10 Heartbreaking Times Lead Characters Left TV Shows

Although Rick Grimes was the core protagonist of The Walking Dead, Steven Yeun’s Glenn had been there right from the pilot until the Season Seven premiere, when he met a very grisly end. Like Ned’s death in Game Of Thrones, it’s difficult to describe it has heartbreaking on a first viewing.

It’s simply too shocking (and more than Game Of Thrones, too gory) to really tug at your heart strings.

However, in the grand scheme of things, losing Glenn is tough to take. So much discussion of the episode at the time revolved around the brutal nature of the death, the perceived drop in quality and the cheap Season Six cliffhanger being stretched that life without Glenn wasn’t really considered.

With a bit more time having passed, you realise just how hard Glenn’s death hit. He was a bit of an anomaly in the show, in that through Lauren Cohen’s Maggie and his unborn child, he has something to live for, before Negan snatches it away.

Rick’s departure from the show was too telegraphed to have the impact of Glenn’s. Though Rick was a more major and likely more popular character than Glenn, it did seem that his time was up anyway.