Caution: spoilers forward!
Season 17 of Grey’s Anatomy is ready to debut in September, and new and outdated fans alike are questioning whether or not Meredith Gray (Ellen Pompeo) will hold onto her new flame, Andrew DeLuca (Giacomo Gianniotti).
The dating is intriguing for various causes. Meredith has struggled to form a long-lasting bond with anyone ever since Derek Shepherd died in Season 11. DeLuca, who has spent Seasons 12 thru Sixteen bouncing round in his relationship existence, is determined for stable romance. The two had been firstly never intended to be in combination romantically and but here we are.
On most sensible of all of this, Meredith and DeLuca have a vital age difference. She’s round 40-41 and DeLuca is about 29. This 10-year gap is not anything to sneeze at for Meredith, who has basically dated older males. However, the Grey’s Anatomy showrunners need to exchange the discussion around age gaps and challenge their target market to accept love as love. But have Grey’s fans been accepting of this new building?
At First, DeLuca Didn’t Have Many Fans
Grey’s Anatomy fans had their hearts ripped from their chests when Derek Shepherd died close to the top of Season 11. Many argued that as soapy and dramatic as Grey’s has been, Derek’s death was far too jarring. Plus, McDreamy used to be a show staple that many fans weren't willing to let pass of.
With this kind of contemporary heartbreak over one of the crucial display’s maximum liked characters, it’s no surprise that fans were reluctant to welcome Gianniotti’s character into the fandom. Gianniotti had an excessive amount of paintings reduce out for him, as he needed to persuade the Grey’s Anatomy target market that he was once worthy of more than one season and that his persona was once likable.
“I came in without delay when they killed off Patrick Dempsey [Dr. Derek Shepherd] so there used to be this bizarre stigma that I used to be changing him, which is not true at all,” Gianniotti stated in an interview, consistent with the New York Post.
Furthermore, DeLuca had a rocky entrance. When he first arrived at Grey Sloan Memorial at the end of Season 11, he announced that he was no longer most effective a physician, but “in fact, a surgeon.” He also had a swimsuit on, so the opposite medical doctors assumed he was once an attending. DeLuca then got ostracized via the opposite interns after his true status as a fellow intern used to be printed.
Though many long-time audience vowed to never watch Grey’s Anatomy once more after Derek’s death, (one Twitter consumer named Natalie Brodie said in 2015 that the show had ruined her lifestyles) those that caught round began to look DeLuca as more than a Derek Shepherd alternative. He was fascinating, good-looking, and as Refinery writer Rebecca Farley put it, “slightly of an idiot.” His appears to be like and character sooner or later won him a spot within the fandom’s center and quickly enough, he graduated from tentative newcomer to series common.
DeLuca and Meredith Were Originally Not Supposed to Be Romantic Partners
At the start of his career on Grey’s Anatomy, Gianniotti promised that his character would not become romantically involved with Meredith Gray.
“I’m just a new persona on the show. I’m now not filling any void,” Gianniotti explained within the 2016 New York Post interview. “I’ve been getting the ones loopy tweets: ‘He’s not Derek,’ ‘He’d better steer clear of Meredith.’ But Andrew won’t have any [romantic] intentions with Meredith, so fans don’t have to worry about any risk.”
For a good amount of time, Shonda Rhimes and her fellow showrunners venerated that promise. DeLuca were given into his personal hassle without the assistance of Meredith. He moved in with Arizona Robbins after the other interns ostracized him. He dated Maggie Pierce for a hot minute, most effective to get a divorce with her with the intention to “stay issues skilled.” He advanced emotions for Jo Wilson, which ended in Alex Karev (long-time cast member Justin Chambers) beating him inside an inch of his lifestyles. He rekindled a romance along with his ex, Sam Bello.
Well, fast ahead to Season 14, when the Grey’s Anatomy writers decided that sufficient time had passed since Derek’s premature dying. At Jo and Alex’s marriage ceremony, DeLuca drunkenly kissed Meredith after she tried to avoid wasting him from a depressing marriage ceremony speech. Meredith at the beginning disregarded the kiss as a second of inebriated affection but did tell DeLuca that it was flattering.
DeLuca and Meredith’s Relationship and Age Difference
Exploring a romance between DeLuca and Meredith in Season 12, right after Derek’s death, would had been strongly rejected by way of fans and frankly, unrealistic when it comes to personality building. Waiting till the end of Season 14 gave the impression to be the suitable move, as DeLuca was more established. Plus, each he and Meredith have been single. (And when two docs on Grey’s Anatomy are unmarried, they could as neatly test it out, right?)
So a long way, the system seems to have worked. Though some fans do appear to be bothered by Meredith's antics and the significant age difference, many are opting for to accept it as it is. In truth, Grey’s Anatomy showrunners have claimed that one among their targets in this relationship is to de-stigmatize older ladies courting more youthful males, especially since older males courting younger girls is more commonplace on TV displays.
"All the time on television you see older men with younger women and it is so common that it isn't even a thing that people notice," showrunner Krista Vernoff informed The Hollywood Reporter in 2019. "It was not a conversation that Derek was so much older than Meredith. It was just that he was the senior surgeon. The age difference wasn't a conversation. I find it delightful to have the opportunity to flip that script. And when people buck against their age difference, my response is to say, 'So? Let's not fall into weird stereotypes.' People are people—and people fall in love."
So, what does this imply? Will DeLuca and Meredith stick in combination in what is also the overall season of Grey’s Anatomy? We’ll need to music on this September to find out.
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