Grey's Anatomy: Wait, So Is Alex Going to Prison or Not?

We're a couple episodes into the Winter season of Grey's Anatomy, but one of our burning questions still remains unanswered. Suffice it to say, the biggest controversy on the show right now has nothing to do with patients, surgeries, or Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital. Instead, it has everything to do with Alex Karev and whether or not he'll go to prison for beating Andrew DeLuca nearly to death. Last week, Bailey seemed convinced that Alex had taken the plea deal and that he was going to prison (which, of course, had us worried Justin Chambers might exit the show). This week, a few details have us wondering if Alex found a way out of his legal situation after all.

Let's go over the evidence. At the beginning of the episode, Meredith and Maggie are desperately trying to find Alex's criminal case online. They eventually do, and they learn that Alex has entered the plea deal (which gives him two years in prison). They also learn that the case is "indefinitely postponed," which Meredith believes means Alex is in prison. Thus begins her citywide search for her imprisoned friend. Here's the catch: Alex isn't in prison . . . yet. It's not until the end of the episode that we realize he's been sleeping in Meredith's bed all day.

There are a few things to consider here. The first is Arizona's telling scene with DeLuca, in which she says she really misses Alex and she wishes he wasn't gone. DeLuca looks extremely confused and says, "What?" When you combine that with the fact that the criminal case is "indefinitely postponed" and Alex is in Meredith's bed and not in prison, there's one optimistic conclusion you could come to. Alex may have entered the plea deal, but it's possible DeLuca felt terrible and dropped the charges at the last minute, allowing Alex to go free.

Sadly, the other possibility is that DeLuca did not drop the charges, and that Alex took the plea deal, and he's still going to prison. Maybe he gets a day, or a week, or a month to get his affairs in order, which would explain why he's in Meredith's bed. As for DeLuca's confusion, he's been admittedly out of the loop with Alex's court case for some time. Maybe he didn't know Alex took a plea deal. Maybe he didn't know there was a plea deal in the first place. The tragic part here is that it could go either way. Alex may very well be going to prison after all, but we're going to go ahead and hold on to this faint glimmer of hope as long as we possibly can.