Spoiler alert! This story discusses events from Grey’s Anatomy Season 22, so if you’re not caught up, stream the episodes with a Hulu subscription.
Things have been wild this season on Grey’s Anatomy — killing off main characters, plenty of near-death experiences (including for a series OG), lots of returning familiar faces, and (as always) as much relationship drama as there is medicine being practiced. Amongst all the noise, however, I’ve become really invested in the fate of one of the hospital’s patients, Katie Rogers, and I’m really afraid the show is about to repeat a big mistake from Season 2.
Is Katie Rogers The New Denny Duquette?
Katie (Samantha Marie Ware) has been a recurring character on Season 22 as a Stage IV cancer patient of Miranda Bailey (Chandra Wilson). Her heartwrenching story and the undeniable spark between Katie and Lucas Adams (Niko Terho) have made her a fan favorite. The whole thing is reminiscent of Denny Duquette and Izzie Stevens in Season 2, and I can’t help but think that if they kill her off, they’re going to regret not having that character around — just like they did with Denny.
We’ve been on such a rollercoaster with Katie this season, seeing her brighten up with the hopes of getting better and traveling the world … until she received the gutting news that her medical trial had been canceled and that she would likely never leave the hospital again.
There are no LVAD wires for Lucas to cut in this scenario, like Izzie (Katherine Heigl) did for Denny (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) back in one of Grey’s Anatomy’s best episodes, “Losing My Religion,” before a blood clot caused a fatal stroke and he died anyway.
Instead, Lucas, Simone and Kwan offered to give Katie palliative care from Lucas’ “Aunt Meredith”’s house, and boy does it look like we’re in for a sobfest on March 19:
I definitely don’t love the idea of such a great character being taken away from us — not to mention that she’d be such a good love interest for McDreamy’s nephew.
Don’t Relegate Katie And Lucas To The Same Fate As Denny And Izzie
Anything is possible in the world of Grey’s Anatomy, so as bad as things look for Katie, I haven’t given up all hope yet. However, I’m skeptical that any last-second reprieve is coming, mostly because the ABC medical drama just did that storyline at the end of Season 21 — Nora was a terminal patient when Owen Hunt (Kevin McKidd) fell for her, only to have his wife, Kim Raver’s Teddy Altman, come up with a life-saving procedure in the 11th hour.
Back in 2006, Jeffrey Dean Morgan recognized how Denny and Izzie’s romance had “taken the world by storm,” and he begged Shonda Rhimes not to kill him off. Of course his efforts were unsuccessful, and while I won’t go so far as to say Rhimes regretted the decision she made, the writers sure seemed to miss having him around, given how many scripts Denny’s ghost got written into (never forget Izzie’s ghost sex era).
Let’s not relegate Katie Rogers to posthumous hallucinations, OK? She is, after all, the only character who can make McBroody (my nickname for Lucas) even remotely tolerable, and I think letting her die would be a mistake.
I’m not sure how the writers could pull it off at this point, but I’m holding out hope that they’ll remember how much it sucked to lose such a fan favorite character (with love interest potential) in Season 2 and figure out a way to let Katie live.
Tune in to see what happens when “Wrecking Ball” airs at 10 p.m. ET Thursday, March 19, on ABC and streaming the next day on Hulu. You can also rewatch the Denny Duquette era — or find any of your favorite Grey’s starting points — on Hulu or with a Netflix subscription.
