I’m sure that we’ve all been in that place where we have followed a series for a while and fell in love with the characters only to have them die in the end. And while I know that some people get really upset when this happens, usually it doesn’t bother me. I mean, yeah I will probably cry my eyes out and curse the world for a while but when I calm down enough to think about it, if the way a character dies fits with their personality, then I usually understand why the author went there.
For example, in one of my favorite series, that I had followed since it first came out a few years ago, the main character died at the end of the final book and from what I’ve seen on Twitter, a lot of people were upset about it and I believe the author even got threatened. But once I stopped crying and calmed down enough to think about the ending, I got it. This death fit with the personality of that character because this character was the type that would sacrifice their self in order to save the people that they loved. So, at the end when it came down to them or someone that they loved, they done exactly what I would have expected of them and exactly the thing that stayed true to their personality.
Don’t get me wrong, I HATE when one of my favorite character dies just as much as the next person and if I could have every one of them live happily ever after, I would. But I think that sometimes authors don’t have a choice but to kill off certain characters, especially if it stays true to the personality of that character. Katniss in The Hunger Games is a perfect example, yes I know that she didn’t die in the end but if she would have I would have understood because she has the type of persona that she sacrifices herself in order to protect those she cares about, we saw that multiple times throughout the series, I mean she sacrifices herself for Prim in the first book thinking that she would die in the games.
To me, if a character dies saving someone else, then their death means something. And if an author can break my heart in two, then I think that means they done a wonderful job.
TALK TO ME
What do you think about character deaths?
