10 TV Characters Who Died Too Early
5. Curtis Manning - 24
CTU agent Curtis Manning (Roger Cross) was introduced at the start of 24's fourth season and became an instant hit with fans, who due to his general badassery was lovingly named "Black-Jack Bauer" by fans.
Better still, rumours even suggested he was being courted to serve as the show's new lead should Kiefer Sutherland ever decide to depart.
But despite his esteem with fans, Curtis was shockingly and pointlessly killed off early in season six, by Jack Bauer (Sutherland) himself no less.
The episode sees Curtis act wildly out of character after learning that former terrorist Hamri Al-Assad (Alexander Siddig), who he has a brutal prior history with, is being granted a Presidential pardon.
Curtis suddenly holds Assad hostage in an intense standoff with Jack, apparently giving Jack no choice but to fatally shoot him in the neck.
In addition to being a betrayal of who audiences knew Curtis to be, it was just totally absurd that Jack wouldn't, you know, cap the guy in the knee.
To further rub salt in the wound, the episode then ends with a suitcase nuke going off, killing 12,000 people and basically encouraging audiences to forget about Curtis as fast as possible.
Given that Fox has struggled to kick-start new iterations of 24 sans-Bauer, they could've saved themselves a huge headache - and made a ton more money, too - by simply keeping Curtis alive and letting him take up Sutherland's mantle.