The 31 Saddest TV Deaths of All Time

1 | Lexie Grey, Grey’s Anatomy

Of all the deaths on Grey's Anatomy—and there have been so many—Lexie Grey's (Chyler Leigh) demise still hits the hardest. Maybe it's Meredith's (Ellen Pompeo) gutted reaction, maybe it's Mark (Eric Dane) refusing to let go of her hand, or maybe we'd just grown especially fond of Little Grey over the years.

2 | Jack Pearson, This Is Us

After a season-and-a-half of teasing us with the promised reveal of how Jack (Milo Ventimiglia) died, This Is Us saved the gut punch for a post-Super Bowl episode, in which Jack escapes the fire fans had assumed killed him—only to die from cardiac arrest shortly thereafter. Way to keep us guessing. And crying.

3 | Glenn Rhee, The Walking Dead

The cruelty of Glenn's (Steven Yeun) brutal death on The Walking Dead is that the character had just recovered from a close call the prior season, and the show killed off Abraham (Michael Cudlitz) first, making viewers think that Glenn was safe. The sadistic way this murder of a beloved character played out was enough to make some fans quit the series for good.

4 | Logan Roy, Succession

After nearly succumbing to a stroke in the first episode of the series, audiences were shocked when billionaire media mogul Logan Roy (Brian Cox) suddenly died while aboard a flight early into the show's final season. The seismic event rocks his surviving family and colleagues, where deceit and infighting have all but destroyed his inner circle.

But it’s not until his funeral a few episodes later that his children begin to address their own complicated relationships with their father, making for a cathartic and emotional send-off to one of television's most memorable patriarchs.

5 | Richard Gilmore, Gilmore Girls

Even though it centered on the titular characters, Gilmore Girls was arguably always a show that was enhanced by its vast cast of supporting characters—especially Lorelai’s parents, Emily (Kelly Bishop) and Richard (Edward Herrmann).

But when the series rebooted nearly a decade after the end of its original seven-season run, showrunners were left with the heartbreaking task of handling the gentle patriarch's storyline after Herrmann passed away in 2014 of brain cancer. Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life immediately picks up as Emily and Lorelai toil with their grief and seek therapy—but it’s also clear the actors are channeling genuine sorrow in their roles at the loss of their friend.

6 | Will Gardner, The Good Wife

Somehow everyone managed to keep the secret that Josh Charles would be leaving The Good Wife midseason, making Will Gardner's death that much more shocking. The burst of violence when his client opened fire in a courtroom was already surprising, but the reveal of his body truly took the audience's breath away.

7 | Poussey Washington, Orange Is the New Black

Orange Is the New Black fans weren't the only ones upset by Poussey's (Samira Wiley) death: Her accidental suffocation by a CO during a peaceful demonstration is one of the major inciting incidents for the prison riot that takes place over the subsequent season. In real life, the show launched a criminal justice reform fund in Poussey's name.

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8 | Lady Sybil Crawley, Downton Abbey

Complications from childbirth are very real, and they were even more of a problem in the 1920s. It's certainly not unbelievable that Sybil (Jessica Brown Findlay) would die after giving birth, but for Downtown Abbey fans who had come to love the character, this plot development felt a little like a betrayal nonetheless.

9 | Lucy Knight, ER

ER was influenced by the medical dramas that came before it and proved hugely influential on those that followed. The character surviving a tragedy only to die from complications shortly thereafter—like poor Lucy Knight (Kellie Martin)—has become something of a staple, and also pops up on several non-medical dramas on this very list.

10 | Finn Hudson, Glee

The real-life death of Cory Monteith had to be addressed on Glee, which devoted an entire tribute episode to the character of Finn and the actor who portrayed him. Viewers never learned how Finn died, but that didn't matter—what did were the heartbreaking performances from Finn's friends, who also happened to be Monteith's.

11 | Mrs. Landingham, The West Wing

The rules of dramatic irony suggest that you should never agree to a future conversation with someone, and you should never make note of picking up your first new car, unless you are prepared to get into a fatal collision in said new car before the conversation can ever happen. Mrs. Landingham (Kathryn Joosten) learned this lesson the hard way.

12 | Lane Pryce, Mad Men

Unlike other prestige dramas we could name—including a few on this list—Mad Men didn't really traffic in character death. That's what made Lane Pryce's (Jared Harris) abrupt exit so shocking and so upsetting. While his despair had been evident for some time, it still felt sudden and left those around him (and the viewers) reeling.

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13 | Sun-Hwa Kwon and Jin-Soo Kwon, Lost

How do you pick the saddest character death on Lost, which had killed off every character by the series finale? (Literally! Turns out the final season was everyone in purgatory.) You have to go with your gut, and ours says that nothing hit harder than Jin (Daniel Dae Kim) and Sun (Yunjin Kim) drowning together after deciding they couldn't bear to be apart.

14 | Tara Maclay, Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Tara's shocking death on Buffy the Vampire Slayer sent shockwaves through the climax of the season, as her girlfriend Willow (Alyson Hannigan) went full-blown dark in search of vengeance.

The controversial choice to kill off one of the show's few queer characters, immediately after she'd reunited with Willow, was made all the more painful by the fact that actor Amber Benson had been added to the opening credits just for her final episode.

15 | Gary Shepherd, thirtysomething

In the early '90s, TV characters didn't drop dead with quite the frequency they do now. Gary's (Peter Horton) sudden death in a car accident was a true shock to the system, especially since thirtysomething fans had been primed for the death of Nancy (Patricia Wettig), who was battling ovarian cancer, instead.

16 | Rayna James, Nashville

Connie Britton's decision to leave Nashville before the series' conclusion meant that her star character, Rayna James, needed a dramatic sendoff. That came in the form of her death, which follows a familiar pattern on this list of the saddest TV demises: car accident, complications after she seemed to survive.

17 | Hodor, Game of Thrones

As with Lost, the body count on Game of Thrones was exceptionally high. But that doesn't mean certain deaths don't stand out. Hodor's (Kristian Nairn) may not have been the most shocking—that would be Ned's (Sean Bean) in Season 1, or Season 3's gruesome Red Wedding—but it was the most poignant. He died saving Bran (Isaac Hempstead Wright), who (we learned) had inadvertently wrecked Hodor's mind and reduced him to one nonsense word decades prior.

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18 | Tara Knowles, Sons of Anarchy

The violence of Tara's (Maggie Siff) death made it that much harder for viewers to endure. Sons of Anarchy fans had come to appreciate Tara as something of a moral compass for Jax (Charlie Hunnam)—her murder at the hands of Jax's mother (Katey Sagal) pulled the rug out from under him, and set the stage for the remainder of the series.

19 | Lance Sweets, Bones

John Patrick Daley has become a successful director over the years, but unfortunately, that meant his character on Bones needed to make an exit. Sweets is shot and killed in the Season 10 premiere, delivering some iconic parting words: "The world is a lot better than you think it is."

20 | Rita Morgan, Dexter

The tragedy of Rita's (Julie Benz) death is that Dexter (Michael C. Hall) seems to win—he dispatches the Trinity Killer (John Lithgow) and should have been able to save Rita in time. But his wife and the mother of his child, one of Dexter's few tethers to the world, had been murdered long before his final confrontation with her killer. The reveal is gutting.

21 | J.T. Yorke, Degrassi: The Next Generation

Over the course of six seasons on Degrassi: The Next Generation, J.T. (Ryan Cooley) went from annoying kid to—dare we say it—mature and compassionate young adult. His stabbing and subsequent death was tremendously upsetting, a shocking moment even for a teen series that had made a name for itself as a show that was willing to "go there."

22 | Bellamy Blake, The 100

Bellamy (Bob Morley) made it so close to the end on The 100 that we didn't really see his death coming—and we certainly couldn't have predicted that it would come at the hands of Clarke (Eliza Taylor), who not only killed Bellamy but also any hope Bellarke shippers had that those crazy kids would one day make it work. If it's any consolation, the two actors eventually got married in real life!

23 | Bill and Frank, The Last of Us

The apocalyptic landscape of The Last of Us doesn’t leave very much room for heartfelt moments. But early in its first season, the show veered off its main character to introduce hardened, curmudgeonly doomsday prepper Bill (Nick Offerman), who begrudgingly decides to welcome lost survivor Frank (Murray Bartlett) into his heavily secured home.

The two soon fall in love, and the couple work together to manage their existence in the dangerous new world over the course of two decades—before they both ultimately decide to leave it together. Audience and critical reaction to the tearjerking episode called it one of the single most touching love stories to ever make its way to TV.

24 | Sarah Lynn, BoJack Horseman

BoJack Horseman (Will Arnett) had plenty of rock bottoms, but none were lower than his bender with his former child co-star Sarah Lynn (Kristen Schaal), culminating in her death. On a series that never shied away from darkness, Sarah Lynn's overdose still felt particularly bleak, an unpleasant reminder of the swath of destruction in BoJack's wake.

25 | Marvin Eriksen Sr., How I Met Your Mother

The death of Marvin Eriksen (Bill Fagerbakke)—beloved dad of Marshall (Jason Segel)—happens off-screen on How I Met Your Mother. Instead, the audience learns about it just as Marshall does, when his wife Lily (Alyson Hannigan) breaks the devastating news. Segel knew his co-star would be delivering a twist but asked not to be told in advance of filming what it was, making his gutting response, "My dad's dead? I'm not ready for this," totally improvised and viscerally real.

26 | The entire cast of Six Feet Under

It only seems fitting that a show centered around death would begin its final run dealing with the loss of one of its main characters, Nate Fisher (Peter Krause). The event brings about a unique opportunity for the remaining characters—who already spend their days surrounded by reminders of their own mortality as morticians and funeral directors—to reflect on their lives, relationships, and priorities.

But after this last set of endearing moments, the show goes even further by showing when and how each of them eventually passes on in an intensely emotional montage set against youngest daughter Claire Fisher (Lauren Ambrose) setting off to drive cross country to New York. Ultimately, it provides one of the most appropriate and profoundly moving ways to end the series.

27 | Howard Hamlin, Better Call Saul

You gotta hand it to Howard Hamlin: His death makes for what is arguably the most talked-about and unforgettable scene in the entire run of Better Call Saul. Patrick Fabian's character shows up to confront Jimmy (Bob Odenkirk) and Kim (Rhea Seehorn) about the increasingly cruel pranks they've been playing on him, only to become collateral damage in Lalo's (Tony Dalton) war against Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito).

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28 | Amber Volakis, House

Season 4 of House ended on a real down note, with the deterioration and eventual death of Amber (Anne Dudek) following a bus crash that both she and House (Hugh Laurie) initially survive. As she struggles in the hospital, House is able to recover a memory from before the crash that diagnoses Amber's condition—because of her injuries, her body is unable to process the amantadine she was taking for the flu. But it's still too late, and she dies with Wilson (Robert Sean Leonard) holding her in her hospital bed.

29| Edith Bunker, Archie Bunker’s Place

Even decades after its run ended, few characters loom as large over the television landscape as Archie Bunker (Carroll O'Connor) and his loving, shrill-voiced wife, Edith (Jean Stapleton) from All in the Family.

But after his spouse succumbs to a stroke in the second season premiere of its spinoff, Archie Bunker’s Place, the legendarily gruff sitcom dad becomes grief-stricken and forlorn. The standout moment comes when Archie laments losing the love of his life in a tender, tearful, and breathtakingly moving scene when he finally allows himself to mourn his loss.

30 | Michael Cordero, Jane the Virgin

Yes, yes, this death was eventually retconned in the telenovela twist we should have all seen coming. But it was still heartbreaking for Jane Villanueva (Gina Rodriguez) and Jane the Virgin fans when her newlywed husband Michael Cordero (Brett Dier) seemingly dies from an aortic dissection caused by a gunshot he took to the chest months earlier—just as he's embarking on a new life path by taking the LSATs.

31 | Adriana La Cerva, The Sopranos

There are plenty of character deaths to catalog on The Sopranos, and they run the gamut tonally from absurd and sort-of comic to majorly gut-wrenching. Given that Christopher's (Michael Imperioli) fiancée Adriana (Drea de Matteo) is not directly responsible for any violence herself, unlike most of the other players who get whacked, her death goes in the second bucket.

Despite enduring abuse at Christopher's hands over the years, she still tries to stay loyal to him and the rest of the family after she's blackmailed into cooperating with the FBI. Confessing to him is a death sentence, even though it's one that nobody—including her executioner Silvio (Steven Van Zandt)—seems thrilled to be carrying out.