10 Movie Franchises That Stupidly Killed Off Their Best Character

There are many, many times when it absolutely makes sense for a franchise to kill a character, no matter how beloved they might be by the fanbase. But creatives must be absolutely sure that it serves the story and series overall, or risk leaving hundreds of millions of dollars on the table.

Killing off a long-tenured or breakout character is hugely risky and has massive potential to backfire, as it absolutely did in these 10 movie franchises.

Each of them took a bold swing and killed a character audiences were incredibly attached to, leaving them shocked and even pissed off.

In some cases the filmmakers responded by finding contrived ways to resurrect the characters in subsequent movies, while others stuck to their guns and basically told fans to deal with it.

Either way, on the balance of things, these franchises were all harmed one way or another by killing off characters who, above all else, were the best in the entire series.

Whether the frontline hero or an awesome support character, killing them off was a very silly gamble that flatly didn't pay off...

Now, it's absolutely fair to say that Scream's O.G. trio of Sidney (Neve Campbell), Dewey (David Arquette), and Gale (Courteney Cox) had developed some seriously thick plot armour by the time the fifth movie rolled around.

All three of them had survived some majorly dubious scrapes with the various Ghostfaces, and none more so than Dewey, whose improbable longevity bordered on parodical at times.

And yet, fans were largely OK with that - Dewey was a fan favourite character ever since his introduction, and arguably even more popular than franchise heroine Sidney herself.

And so, fans en masse were devastated when Dewey was "finally" killed in the fifth movie. Though one of the trio totally had to die, could it not have been Gale instead?

Dewey had such a fascinating arc throughout the film that avenging Gale's death would've been far more gratifying than him foolishly forgetting to shoot Ghostface in the head when he had the chance, turning his back, and then getting gutted as a result.

It didn't just feel like the filmmakers killed the wrong hero - they also rubbed salt in the wound by making him look like an idiot as he went out.