10 Worst Ways TV Characters Were Written Out
Chef got it ROUGH!
A TV show is a living, breathing organism. You can make all the intricate, long term plans you like, but things can change on a dime - a fresh idea, an external influence, a real life situation - and suddenly you need to rethink.
Characters come and go on TV, and it’s up to the creative team how they go about dispatching them. Sometimes characters are given a beautiful send off - they’ve served their purpose on the show, but their story (or the actor’s contract) is over, and a suitable exit is written.
Sometimes it doesn’t go quite so gracefully. Maybe there have been some behind the scenes disputes and the writers feel disinclined to give their creations a good goodbye - perhaps they even want to punish the actor by proxy of their character.
Other times, sloppy writing can be forced upon the creators - an actor might die, or their personal life may infringe on the show so badly that there’s no option but to give them the snip.
Whatever the reason, there are plenty of TV shows who have lost characters by the most graceless means imaginable.
10. Charlie Harper - Two And A Half Men
It seems odd now given how quickly his schtick became tedious, but in the heady days of 2010, everybody wanted a piece of Charlie Sheen. The troubled sitcom star was making a more than comfortable living on the bafflingly popular Two And A Half Men, but evidently got as bored of making it as we did watching it, and decided to stir the pot.
Sheen was, it’s fair to say, going through some things at the time, with stints in rehab and health issues abounding, but the final straw came when he decided to mouth off to TMZ, describing Two And A Half Men creator (and all round mediocre sitcom powerhouse) Chuck Lorre as a “stupid, stupid little man” - and much worse - leading to his termination.
Sacked on grounds of "moral turpitude", Sheen was killed off, the first episode of season nine revolving around his character’s funeral, and ultimately replaced by Ashton Kutcher.
Sheen, who had launched a $100,000,000 lawsuit in the interim, evidently calmed down by the time the episode aired, lavishing it with praise. The network and Sheen himself made the best they could of the whole situation, but the whole thing was unbecoming.