Even Grey's Anatomy Fans Think The Show Is Dragging On Longer It Should

It can be pretty hard to keep a primetime series running for years on end, especially when you consider that network shows still produce upwards of 20 episodes per season. There are only so many romantic pairings that can remain plausible, only so many crazy things that can possibly happen, and only so many bombs you can stuff into body cavities, if you're Shonda Rhimes and Krista Vernoff. Defying all expectations, "Grey's Anatomy," which premiered as a mid-season replacement in 2005, is currently airing its nineteenth season, which isn't a landmark many network shows attempt to hit.

Despite Ellen Pompeo's exit from the series in February 2023, bringing the reign of Meredith Grey to a close, the show is still stubbornly trucking along, introducing a new scrappy band of interns that are supposed to carry "Grey's Anatomy" into a new era. With that said, a lot of people — even the show's biggest fans — think maybe Shonda and company should just call it quits, according to this Reddit thread. User u/Cr7-Cr7Real kicked things off by titling said thread, "Anyone else think that Grey's Anatomy should have ended at least 7 or 8 seasons ago?"

After talking about all of the actors who have left the long-running series, including Sandra Oh, Isaiah Washington, Katherine Heigl, and Patrick Dempsey, u/Cr7-Cr7Real continued, "Also, I don't really know what the show was about for so long? What I saw is that there were a lot of relationships, and characters move from one relationship to another between them, and above all this is the departure of Alex, one of the oldest characters in the show, and then the departure of Meredith, the main character in the show, and yet it is still airing???"

Alex Karev, played by Justin Chambers, infamously exited the series by writing a letter to Meredith and his wife Jo (Camilla Luddington) revealing that he ran away to be with his first on-screen wife, Heigl's Izzie Stevens. There are some other moments that put fans off of the show entirely, though. u/Granum22 wrote, "My sister loved it up until they killed off McDreamy [Dempsey]. I'm assuming that was the breaking point for a lot of fans," while another user said that the endless drama between wives Callie Torres (Sara Ramirez) and Arizona Robbins (Jessica Capshaw) drove them away.

There are, frankly, a lot of spots where even loyal viewers could have dipped out of "Grey's Anatomy," and it always seemed like the show would end if the titular Grey wasn't around. Now that it's continuing without Pompeo, it could stand to lose even more diehards the longer it goes on.