April 25th, 2007 by screenwriterguy
 Death may be the one aspect of life that shows up LESS on television than in reality (excluding, of course, those shows that start every episode with one, where it is featured far MORE than statistically plausible.) Death can be a taboo subject, perhaps harkening to more superstitious times when to name was to invite it. I thought I’d reflect for a post on how television shows through history have handled the ultimate facet of life. When TV is at its best, reverent or not, death is handled artfully. Of course, we know that when TV is at its worst…
Here are my selections of notable storytelling surrounding the death of a main or recurring character. Because they really do fall into extremes, and to save me from sorting through which Sopranos character really had it coming, I feel like I have to break this Top Ten into five best and five worst: |
WORST TV CHARACTER DEATHS:
| #5 |
Nate Fisher (season three)–Six Feet Under deserves props for its handling of death. The series starts grippingly with the death of Nate Fisher, Sr. (in one of the first times we’ve seen that traffic crash-out-of-nowhere moment that has become so common.) Every episode began with a death, often delightfully self-aware. Death was a prevalent theme of the show, and the finale episode of the series used death to magnificent advantage to depict some of the most moving television I’ve ever experienced. Still, this show got some deaths wrong, too. Every once in a while a subplot about that episode’s intake turned cloying. The passing of Nate’s wife Lisa was painfully anti-climactic. And worst was Nate’s death–the first one, that is. At the end of season two, Nate is going in for brain surgery and we watch him die. Season three begins with this surreal exploration of multiple realities that goes on way too long, and suddenly he’s not dead, he’s in an unlikeable marriage with a kid. Yuck. |
| #4 |
Rosalind Shays–Evidently they don’t mess around when getting rid of annoying characters on L.A. Law. One minute she’s there, the next she’s dropped down an elevator. Huh. |
| #3 |
Maude Flanders I remember quite specifically the episodes of The Simpsons that prompted me to stop watching. It was after the premiere of season 9, “The City of New York vs. Homer Simpson,” that the show stopped being appointment television for me. The single episode that made me stop watching entirely was “Alone Again, Natura-diddly. I knew only that something about Homer’s character felt fundamentally wrong. Gone was the born-loser everyman who often came up short but at least wanted to do well by friends and family. In his place was an uncaring hedonist happy to–or even seeking to–inconvenience others with his buffoonery. When his clowning at a Nascar race caused Maude to be hit by a t-shirt cannon, plummeting hundreds of feet off a stadium to her death, Homer showed almost no remorse for his part in the death of his neighbor’s wife. It was not only inconsistent character work, it was just plain unfunny. (Only years later did I piece together that both of these scripts were the work of Ian Maxtone-Graham, and learn of the contempt for him among fans.) |
| #2 |
Dr. Robert Romano–He was the E.R. doc you either loved to hate, or just plain hated. Having lost an arm to a helicopter, he later lost his life to another helicopter. That fell on him. It was wrong, and not in an intended way. Add all the “someone’s gonna die” pre-show hype, and you have a moment of shame in television history. |
| #1 |
J.R. Ewing–There’s a concept in improvisational theater that applies well to all of storytelling. Basically, it says that if you start a story in a certain direction, asking your audience to accept certain exposition, you should never reverse what you’ve done. If you move the story then move it back, you’ve effectively told no story. Applied to a TV show, for example, if you say that a main character is dead, a big “JUST KIDDING!!!” will leave your audience members unsatisfied. And it did. |
Honorable
Mention: |
Billy Thomas–Producer David E. Kelly does a lot of things right. Death is not one of them. I remember in the early 2000s there was a period of about a month in which minor, minor, minor characters died on various shows–a judge on Ally McBeal, a girl wrestler on Boston Public, and a D.A. or some such on The Practice. Each one had this glorious funeral scene with a big musical send-off, all for a character we didn’t care about in the least. Bleck. Another thing he didn’t do well was get rid of characters whose part had been played out. Ally’s old boyfriend Billy went through this ridiculous phase of blonding his hair and owning his male chauvinist pig-ness. Then he got a brain tumor and died. Bleck. Oh well. David E. Kelly married Michelle Pfeiffer, so he still wins. |
| John Ritter–8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter met the death of its star with attempts to play out the family’s experience of losing its patriarch. Adding James Garner was not enough, nor was David Spade useful; the show was too intricately wrapped around Ritter. I give the creative staff credit for the shows that directly addressed the death. Scripts still held jokes, presented with no audience laughter as characters struggled. It was a noble experiment. Ultimately, the schmaltzy promotion by ABC is what lands this TV death in the “worst” column. |
BEST TV CHARACTER DEATHS:
| #5 |
Chef–When Isaac Hayes decided to leave South Park, presumably because of their scientology episode (there was much written at the time, some of which implied that it was Hayes’s people who quit for him, as he would have been too sick to write the letter himself) the show ended the character of Chef. In an odd way, the episode honored Hayes’ contributions, as the South Park boys encouraged the citizens to remember Chef’s great qualities, before that “fruity little club” messed with his head. Of course, Trey Parker and Matt Stone also had no mercy when terminating the character, first implying that his membership in the “fruity little club” had turned him into a child molester, then killing him quite definitively. Amazingly, though, after the extreme finality of Chef’s death–he is hit by lightning, plummets down a cliff, impales himself on spikes, and is torn apart by a bear and a mountain lion–he still gets revived as “Darth Chef,” suggesting that there may be a way for the character to live on if Hayes ever changes his mind. |
| #4 |
Susan Biddle Ross–Nothing could better epitomize George Costanza’s character than the death of his fiancée because he was too cheap to buy better wedding invitations |
| #3 |
Jenny Calendar– Her death, while masterfully handled, might have been minor compared to that of characters that followed on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Tara was amazingly significant, Willow’s revenge that followed was huge, and of course the brilliant episode “The Body” was one of those moments where Joss Whedon lead television to bleed into experimental film. Still, I chose Miss Calendar’s demise because it helped establish how Buffy, and I would argue, all of TV, would hence depict death: sometimes people we care about die, and sometimes it is senseless and pointless. Following that moment, everything became more real. ANY of the characters on the show might die. It wasn’t long before shows like 24, Lost, and Heroes were killing main characters every other week. |
| #2 |
Mr. Hooper–When actor Will Lee died in 1982, the producers of Sesame Street decided that his character would die as well, and that the show would explore grieving and loss for children, through the eyes of Big Bird. So powerful was the resulting episode that it never aired again. I remember seeing the episode as a kid, and I tracked it down again at the Museum of Radio and Television in New York a few years ago. I was shocked at how close my memory was to what I had seen as a child. Big Bird has a present for Mr. Looper (sic). The adults explain to Big Bird that he can’t give Mr. Hooper the present, because Mr. Hooper has died. Big Bird says he will have to wait then, until Mr. Looper comes back. They tell him, no, Mr. Hooper isn’t coming back. That’s what dying means. And Big Bird learns what death is about, and he grieves, and he eventually copes with loss. You can’t ask for much more honest dealing than that. |
| #1 |
Col. Henry Blake–The story goes that the actors didn’t even know the story, so the scene was their genuine reactions to the death of the character. “Lt. Colonel Henry Blake’s plane shot down over the Sea of Japan. It spun out of control. There were no survivors.” Here was a show that had to turn on a dime between silliness and tragedy. Henry was on his way home from it all when he lost his life. It was a dramatic moment that made TV history, and a bold statement about the true cost of war. |
Honorable
Mention: |
Leo McGarry–Faced with the real-life death of actor John Spencer, the team behind The West Wing did an amazing job of ending the life of the character of Leo McGarry. His passing was suspended for a few episodes, in which characters would mention that Leo was working the campaign trail elsewhere, and even hinted at a romance with his aide, played by Kristen Chenowith. Then Leo’s death was woven into the existing storyline so masterfully that it might have been a choice. Kudos to the writing team for having some of the characters on the show a bit callous as to the loss, all while simultaneously ensuring that the show honored both the character and the actor. |
| Brian Cooper–He doesn’t really qualify, probably having had a minute of screen time. However, the death of Winnie Cooper’s older brother in the pilot episode of The Wonder Years is an impressive use of death in storytelling. What could more solidly set time and tone for the series than the loss of a town’s favorite son to the Vietnam War? |
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Posted in Top-Ten Lists |
Apr 25th 2007 at 4:59 am
Oh, damn. I REMEMBER that episode of “Sesame Street” exactly like you described it. I’d love to see it again, if only for nostalgia (and not the inherent life lessons it would undoubtably provide again).
Apr 25th 2007 at 12:16 pm
Good list. Yeah, Jenny Calendar was totally one of those moments where ur like no wait that didnt really happen!
Another honorable mention for you… Laura Palmer. Her death started a whole weird TV show.
Apr 25th 2007 at 7:54 pm
Billy died on Ally McBeal?!?!?! Seriously? I watched that show religiously at first, and kinda got lost during the Bon Jovi years. But, seriously? Billy dies? How is that possible?
I’m totally serious here.
Billy dies?
Apr 27th 2007 at 4:39 pm
Yeppers. Billy had a brain tumor and kicked the bucket in the middle of the trial. He had a hallucination as he was dying, about family and kids and such, and it was sorta an affirmation to Ally as to her true love. Sadly, his ghost talked to Ally for a while after that. All of this was in season 3. Bon Jovi was season 5.
Apr 30th 2007 at 9:35 am
I think Whedon’s storytelling is underrated and not appreciated by the mainstream. Buffy and Angel told compelling stories, the supernatural element was incidental. I think I actually greived when Jenny and then Tara died, even Buffy’s mom. Only regret was when Spike died and he was magically brought back for the Angel series.
Apr 30th 2007 at 9:50 am
Couldn’t agree more, Buffy Fan. I think the strong storytelling is why folks with knowledge of Whedon’s work tend to be such dedicated fans. And yes, the supernatural tended to be metaphor, the way it should be in all good science fiction.
We absolutely grieved at the loss of of Jenny, Tara, and Joyce. Why? Giles, Willow, and Buffy. Those characters went through such deep suffering when they lost a loved one, and you just don’t see that in most shows–even the ones that kill off characters.
I remember Giles in particular being very effective for me. Here’s a guy whose job (or calling, anyway) demands that he be lonely, and he’s finally found someone he can be a little intimate with, who actually understands him. Then, snap. She’s brought down by a monster. Oh, and a monster whom the person Giles loves most happens to be in love with. It wasn’t black-and-white good-and-evil stuff. It was messy and gross and beautiful, just like life. That’s what that show so often got right.
May 14th 2007 at 3:20 pm
I totally agree with your Whedon placement, though I would have put “The Body” on the list. That episode happened to air right after my favorite uncle died and it made me break down in tears. I just saw it again a few months ago, and it still brought me to tears. With the no music and the absolutely unsupernatural death… it just got to me. But I have to put a big downgrade on Doyle’s death in Angel Season 1. They put all his backstory (mostly) in one episode, have him share his feelings with Cordy and then die all in 42 minutes. I think if they had waited a little more, there would have been more impact on the characters and audience.
May 15th 2007 at 3:50 pm
I agree that “The Body” probably deserves its own place on the list. But then suddenly my list would be all Buffy, so I had to choose something representative.
Good point about Doyle. The rumor I’d heard was that his death was more about producers wanting the actor off the show. If that’s true, it might explain the strange, unsatisfying “sacrifice” he made.
Sep 13th 2008 at 3:10 pm
Jeez, no list is complete without The Wire. When Wallace was murdered in season 1 or when Stringer Bell bit it in season 3! And Bodie in season 4! I mean come on, not only is The Wire the greatest show television ever produced, it also has some of the most memorable and shocking character deaths.
Outside of The Wire I’d have to mention Doyle dying in season 1 of Angel.