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Tonight’s episode of Grey’s Anatomy centers around the trip Jo Karev (played by Camilla Luddington) took in last week’s episode to meet the woman she believed to be her biological mother, and the episode’s promo video shows Jo confronting her mother with a lifelong question, saying “tell me who my father is.” With a face and a name now attached to Jo’s mother on the show, fans are wondering if they will get the answer Jo appears to be seeking. The episode comes with a warning that “Viewer discretion is advised.”
The official synopsis for the episode, entitled “Silent All These Years,” reads “When a trauma patient arrives at Grey Sloan, it forces Jo to confront her past; Bailey and Ben have to talk to Tuck about dating.” Michelle Forbes guest stars as Jo’s biological mom, Vicki Ann Rudin, and Khalilah Joi plays Abby. No actors are credited in any roles that could be Jo’s father, but that still means he could be referenced by name without getting any actual screen time.
According to Elite Daily, showrunner Krista Vernoff spoke about the episode (which she calls the “most powerful” hour of television) and their decision to introduce its storyline into the show. During a panel, she revealed “With the Supreme Court situation [that] happened this year, I wrote the writers and I said, ‘We have to do something about consent. It hurts me too much. We have to do something.’ It was the only time I can point to where I came at them with an issue and the story evolved. What these great writers brought to it is so much character and so much humanity and so much heart.”
Based on the episode description and what the cast and creatives have teased about the episode so far, it appears that the sensitive subject material that requires viewer discretion is about sexual assault. If Jo’s father is identified by name, it will most likely be as a detail in Vicki’s overarching story about what he did and how Jo came to be, rather than a big, unexpected reveal.
In the promo, Jo and her biological mother are shown crying face-to-face in a diner after Jo asks her about her father. With the topic of consent in mind, it is possible that Jo’s mother’s pregnancy was the result of non-consensual sex, which could have influenced her decision to abandon Jo at a fire station. Fans of the show will remember that before Jo was married to Alex Karev, she was in an abusive marriage, so learning that her mother also suffered abuse would certainly be a painful realization.
Back in season 10 of the show, Jo pushed Alex to find out if one of the hospital’s patients was his father, which was a painful discovery for Alex once the blood test came back positive. Her desire to reconnect Alex with his father came from her own lack of a family; however, if Jo’s mother identifies her biological father by name, that doesn’t mean that Jo will go looking for him. Then again, it is Grey’s Anatomy and the show is known for naming people from their main character’s pasts by name, only to have their storylines collide later on.
Okay everyone. Tonight is the night. I will be live tweeting with the west coast feed. I am so incredibly proud of this ep and allllll involved. Please tweet me your thoughts and feelings ❤️ #GreysAnatomy @GreysABC
Camilla Luddington, who has played Jo on Grey’s Anatomy since 2012, wrote on Twitter that she will be live-tweeting with fans as the episode airs on the west coast, adding “I am so incredibly proud of this ep and allllll involved. Please tweet me your thoughts and feelings.” The episode was directed by Debbie Allen, who also plays Dr. Catherine Fox on the show; ahead of its premiere, Allen shared a behind-the-scenes video from filming, writing “@ellenpompeo brings levity to a heavy episode. The world will be talking.”
Tune in to season 15 of Grey’s Anatomy on ABC, Thursday nights at 8/7c.