Why did Natalie leave Chicago Med?

Natalie left Chicago Med during the first few moments of the Season 7 premiere.

In a blink-and-you-missed-it moment, Natalie and Will were shown packing up her car as she left town with her son.

For Chicago Med fans who already knew that actress Torrey DeVitto (she played Dr. Natalie Manning) was leaving the show, it was pretty shocking that she popped up in the season premiere.

It was later revealed that DeVitto and Nick Gehlfuss (Dr. Will Halstead) were able to film that opening scene just a few weeks before the season premiere aired on NBC.

Why did Natalie leave Chicago Med?

Within the context of the One Chicago universe, Dr. Natalie Manning lost her job at Chicago Med when she admitted to stealing drugs from a trial that was taking place at the hospital. Will had tried to take the fall for it, but even after he got fired, Natalie went to Sharon Goodwin to let her know the truth.

The plan had been that the Season 6 finale would be the final episode for Dr. Natalie Manning, with Torrey DeVitto even posting about it on social media. Having the character return for one final scene ended up being a treat for Chicago Med fans.

On the surface, the writers and producers still left a bit of mystery behind the reasoning for Natalie to leave Chicago Med, which does raise the possibility that the character could return to the show at a later date. That might be something that could take place during a future season if everything can get worked out.

For now, we may have seen the last of Natalie, with some heavy hints on the show that Will might just be interested in exploring things with one of the new doctors on the Chicago Med cast.

Chicago Med Season 7 all about new faces

So far, the first few episodes of Season 7 have worked hard to introduce a group of new doctors to the show. We met Dr. Hammer and Dr. Scott as the two new faces in the ED, Dr. Cooper is someone who Dr. Halstead is secretly investigating, and then Dr. Joy Yang showed up to help out Sharon.

It looks like there is a lot of room to further explore the backstories for Dr. Hammer (her mother living on the street), Dr. Scott (his background working for the Chicago P.D.), and Dr. Cooper (if he really is committing fraud). There are a lot of directions the stories could take Chicago Med Season 7.

And we are still awaiting the first new episode that features Dr. Ethan Choi (Brian Tee). He was mentioned in the season premiere as still dealing with his rehab after getting shot, but it might take a while for him to be back at a point where he can work at the hospital again.

Having Dr. Choi return to an ED where Dr. Dean Archer is now the boss definitely seems like a dramatic future storyline.

Chicago Med airs Wednesdays at 8/7c on NBC.