SPOILER ALERT! This post contains details from the Season 22 finale of Grey’s Anatomy.
Grey’s Anatomy said goodbye to two of its longest remaining cast members in Thursday’s Season 22 finale as Kevin McKidd‘s Owen and Kim Raver’s Teddy depart Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital for a new opportunity.
The episode, also directed by McKidd, picks up moments after the penultimate episode, when a bridge collapse sends the Grey Sloan trauma bay into disarray. The bridge happens to be along a route that several of our characters take to work, including Owen, whose car we soon see has gone overboard in the collapse.
“I’m really proud of this episode. It really packs a punch. It feels like quite a unique big, big episode [with] that whole bridge collapse sequence. I think was pretty ambitious for us,” McKidd told Deadline in an interview ahead of the finale.
While Owen sustains minor injuries, he manages to make it out of the car before it sinks and immediately jumps into action searching the wreckage for survivors. He quickly zeroes in on a family who needs serious medical attention and stays with them until paramedics arrive. And, true to form, he hitches a ride to the hospital in the back of an ambulance so he can get to an operating room and finish saving these folks’ lives.
Living through yet another life-altering event certainly changes his perspective on his future, ultimately encouraging him to take a leap of faith and move to Paris with Teddy and the kids for her new job opportunity. After a season of strife, Owen and Teddy’s last moments on screen (for now, at least) mark a happy ending for the long-lasting couple.
In the interview below, McKidd goes in depth on directing his exit from Grey’s Anatomy after 18 seasons and what’s next.
DEADLINE: I know that you directed this episode as well. So what was it like for you to get to act in both capacities for this farewell to Owen and Teddy?
KEVIN MCKIDD: Debbie Allen asked me right to start the season before we knew that this would be my last season, and she was doing her Broadway debut as a director, so she said, ‘Look, could you please direct the finale for me?’ I said, ‘Absolutely, I’d love to.’ I’ve directed a few finales before, so I think she trusted me to do it. But then, when we decided this would be my last season, I was like, ‘This feels like a lot to take on’ — finale episode and me exiting and Kim exiting — but I’m really glad I did. It felt really empowering. I’m really proud of this episode. It really packs a punch. It feels like quite a unique big, big episode [with] that whole bridge collapse sequence. I think was pretty ambitious for us. I think it packs a really emotional punch that I’m really proud of too, and I think it gave me a real sense of ownership. It almost felt like I was kind of graduating from the Grey’s Anatomy film school. This is my 49th episode of directing the show. So, it felt like a completed journey for me.
DEADLINE: Was that the biggest set piece that you had directed? Or have there been bigger ones?
MCKIDD: I think it was, yeah. It was the biggest we’ve done in a long time. We built this massive set, and it took weeks to build it. It was the final two days of the shoot, because it took so long to build. Just filling up the water tank took three days, because it was this massive lake, essentially. So the logistics were really tough, and it physically was very demanding. So I was very tired by the end.
Then I got on a plane that night, as we wrapped and we were saying goodbyes…people came by and there was cake and speeches, and I got a car to LAX to go and fly to Scotland to start this movie I’ve just done. I think that only then, when I got to the airport, in my seat, lying on a red eye to my home country to do a movie, it all kind of hit me. I could take it all in, because when you’re directing, you’re so on mission to get the thing completed, and not have any issues. That’s all I was focused on. I don’t give myself the latitude to really feel anything, if that makes sense. I was just so busy getting the job done.
DEADLINE: How are you feeling now that it’s been a bit since you filmed it, and the episode is about to air, and you’re really kind of letting go, at least for now, of Owen?
MCKIDD I’m excited for people that watch this episode. I think it completes the journey of Owen in a really beautiful way. Owen, starting the show, is this really traumatized, broken human. He lost his entire platoon. His best friend bled out in front of him. I think that’s partly why this episode was written this way. I mean, of course, there’s the bait and switch of what we do on the show all the time, which is we in the teaser, you tease that ‘Is Owen going to die?’ and actually they don’t die. But on a deeper level, the reason Meg [Marinis, the showrunner] wrote it this way, she told me was to complete the journey and to heal the wound that Owen carried with him all this time of losing his platoon [and] his best friends. He wasn’t able to save them. He was the sole survivor. To, all these years later, have this family in this crushed car, which is kind of a metaphor for that event that happened all those years ago in Iraq, and for him to be able to right that wrong and heal that wound and save that family and keep that family whole was kind of like the completion of a circle for Owen. So, I’m really proud of just seeing that, depicting that, and directing that and playing that. I think we did a really good job. I’m excited for people to see it.
DEADLINE: This season that for Owen and Teddy has been a big journey of just finding their way back to one another and realizing that there was a path back to each other in the first place. I started to really notice that when they were at that rural hospital. When do you think it became clear to the characters that their story together wasn’t finished yet?
MCKIDD: Yeah, I think it was around then. I think that the spark of that started [then]. The chemistry between them is undeniable. They both realized they can’t live without each other. That was their realization. Ultimately, sometimes you have to walk away from something to know that you need it in your life. I think that’s kind of the journey they were on.
DEADLINE: Do you think that was a moment of like growth for Owen, to be able to realize that he should take this leap of faith for her?
MCKIDD: Yeah, I think so. I think, for a long time, Teddy’s kind of been following Owen in a way, or letting Owen take the lead in things. I think she’s been on her own path very much this season, since the finale last year, and I think Owen finally made peace with that and realized that his job in this chapter that they’re stepping into together is about him following her and letting her drive the car for a while. For him to see what that feels like, to show her that respect, [and understand] that what she needs and what she wants matters to him as much as what he needs and what he wants. I think that is shows real maturity in that relationship.
DEADLINE: Owen’s had a lot going on. His mom had a stroke, then the bridge collapse, and Paris. There’s so much going on for Owen. I’m curious, outside of his relationship with Teddy, how those other factors might have influenced this moment of just realization and growth for him about what he wanted out of his life?
MCKIDD: I think family is number one for him. His mom getting sick and surviving, I think, was pivotal to that. [Also], the idea of this new job and realizing that it’s not quite what he wants, that he wants to keep his life together. He doesn’t want to just turn the page on it, start fresh, start from zero. He has what he needs. If what he needs is right in front of him, he just needs to embrace it and step into it and just fall into the life that he loves, the woman he loves, his children that he loves, the family he loves. Owen’s always been uncomfortable in his own skin, in a way. I think he’s finally given himself permission to be comfortable, to be at peace.
DEADLINE: Grey’s is quite the anomaly, particularly in this time in television. What’s it been like for you to weather the current TV landscape on this show?
McKidd: It’s incredible. It’s changed my life, you know, and I’ll be eternally grateful to it. It’s a creative family for me. I came to America off the back of HBO’s Rome, which I’m still very proud of, and did a show that was short lived called Journeyman, because the strike in 2008 sort of ended that show. I was kind of wondering what was next, and Shonda Rhimes described this character and said, ‘I need somebody to be a scene partner with Sandra Oh.’ And I came, and it worked. The show has become my family, in a very real sense. So I feel very grateful for that.
It’s funny, we saw the streaming bubble become this big thing. We were all on the show going, ‘Everybody’s off doing these huge, big, splashy projects, and we’re here just chugging away doing Grey’s Anatomy.’ There was kind of a little bit of FOMO in those years, and now the bubble of the streaming thing has kind of burst, and it’s amazing to see, well, we’re still here. We’re stilldoing the thing, and it’s a testament to the show that Shonda created. That pilot episode, the cast, everything came together in just the right way. There’s no shows like this anymore that have this this level of longevity [and] can survive literally different generations of viewership. It’s unheard of, so it’s huge blessing, and I’ll be eternally grateful to the show for what it’s given me.
DEADLINE: I wondered if maybe Owen and Teddy might ever visit from Paris, but Kim and I kind of thought maybe the the Seattle crew needs to find a reason to go to Europe so that they can see them there. Do you see yourself ever popping back in?
McKidd: This place is my home base. I’ll be back to direct, for sure. I know Debbie may want me to. I’ll be honored to do that. If they ever asked me to come back as Owen, it’d be fun to see what he’s up to now, so yeah, I would never say never to any of that. It really is like my family and my home. So it would be like coming home for me every time.
DEADLINE: My last question for you is just what you’re looking forward to now and what’s going on with you post-Grey’s Anatomy.
McKidd: I mean, literally, I got on a plane the night we wrapped the episode,and came to Scotland to do quite a role in Highlander, and that was that’s just been a blast. I just wrapped a few days ago, before I came here to New York. So, it’s been lovely to be home, back in my home country and working with a great cast and crew…that was really fun to get back into period dramas. I used to do a lot of period drama before Grey’s Anatomy. I’ve been a doctor for so long, but now suddenly I’m back on a horse swinging a sword. So that’s been fantastic fun. I’m off to do, start shooting next week in London, this really twisty, naughty, psychological, dark thriller called The Only Suspect for ITV. So I start filming that next week and I’ll be doing that for the next couple months in London.
Beyond that, my production company, Ferryman Films, as just signed a deal with STV as a co-pro, which I’m really excited about. We have about 15 projects on the slate. We have a bunch that are in paid development with Disney and BBC and Amazon. So that, for me, is the most exciting, in a way, because development is a very different side of this business. I’m really learning a lot. I can feel myself every day learning more and more about that side of the business, because I’ve always been in the on the physical production side. Once something’s greenlit, I’m directing or I’m acting, but the actual development and shepherding a story from its inception into a finished script and into a show that people can watch is really exciting. I’m enjoying that. So that’s the biggest new thing for me, Ferryman Films, and what that’s bringing to my life and to my creative world.