It’s official. After weeks of rumors, Katherine Heigl has announced her departure from Grey’s Anatomy. Katherine is the third original cast member to leave the series thus far and her departure is receiving mixed reviews. The biggest downside is the inevitable divorce between Heigl’s Izzy and the heartbroken Alex (Justin Chambers). Alex and Izzie have proven to be on the most cheered for couples in the history of the show, and unfortunately due to either Heigl or the ABC execs this relationship will not be receiving a satisfactory ending.

Add Alex and Izzie to the slowly building list of horrible relationship endings. The first occurred when Burke left Christina at the altar and was never seen again. Grey’s needs to learn a valuable lesson here: don’t let your actors out of the contracts until after you wrap up their stories. It’s beginning to look like the drama offstage is just as much because of the execs as it is because of the actors.

While others will disagree, for me Heigl’s exit will be detrimental to the series. She is an amazing actress who clearly valued her personal life over the series, but there will be an obvious void in the series; however, in many ways the addition of Arizona has brought a new found liveliness to an otherwise flat-lined series. The down-side? Izzy’s exit may pave the way for Teddy to stick around a bit longer (especially if Kim Raver is bumped to series regular). If Rhimes and company think for a moment that Teddy can fill the Izzy void, they are severely mistaken.