This article contains spoilers for the season finale of Station 19.
In the age of shared universes in television and film, Grey’s Anatomy was one of the first non-superhero shows to spring multiple spin-offs.
Station 19 followed Private Practice as the second spin-off to the medical show, but pivoted towards a different group of first responders — firefighters. It premiered in 2018, featuring a Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital mainstay as a lead after Ben Warren decided it was time for a career change.
Multiple other Grey’s characters have popped up on its sister show over the years, but it concluded its run as the finale of its seventh season aired on ABC on May 30, 2024.
The Grey’s Anatomy and Station 19 schedule on ABC, explained
During Krista Vernoff’s run as the showrunner of both Grey’s Anatomy and Station 19 between 2019 and 2023, the two shows were closely linked and even their schedules were determined to facilitate crossovers. Station 19 aired at 8 PM followed by Grey’s an hour later, so that the doctors could take over from the first responder firefighters chronologically and seamlessly when needed.
In the lead-up to Station 19‘s last season that all changed. ABC moved the spin-off show to a 10 PM time slot, which meant it came after Grey’s Anatomy, and the result was only a singular crossover episode that concluded with Ben changing careers again and deciding to finish his surgical residency at the Seattle hospital.
The change, which was announced in November 2023, felt like a bad omen for the future of Station 19 — a prediction that was eventually confirmed when ABC revealed it would not be renewing the show for a new season a month later. During that same year, the network saved the fellow procedural drama 9-1-1 which had been canceled by Fox, giving it a seventh season (and recently, an eighth) as well as Station 19‘s 8 PM time slot, preceding Grey’s Anatomy (which was of course renewed for another season). Talk about backstabbing.