20 Most Shocking TV Character Deaths EVER

Sons of Anarchy was never a show short on horrifying deaths, but no death came with more heartbreak than that of Tara Knowles, a woman doomed by her love for series lead Jax Teller.

Throughout the show, Tara had always stood just outside of Jax's world, though it was only a matter of time before its violent devastation caught up with her. 

In season six, after a stint in jail and an increasingly bleak clash with Jax's mother, Gemma, Tara seemed poised to betray her husband and his friends to the feds so she could leave town and start a new life with her kids. But before she could, Jax voluntarily surrendered himself to save her and their family.

All seems well until Gemma comes to believe Tara ratted on him, hence the arrest, culminating in a scene where Gemma brutally stabs Tara to death with a fork. In the back of the head. Whilst drowning her. It's a brutal, hopeless sequence, but it's true heartbreak lies in how tragically preventable it really was.