Are We Getting More Meredith in ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ Season 21? Showrunner Explains

Ever since Ellen Pompeo (Good American Family) sort of left the main cast of Grey’s Anatomy, the Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital has received visits from its title character Meredith Grey at regular intervals, but fans never know how long it will be until they see their favorite TV doctor again. In the current season, Meredith was along for the ride in the first three episodes, but then she was gone again. Even though we keep hearing her voice as she continues to narrate every episode, fans can’t help but wonder: is Meredith coming back for more in Season 21? Showrunner Meg Marinis has the answer to that.

During an interview with LA Times, Marinis was pretty straightforward about the future of Meredith in the series. The showrunner underscored the previously released information that Pompeo was pinned down for seven episodes this season. Additionally, Marinis revealed that we should think of Meredith’s participation in future Grey’s Anatomy episodes as fully-developed story arcs, which is why the writing team strays away from the idea of bringing her back for one-episode guest roles. She stated:

“We’ve aired three with her, so you at least have four more and I’m just gonna let y’all continue to watch to see what else you get. With Ellen, we always want her to be here as much as she can and she wants. That’s an open conversation moving forward. After this season, we have yet to have those conversations because her show [‘Good American Family’] is about to premiere. But we want her here as much as possible because she is the essence of the show; her voiceover, it is still in every episode. What we did this last season, we tried to look at her episodes as groups of episodes because it’s more fun to tell an arc with Meredith, rather than a bunch of different one-offs.”

There Will Always Be A Spot For Meredith In ‘Grey’s Anatomy’

Marinis also revealed that she has a soft spot for Meredith’s relationship with Nick (Scott Speedman) because she loves the idea of Meredith “being able to find love after Derek (Patrick Dempsey),” who died back in Season 11 in one of the most shocking episodes in the history of Grey’s Anatomy. Marinis added that she is a fan of Speedman, and hinted that he will return for Meredith’s arcs whenever possible.

The showrunner’s comments mirror an interview from early 2024 in which she stated that the team has “an open-door policy” with Ellen Pompeo, meaning that the actor can return as many times as she wants and whenever she is available to scrub in. Luckily for fans, Marinis underscored that Pompeo “cares very deeply for the show,” which means that she will never really be gone — and we will keep hearing her voice narrating episodes for the foreseeable future.

ABC rolls out new episodes of Grey’s Anatomy on Thursdays. You can also stream the series on Hulu.

Grey’s Anatomy

Release Date

March 27, 2005

Network

ABC

Directors

Rob Corn, Kevin McKidd, Debbie Allen, Chandra Wilson, Allison Liddi-Brown, Jeannot Szwarc, Tony Phelan

Writers

Shonda Rhimes, Julie Wong, Jen Klein, Tameson Duffy, Meg Marinis

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  Chandra Wilson

  Dr. Miranda Bailey

Source: LA Times