4w ago

Which fictional character's death affected you most?

For me, it was always Optimus Prime from The Transformers movie.

192 comments

Wash's, in "Serenity". It was just so unexpected and abrupt, and it served to generate a sense of unease in the viewer; after Wash's death, no character seemed to be protected by plot armor. Granted, Shepherd Book bit it before Wash did, but the movie seemed to set him up to be separate from the rest of the crew. I loved that Whedon played with this concept of fragility in the ensuing battle, with Kaylee getting darted, Zoe getting sliced up, and Simon getting shot. And then, Mal's battle with the agent... I thought the misdirect was masterfully done.
I've been affected by character deaths before and since, but Wash's death was the only death I've seen in media that has made me worry for the safety of the other characters. It made a lot of sense outside of the movie, too, as "Serenity" was more or less a tribute to some IP that was never going to get resurrected. While watching the movie for the first time, I was left thinking: "what if Whedon just said 'fuck it'?"
- There's something people always leave out in all this. The crash right before wash dies really feels as if serenity could be totaled. So first that crash... Then all of that
- The gut punch was Gina Torres, and Zoe not being allowed to grieve and be with Wash.
  I watched Serenity again a couple years ago, and it was just as harsh and abrupt as I remember it. It's a hard emotional jab at anyone who has ever loved a partner that's a part of their everyday life.
  
  For a deeper gut punch, remember that in "Heart of Gold", Zoe tells Wash that she wants to have a baby with him, and she won't brook any of his lame excuses, like "the universe is too dangerous for kids". It's possible that if there was ever a second movie or a continuation of the series, they'd say that Zoe did get pregnant just before all of the shit went down, but with it being abandoned IP, we have to guess. So what do you think? Is there a mini Wash in Zoe's future?
- "I am a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar." are some damn fine final words.
  You can't take the sky from me.
- Noooo, I refuse to believe that the movie is canon 😭
- Ooof! I was gonna add something from my own childhood, but then I read this and now I gotta take a knee and go cuddle something soft.

I probably haven't seen The Neverending Story in 25 years, but I still think about Artax from time to time. Fuckin' Swamp of Sadness…
- The 80s were so brutal. We had a kids movie that starts with the main character's horse dying from sadness.
- Fun fact: Artax can speak in the novel.
  
  AAAANDD ITS SO MUCH WORSE TOOOOOO 😭
- For real. That moment in that movie is basically telling you that you cannot save your best friend from crippling sadness and depression. The horse and the boy love each other but it doesn't matter in the end.
  I was allowed to watch that movie waaay too young, and I know it's the same for others my age, but I was pissed when I learned that one of my friends let her 5 year old watch it because she'd seen it when she was 5, and apparently forgot or didn't care that the horse dies?? Like how can you forget that?? And then the 5 year old heard us talking about the movie and the FIRST thing she says is "Remember the horse?" in this sad little voice. Way to traumatize your kid.
- It was so traumatizing, death by depression. But, overall, as a little fruity kid about the same age as Bastian when it came out, TNS was the closest thing to affirmation of my own little fruity existence I could find. We easily traumatized fruity kids don’t usually get represented well in action films.
- Thank you! This traumatized me as a child, my dad used to have to fast forward that part because it was so upsetting for me.
- Dangit! Two people now have totally eclipsed what I was gonna add with something that just takes more wind out of my sails!
  I definitely need something to cuddle now.
  
  Well, at least your username fits.

Companion cube
- You monster

First time I saw Wash die in firefly was brutal.
More recently, after watching better call Saul I am heartbroken over Mike's death. Particularly for Stacey and Kaylee.
- Mike Ermentraut was an amazing character. They built him so well as a fully 3 dimensional broken man who still held on to a sort of moral code, warped as that was.
  The actor was excellent and portrayed ‘old-man strength’ perfectly. The pain he held inside but never even seems to really understand was written on that bumpy face. But you knew and really believed that he struggled to show his kind of love to the remnants of his family. Mike died as a fully human being.
  
  Mike: Walter shut the fuck up and let me die in peace
  Walter: doesn’t shut the fuck up, to nobody’s surprise
- Howard’s death hurt me the most out of all of them. Not sure why.
  I guess because he was an innocent guy in the wrong place at the wrong time. They just wanted to fuck with the guy just a little but instead they tore him down and destroyed him. It just feels bad.
  
  And for a huge portion of the show he was the only ally they had.
  
  Namaste! They built him well too, but differently. He might be one of those ‘good times, noodle salad’ people. Well intentioned, cosseted, smart in a narrow way and so so naive. The clincher was dumping him in the same hole as Lalo Salamanca. Dirt doesn’t know the difference, but the audience did.

"Dogmeat has died".
Oh no he fucking has not. Reload.

Mordin Solus from Mass Effect.
"Had to be me. Someone else might have gotten it wrong"
- "Too many. Lost shields. Sorry, Shepard. Tell them... I held the line."
  And I had to reload an old save.
- I was going to post Shephard, but no, Mordin was the worst.
  I haven't the constitution to play "evil", so saught out the evil equivalent as video... also heartbreaking.

Robin Williams as the Bicentennial Man. The movie was okay; his performance was amazing. I've struggled with mortality for a while, like I expect a lot of people do, and to see him as a character who started their existence immortal, and to choose mortality. His death in the movie hit me much, much harder than I expected. I haven't watched the movie again since my first viewing because I'm honestly afraid of going through that again.
- Robin Williams as the Bicentennial Man. The movie was okay; his performance was amazing.
  +1.
- Underappreciated great movie; and the book is good too. (The Positronic Mang)

Joyce Summers. That episode of Buffy was a masterpiece.
- I just saw this for the first time recently. It hit me so hard that I had to call my therapist for an extra session. The look on her face was identical to my father's when he passed.
  
  My mom died when my sister and I were approximately Buffy’s and dawn’s ages, respectively. It was an absolute gut punch to watch for me too.
- Ugh...Just laying on that couch... Can't defeat natural causes with a wooden stake.
- Holy hell, that was so brutal. How she was just lying there, with eyes open and all

Aerith. Do I need to say more?
- This was spoiled for me since I didn't play it until the PS2 era, and it still hit me hard and unexpectedly.
- The FF7 remake is going to make it hurt more.
  
  Geez, that hasn't come out yet, has it? I'm a bit out of the loop, but you're telling me we got a game about Yuffie, but Aereth didn't die yet?
- My reaction was "good, now they won't force me to keep this useless redundant healer in my party anymore". I suffered through the loss of Tellah in ff4, who was actually useful in battle, so I was hardened by the time 7 came out

Artax from The Neverending Story

Jesus, because no one ever shuts up about it

Mufasa would be the most popular answer for us oldies.
- Since 9 Sep especially, it's been a rough scene to watch. It hits so, so much harder now.

Hazel from Watership Down.
NOT a children's movie, mum!
- OH MY GOD That movie caused me so much enotional damage as a kid
  
  I was spared but my wife was damaged by this also. I watched it with her as an adult and couldn't believe people let their kids watch it.

Bambi's mother.
Runner-ups:
Carl's wife from Up
The mother in Violet Evergarden
Ghost and Roach from Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
- Up wrecks me as an adult
- Ellie's death is impressive because it works despite the viewer only having known her for ten minutes with no spoken words.

Maes Hughes

Cowboy Bebop spoilers
- The English dub actors that voiced Spike and Julia got married a couple years ago. That made me feel slightly better when I learned about it.
- Great answer. Such a bummer.
- Gotta knock a little harder...
- ^Bang!

Sirius Black in Harry Potter. I had to go back and reread the paragraph several times, then put the book down. Seemed just so unfair.
- Put in there just as a cheap way to get emotional reactions from the audience, it's the story telling equivalent of having the dog in the story die.
  
  Technically, Sirius is the dog in the story.
  
  Especially since his death didn't really do anything. He didnt sacrifice himself or saved anyone and his death wasn't discussed much after the initial shock. I assume he had to be out of the picture so Harry could go Horcrux hunting, without him interfering

Made me cry:
Gotta be Schindler's List. That movie was so goddamn sad, and I just started sobbing when I saw that splash of red color. You know when. Ooof. A masterpiece I will never watch again.
For a more recent example, I watched the second season of Arcane. Lots of sad scenes, but anyone else who has watched it knows the most heart-wrenching one:

Left me disturbed:
Another Spielberg movie, Saving Private Ryan. Didn't cry when the Nazi soldier sloooooowly stabbed Mellish to death. But afterwards, I had nightmares about it for months. Cripes, what a brutal death scene.
- are you sure that what made you cry in Schindler's List is "fictional"?
  
  I still need my Suspension of Belief, here, or I'll hate people even more. I came out of the cinema enraged and ashamed and so- well, just prickly I guess.

Arthur Morgan's death scene in RDR2 really got to me. But perhaps even more so, when my horse was killed right before. I remember pausing the game for a moment because I had had that horse for so long and somehow it felt like a major deal that happened so quickly.
Never had a game affect me like that before.
- Every one of these RDR2 posts about the horse in the last morgan mission makes me mad more people aren't posting about Agro from Shadow of the Colossus
  
  Never played Shadow of the Colossus, but it has been on the list for a while!

It’s been 25 years since I first read it and I’m still not ok with the fact that Old Dan and Little Ann didn’t make it.
- I buried Little Ann by the side of Old Dan. I knew that was where she wanted to be. I also buried a part of my life along with my dog.

Big dan and little anne from where the red fern grows. Fucked me up at like age 10
- I can't believe they had us watch that in gradeschool.
  
  Its probably worse in the book, it is graphic

The second death of Jake Chambers in Stephen King’s ”The Dark Tower” comes quite quickly to mind…
- It's Oy for me. That little fucker knew how he was gonna go, knew how bad it was gonna be, and went ahead anyway...
  I'm not crying, you're crying. 😭

This is all spoilers, spoiler tagging doesn't really work so proceed with caution
Several from the Misborn series really hurt. I think Vin's death most affected me, but Kelsier was a hard one to swallow as well.
I think the biggest impact though is probably from Swan Song? Sister Creep hit me so hard. I read the book young and I'd never read anything so bittersweet and hopeful but so painful. It really stamped some new emotions in me I think.
Or, gosh, almost anyone in Bly Manor, but especially Dani.
- Relatedly, I think the death to hit me the hardest happened in stormlight 4. You know which one it was.
  
  How could he do that to my best lad 😭

Hedwig and Fred Weasley

My horse in Red Dead Redemption 2. I captured and tamed it from wild the moment I was able.
R.I.P Coffee!
- Shiii- I was blanking on answers (trauma response maybe), but this reminded me of the Minecraft horse I lost one time. I mean, I am, and was, a grown man playing a block game for fun, but that horse dying. Oof.

Dumbledore
- Personally, I felt more sad over Dobby's death.
  
  Of all the deaths in the series, I thought Fred's hurt the most.
- I used to be able to read during car rides. While going on holidays, I read the half blood prince to my family. The whole car was in tears and I had to take a break. Dad was driving; no clue how much his vision was impaired...
- I was pissed that Snape was the stupidly obvious traitor all along. Weak, bad writing, angry at childish plot "twist".
  Well...
  
  Snape is the best part of the latter books. He's well rounded, motivated, and a fully fleshed out character.
  The rest of the world and half the people in it feel like cardboard shuddering in the breeze by that point.
  The plot twist was that Snape wasn't a traitor, and killed the dying Dumbledore to save Draco Malfoy from becoming a murderer.

The dragon from Dragonheart. It was my first time being sad from a movie.

Breaking bad spoilers
- !Shut the fuck up and let me die in peace.!<

Optimus Prime was a real shock for sure. For me it’s any animal death.
Artax from The Neverending Story
The dogs from Where the Red Fern Grows
There’s a scene in the Sci-fi novel Armor where a puppy falls in a well and its owner, a child, unable to rescue it ,has to kill it by dropping stones on it to spare it drowning. I read that a long time ago, probably in the 80s, and it still haunts me.
- One of my teachers read Where the Red Fern Grows to my class at the pace of a chapter or two every couple days (spare time in the lesson plan). I was impatient, so I got my mom to drive me to the public library, checked it out and finished the book that night. Had to wait almost 2 whole weeks before the class got caught up. I also didn't want to spoil the ending for my classmates, so I just had to kinda hold onto the knowledge of the events and deal with it by myself while all the other kids were oblivious. Out teacher had us start watching the movie towards the end of the book, she had it timed perfectly so that the class (other than me) had no ideas for the back to back double whammy of loss that they were about to experience.
  
  I had already read that book prior to my teacher reading it aloud in class. She couldn't read that chapter, so I volunteered to, having already had my trauma from the scene. We didn't end up watching the movie, though.

The Tali/Legion decision is brutal if you made mistakes in ME2 and 3.
Carter from Person of Interest.
- The Paragon interrupt not being enough to save anyone if you side with Legion just makes it hurt more.

A lot of people hate on Sword Art Online, but in the second season...
- It wouldn't be so hateable if there weren't so many good things about it!

The last one i remember is the Going Merry from One Piece

Charlie from all dogs go to heaven.

Chewbacca
- I read that book while on a vacation with my family and that part had me upset for most of the first day we were there.
  
  I know I didn't do it justice but Salvatore really did give Chewie a glorious hero's death, honoring his life debt to the end.

BT in titanfall 2, one of the only scenes that made my shed a tear
- That's a good one.
  Saw it coming a mile away (i.e. from the start thanks to the protocol that says to protect the pilot), but it was such a good execution.

Marley from Marley and Me

Captain Kirk - of course
- For me it was Spock in ST:II

Artax

Richard Harrow in Boardwalk Empire. The episode was amazing and the send-off was beautifully written but, boy, was it sad.

I've kept this vague, but still, SPOILERS ahead for The First Law series by Joe Abercrombie. SPOILERS. I'll see if I can get the damn spoiler tag working, but SPOILERS.
EDIT: No dice, I can't seem to get the spoiler tag working on Interstellar.
<details><summary> Spoilers for The First Law series by Joe Abercrombie</summary>
At the very end of the ninth and final book of the First Law series by Joe Abercrombie, your favorite character (possibly just of the series, but they might be your favorite fictional character ever) that you've spent three books getting to know and love and cherish is fucking executed in front of people they love and then you find out that execution was orchestrated by the second best character in the entire nine book series. It felt like my heart was being ripped up and I fukken wept like a small child. My partner was angry and depressed for months because this character stood for so much that was good and hopeful and then they just fucking died in such a horrible way. Joe Abercrombie is a fucking amazing writer for being able to elicit an emotional response like that and he's a bastard for doing so. The moment is totally earned and I'd highly recommend the books. Just make sure you're in a good place emotionally before you start the last one.
</details>
- The second death of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ

Charlie in Lost sticks with me
And for my Stormlight fans >!Teft's death still hurts. He had grown so much...😭!<

John Marston. There are a lot of character deaths that really hit me hard. Hank from Breaking Bad comes to mind.
But man, John's death just hits so deeply. I played RDR a good 4 or so years after its release, so I knew it was coming. Even then, it barely felt real. And you better believe I was frantically trying to mark all those Pinkertons to help John get through it.
- I had a similar experience with RDR2. I knew Arthur was going to die on that last mission. However, I was not prepared for my horse to die. I found the white Arabian around the start of chapter 3, and it was the only horse I used after. On subsequent play throughs I would just grab a random horse before doing that mission.

Nagisa Furukawa. Messed me right up.

Life is strange - Kate's Suicide
I honestly think you got robbed if you managed to save her on your first play through

I started reading Dragonlance novels around 10 years old. When I got my hands on the third main one (IIRC), one of the main characters who's a knight died and that impacted me for quite some time.
- When the older character in the first(?) book dies, it hit me like a ton of bricks the first time around.
- Sturm Brightblade, in the second book _Dragons of Winter Night _
  
  I was specifically avoiding the name to leave some ambiguity in case someone might want to read it, though probably overkill. But, yep, him

Jiraiya from Naruto Shippuden. Felt like my own family member passed when they killed them off.
Edit: Also, Sergeant Johnson in Halo 3.

SPOILERS, dude.

Cyberpunk 2077 spoiler:
- I’ll ride his Arch til the day I can’t. Not a scratch.
  Riding a vehicle without ever letting it get a scratch in Cyberpunk 2077 is quite impressive. I think I "scratched" Jackie's bike in under a minute when I got it in my first playthrough.
  
  It’s a metaphor. :) Pretty sure I wrecked it completely within a few minutes lol. But the auto-insurance, what’s it like $50 eddies? covers the not a scratch part.

I still think about Aeries/Arith from FF7. Such a senseless death. It makes no sense. Literally was done just to elicit a response from the player. This segment alone is why I am upset that the second game in the Rebirth series isn't on PC; I really want to know if that scene is going to be altered due to the weird storyline branches that come from the time-travel/alternate reality shenanigans that so far as I've seen from the first game, only Arith knows about.
The only other one I really think about randomly is your own character in Fallout 3. Fuck you Fawkes! I don't believe in fate. Now get your green ass in there so nobody has to die!
- At least Rebirth will be on PC in just a couple weeks, on January 23. No Epic exclusivity this time either.