We've all seen it happen before. We get hooked on a show, stay awake to finish the last few episodes of the season, tell everyone we know how amazing it is—only for the writers to kill off every main character we know and love.

Now, wait. I know what you're thinking. "The show would be boring if everyone always remained alive and well! They need to add plot twists to keep the audience hooked! They're proving that life isn't all rainbows and sunshine because people die every day!"

Trust me, I get that. I'm a writer myself. I get how hard it is to maintain suspense and keep your audience turning the page, and when you have a huge network hanging over your shoulders and the high expectations of fans to satisfy, I understand why show writers resort to the occasional death.

But that's the thing!

Killing off a character should be used sparingly—and for good reason!

Why should a character die? Maybe their death pushes the plot forward. Fair enough. Maybe they have to die to impact the other characters' developments. Sounds good (if you do it right and don't fall into harmful tropes while doing so). Maybe they don't add anything to the story. Okay… then do they need to be there at all?

The point is that death should not be considered a "normal, everyday" thing. It's traumatic, painful, and it'll hang over your characters for a while. Therefore, if you're killing off a character, it should pack a punch both for the audience and the other characters in the story.

But when writers resort to the age-old tactic of killing off all their characters under the guise of playing into their "post-apocalyptic" or "destructive" setting or showing the audience the reality of death, they're doing the exact opposite. We all know why the characters are being killed off: shock value.

Show writers want to keep their audience coming back and to do that, they kill off characters to push their boundaries. But what does this really achieve?

I mean, now they have to bring in new characters to replace the old ones, and honestly… the new cast will never mean as much as the original did. People get attached. That's what happens, and it'll be hard for them to attach themselves to new characters. It's why people suspect characters that appear later on in the show to be antagonists. We naturally trust the people we go on the original journey with, and for us, these are the original characters.

Another thing that happens is that the audience becomes desensitized to death in the context of the show. They come to expect it. They never get attached to characters because they're convinced they will wind up dead. Then they get angry. Frustrated. And rightfully so!

Many audience members who have a favorite character (who is now dead) will wind up dropping the show. Let's be honest here: you can have the worst plot ever, but if you have memorable, sympathetic, three-dimensional characters, the audience will stay with them until the end.

So show writers… here's my advice. If you plan on killing someone off, first consider why you want them dead. Then figure out what their death brings to the plot. If the only answer you can come up with is plot development or shock value, that is a major red flag. Consider other alternatives instead!

Characters do not have to die for the plot to move forward or for other characters to be moved on their behalf. Characters do not have to die for the audience to care about them.

If you want to test your characters, expose them to their deepest fears, figure out what they want most in the world and put every obstacle in their path, or give them new motivations. If you want to keep your audience, create real characters.

We already know death is a constant reality. We're not delusional. Give us something different instead. After all, we turn towards books, film, and television to escape. We don't want to finish an episode feeling worse.