wakes up wishing that everything had been a bad dream. What’s hilarious, this whole time she had no idea that the doctor operating on her was Meredith Grey. That makes her wish it was all a nightmare even more. What a way to make a first impression!
It wouldn’t be Grey’s Anatomy without an elevator scene. Simone and Bryant still clearly have a thing between them. This is going to get dramatic with Adams. Speaking of Adams, he finds her as she’s leaving, and she ends up delivering some bad news. She doesn’t think they should get back together, after all. Just as I thought she’d be best telling him the truth, that’s exactly what she does, and Adams just walks away.
Winston goes to see how Amelia is, and that’s when he realizes that she hasn’t heard about Beltran. Now he has to deliver some bad news to her.
As for Nora, she’s on her way to Seattle Press. Now it’s time for Owen and Teddy to finally actually face each other. One thing Teddy admits is that she doesn’t know who she is anymore, and it leaves Owen to be the one to tell the kids about them splitting up.
We end with Meredith and Webber heading back to the OR floor to see the damage. It turns out that the OR floor probably won’t be usable for weeks, and Webber offers a way out for Meredith. What are they going to do? It has to be what they always do. “Rebuild.”
Grey’s Anatomy airs on Thursdays at 10/9c on ABC.