Sometimes all the best wishes just aren’t enough.
Grey’s Anatomy has always been known for writing off its characters by killing them off and leaving no chance for a comeback.
However, the show is nowhere near as cruel to its doctors as it is to its patients. Of course, you would have to kill off some of the patients to keep the show realistic, but Grey’s Anatomy goes way beyond those limits by giving its patients hell even at times when it doesn’t need to.
Some would go so far as to say that Grey’s Anatomy is guilty of using its patients as plot devices to increase the shock factor, and they wouldn’t be too far off the mark. There is one patient in particular who had a storyline so rough that viewers were almost ready to riot ABC upon her death.
Mary Portan, portrayed by guest star Mandy Moore, experienced the worst at the hands of Miranda Bailey, who was supposed to perform a relatively simple procedure on her. Unfortunately, things went wrong from the start and only got worse when the hospital was locked down due to the shooter in the building.
Both Mary and Miranda had to hide from the shooter and fortunately survived the attack. They also worked together on another surgeon, Charles, who was shot and didn’t have much of a chance of surviving without help. Feels like enough trauma for one patient in one day, right?
No matter how much she went through, and no matter how much the viewers were rooting for her to make it back to safety, Mary did not survive in the end. After all was said and done, six months and one flawless colostomy bag reversal later, Mary just didn’t wake up from her surgery.
To this day, fans find this death in the show particularly disturbing and pointless, as there was no apparent message to it.
For a character who has been through so much, and trusted the doctor so much, to die “just because” was the most unsettling ending imaginable, and it continues to shock viewers with every viewing.
You can re-watch these Grey’s Anatomy episodes with Mandy Moore by streaming the show on Netflix, Hulu, or Disney Plus, or join the wait for the 20th anniversary season to premiere on ABC.