Hawaii Five-0 viewers (all eight of them) had a unique experience while watching the latest episode: They got to choose the ending. Audience members could vote online for one of three endings, each with a different killer. While this was a pretty gimmicky attempt to boost ratings, the idea of audience participation is cool in an R.L. Stine kind of way, and it's been done well before. In 1988, for instance, readers phoned in to determine the fate of the Jason Todd incarnation of Robin in a four-issue Batman comic arc. Since nobody liked Jason Todd, readers chose for him to get beaten to death by the Joker in the aptly titled A Death in the Family. Hawaii Five-0’s experiment could be tweaked to raise an interesting question in some other shows. Here are the characters whose deaths would make better shows.
It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia – Rickety Cricket
This is more of a mercy killing than anything. A former clergyman whose life was ruined by the gang, Cricket has fallen from a respectable man of God to a ringworm-infested street rat. He even begged to be put down when he was living in a dog pound in Season 8. At this point, Cricket needs to go out in a blaze of glory. If he gets any worse, his arc will start reaching Breaking Bad levels of bleakness. Speaking of which…
Breaking Bad – Marie Schrader
Did anyone ever like Marie? Did anyone care about her? The writers don’t even seem to care about her, since her thievery arcs that show up occasionally don’t go anywhere. All she does dramatically is piss off her husband, Frank, who’s actually really badass when he’s not putting up with Marie. Maybe she can get gunned down by Jesse as he (and the audience) let out a cathartic “BITCH!”
The Big Bang Theory – Penny
To the unfamiliar, this show is about nerds written by people who don’t understand nerds. It could’ve been a show about smart people with smart jokes that would’ve been cancelled after one season and the Internet would’ve loved it, but instead they added dumb-blonde Penny and a laugh-track and made the whole show about how awkward and silly nerds are. Killing Penny would make the show less of a point-and-laugh-at-dorks debacle and more of an intelligently written show.
Arrested Development – George Michael Bluth
This is a bit of a cheat since the new season of Arrested Development hasn’t hit Netflix yet, but part of the problem comes from this delay. Since the show was originally cancelled, Michael Cera has shown audiences that he can only play one character: Michael Cera. His awkward routine is soured now and George Michael’s character will suffer because of it. Maybe Mitch Hurwitz can kill two birds with one stone and have George Michael and Maeby run away together.
Game of Thrones – Joffrey Baratheon
In a cast full of morally gray characters, Joffrey sticks out as truly evil. A bastard born of incest, Joffrey beats up whores, degrades his former bride and orders his soldiers to kill random civilians. Peter Dinklage’s pimp hand is not enough. Daenerys needs to ride her dragons to Westeros and set this smug Aryan shit ablaze. Of course, having read the books, I know this doesn’t happen. Stupid George R.R. Martin.