Grey’s Anatomy has returned in dramatic fashion with its first death of season 22.
*Warning: major Grey’s Anatomy season 22 premiere spoilers to follow*
The season premiere of the long-running medical drama, which follows the professional and personal lives of a group of surgeons at a Seattle hospital, picked up immediately after an explosion destroyed a portion of the surgery wing in the season 21 finale.
While it originally seemed like Dr. Atticus “Link” Lincoln (Chris Carmack) was the show’s next major casualty, it was indeed Dr. Monica Beltran (Natalie Morales) who was unceremoniously killed off in Thursday’s episode, “Only the Strong Survive.”
At the time of the explosion, Dr. Beltran was performing a procedure in an operating room next door. The blast left her pinned beneath a piece of heavy medical equipment.
She had initially told her surgical intern, Dr. Jules Millin (Adelaide Kane), that she only sustained a shattered pelvis, concealing the true extent of her injuries. She continued to verbally instruct Dr. Millan through the life-saving procedure to stabilize their patient before falling unconscious.
Once Dr. Millan noticed, she ran over to perform chest compressions, but Dr. Beltran ended up dying before firefighters were able to access the OR.
Dr. Beltran’s death comes two seasons after she first joined the cast in 2024’s season 20 as a new attending physician at the hospital.
Throughout her time on the series, she became romantically involved with both Dr. Winston Ndugu (Anthony Hill) and Dr. Amelia Shepherd (Caterina Scorsone) in the wake of her divorce from her ex-wife (Briana Venskus-Vazquez). However, it was her slow-burning romance with Dr. Shepherd that instantly made her a fan-favorite.
“Can’t believe Grey’s Anatomy just decided to get rid of Monica….,” one lamented on X.
“Why do I keep being a fan of a series where they always kill off the best people? PLEASE ON TOP OF THAT IN THE ARMS OF JULES?! HAVEN’T MY GIRLS SUFFERED ENOUGH? ENOUGH ALREADY FOR GOD’S SAKE,” a second said.
“What a curse omg, another sapphic going from cradle wtf,” a third commented, with a fourth writing, “I’m drooling with hate.”
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“You need to leave Amelia alone ENOUGH IS ENOUGH,” another begged.
Following the season 21 finale, showrunner Meg Marinis had cryptically teased that all characters’ lives were fair game.
“I feel like a lot of people are probably sitting in operating rooms, so unless you saw them and where they were when that explosion went off, I don’t think we can say anyone is necessarily safe,” she told The Hollywood Reporter in May.
“I love that we twist it in the very end. You think everything is going to be just fine. But if you’re a long-term Grey’s fan, you hear that music start to pick up in the end and you know that it’s not going to be fine.”
New episodes of season 22 of Grey’s Anatomy air Thursdays at 10 p.m. EST on ABC.
