People die. Characters die. This is perhaps life’s most unfortunate fact: that people will die and leave the rest of us behind. It’s incredibly rare that any dramatic television series lasting over three seasons will never kill a main or recurring character, and all those deaths have driven a stake through the heart of fandom: Joyce on Buffy, Lady Sybil on Downton Abby, Charlie on Lost, Ned Stark on Game of Thrones, Jen on Dawson’s Creek, Nate on Six Feet Under — but when the person who dies is a lesbian or bisexual character, queer fandom takes it pretty hard.
The history of lesbian representation on television is rocky — in the beginning, we seemed exclusively relegated to roles that saw us getting killed/attacked or doing the killing/attacking. And until the last five or so years, lesbian and bisexual characters seemed entirely unable to date an actual woman or stay alive for more than three episodes, let alone an entire run, of a show. Gay and lesbian characters are so often murdered on television that we have our very own trope: Bury Your Gays. We comprise such a teeny-tiny fraction of characters on television to begin with that killing us off so haphazardly feels especially cruel.
Not every death listed below was wholly uncalled for. In many genres, like soap operas and shows about vampires, zombies, criminals, or games of thrones, characters are killed on the reg. That’s a different trope — Anyone Can Die. Furthermore, shows composed entirely of queer characters will inevitably kill one. But regardless, they still add to the body count weighing down our history of misrepresentation.
And, due to the recent untimely death of Lexa on The 100, this week seemed like a good one to count down everybody we have lost over the years.
This list contains every television death of an OPENLY lesbian or bisexual or queer female character on a television show. With a handful of exceptions, these are all characters who appeared for more than one episode. The exceptions were deemed exceptional because something about the characterization still fits in with the Bury Your Gays trope. Victims-of-the-week from crime procedurals (Law & Order, Cold Case, CSI, Criminal Minds or older shows) or patients-of-the-week from hospital dramas (Chicago Hope, E.R.), aren’t on this list, as that is an entirely different kind of list, but recurring characters from those shows are on this list. Nor is subtext on this list, because we’re not gonna give Xena showrunners Queer Character Credit for a character they refused to make openly queer when she was really so obviously queer. You know? [ETA: Okay, I’ve added Xena after doing further research and because if one more commenter takes up space on this thread — a thread I’m using to find more characters to add, and also to engage with thoughtful/funny readers who have opinions and feelings — to tell me that I “forgot” Xena without reading this introduction, I will become the 200th dead lesbian and the cause of death will be “Walked off a cliff with a commenter in her arms. Murder-suicide.” But Xena will be the one and only inclusion based on subtext.] Also, although I’ve done tons of research, I haven’t personally seen all of these shows, so mistakes may very well exist, and feel free to politely inform me of them in the comments, or tell me about characters I may have missed — it’s especially helpful if you can tell me the cause of death and the year.
Unsure if this needs to be said but… SPOILER ALERT.
Special thanks to the LezWatchTV Database for providing info on shows I haven’t seen or heard about directly!
Every Regular or Recurring Lesbian or Bisexual Female Character Killed On Television
Julie, Executive Suite (1976)
Cause of death: Hit by a car. Her love interest had just walked into traffic after realizing her lesbianism and Julie was chasing her.
Franky Doyle, Prisoner: Cell Block H (1980)
Cause of death: Shot by a police officer after escaping from prison
Sharon Gilmour, Prisoner: Cell Block H (1980)
Cause of death: Pushed down the stairs by a corrections officer
Karen O’Malley, Casualty (1987)
Cause of death: Head Injury
Cecília, Vale Tudo (1988)
Cause of death: Car Accident
Cicely, Northern Exposure (1992)
Cause of death: Shot by a gunman employed by the town’s evil overlord who doesn’t want to let the lesbians change his town. The shot was intended for her girlfriend Roslyn, but Cicely, who was already sick, blocked the bullet and died in Roslyn’s arms, thus magically healing the town’s long-simmering feuds and leading them to re-name the town “Cicely.”
Talia Winters, Babylon 5 (1995)
Cause of death: Activated a sleeper personality that wiped out her actual personality, effectively killing her
Beth Jordache, Brookside (1995)
Cause of death: Genetic heart condition, died in prison
Susan Ross, Seinfeld (1996)
Cause of death: Toxic envelope glue
Naomi “Tracy” Richards, Band of Gold (1996)
Cause of death: Stabbed herself
Lucy, The Fortunes and Misfortunes of Moll Flanders (1996)
Cause of death: Caught thieving and hanged
Kathy, NYPD Blue (1997)
Cause of death: Shot by a hit man hired by her girlfriend Abby’s ex, who wanted to get rid of Kathy so she could get back together with Abby. Abby was pregnant at the time.
Sondra Westwood, Pacific Drive (1997)
Cause of death: Murdered by a serial killer
Jadzia Dax, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1998)
Cause of death: Blasted by an alien-possessed alien
Sonia Besirky, Lindenstraße (1998)
Cause of death: Drug overdose from medication given to her by her ex-lover’s husband
Leila and Rafaela, Torre de Babel (1998)
Cause of death: Explosion in a shopping mall
Susanne Teubner, Hinter Gittern (1999)
Cause of death: Shot during a bank robbery (she was a customer)
Shaz Wiley, Bad Girls (2000)
Cause of death: Bomb, died in resulting fire
Laura Hall, Shortland Street (2000)
Cause of death: Heart attack
Diamond, Dark Angel (2001)
Cause of death: Used as a lab rat for research that killed her
Xena, Xena the Warrior Princess (2001)
Cause of death: Beheaded
Beate “Bea” Hansen, Hinter Gittern (2001)
Cause of death: Injuries from an explosion
Jule Neumann, Hinter Gittern (2001)
Cause of death: Suicide
Frankie Stone, All My Children (2001)
Cause of death: Murder Mystery!
Bridgit, 24 (2001)
Cause of death: Shot by a man in front of her girlfriend
Tara Maclay, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (2002)
Cause of death: Shot in the heart by a stray bullet
Kelly Hurst, Family Affairs (2002)
Cause of death: Pushed down the stairs by her lover’s husband
Megan Hartnoll, At Home With The Braithwaites (2003)
Cause of death: Electrocuted in the bathtub
Juliet Becker, The Bill (2003)
Cause of death: Stabbed
Tina Greer, Smallville (2003)
Cause of death: Impaled through the chest on a large piece of wood during a fight with a male character
Sandy Lopez, E.R. (2004)
Cause of death: Injuries sustained from fighting a fire in an abandoned warehouse
Al Mackenzie, Bad Girls (2004)
Cause of death: Poisoned
Hanna Novak, Verbotene Liebe (2004)
Cause of death: Stroke, died in her girlfriend’s arms
Ines Führbringer, Hinter Gittern (2004)
Cause of death: Throat slit, died in girlfriend’s arms
Thelma Bates, Hex (2004)
Cause of death: Murdered by a demon
Flora, Deadwood (2004)
Cause of death: Beaten by a man who then forced a woman to shoot her with his gun
Brenda Castillo, Charmed (2004)
Cause of death: Stabbed with a cursed blade by a man, causing her to rapidly age and then die
Tosha, The Wire (2004)
Cause of death: Shot during a heist gone wrong
Marissa Cooper, The O.C. (2005)
Cause of death: Car crash after being driven off the road by her drunk ex-boyfriend
Servilla, Rome (2005)
Cause of death: Stabs herself in front of her rival house, inhabited by the mother of her lover
Dusty, Queer As Folk (2005)
Cause of death: At a benefit at a gay club when a bomb went off
Dana Fairbanks, The L Word (2006)
Cause of death: Breast cancer
Helena Cain, Battlestar Galactica (2006)
Cause of death: Shot by her ex-lady-lover
Manuela Wellmann, Hinter Gittern (2006)
Cause of death: Stabbed, died in girlfriend’s arms
Maya Robertson, Hex (2006)
Cause of death: Hit by a car
Natalie, Bad Girls (2006)
Cause of death: Bludgeoned to death with a brick
Gina Inviere/#6, Battlestar Galactica (2006)
Cause of death: Set off a nuclear weapon
Eve Jacobson/Zoe McAllister, Home & Away (2006)
Cause of death: Inside a building when it was blown up
Van, Dante’s Cove (2006)
Cause of Death: Killed by the Shadows
Angie Morton, Stritctly Confidential (2006)
Cause of death: Suicide. Jumped off a building.
Rae Thomas, Passions (2007)
Cause of death: Stabbed
Jay Copeland, Shortland Street (2007)
Cause of death: Strangled by the Ferndale strangler
Lily Baker, Supernatural (2007)
Cause of death: Attacked and hung on a windmill by a demon
Toshiko Sato, Torchwood (2008)
Cause of death: Shot
Nicole Wallace, Law and Order: Criminal Intent (2008)
Cause of Death: Killed by another serial killer. (Wallace was a recurring character on Law & Order: Criminal Intent, appearing in 6 episodes.)
Franzi Reuter, Gute Zeiten, schlechte Zeiten (2008)
Cause of death: Gas explosion
Snoop, The Wire (2008)
Cause of death: Shot by a new dealer, who correctly believed she was about to shoot him
Sarah Barnes, Hollyoaks (2009)
Cause of death: Skydiving accident, instigated by her ex who tampered with the parachute thinking it was Sarah’s activity partner’s parachute
Olivia Lord, Nip/Tuck (2009)
Cause of death: Cardiac arrest during plastic surgery
Jenny Schecter, The L Word (2009)
Cause of death: Murdered by Ilene Chaiken
D’Anna Biers/Number Three, Battlestar Galactica (2009)
Cause of death: Decided she’d rather stay behind on the toxic wasteland that once was Earth with her ancestors than inevitably be killed by Cavil in the cold darkness of outer space.
Doctor Marina Ranieri del Colle, Terapia D’Urgenza (2009)
Cause of death: Shot by the mother of a baby who had died despite Marina’s care. Died in her girlfriend’s arms.
Silvia Castro León, Los hombres de Paco (2010)
Cause of death: Shot by gangsters directly after her wedding
Isabella Kortenaer, Goede Tijden, Slechte Tijden (2010)
Cause of death: Infection from slipping on the bathroom floor
Dahlia, Legend of the Seeker (2010)
Cause of death: Confessed
Amy Tyler, Sons of Anarchy (2010)
Cause of death: Shot in the neck by her girlfriend, who wanted to frame her for murder
Sophia, Skins (2010)
Cause of death: Suicide. Jumped to her death in a dance club after buying MDMA from the girl she was obsessed with
June Stahl, Sons of Anarchy (2010)
Cause of death: Shot in the back of the head
HG Wells, Warehouse 13 (2011) (Resurrected in 2012)
Cause of death: Sacrificed herself to keep the rest of the Warehouse crew (especially Myka) from getting blown to smithereens.
Marissa Tasker, All My Children (2011)
Cause of death: Shot by her jealous ex-husband
Patty O’Farrell and Veronica Cortes, La Reina del Sur (2011)
Cause of death: Patty drives off a cliff with Veronica in the passenger seat — Veronica dies, but Patty doesn’t, so after waking up in the hospital, she kills herself.
Susan Grant, Private Practice (2011)
Cause of death: Septic shock following cancer treatment, collapsed at her wedding
Bizzy Forbes, Private Practice (2011)
Cause of death: Suicide after her wife died
Queen Sophie Ann Leclerq, True Blood (2011)
Cause of death: Wooden bullet shot by American Vampire League snipers
Gaia, Spartacus: Gods of the Arena (2011)
Cause of death: Head bashed in by a man she rejected
Angela Darmody & Louise Bryant, Boardwalk Empire (2011)
Cause of death: Shot by a mobster
Freya Wilson, Doctors (2012)
Cause of death: Saved a man from a housefire
Nadia, Lost Girl (2012)
Cause of death: Stabbed while violently possessed
Laure,Les Revenants (2012)
Cause of death: Disappeared along with a group of other police officers, assumed died while fighting the horde, precise cause unknown
Cat MacKenzie, Lip Service (2012)
Cause of Death: Hit by a car
Charlie, Home & Away (2012)
Cause of death: Life support shut off after a shooting left her unable to breathe on her own
Wendy, American Horror Story: Asylum (2012)
Cause of death: Murdered by serial killer Bloodyface
Lucretia, Spartacus: Vengeance (2012)
Cause of death: Murder-suicide, walked off a cliff with a baby in her arms
Maya St. Germain, Pretty Little Liars (2012)
Cause of death: Bludgeoned by her ex-boyfriend/stalker
Nora Gainesborough, True Blood (2013)
Cause of true death: Hep-V
Beate, Bron/Broen (2013)
Cause of death: Accidentally via poisoned needle at her girlfriend’s hospital bed
Natalie, Siberia (2013)
Cause of death: Unknown. Found dead in the woods.
Annie, Siberia (2013)
Cause of death: Gunshot wound
Helen Bartlett, Scott & Bailey (2013)
Cause of death: Slit her wrists
Clementine Chasseur, Hemlock Grove (2013)
Cause of death: Eaten by a Upir after being kidnapped, beaten and caged
Nan Flanagan, True Blood (2013)
Cause of true death: Staked by Bill Compton
Saxa, Spartacus (2013)
Cause of death: Sword attack during battle
Shana Fring, Pretty Little Liars (2013)
Cause of death: Fell off a stage after being hit in the head with a gun
Naomi Campbell, Skins (2013)
Cause of Death: Cancer
Cristina, Tierra de Lobos (2013)
Cause of death: Head injury sustained during a scuffle with a jealous man who was going to shoot her
Alisha, The Walking Dead (2013)
Cause of death: Shot by a 12-year-old girl
Emily, Teen Wolf (2013)
Cause of death: Was about to have sex with her girlfriend in a tent when she was kidnapped by a swarm of cockroaches, tied to a tree, bludgeoned over the head, strangled and then had her throat slit (ancient druidic “triple death”) as the first virgin sacrifice of an evil druidess who was attempting, through ritual sacrifices, to amass sufficient power to get her revenge against the evil uber-Alpha Werewolf who had massacred her friends and horribly disfigured her.
Alice Calvert, Under the Dome (2013)
Cause of death: Heart attack suffered from low blood sugar (she was a diabetic) after delivering another character’s baby
Bullet, The Killing (2013)
Cause of death: Murdered by serial killer
Tricia, Orange is the New Black (2013)
Cause of death: Drug overdose
Texas Longford, Hollyoaks (2013)
Cause of Death: Shoved out a window on her wedding day by her husband.
Tina Patterson, Boss (2013)
Cause of Death: Murdered by order of Chicago’s mayor in order to destroy her girlfriend’s campaign.
Collen Donaghy, 30 Rock (2013)
Lucy & Alice, American Horror Story: Freakshow (2014)
Cause of death: Bludgeoned with an axe by a puppet controlled by Lucy’s husband, Chester, who was suffering from PTSD and upset they won’t have a threesome with him
Jana Murphy, The Following (2014)
Cause of Death: Suicide
Uriel, Dominion (2014)
Cause of Death: Air strike
Lucy Westenra, Dracula (2014)
Cause of death: Killed (turned into a vampire) by Dracula for betraying her ex-best-friend by sleeping with her fiancé
Ana and Teresa, Amar en Tiempos Revueltos (2014)
Cause of death: Originally given a happy ending in 2012. The show was sold to another network and came back as “Amar es Para Siempre,” and viewers then learned that Ana and their son died in a fire, and Teresa died in the hospital as a result of injuries from the fire.
Claire Bennet, Heroes Reborn (2014)
Cause of death: Died in childbirth from cardiac arrest from a traumatic seizure
Victoria Hand, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D (2014)
Cause of death: Gunshot wound to the head
Isabelle Hartley, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D (2014)
Cause of death: Car accident, SUV was flipped by the Absorbing Man
Catriona, Doctors (2014)
Cause of death: Suicide after being attacked in a hate crime
Nadia Petrova, The Vampire Diaries (2014)
Cause of death: Werewolf venom
Reyna Flores, Matador (2014)
Cause of death: Shot
Tara Thornton, True Blood (2014)
Cause of death: Took a bullet for her best friend (2009). Was then made vampire. Meets the true death while attempting to protect her mother from an H-Vamp. (2014)
Leslie Elizabeth Shay, Chicago Fire (2014)
Cause of death: Pipe collapse while fighting a fire
Kenya Rosewater, Defiance (2014)
Cause of death: Poisoned by her lover
Sara Lance, Arrow (2014) (Resurrected in 2015)
Cause of death: Three arrows to the chest, causing her to fall off a building
Rose, Crossbones (2014)
Cause of death: Throat slit by her girlfriend
Rachel Posner, House of Cards (2015)
Cause of death: Ran over by a man with an obsessive crush on her
Elise Beaupré, Unité 9 (2015)
Cause of death: Cancer
Tituba, Salem (2015)
Cause of death: Man sent a flock of crows after her to peck out her eyes and leave her for dead
Jenna Dickerson, Supernatural (2015)
Cause of death: Neck broken by a man while she was possessed by a demon baby
Kate, Last Tango in Halfiax (2015)
Cause of death: Hit by a car
Natacha Rambova, American Horror Story: Hotel (2015)
Cause of death: Shot
Destiny Rumaneck, Hemlock Grove (2015)
Cause of death: Hit her head on a glass coffee table during a violent confrontation with a man who then broke her neck.
Adele, The Lizzie Borden Chronicles (2015)
Cause of death: Throat slit by Lizzie Borden
Connie Ward, Home Fires (2015)
Cause of death: On a ship sunk by German U-Boats.
Denise/Simone, Felizes Para Sempre? (2015)
Cause of death: Shot in the head
Wendy Ross-Hogarth, Jessica Jones (2015)
Cause of death: Bludgeoned with a vase, fell and hit her head on a glass coffee table, was psychologically controlled by an evil man at the time
Samantha Krueger, Ascension (2015)
Cause of death: Shot in the head
Maddie Heath, Coronation Street (2015)
Cause of death: Building yard explosion, died in hospital
Lillian Moss, Murdoch Mysteries (2015)
Cause of death: Shot by her ex-lover’s husband
Tamsin, Lost Girl (2015)
Cause of death: Died while birthing a child conceived from rape
Carolyn Hill, Under the Dome (2015)
Cause of death: Crushed to death in a collapsing tunnel
Vivian, Mistresses (2015)
Cause of Death: Cancer
Sam, Scream Queens (2015)
Cause of death: Suffocated by a serial killer in a red devil mask
Sophia Varma, Blindspot (2015)
Cause of death: Asked her girlfriend to run away with her and then killed herself
Sally, American Horror Story: Hotel (2015)
Cause of death: Pushed out a window
Charlie, Supernatural (2015)
Cause of death: Stabbed by a Neo-Nazi who then dumped her body in a bathtub
Rachael Murray, Scream (2015)
Cause of death: Thrown off a balcony by Ghostface, snapping her neck
The Countess, American Horror Story: Hotel (2015)
Cause of death: Shot and then decapitated
Ruby Haswell, Emmerdale (2015)
Cause of death: Helicopter Crash
Zora, The Shannara Chronciles (2016)
Cause of death: Throat slit
Rose/Sin Rostro, Jane the Virgin (2016) (Resurrected in 2016, Killed Again in 2019)
Cause of death: Strangled by the crime lord Mutter.
Carla, Code Black (2016)
Cause of death: Cancer, shortly after giving birth
Julie Mao, The Expanse (2016)
Cause of death: Infected by an alien pathogen
Ash, Janet King (2016)
Cause of death: Shot, between seasons
Lexa, The 100 (2016)
Cause of death: Shot in the stomach by a stray bullet
Kira, The Magicians (2016)
Cause of Death: Paralyzed and kept alive in a vegetative state, she enables the spiritual growth of a white woman in another realm and then asks the white woman to kill her in real life, which she does.
Denise, The Walking Dead (2016)
Cause of Death: Shot in the eye with a crossbow bolt by a man while she was in the middle of a sentence
Nora and Mary Louise, The Vampire Diaries (2016)
Cause of Death: Suicide. They destroyed a magic sword together to prevent Nora from being forever trapped in it, knowing that destroying the sword would kill them both. They chose death rather than having to be apart with Nora trapped in the sword.
Mimi Whiteman, Empire (2016)
Cause of Death: Poisoned by her wife, who was cheating on her and wanted her to hurry up and die of cancer
Camilla, Empire (2016)
Cause of Death: Poisoned by her wife’s former business partner after poisoning her wife
Cara Thomas, Marcella (2016)
Cause of Death: Hit and then run over by a car
Pamela Clayborne, Saints & Sinners (2016)
Cause of Death: Shot by an intruder who was associated with the man her husband falsely accused her of having an affair with (she was actually having an affair with a woman).
Felicity, The Catch (2016)
Cause of Death: Shot by a man she slept with after giving him information on his con artist sister, who she was also sexually involved with.
Bridey, The Family (2016)
Cause of Death: Stabbed
Mayfair, Blindspot (2016)
Cause of Death: Shot in the back
Karen Kim, Mistresses (2016)
Cause of Death: Fell off her balcony trying to save her suicidal nanny
Root, Person of Interest (2016)
Cause of Death: Saving a man from a sniper’s bullet
Poussey Washington, Orange is the New Black (2016)
Cause of death: Strangled by a Correctional Officer following the violent interruption of a peaceful protest of the Captain of the Correctional Officers
Bea Smith, Wentworth (2016)
Cause of Death: Deliberately stabbed with a screwdriver in order to ensure a terrible person remained in prison. Sacrificed herself and died the tragic hero.
Molly Ryan, Guilt (2016)
Cause of Death: Girlfriend hired somebody to kill her rather than have to witness her being involved with somebody else.
Roz Walters, Guilt (2016)
Cause of Death: Attacked by the roommate of her ex-lover after it was revealed that Roz had killed said ex-lover to avoid having to see her loving somebody else.
Sarah Harvey, Pretty Little Liars (2016)
Cause of Death: Unknown — found dead in a hotel bathtub
Julia, The Exorcist (2016)
Cause of Death: Car accident, directly after confessing her feelings to her friend, who was driving.
Helen, Masters of Sex (2016)
Cause of Death: Died in childbirth. Following her death, her parents took the baby she’d been planning to raise with her partner, Betty.
Gina, Shut Eye (2016)
Cause of Death: Murdered off-screen
Zoë Vaughn, Scream (2016)
Cause of Death: Drowned
Susan, Van Helsing (2016)
Cause of Death: Strangled
Monica Gallagher, Shameless (2016)
Cause of death: Massive cerebral hemmorrhage
Eleanor Guthrie, Black Sails (2017)
Cause of death: Stabbed to death by a Spanish solider.
Mia Rochland, Rogue (2017)
Cause of Death: Betrayed by her girlfriend, who shoots her in the back so a cop can kill her.
Bill Potts, Doctor Who (2017)
Cause of Death: Shot by a Cyberman then turned into sentient oil
Joan Ferguson, Wentworth (2017)
Cause of Death: Buried alive (hopefully)
Barbara Kean, Gotham (2017) – RESURRECTED
Cause of Death: Electrocuted, then resurrected
Jukebox, Power (2017)
Cause of Death: Gunshot
Ivy Mayfair-Richards, American Horror Story: Cult (2017)
Cause of Death: Poisoned by her wife
Renée, Slasher (2017)
Cause of Death: Run over by a snowmobile
Talvinder, Slasher (2017)
Cause of Death: Killed by her friends
Susan, Slasher (2017)
Cause of Death: Neck broken & eyes gouged out
Winter Anderson, American Horror Story: Cult (2017)
Cause of Death: Strangled by her brother for doing a thing she didn’t actually do
Bebe Babbitt, American Horror Story: Cult (2017)
Cause of Death: Shot in the back by another woman when she was about to kill the male cult leader that really needs to be killed because he is destroying lives.
Emily “A&W” Blake, Prison Break (2017)
Cause of Death: Neck broken by serial killer / rapist
Nadia Fiero, Counterpart (2018)
Cause of Death: Murdered by government agents who were going after her because her (also gay) counterpart, Baldwin, is a wanted assassin.
Karen Williams, Star (2018)
Cause of Death: Ded in a house fire after a mutual love proclamation with her girlfriend and best friend, Simone Davis. Karen was in the house at Simone’s suggestion. She was running away, and Simone offered her protection in her home.
Mason, The Arrangement (2018)
Cause of Death: On the same day that her annual lover, Deann, declares that she wants to figure out how to build a real, more-than-annual relationship with her, she dies. I’m not sure how yet because I got so upset I had to turn off the television as soon as it was confirmed that she was dead.
Kit, The Handmaid’s Tale (2018)
Cause of Death: Toxic working conditions in the colonies
Nadia, Killing Eve (2018)
Cause of Death: Murdered by her ex in prison
Anna, Killing Eve (2018)
Cause of Death: Shoots herself
Odette Johnson, The Handmaid’s Tale (2018)
Cause of Death: Killed during the war
Maureen Kukudio, Orange is the New Black (2018)
Cause of Death: Died during a prison riot, prior to which she was forced to engage in hand-to-hand combat with another inmate, resulting in severe facial injuries that were infected due to inadequate medical care.
Drago, Wentworth (2018)
Cause of death: Killed in a fight club match after telling her opponent that she had killed her sister
Sarah Tan, Condor (2018)
Cause of Death: Died in the attack on the IEP’s office that killed all her colleagues.
Alisha Granderson, The Last Ship (2018)
Cause of Death: Alisha’s girlfriend turned out to be pulling a long con and soon after Alisha realized the truth, her girlfriend stabbed her in the midst of a struggle.
Bracka, The Purge (2018)
Cause of Death: Shot after entering the home of the wealthy cis straight white man she’d been paid to assassinate.
(Photo by: Patti Perret/USA Network)
Peach Salinger, You (2018)
Cause of Death: Shot by her best friend’s boyfriend who did not appreciate the competition for his attention, because he is a creepy stalker.
Lila Stanton, The Purge (2018)
Cause of Death: Stabbed by her ex-girlfriend because she was about to kill her ex-girlfriend’s husband
(Photo by: Patti Perret/USA Network)
CeCe, Grey’s Anatomy (2019)
Cause of Death: Complications due to kidney failure and congestive heart failure
Rana Habeeb, Coronation Street (2019)
Cause of Death: Roof collapse the day after her wedding
Tara, The Walking Dead (2019)
Cause of Death: Decapitated by The Whisperers
Photo Credit: Gene Page/AMC
Mr. Kaplan, The Blacklist (2019)
Cause of Death: Jumped off a bridge
Rose/Sin Rostro, Jane the Virgin (2019)
Cause of Death: Pushed down a building shaft by her on-again/off-again girlfriend Luisa, then impaled by a set piece and set on fire.
Arlene Branch, Claws (2019)
Cause of Death: Throat slashed by a mob boss.
Daddy, Orange is the New Black (2019)
Cause of Death: Drug overdose
Charlotte Wells, Harlots (2019)
Cause of Death: Knocked over a railing and dashed to her death
Sky Garibaldi, Grand Hotel (2019)
Cause of Death: Murdered by a co-worker to protect a secret about the rich family they both worked for.
Jade, Why Women Kill (2019)
Cause of Death: Stabbed by ex-girlfriend Taylor in self defense, shortly after Jade stabbed her ex-boyfriend, who is Taylor’s husband.
Joy Wilkes, Castle Rock (2019)
Cause of Death: Murdered by her sister
Jamilah Olsen, Black Lightning (2020)
Cause of Death: Shot to death while reporting the news.
Bel, Boca a Boca (2020)
Cause of Death: Deadly virus
Carlota Senillosa, Cable Girls (2020)
Cause of Death: Shot by National forces while attempting to distract them to protect soldiers. Assumed killed in a group with all the other Cable Girls at the series finale.
Dani, The Haunting of Bly Manor (2020)
Cause of Death: Claimed fully by the lady in the lake
Swanee Caps, Fargo (2020)
Cause of Death: Shot
Celia, Cursed (2020)
Cause of Death: Killed when the Abbey is burned down
Tina Carter, EastEnders (2020)
Cause of Death: Murdered
Tatiana, Batwoman (2021)
Cause of Death: Stabbed to death
Nicole, Power Book III: Raising Kanan (2021)
Cause of Death: Drug overdose
Maya, American Horror Stories (2021)
Cause of Death: Killed as revenge by the girl she outed online
Lemon, I Know What You Did Last Summer (2021)
Cause of Death: Hit by a car (her friends are driving the car and they proceed to try to cover up her death while her twin sister assumes her identity)
Hinata Murai, Invasion (2021)
Cause of Death: Spaceship explosion
Sissy Cooper, The Umbrella Academy (2022)
Cause of Death: Cancer
Mari Winters, Wentworth (2022)
Cause of Death: Stabbed with a kitchen knife
Betsy Mallum, Dopesick (2022)
Cause of Death: Drug Overdose
(Photo by: Gene Page/Hulu)
Charly Burk, The Orville (2022)
Cause of Death: Sacrificed herself to stop a genocide against Kaylon even though she hated them
Helene, Killing Eve (2022)
Cause of Death: Throat slit
Vilanelle, Killing Eve (2022)
Cause of Death: Shot multiple times
Riley, The Last Of Us (2023)
Cause of Death: Deadly virus that killed most of humanity
Rashida, Swarm (2023)
Cause of Death: Strangled by her girlfriend, a serial killer
Pages: 1 2 3 4See entire article on one page
Rachel Posner reminds me of Evan Rachel Wood. (Canonically, Evan’s character in Once and Again is alive.)
I know, they look so much alike!
I’m still very, very angry about Tara. Just sayin’.
ME TOO
Weirdly seeing her on there brought a tear to my eye! Tara’s death was just awful.
Being a lesbian or bisexual woman called Tara seems to give you particular bad luck – either dying, or having your girlfriend die.
Did I miss something? I thought Helena Cain was killed by a Six? I don’t remember anything about her digging chicks?
In the Pegasus spinoff/TV movie Razor, the Six who kills Cain is her girlfriend.
It was revealed in the TV movie “Battlestar Galactica: Razor” that she had an affair with a Six who posed as an engineer on the Pegasus.
The Six in question was Gina, who worked as a network analyst on Pegasus until she was discovered to be a Cylon. And also was intimately involved with Cain.
Can I say that I just about fainted when Michelle Forbes showed up on Orphan Black? She has One Of Those Voices, the kind that slays me every time.
She was killed by a version of Six named Gina. BSG Razor details their relationship more than the show did.
In the flashback movie you find out that Helena and Gina (the Six in question) were dating.
I had to go back and rewatch those episodes. I remembered why I was glad she was killed.
She was shot by a Six, Gina Inviere. It’s revealed through flashbacks (in Razor, I think?) that the two had been lovers before Cain discovered Gina was a Cylon.
Whoops, didn’t see all these existing replies.
Me neither!
She was killed by the Six she had fallen in love with, who became a prisoner when Helena found out she was a Cylon.
It was a really a “blink and you’ll miss it” relationship. The Six, Gina, was in a relationship with Cain. It was mentioned in Razor.
The 6 that killed her was her lover before the Cylon attack and until they discovered she was a Cylon. Their romance was a small plot in the Razor movie/super long episode.
That Six (Gina Inviere) was her lover. The beginning of their romance was shown on the movie “Battlestar Galactica, Razor”. That’s why, when her treason was discovered, she was so brutal allowing the constant rape and torture of that Six.
She did. She had an r-ship with a six who betrayed her and so she allowed her crew to gang-rape the six. This was part of what made her bitter and aweful.
That Six, Gina, was in a relationship with Cain. It was in the episode about the Pegasus, the Razor. I don’t know if this was a special episode that wasn’t shown with the original television showings or not, though. Gaeta was in a relationship with both an Eight and Hoshi, but you wouldn’t know that unless you saw the webisodes.
Anyway, the Razor is on BSG on Netflix.
It was revealed in Battlestar Galactica Razor that Admiral Cain was seeing Six before they new she was Cylon.
Her and Gina were together when the colonies were nuked. When Cain realized that Gina was a Cylon and she had been sleeping with the enemy, she locked her up, let her be tortured and raped repeatedly. When Gina got free she shot and killed Cain. I think it’s more explained in Razor. If I’m not mistaken it was a movie that came out in between season 3 and 4 and explored two timelines, one from the start of the series meeting up with a few episodes from S2 I think.
Didn’t see the many responses until my comment posted.
You must not have watched the movie “Razor”. It came out between seasons 2 and 3 and focused on Battlestar Pegasus prior to finding the Galactica.
You have to watch Galactica – Razor tv movie. There are flashblacks where you’ll see Cain and Gina (6) are together.
The Six who killed her was her former lover. Cain had her caged when she found out she was a cylon
There was an episode where it showed what happened to the Pegasus in the months following the Cylon attack, During this time there was in fact a ‘6’ on board referred to as Gina. Helena and Gina developed a relationship that is subtly shown…when it was discovered Gina was a cylon Helena locked her in a cell allowing her to be tortured and abused, probably out of spite, Gina is the traumatized ‘6’ that Gayus later helps, she subsequently gets freed during when there was a near mutiny and shoots Helena, This same ‘6’, Gina, goes onto get her hands on a nuke and destroys a civilian ship :D #battlestarnerd!!
The story-line about her digging chicks was in the Mini-Movie Razor. Pretty good. The relationship was before the attack by the Cylons.
Some of these are really reaching. I seem to recall a romantic relationship between Cain and the Six (who is also listed here) was implied, but that’s all it was.
D’anna Biers, when did we see her being into girls? Or Snoop from The Wire? Or Claire Bennet? Is my memory really that rusty?
The relationship between Cain and Gina was not implied, it was a small plot line to be sure, but it was definitely there in Razor. Their relationship was used to explain why Cain became so ruthless, why she let her men do those horrible things to Gina and why Gina said what she did before she pulled the trigger.
D’anna Biers/3 had a relationship with both Caprica Six and Baltar when Baltar was captive on the Basestar after New Caprica.
Was the relationship d’eanna had real with baltar or was it one of baltars hallucinations? Its been so long since ive seen the show so my memorys rusty but i dont recall that subplot in the series.
Regaring Claire Bennet, in the actual Heroes-show we never got an answer regarding whether she was bi/fluid or not. Gretchen kissed her, but when she later asked Claire whether she felt something Claire replied that she didn’t know. And within the Heroes show, the possibility of a romance between them were never brought up again, they just stayed roommates and close friends.
In an eBook called “Save the Cheerleader, Destroy the World” that are supposed to sum up the events between Heroes and Heroes Reborn for Claire, this is what the Heroes-wiki says about Claire and Gretchen: “On December 14, 2010, a picture of Gretchen and Claire at Arlington University appears on the cover of a magazine with the title “Indestructible Girl in Love Nest with Co-Ed”. Overwhelmed and humiliated, Gretchen sends Claire a text saying that she never wants to see her again. Claire sends her around 30 texts begging her to reply, but she does not. Claire finally gives up trying to contact Gretchen sometime in April 2011.”
So apparantly, they actually did become a couple after Heroes the show ended, but don’t ask me why Gretchen got so angry over that becoming public, since Gretchen on the show most certainly wasn’t closeted.
And then Claire is presumed dead in Heroes Reborn, although there were some theories that she wasn’t dead at all, but just that her father were lead to believe that she was. However, since Heroes Reborn is cancelled, those theories are obsolete by now.
This is broken down into 3 separate scenes.. (1) Cain has regular meetings with Gina Inviere (aka Six), a civilian contractor working for the Colonial Ministry of Defense. The two eventually become “romantically involved”. (2) Then Cain is deeply stung by Inviere’s betrayal, her feelings toward her erstwhile “lover” turned into hatred and scorn. (3) Cain returns to her quarters and is surprised to find Gina Inviere (Six) who escaped her cell,waiting for her. After a tense confrontation, Gina (Six) kills Cain with a shot to the head.
This is broken down into 3 separate scenes.. (1) Cain has regular meetings with Gina Inviere (aka Six), a civilian contractor working for the Colonial Ministry of Defense. The two eventually become “romantically involved”. (2) Then Cain is deeply stung by Inviere’s betrayal, her feelings toward her erstwhile “lover” turned into hatred and scorn. (3) Cain returns to her quarters and is surprised to find Gina Inviere (Six) who escaped her cell,waiting for her. After a tense confrontation, Gina (Six) kills Cain with a shot to the head.
Uh, yeah, that Six and Cain were lovers before Cain found out she was a Cyclon.
She was her lover.
Watch the episodes with the Pegasus, and the movie Razor. The Six who shot her was her lover.
She and the Six (in her persona of Gina Inviere) were lovers which is why Cain allowed her to be treated so badly as a prisoner.
Honestly, there are a lot of characters on this list where it was never mentioned that they were bisexuals or lesbians
Cain’s romance with a Six was in the Battlestar Galactica: Razor movie. It’s been explained in the comments a bunch of times already, if only people would backread before asking repeat questions….
Cain was killed by the Gina Inviere 6 (who also makes an appearance on the list). Before Inviere was revealed to be Cylon, she was a lover of Cain’s.
Oh,man half these shows I stopped watching before characters died and I am so happy i did.
under the dome is such a mysoginistic mess, i couldn’t stand it.
Yes, exactly! A lot of these shows were doing our community a disservice even before they killed the bi & lesbian characters off–and I’d love to see that quantified too.
Okay, Jenny Shechter’s description of “Murdered by Ilene Chaiken” made me giggle, just a little.
Luckily for me no one was in the store when I saw that cause I was laughing pretty hard that I nearly fell out of my seat. lol
i was like “same.”
I mean I’m pretty sure 90% of the lesbian population was begging for it to happen. And to be fair, on a show made up of primarily lesbian characters, to kill one of them off doesn’t feel as wrong as to kill off the token lesbian on any other show.
Haha. I think you they should change Lexa’s cause of death to “killed by JRat” . Just seems more accurate to me. Haha
Same, I was like wait we don’t even know what killed her but than I read that and I was like yeah ok that’s perfect
I laughed out loud when I read it too!
Circa 2002, Family Affairs – Kelly Hurst. Accidentally pushed down the stairs by the husband of her lover (and father of her surrogate baby, long story).
added, thank you!
Xena is missing from this list
subtext doesn’t count
they litterally kissed ??? On top of being soulmates and all the jazz ?
I feel excluding it is uncalled for given the people behind the show have stated how hard the network was cracking down on them about not making it a ~gay thing before the first season was even filmed and all the cast and creators have said they were bi and totally together. But hey go ahead and be rude about a show that was just as important to lots of people as the 100 was and also killed a wlw
she’s there…..
She’s there.
Xena is just below Diamond from Dark Angel from 2001.
Xena is listed. The writer says she was beheaded.
OH MY GOD read the introduction to an article and think about the comments before you decide to correct people.
Notice how in this VERY comment thread Riese (who wrote the article) says “subtext doesn’t count”? That is because Xena was not originally on the list, she was added later AFTER all the comments/discussion about her absence, as explained in the ETA in the introduction.
no she is not!
Well, looks like my decision to quit House of Cards after season two was entirely justified. Thanks for giving me that closure.
SAME.
THIS ARTICLE REALLY GOES THERE SHOUT OUT TO YOU RIESE
THANK YOU ERIN
You forgot Xena…
Xena was only ever “confirmed” gay by Lucy Lawless and well after the show’s end. There was no confirmation in the show or by the show’s writers or showrunner.
I thought the showrunner and writers DID confirm after the show ended?
Or not and
I don’t think so, and even if they said that, they never proved it in-show. :(
I just remember seeing something with a bunch of quotes from people involved who said Xena and Gabrielle were a couple.
They all but said it and they made it clear they were soulmates lol.
Although they had to play a lot with subtext that became very maintext in the later seasons they hugged, kissed and said I love you more than any other couple… Plus the soulmates concept was a pretty core concept of the show.
And a lot of the people that did the show confirmed their relationship, directors, writers and actors (Liz Friedman, Steven Sears, Lucy Lawles, Renee O’Connor, Kevin Smith, Katherine Fugate, etc).
Well, they did hire a slashfic author to be an official writer.
I saw that Xena was just below Diamond from Dark Angel from 2001.
Tamsin. <3. I've decided I'm in charge of canon there and she's doing swell.
#TamsinLives! And I’m all for #CopDoc :)
Damn, should have realized the extremely obvious: SPOILER ALERTS! Catching up on Orphan Black is gonna be *rough*.
I’ve been seen Delphine on all these lists but I *refuse* to believe she actually belongs. Spoiler alert kind of, since you’ve already been spoiled: the survivable gut-shot happens in the waning moments of the S3 finale and we have NOT seen a body or confirmed she’s dead. I am holding out hope Fawcett and Mason are having their giggle and actually subverting the trope and she survives.
Delphine is shot in the season finale – we’re meant to assume she’s dead but she may not be!
My condolences–I was spoiled for that particular item before it happened too, and I HATE being spoiled for that show. (Though if you love the character I do think the episode is well-worth watching for her arc.)
Delphine was found to be alive a few weeks ago. At least there is someone we can remove from this heartbreaking list.
thank you for this. autostraddle and afterellen have been my fave go to sites for all things queer media and life….stuff. i felt so betrayed after reading afterellen’s recap to see them try to justify this bogus storyline of the 100 and then double down and have the show runner try to fix his mess on their site. you’re now my only source for queer content and i’d like you to know how much i cherish this site.
i would also like to cheer the 100 fandom, their response has gotten a lot of notice and i hope that anybody hoping to write/ produce queer characters will have taken this message to heart. we are a fierce minority and we can fuck yo shit up
My feelings exactly.
You know, that AE’s recap was a huge disappointment, but then they decide to add that piece of crap podcast?!!! I was raging mad. You say that there wasn’t any queerbaiting? That we should be happy because we still have Clarke? Are you kidding me?
The only good thing about this, and the thing that made me happy, is that you couldn’t find a positive comment on that podcast.
all i remember thinking is, whose interests are you serving right now? the only queer people ive seen defend the show are people who benefit from being close to the show runner and such pandering to harm being committed against ones own community, i have no time for it
The response from the feminist internet in general other than autostraddle has been extremely disappointing.
I couldn’t believe it when I read the AE article. I just felt so betrayed by it. The other day the mary sue also ran an article defending the shit show. Almost no major sites seem to get it.
Yeah, I feel you. Afterellen and autostraddle are my lesbian media guide and I always look up to it. But I’m pretty devastated that afterellen kinda try to justify it in a way. It sucks that I feel like they were holding back with what they truly feels. I don’t even know if this makes sense.
I was thinking, too: Where’s Xena? But it was not canon, after all. Still angry about Dana, sad about Tamsin and not sure about Jenny.
Xena is a lesbian icon, it is a show that pushed a lot of boundaries in TV… saying that their relationship was not canon is like ignoring 90% of the show. Specially with heavy maintext episodes like the Nordic trilogy or even the final that it’s like their big coming out party regardless of Xena’s death.
Cast, writers and directors confirmed their relationship. It was a show that ended on 2001 and that did the best they could with the boundaries they had, they even had planned a big Musical Sappho episode with a kiss between Xena and Gabrielle that never saw the light…
Oh, yes, she IS a lesbian icon and I treasure the episodes you mentioned. And they hired Melissa Good as a writer, after all :) I honestly think, too, that TBTB did the best they could back tuen, but I would still consider it subtext, albeit on the heavy site of it. Perhaps “not canon” wasn’t worded very well (no native speaker here).
I saw that Xena was just below Diamond from Dark Angel from 2001.
But you missed the ETA in the intro that explains she was added to the list after it was first posted.
Which is why you see so many comments about Xena’s absence – the comments were from before she was on the list.
Wow. And this is just the women. And just TV. I’m struck by the violent manner of death for so many of these characters. I really want to dig deeper here and compare this with the deaths of straight characters. I wonder if variables like ‘time after romantic revelation/encounter’ or ‘manner of death’ would further highlight the poor treatment of LGBT characters.
Especially since Lexa was strikingly similar to Tara – they’d both JUST had sex for the first time/first time after a break with their love interest and were hit by a bullet meant for someone else.
Agreed–the violence is really striking. It might be about general media violence growing along with the inclusion of bi and lesbian characters in recent years, but I think it’s mostly about cultural misogyny; TV loves to dramatize over-the-top violence against women.
I also would love to see the timing of romantic encounters and other factors (like whether the death was primarily about the character who died, or about its effect on another queer female character, or about its effect on a straight man) charted!
Jay Copeland – Shortland Street 2007 Murdered by the Ferndale Strangler.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jay_Copeland
Oh, and now I’m down on memory lane to German soap operas. Very gay and, unsurprisingly, very fond of tropes, either. Rest in peace, Susanne, Hanna, Franzi et.al.
I was kind of hoping you’d do this, lest I had to research it all for myself and drive myself into misery, as I kind of want to build a memorial to them and then tour it round TV station headquarters like “Do you realise what the fuck you are adding to by doing this” I’ve been thinking about it since Lexa got Maclayed.
So thanks for doing the hard work again Autostraddle.
I will never, ever, ever forgive True Blood for killing Tara off BEFORE THE OPENING CREDITS of their final season and not even letting Pam mourn her death!!!
The systematic de-gaying of that show (Tara + Killing off Queen Sophie, Naan, Nora, having Pam spend her last season searching for Eric- leaving her progeny unprotected and ultimately leading to her aforementioned untimely death) alwaaaaays bothered me.
But, tied to their unceremonious abuse of the “bury your gays” trope, I’ll never forgive True Blood to the erosion of Lafayette over the years. Turning this wonderfully strong, vulnerable, dark and complicated, black, femme black gay man who was unlike anything seen on tv and reducing him to a sassy “gay bestie” stereotype for Sookie was heartbreaking and unwatchable.
Lafayette and Tara were best friends and cousins and each other’s port in a storm during their abusive childhoods and complicated adulthoods. Lafayette was out for as long as we knew him, but when Tara came out at the start of season 4 and Lafayette was their to love her, accept her, and yes- tease her just a little bit- man, it was beauty.
Given that there is a small amount of queer representation on tv, want to imagine how much smaller queer of color representation is? Want to imagine how much smaller black queer representation is?? Want to imagine how much smaller healthy depictions of black queer kinship is???????
In a land of vampires, Tara and Lafayette were f*uckkng unicorns. What True Blood did to them was a sin.
(Sorry, this article took me back to my rage place. Ignore me, Carry on!!)
Oh my god, Tara’s death on True Blood pissed me off so much. Like what the fuck?! It didn’t even happen on screen and Pam barely acknowledged it.
I second all of this!!! Thank you for raging. This fucking pos show that I for some reason watched until the very end >:|
Delurking to say I 100% agree with this. Tara and Lafayette deserved so much better than what they got.
Seconded. “True Blood” really did turn to shit in the last couple of series, particularly in its treatment of of queer characters/characters of colour. That final season was unwatchable.
That said, I was startled when, after watching first series, I attempted to read the (terrible) books. I found that both Tara and Lafayette are teeny, tiny bit parts, with Lafayette basically consisting of one line of sass, a description of his nail varnish, and getting killed off by the end of book one. So in a sense, I suppose we were lucky the show runners were marginally more progressive than the author!
I’m also glad Tosh got a look in on this list. Her death is always overshadowed by the horrible mess “Torchwood” made of killing off Ianto, the second he was in a functioning relationship. That’s another show I will never forgive.
I watched season 1 of true blood and loved it for the dynamic characters. I’ve been thinking about watching the rest of it, but the fact that they kill Tara really fucks me up. I don’t know if I can watch it after that…
Damn this is real. Never getting over Lexa. Or Tara Thornton, or Rachel Posner. Generations of shows later and it never ends.
Also, thinking about Tara Thorton, Maya St Germain, and Shana Costumeshop, along with the black lesbian from “Under the Dome”, which I never watched– are there any black queer women who make it to being alive at the end of the show (or at least the end of their show arc)???
I’m not being snarky, I’m honestly curious. I’m racking my brain and can’t think of any. Right now it feels like if you are black woman who enjoys sex with women, you’ve got a 100% death sentence…
Tasha and Bette on The L Word were thankfully left alive. But that’s all I can think of off the top of my head.
Let’s all just pray that the black lady-loving-ladies on OITNB make it through.
Oh, and Lena Adams-Foster is still alive, and will likely stay that way. (FINGERS CROSSED. I really hope I didn’t just jinx that.)
UGH. And Annalise Keating, obviously.
OMG!!! YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! All of these ladies. YES.
Thank you so much for taking me back to a happier place.
Glad I could help :)
But obviously none of them erase your point, I’m just saying that maybe there’s a little bit of hope for the future.
Absolutely!
As far as shows that are already off the air… Kima Greggs from “The Wire”?
Yeah, it’s become apparent that I jumped the gun (pun not intended) a bit when I started looking for a larger trend. I’ll go ahead and blame my underlying Tara related ptsd.
Also, how strange is it that, as much as I love Snoop, I often forget about Kima on the wire? I should do better about that.
Pippy is still very much alive on Rosewood and I’m not worried that will ever change. For once.
Bethany Mayfair from Blindspot is alive and well. Can’t say the same for her one episode flashback girlfriend, though. They did off another character’s straight dude love interest within a couple of episodes so that was kinda balanced at least.
Check out Masters of None on Netflix. She isn’t dead yet….
Damn, how could I forget!
I gave up around that point – just stopped caring. But the writers for better than the books :Lafayette was killed after the first so, and Tara was white. True Blood is one of the shows that should have ended much sooner.
Amanita from Sense8 is alive.
Try not to break a hand knocking on wood that if there’s a season 2 or more she stays that way.
The only show I know of who had two black queer women who didn’t die (as far as I know) was canceled after 11 episodes and I really wish I could have watched it. It’s called Courthouse (CBS 1995) and in it Juvenile Judge Rosetta Reide (Jenifer Lewis) was in a relationship with Danni Gates (Cree Summer), who was also Rosetta’s housekeeper.
in how to get away with murder Annalise is bi & she’s alive :)
Diana Barrigan made it to the end of “White Collar”.
Original Cindy from Dark Angel survives.
There are tragically few, but off the top of my head, Kima from The Wire is a major character and survives the whole show.
Maybe The Fosters and Rosewood?
Cindy in Dark Angel (the other woman in Diamond’s picture) survived both seasons before the show got cancelled.
I’m thinking of Tasha (who is black) and Alice from The L Word. Technically… Tasha does live but her character gets shipped off to war and never returns. -_-
Now we have The Fosters with Lena Adams-Fosters who is biracial (white father, black mother). I would like to think she’s not going to die considering she is one-half of the duo leading the show.
There’s Amanita on sense8 who is currently alive, however, sense8 just finished their first season and it looks reckless as hell. Who knows if she’ll even make it to the end of the show.
We also have Annalise Keating on How to Get Away With Murder. Maybe you can throw in Sophia Burgess from Orange is the New Black, but her sexuality hasn’t really been explored aside from her ex-wife.
So we have a few living black women, nevertheless, some of their fates are still undecided. I’m still keeping hope for television.
For your consideration:
A strong, beautiful, black, courageous lesbian character, who made it to the end of a series as the most redeemed of a highly compromised set of characters…
Kima, in The Wire !
(It was touch and go for a while when she was shot and critically wounded in Season 1…)
The only person I can think of is Samira Wiley’s character Moira in Handmaid’s Tale. As of season 3 she is alive and somewhat safe, although (surprise) her fiancé was murdered. Season 4 is still to come though…
Olivia Lord – Nip/Tuck
added!
Talia Winters from Babylon 5!! Teenaged me was soooo heartbroken by that!
So,so heartbroken!
And quite flabbergasted by the “I think I loved Talia.” reveal.
Damn, these two could’ve been so good together..
I’m still not wholly convinced Delphine is dead…just sayin. I know I’m not alone.
Also, nice to see Dark Angel up there. Loved that show.
It wouldn’t be the first time they did a fake out with a character and I’m really hoping that’s what they’re doing.
And no matter what, let’s always remember Delphine with her magnificent curly hair instead of all-Dyad-business straightened hair Delphine.
Delphine lives. I’m sure of it. They’re being way too coy about it, trying not to spoil us but all the deaths on the show have been graphic and she just gets shot in the gut? Like Graeme Manson said “she was shot in the liver, right? Can you die3 from that?”
So out of 65 deaths listed here, gunshot wounds seem to be the leading cause of death among LBT women (17 total; 18 if you include Tara’s human death; 18,5 if you include Sara Lance who was shot with arrows, 19 if you include Cristina from Tierra de Lobos, who died trying to avoid being shot). Gun control people. It’s a thing.
The second leading cause of dead is car related (3 of them intentional, 3 accidental), stab wounds take the 3rd place (5, including Nan Flanagan’s staking) and 4th leading cause of death is being bludgeoned.
Unrealistically, no lesbian died because of over-processing or U-Hauling incidents. I call bullshit.
I really would have thought cancer would have been higher on this list….
“Unrealistically, no lesbian died because of over-processing or U-Hauling incidents. I call bullshit.”
I appreciated the laugh. Thank you.
Where does Ilene Chaiken fall on this list?
Wow. Also, Private Practice, 2011 – Susan Grant to cancer / cardiac arrest, and Bizzy Forbes to suicide, right after their wedding to each other.
YEP YEP! They both had reoccurring arcs, which should qualify them for this list. And they were over 50/60 years old, late in life lesbians, which is rarity.
And I was just about to congratulate Shonda on, despite her other faults, never falling into the “bury your gays” trope. :(
added!
I’ve been rewatching Private Practice lately, and yeah. Ouch.
I never made the connection at the time with Private Practice but looking at it now, holy shit. And trying to think if Shondaland has done this in any other place….I have a sick feeling that Oliver might get killed off on HTGAWM but I feel like Callie and Arizona will always remain living. That was the strangest few sentences I have ever written.
I tend to give Shonda a liiiiittle more leeway because it feels like she at least kills off straight and queer characters at roughly the same pace, overall (what even? you know you’re talking about soap operas when…)
That said, Private Practice is my least favorite Shonda show (except for Off the Map) – it felt so obnoxiously straight sometimes and often Political Issue of the week which was kinda cool and kind of annoying.
Also, I always wanted Addison to be a lesbian. I loved Kate Walsh so much and she got so watered down on PP as opposed to Grey’s where she was this great mix of ice queen and person I’d want to be besties with and also make-out with.
The one thing I did really love about PP was Amy…she will forever be my favourite Shonda character and I really, really wish with all my heart that she will discover she is bisexual
Didn’t Denny Blood’s girlfriend in Bad Girls, with the fuzzy blonde hair, die in a fire whilst high as a kite?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Bad_Girls_characters#Shaz_Wiley
added!
I’m currently watching season 3 of Hannibal because I was guaranteed a happy ending for the lesbian couple. BUT I DON’T GET ANY OF SEASON 3 what is happening I need help.
Me too. I don’t understanding anything in this season |D But I can’t imagine a happy end for the two tbh o.o
Really feel this comment. I was so thrilled and honestly shocked by the lesbian couple making it out alive on that show. The lesbians so rarely survive, let alone a couple!
As for explaining S3, I wish I could. It took me three watches of the first half of S3 before I felt like I was following anything and I’m still not sure I actually understand it. Good luck!
Jadzia Dax (1998)
Cause of Death: Blasted by an alien possessed alien
For Hex, you’ve mish-mashed both of the murdered lesbians – the picture and cause of death is for Thelma Bates, who dies in the first episode.
Maya Robertson is hit by a vehicle and killed later on in the series.
thank you for the correction! nice to know they killed two lesbians
Also Thelma sticka around as a ghost for most of the show – not sure how that counts? Also, the actress played George in The Famous Five and did an ep of Sugar Rush if that is of interest to anyone but me…
They both become ghosts and actually became a couple afterwards, it’s not like their deaths were the end of their stories.
Also, in Brookside there was another lesbian death: Shelley started out as a perfectly reasonable character that started going out with Lindsay Corkhill (one of the main characters). Shelley duly went batshit crazy, tried to instigate a weird love triangle with Lindsay’s mum, then started a fire in which she died.
I will attempt to find evidence of this beyond my own infallible lesbian death memory.
I looked up a bunch of synopses and couldn’t find anything saying Shelley died so I eagerly await your return and concordant evidence
I am starting to suspect that my lesbian death memory may be fallible after all, because I can’t find any evidence that Shelley actually died! (she deffo had a total personality transplant to psycho-dom though).
I may have to re-evaluate everything about my own cognitive functions, and life itself.
i want you to know that i liked both your comments anyway
Thank you Riese, that provides me with some comfort, as I feared I was to become the first lesbian to die from futile googling.
I finally tracked down Shelley’s last appearance, and she left in a taxi, not a hearse. I am going to embark on a long period of personal reflection over this mistake.
Some mitigating circumstances: it was 15 years ago, Brookside had a lot of fires, and I had a lot of alcohol.
Delphine Cormier shouldn’t be on this list because we don’t know if she’s dead for sure. #SaveDelphine
Oof.
Oh no, now I know that Charlie in Home & Away died. I only watched the Joey & Charlie parts until Joey ran away after Charlie cheated on her with a guy (if I remember correctly). My headcanon of course was that they found each other again and were happy ever after. Damn it.
yeah I had no idea…unless I actually do remember 0_0…the thing with home and away is once you get reminded of one thing it all comes flooding back
really it was joey “running off on a boat” that “killed” the lesbian storyline (or the attempt at one) if I recall charlie never actually seemed all that into the whole thing (or if she was she was really really angsty about it) I’m actually surprised they didn’t kill Joey since that would have been more in line with the running theme here
Charlie died well and truly after her “lesbian phase” was buried..its a shame because Charlie was the one and only home and away character I actually liked
Now I remember the “running off on a boat” too, what a sad scene. At least Joey didn’t die, you’re right. The pulled a “lesbian disappears in the parking lot” (stems from Erica leaving Grey’s Anatomy I think).
In my opinion Charlie was just really angsty about being with a woman and in the end her fear killed the relationship. Somehow I liked their storyline anyway (up until the cheating), it was kinda sweet and touching.
joey was also really cute :/
I think they canned it because of the controversy at the time? I mean you can’t really expect much from something like Home and Away but from what I remember it was a bit of a “how not to write a gay story-line”
like characters making joeys gayness “a thing” and Charlie being so angsty over it it was almost as if it wasn’t fully consensual. That said though it would be interesting to watch again with the perspective I have now as opposed to how I felt at the time (I would have been in highschool and very homophobic/closeted)
If Xena doesn’t get included on the list then Isabelle Hartley and Victoria Hand shouldn’t be on the list. At least Xena had subtext. Despite them being queer in the comics, they were not openly queer in Agents of SHIELD.
This is probably distasteful but damn it’s so funny how Lucy Lawless is in this list 4 times… a true ally hahaha
Some of these deaths still make me salty. >:-(
Pedantic infighting about whether or not Xena was a canonical lesbian is like having a slap fight about whether or not a tomato is a fruit or a vegetable while locusts swarm around and try to destroy all the produce. WE’RE FIGHTING THE LOCUSTS.
Well I mean, it is a fruit :p
I get your point, just being a pain the ass.
If you can’t be pedantic AND fight the patriarchy, is there any hope for us?
Heather, I’m ready to DEETspray the locusts with you whenever you’re ready. Tomato, tomahtoe. Seems like some of our fellow travellers may have missed the point.
The fact that so many of these happened in 2015 is really discouraging.
Also, RIP Lexa :(
I mean I think it makes sense that so many would happen in 2015 because there are so many more queer characters in 2015 than in prior years?
That’s pretty much what I tried to say below, though now I’m wishing I’d found a simpler way to say it.
I am still so, so, SO very mad about Tam-Tam. Tamsin deserved so much better than death by rape baby.
Tamsin’s fate shits me. Fuck that bullshit. “it’s okay, she’s my legacy” NO Tamsin should be fighting right up to the last.
I am astonished that people continue to cite Lost Girl as good representation after the rape baby plot.
ALSO thank you so much for putting this together. A friend and I were talking about LGBT FANS DESERVE BETTER and they were all “but it’s getting better…!” and nope nope NOPE it’s just getting worse.
I wonder what the statistics are of (dead lesbians/total # of all lesbian characters ever) would be.
Yeah, I’d love someone (else) to do the chances of a queer major character dying on a majority queer show (The L Word, etc); a queer major character dying on a majority hetero show; compared to a straight major character dying on either.
Same!!! Colorful charts and graphs would be divine, too.
Yes! And then broken down by year (it seems there’s a lot more queer women now, but they’re all dying, ya know?) and by cause of death (shooting, stabbing, jealous boyfriend, other). Would be fascinating/sad.
This hurts. And i haven’t even seen most of these programmes.
DELPHINE IS NOT DEAD YOU GUYS!!!!
Does Lucy on NBC’s Dracula count? The show made her canon bi, which the book did not when writing her death/change-into-a-vampire.
I wasn’t sure! Because although she was killed, she remained on the show, just as a vampire instead of as a human. Like her role didn’t change / diminish, right?
I feel like the point might be that their sexuality gets them killed, and the emphasis with Lucy on the show is definitely on her feelings for Mina. They didn’t have to make her bisexual, but they did, and she was killed.
Aside from telling the world queer folk don’t deserve happy endings, the media is screaming that we all need to get some flak jackets and helmets.
No! A protective force field generator.
Just to be sure.
Helmets and flak jackets: the new beanies and flannel.
They got kevlar hoodies.
Maybe be we can get ’em in a plaid?
Just make sure to have those nice dilatant non-Newtonian fluid impact protection pads.
I think they’re called D3o or D30.
Anyway they’re awesome and you would want to have your kevlar stop that bullet only to have impact stop your heart or send bones into squishy important bits.
That would be heartbreaking.
Literally not just figuratively.
#=$%!
Comment award !
try re-typing instead of copy-paste and make sure there aren’t too many quotation marks around the address
i fixed it for you
Thank you, Riese, you’re a darling.*spoken in HG Wells voice*
I really REALLY wanna make a sexual innuendo at this picture but I’m just gonna sit here quietly instead.
Ditto
<_<
We could totally adopt the three fingered salute as a Lesbian/Bi thing.
Honoring our fallen heroines and chuckling while doing so.
Purple middle finger.
That is what I got out of that.
Because bi pride flag has a purple stripe in the middle.
I think it is time for sleep now.
Debate if index or ring finger should be the magenta or the blue laterrr.
re-typing the I mean, not the link. but on closer investigation, I think maybe that link source just doesn’t play nice!
Let’s try imgur,then, which was so kind to change its entire layout..
Thank you, Rachel, you’re super sweet, I’m obviously just entirely incapable.
xoxo
The image is perfect, it needed to happen.
76? Oh lawd give me strength not to try to write Killed Off Queer Ladies cover of an annoying stage musical song that’s a con man’s pitch to swindle a town.
I came here to say Charlie is not just a Dead Lesbian she’s also an example of what I call Murdocking. Killing off a perfectly sweet nice character that happens to be in the life of white male hero character simply to up the Angst-o-Meter, not to develop the story.
He’s not deep in the man pain and you worry the actual plot is just too slow for our tiny minds? Kill someone nice. He’ll be sad, we’ll sad it’s all good now.
No, no it is not because we see you and your lazy writing. We see it.
It’s called Fridging! There was comic book where a woman was killed and shoved in a fridge to move the man’s story forward. It’s a whole other crushing trope.
No.
Fridging is for love interests and people very close to the hero and requires a certain degree of brutality and intent by the villainous forces in the hero’s life. Also leads to much angsted revenge plot
Murdocking is friends, associated, periphery and for angst that just adds to man pain and no plot. Even a dumb over done revenge plot.
I’ve never seen Supernatural or Home & Away so…which Charlie are you referring to and why do you call it Murdocking?
Charlie from Supernatural
Cause of the character Matt Murdock.
Because people nice or sweet in his periphery get killed off or something to make him sad an awful lot.
Plenty of fridging too, but dude is constantly being given the sads by stuff happening to people around him.
**FUCKED UP WARNING**
***************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
It was Alexandra DeWitt girlfriend of Green Lantern Kyle Rayner. She was killed by the villain Major Force and her body forcibly crammed into the fridge of their shared domicile for Kyle to find.
It was just one example in a trend at the time of brutalising female secondary characters for shock value, sexual exploitation and to create a revenge plot for a male primary character.
In couple cases exploitatively brutalising a female main character for an “emotional impactful and brave” arc that would be forgotten and not touch upon ever again.
I totally agree. I’m so pissed at the show for sacrificing Charlie on the altar of Dean’s angst.
Also, I really thought they would not kill her as she’s the only recurring female character the fans didn’t hate. Her lesbianism being a big reason. She did not pose a threat to the Winchester brothers threesome playing out in their minds.
So mad at TPTB for killing my Charlie!
I may have missed it but I don’t recall Julie being queer in The Expanse TV show. She isn’t, as far as I can tell, in the books and her dating profile only displays men.
i added it after a commenter told me to, this is all i was able to find to confirm it:
Wow clearly I missed that one! Thanks
Same! I’m wondering if it was an off hand comment about her being queer. And she appeared in like 2 seconds of the show…so not sure if that counts really either way
I really dont think she was, that profile was to lure specific people to help her undermine her fathers company while working in the opa. They dont talk about her sexuality at all in the series, her existence is for something else entirely. Plus Miller’s in love with her and the writers do a weird thing with that at the end of the first book. Sorry Im just religiously reading these books right now. :P
Add Jill Marie Jones’s character from Ash vs. the Evil Dead. Zombified on Christmas and I think the zombie died the next week.
i can’t find anything about her sexual orientation, can you direct me to a source?
I unfortunately don’t even know her name on the show, but in one of the old Boob(s) on Your Tube, Heather definitely had picture of her flirting with (and possibly kissing) Xena. I remember it because everyone else was excited about Lucy Lawless playing gay, and I was excited because Jill Marie Jones was one of my favorite actors on a UPN sitcom called “Girlfriends”….. I didn’t know her character on Ash vs. Evil died though. That’s sad!
Nothing happened within Ruby and Amanda, except that heavy flirting scene.
Ruby Knowby’s (Lucy Lawless) status on the series is unknown, she could be dead. Jeez, Lucy Lawless has shit for luck.
yeah she also played #3 on Battlestar Galactica… who also died!
Hmm, thought I read something before the show started but now I can’t find it. I’ll come back if I do.
Webseries aren’t included, right?
Thank Jebus, Riese, for not including Xena, because in that case we would need a new category: “Bury Your Lucy Lawless”.
right? Mia Kirshner bringing up the rear, too
Well, it was kinda miraculous that her character on 24 didn’t ended that way.
Why is everyone saying that? She’s near the top of the list.
Didn’t read the introduction, did you? ;)
Check the ETA Riese added. Xena wasn’t on the list until commenters either badgered her into it or convinced her it wasn’t the writers’ fault it wasn’t more overt, depending on your perspective.
I forgot Hex existed!!! I was OBSESSED with that show. I don’t think 15 year old me knew why so much…I think it’s on Netflix too.
Man, this is painful to see. Also I’ve been watching Hemlock Grove (only finished the first season so far) and in the first episode a girl gets killed by a beast and near the end there’s this woman(forgot her name) who died after being skinned alive, both were lesbians I believe.
Dr. Clementine Chasseur! Riese, you should add her to the list. I can’t find the HTML for it but here’s a pic:
http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/hemlockgrove/images/a/a6/Tumblr_mok21d8sAz1srr4wio1_500.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20130812063333
Cause of death: Mercy killed after being skinned alive by Famke Janssen.
wow! i watched that show and totally forgot. will add!
Sweet. I totally blanked until Alex’s comment too, which is weird because she was my favorite character.
yeah! and she’s the actress from battlestar. i mean as soon as Alex mentioned it i was like OH YEAH, I remember even when we were watching the show i was like oh god of course they are killing the black lesbian
Oh the teacher and the student relationship. yeah they were lesbians – the teacher as far as i know is canonically still alive. Her name was brooke bluebell and she was killed by a vargulf.
Man, this is painful to see. Also I’ve been watching Hemlock Grove (only finished the first season so far) and in the first episode a girl gets killed by a beast and near the end there’s this woman(forgot her name) who died after being skinned alive, both were lesbians.
It’s distressing to see how many got killed by jealous men.
On another note, they’ve had gay people on Home & Away!? This would be awesome news if I hadn’t found out whilst reading one of them died!
Adding to the list: Samantha Krueger in Ascension.
Oh, and Laure Valere in Les Revenants.
oh interesting, she didn’t die in the american version, she was shot but survived
i’m having a hard time nailing down how she died — dehydration? shot? eaten? it seems like the information was revealed in pieces and it’s hard to track down a solid answer. do you know?
Well, her death wasn’t shown on-screen (Alix Poisson was pregnant at the time of filming and didn’t appear in season 2). The police officers who fought the horde at the end of season 1 and mysteriously disappeared were found dead in season 2, presumably killed by the undead. Julie sees a poster in the hospital of Laure and the other missing officers and asks a nurse about them who informs her that they’re dead. This is all they reveal about her death, unfortunately. Safe to say she died fighting the horde, but the specifics are still a mystery.
no wonder it was hard to find! thank you.
…is it bad to say I don’t believe Delphine Cormier is dead? The showrunner teased in a Comiccon about someone being able to survive being shot through their liver if they got medical attention…
She has been officially said to be dead. The show hopefully are lying but as of now she is said to be dead so does fit the list until proven otherwise.
Showrunner interview:
Variety: “Can you definitively confirm that Delphine is dead, or is there still hope?
Fawcett: I would love to say yes or no, but this is “Orphan Black” and I don’t want to say one way or the other … We wanted to leave it in a hanging cliffhanger, so is she dead? Is she alive? I want the audience asking those questions.”
Would be worth it to mention Nadia Petrova from The Vampire Diaries (2014, death by werewolf venom) as it is an other prominent CW show and was shown having sex with an other woman and a man early in the season. Earlier on there was also Isobel Flemming (2011) played by Mia Kirshner more subtly hinted as bi (she was shown having compelled a male and female stripper, the latter of which was shown with bite marks on her thighs) and she committed suicide by exposing herself to sunlight.
To further help Nadia is seen kissing and having sex with Rebekah Mikaelson in 5×01
and she dies in 5×15
http://vampirediaries.wikia.com/wiki/Nadia_Petrova
from what i’ve heard she only had sex with rebekah in order to rob her? is there any other evidence of her queerness? sorry to be a stickler! it’s just that the value of the list dilutes if we include everybody who has kissed a girl even if they aren’t considered a queer/bi/lez character by the showrunners.
Well one could argue she was sleeping with both Matt and Rebekah for it, but in that case she wouldn’t have needed to interact with Rebekah at all in the capacity she did. The scene focused on Rebekah and Nadia as opposed to focusing on Matt. I’m not sure it dilutes the list – it only underlines the point of how narrow and limited our representation is, and how most of the time it ends in shock/tragedy (when it doesn’t go with the whole ‘bi girl redeems herself by getting with a guy’ route). I also feel personally it’s quite relevant given the CW’s particular body count in this mess.
Agreed on both accounts.
HAHAHA the first gif oh my god… the smugness and the way she checks her out. Thanks for finding those I couldn’t remember the exact episodes featuring Isobel’s gay… Nadia’s is obviously fresher in my mind. They have the petrova fire (and gay). Also is it me or does Mia Kirshner have a really specific niche/typecast? She’s basically typecast as the queer girl who dies.
I REMEMBERED ANOTHER ONE !
In At Home with the Braithwaites, Megan, the married woman who lived next door had an affair with Virginia, eldest daughter of the main family and generally excellent TV lesbian. I seem to recall they had a Bollywood-themed wedding ceremony (before gay marriage was legal) before spiralling into gin-soaked post-nuptial hell and eventual breakup. Shortly aftwards Megan is accidentally electrocuted in the bath when some appliance (maybe a TV?) falls in the water!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At_Home_with_the_Braithwaites#Megan_Hartnoll
added!
But don’t worry, Megan is now Rhona in Shetland, and she hasn’t been killed off (yet)…
this makes me wanna smash something tbh
Tosha (one of Omar’s crew) in The Wire was accidentally shot in a heist.
Delphine is not dead.
omg i forgot about her! i loved her so much
I didn’t realize cars have such a vendetta against queer women.
They be jelly of how we’re shinier than they are, being made of rainbows and unicorn dust aka glitter.
Like fairy dust but gayer.
And yet strangely I’ve noticed when cars are given names in fiction they’re usually feminine, like ships!
Well you know girls are catty, vicious and appearance obsessed.
Us being shinier than they are is still totally motive for their vendetta.
/sarcasm
Lillian was a recurring character in the Canadian show Murdoch Mysteries and was shot dead early this season by the husband of her ex-lover.
Dixie’s recurring lover Karen died after a head injury in the UK show Casualty.
This list is nowhere complete and there’s plenty of characters missing.
It says on wiki that Dixie’s lover was Carol; Karen is minor character from one of the 80’s seasons
What about Sophia? from Skins, the one who died by jumping from a height while on drugs and later we find out the girl who sold her the drugs also had a thing with her…
added!
Thanks Riese. Is it still suicide if she’s probably too high to really know what she’s doing?
she’s on the list
Julie Mao from “The Expanse” is confirmed queer? I missed that somehow! How was it shown?
someone tipped me off to her either on this thread or on twitter — and this is what i was able to find to confirm it:
wow i had missed this too
Wow, that’s a long list.
Since last week’s The 100, I have been thinking about queer female characters that died on German TV shows. I came up with these:
– Sonia Besirsky, Lindenstraße (1998): drug overdose, probably killed by the husband of her former lover
– Hanna Novak, Verbotene Liebe (2004): dies from a stroke in the arms of her girlfriend Carla von Lahnstein
– Franzi Reuter, Gute Zeiten, schlechte Zeiten (2008): dies in a gas explosion
At the moment, there are barely any queer female characters on German TV shows, but at least there haven’t been any casualties lately.
I still miss Hanna, sometimes. The Paula/Franzi-storyline was a mess. I might add:
– Susanne Teubner, Hinter Gittern (1999): deadly shot during a bank robbery
added!
Seeing Agents Hand and Hartley from SHIELD on this list is bitterly ironic, cause the showrunners specifically said that one of the reasons they erased both character’s queer sexualities from the show is because they didn’t want to become known as the show with two dead lesbians. Yeah, fuck that show.
I’m also wondering how many of these characters were killed because the actresses who portrayed them got better jobs and the showrunners basically went “welp!” (Lip Service, The 100, etc)
That is why I don’t understand how they made the list but some other characters didn’t
Well, I’d support them being on this list if only because it’s a big f-you to the showrunners who explicitly wanted to avoid this outcome, which is bullshit homophobic erasure.
precisely
That’s why I assumed they were being included. Glad to see I wasn’t wrong!
You don’t get to pretend that you didn’t “bury your gays”. We all know what you did- and you do too. No free passes.
Given that more than half of the entries on this list were in last five years, could be reasonably argued that lesbian and bisexual characters aren’t necessary dying with greater frequency, but than we just have more openly gay and bisexual character on TV in general. While it still possible that percentage wise they may be more likely than (presumably) strait to be treated as expendable, it stand to reason that the more of you truly exist in fiction-the more of you are bound to die in fiction too.
So maybe in morbid way…this could be consider a partial sign of progress over time? That doesn’t give writers on automatic out for killing a popular charter of course or even a poorly written killing of an unpopular character. It’s just hard to say now if gay and bi characters are still more likely to bit a bad end than strait ones. Especially since the growth of networks have made the number of reoccurring characters so much larger, even while most of them are still written as straight.
As you seem confident enough to cast aspersions on the shared experience of a group of 200+ commenters that say the exact opposite, you shouldn’t have any problems providing 90+ examples of living/happy queer women in TV. Annnnd Go:
I’m not prejudging the experience of anyone else. At not point did I mention any other commentators. All I did was offer a speculative question as to what these figures might tell us about how much visibility has gotten better or worse over time. Although I do notice there should been a question mark at the end my first sentence, so maybe there is some confusion there.
Do you honestly think that no-one else here has considered that question? Or are you to be considered the only voice of reason and logic?
Also, I’m not actually trying to be aggressive. If you really do know better than most here, a list showing proof of your theory would be very much welcomed right now.
So if you can provide a list, please do.
I honestly don’t what I wrote that led you to think I want to be consider “the only voice of reason and logic,” I’m not so delusional that I would consider myself the final voice on anything. I have no theory. It was all speculation about things good and bad.
There are far more gay and bi character on TV now than there were ten twenty etc. years ago. Along with a long of other groups are still marginalized and stereotyped. In shows where a lot of characters are bound to die anyone (crime and horror) in-particular, there are bound to be more cases where at least some of these characters are gay.
I never said that number of gay and bi character dying WEREN’T disproportionally high. I said maybe percentage wide they gotten higher or maybe they’ve gotten lower and admitted it’s hard to tell. That’s why I said that the…”growth of networks have made the number of reoccurring characters so much larger, even while most of them are still written as straight.”
FYI I agree that there should be more stories with gay/bi/trans characters in leading roles living to the end of a series and more same-sex couples with happy endings. However, as Riese pointed out not ever death listed here can be considered wholly on called for. The most offensive about the Bury the Gays trope is that the gay characters are treated as “expendable,” with deaths occurring for gratuitous reasons. I’d be very interest to know how many of these characters (if any) could be said to have died heroically.
Again with the extraneous explanations. We know all of this already.
I am past the point of caring why they die, I just care that they keep dying.
Lol
I actually wouldn’t necessarily say that lesbian and bisexual and queer characters are dying at a greater frequency than they have been in the past. I think the ratio of lgbtq characters killed to lgbtq characters that exist has remained the same over time… and that ratio has always been way too damn high! it’s uncanny.
I suppose this question could apply to change or lack of change for in the portrayal of characters who make up any minority – but do you think this is mainly due to linger prejudice or simple laziness?
To be fair to Mike, this occurred to me (a lesbian who is thoroughly frustrated on a personal level by All The Dead WLW) too – not a working theory or an opposition, just a pondering. I wondered whether the % of WLW character dying had remained the same but the number increased because there’s more of us on telly. I wondered whether the % might even have gone DOWN but there’d been a real terms increase because of improved representation. I also wondered if, with the increased representation, the % might even have gone UP due to the fact that yes, writers are inserting more WLW, but then they haven’t a clue what to DO with them, particularly once they’re happily loved-up, and they’re actually now even more disproportionately likely to kill them.
All of these things occurred to me. Mike could’ve phrased his comment more carefully given his position as a dude in lezspace, but reading over it I don’t think he meant to be a voice of authority. He was just struck by a thought that I know I’ve been wondering about, on and off, since this article was published. I don’t have any answers either but I don’t think the question is offensive in and of itself…
(PS: I am usually the one crucifying mansplainers; I stg)
Mayor Carol Blanton from Neon Joe, Werewolf Hunter
cause of death / year?
Actually she survived the spacecraft crash, but she was bitten by Neon Joe’s dad, so: cybot + werewolf.
Thank you for bringing this show to my attention, it was funny as hell.
Kate’s death in Last Tango In Halifax made me so angry. As did the whole planned pregnancy by sex with a man thing. That programme did all the other storylines really well and theirs really badly.
Yeah, me too. That couple had such storyline potential, but Kate was “not integral” to the plot. She was much more than a plot device, especially to older lesbians viewers. . So proud of the leskru’s activism. They are schooling the rest of us in who it make an impact: over $30,000 raised for Trevor!
That was the lesbian death which finally tipped me over the edge to say – enough.
Sally Wainwright has three kills to her name on this list: Kate, Helen Bartlett in Scott & Bailey, and Megan Hartnoll in At home with the Braithwaites. Is that a record for one person?
Also – what about unlucky in love Sophie Webster’s girlfriend Maddie Heath? There’s an explosion in a building yard as she’s passing. She dies a couple of days later from her injuries.
Ryan Murphy has quite a few on the list
Occurs to me now that there were a couple of occasions where it is suggested that Clara Oswald isn’t entirely straight and we all know how last season of Doctor a Who ended…
She didn’t really die though.
Well, she did, then she turned into an immortal time traveler, so…
Clara is canon bisexual, as is River Song, they should both be on this list.
There’s a longstanding tendency in the gay/lesbian community to require much more proof of bisexuality than of being lesbian/gay… which is a lot like the way straight people want way more proof a character is a lesbian than that she’s straight.
It goes right along with phrasing like “gay or *at least* bisexual” to make us seem like… in our community’s eyes, we barely count.
Please, everybody, hold bi characters to the same burden of proof. If you would have read Clara, for example, as queer for all her Jane Austen innuendo if she HADN’T had a boyfriend, read her as bi now.
I agree with both of these. Clara in 2015 and River… confuses me lol.
Also that is the best way I’ve ever heard how to read someone as bi explained, thank you! :)
Yeah, this. I 100% read Clara as bisexual, and the text of the show supports it (she mentions kissing and loving Jane Austen, seems pretty clear to me). But if they’re sticking with their “no subtext rule” with a broad definition of subtext (which is weird, considering Talia is on here) then River should at least “count.” She mentions having a wife.
Is there a happy ending list?
Please, for the mental health of the staff I hope there is.
May it be long and glorious.
They Don’t Die is a Tumblr blog working to document queer women couples that get happy endings in media (not just TV, but also games, movies, webcomics, and the like). It’s pretty new and they’re taking submissions.
Thankyou, Riese, for doing all the hard work for us and putting this list together! Seeing quite a few of these dredged up some painful TV memories (Pepsi! Why??). It helps put this past week in context. It’s not a nice list, but important, nonetheless.
I hate to be a stickler but Marissa from All My Children was played by Sarah Glendening not the girl you have in the picture. Yes the girl in the picture (Brittany Allen) DID play Marissa but she wasn’t the Marissa that was part of the MINX pairing.
Personally I was a huge BAM fan (I actually went to events for them) and I only shipped Eden Riegel’s Bianca with Liz Hendrickson’s Maggie. I also became a huge MINX fan because it was now Christine Lind’s Bianca with Sarah Glendening’s Marissa. I basically considered them 2 separate couples not the same character (Bianca) with different women.
fixed the picture, i think!
I’m with you I was a huge BAM fan in the day. Eden and Liz had amazing chemistry!
um Jadzia Dax was not a lesbian. At best, she was bi. But one kiss with a woman does not make her a lesbian.
Title of list includes bisexual and her case is not cut and dry as just one kiss with a woman.
She was a joined Trill.
Which is why the article is named 65 Dead lesbian AND **BISEXUAL** characters on TV and how they died.
There are some days when I wonder why I watch Supernatural, and some days when I wonder when I’m going to outright hatewatch it. Killing Charlie felt like one of the biggest fuck yous from that show. She was only in a couple eps this current season, but there was also a cute queer cop lady that was killed off after her soul was sucked out.
Jenna Nickerson I believe was her name. She revealed on the show that her first kiss was with a woman.
She had her soul sucked out by a demon baby and was then killed by being tossed around by another character until her neck breaks.
I will be forever bitter about Charlie.
But I’m also not entirely convinced she’s dead. It IS Charlie we’re talking about here.
They could definitely find a way to bring her back. Which I hope they do.
you know when i first saw that you had updated the article i jokingly thought, watch this get to a hundred. we’re at bloody 85 and i didnt think it was actually possible for it to be this high. guess what? i have another queer casualty, from a Brazilian show called happily ever after? felizes para sempre? ( a freakin question mark should be all you need to know about how it ends.) anyway, denise/simone is shot and killed. denise and marilla were amazing together. ive included a link in case anyone is interested
Nadia Petrova on The Vampire Diaries, bitten by a werewolf.
Seeing Lexa made me feel a lot of fresh things. Ugh.
Are Vastra and Jenny on Doctor Who still alive?
Also, River Song was bisexual and they killed her, yeah?
was river song actually written as bi, though, or just said to be bi on twitter? i hesitate to include characters that were essentially queerbaiting, because i don’t think they fit in as examples of this trend
River Song is bi on the show, she mentioned in the last Christmas episode that she had been married to a woman (Something about her 2nd wife).
Clara Oswald is bi on the show as well and technically dead, but just removed from time at the moment of her death.
yeah i feel that. i actually don’t recall – i only watched the episodes when amy pond was on because, actually, she is my root – and if river canonically did anything gay it was after i stopped watching out of spite. so she may well have been a queerbait character, and unworthy of this list
She mentioned onscreen having had two ex-wives.
Jenny died and was brought back twice in the same episode, The name of the Doctor, and it was fucking brutal watching Vastra break down. So yeah Jenny died, but then undied because Doctor Who. I feel like if Thelma from Hex counts, Jenny counts because Thelma then spent 2 seasons as a ghost and even got a ghost girlfriend.
Thankfully yes! Jenny did die, but then they went back and fixed it, so it doesn’t really count. River Song died the first time we met her, and we have seen her lots since because of timelines and things. As a side note – Jenny and Vastra should have their own spin off. Love them so much!
I second Jenny and Vastra having a spin off, I flaming love them. I feel like a Victorian Torchwood type thing would be brilliant.
How could I have forgotten about Vastra and Jenny?
Vastra and Jenny are still alive, well in the 19th century so they are probably dead by now but not in the show.
As for River, she died in her first episode, before she was known as bisexual, and she’s kept coming back since so I don’t know if that should be on the list really.
Wasn’t River Song killed off before she was revealed as being bi? Or for that matter, became a recurring character in the first place. She died in the episode with Ten which introduced her as the Doctor’s future lover.
susan on seinfeld died after licking some bad envelopes
She was engaged to George Costanza and was licking the defective envelopes for their wedding invitations. how can she be considered openly gay if she was engaged to a man?
This list isn’t only for gay women. Bisexual women count too, and it is mentioned in an episode that Susan has a history of dating women as well as men.
Original Cindy’s girlfriend hurt. I’ve been a robot ever since.
There is also Piper Perabo ( as Paulie) in Lost and Delirious when she jumps out of the roof!
that’s a movie
this is about tv shows
also does anybody want to hear me talk about how much i hate lost & delirious
If I can counter it with how much I loved that movie as young teenager and the twisted reasons why.
It will be terrible.
Like watching that movie again as an adult with none thanatotic worshipfulness of a terribly short sighted depressed adolescent.
That movie scarred me as a kid. It was like one big anxiety festival.
That means you were totally sane as a kid.
I toast to your continued sanity.
But it’s okay this world can be maddening after all look at that dead count.
It’s 135 at the moment.
Can you imagine the numbers if you add movies to the list? Endless.
Lesbian and bisexual characters ON TV…
This list would be more interesting if someone could compile and compare all of these deaths with two additional lists: A) how many lesbian and bi characters are still currently alive on series or survived full run of a TV series, and B) how many heterosexual characters have been killed off of series.
That would be interesting to me. Maybe only to me; I like quantitative analysis.
i think it would take at least a year to do that!
I think it would be extremely hard(well time consuming) to compile a list of heterosexual characters who have been killed considering that hetero characters have always made up the overwhelming majority of tv characters and there are a shitload of tv shows, past and present, to sift through.
It’s much easier to make up of a list of lesbian and bi characters(dead or alive) when they only account for like less than one percent of tv representation. Even less in previous years.
yeah, exactly!
i mean y’all know there is nothing i love more than analyzing data, counting things, and making lists and graphs of those things, but oh man there have been thousands of tv shows!
The list of dead heterosexual characters seems pretty impossible, haha. A list of lesbian/bisexual women that have survived the full run of a tv show (so no currently airing shows would be on the list) would be a lot easier to do, I think.
That would be beyond time consuming. I mean taking just Buffy, for example you’d have a good 100 that were killed off alone. But I suppose that also depends on who you include…
I am comfortable with Skins Fire never existing, so Naomi is alive and well in my mind.
I know she was loathed by the fandom, but I really liked Cat from Lip Service. The show went off into an entirely differently direction, one that I didn’t appreciate. So I think the showrunners made a mistake killing her off.
Dahlia from Legend of the Seeker. Was in 3 episodes. Pretty sure she died from confession by Kahlan. Was love interest for Cara.
Dahlia was resurrected afterward, though.
I know this has been answered before and it may seem abit silly for some people that we are arguing over whether Xena counts as canon or not, but her death in particular has affected me the most out of all the lesbians and bi women I’ve seen killed in fiction and I’m sure I’m not the only one whose been affected deeply by her being pointlessly killed off.
It just seems wrong to not recognize this fact and the pain it has caused women like me over something as small as not giving the showrunners credit for a show older than most of the things on this list which limits what they even could do. I think the number of people pointing out how they feel Xena missing from the list enough for her to be put on it.
Also supporting Xena and Gabrielle being added to the list are the numerous interviews with Xena herself, Lucy Lawless, stating outright that she herself felt that Xena and Gabby were a couple at the end of the series. One could add the numerous lesbian in-jokes added deliberately to the series by the writers once they discovered that the show had a large lesbian following, but I could argue that as being merely circumstantial evidence. (I could, but I won’t, since I’m a hetero guy who felt all along that Xena was bisexual and, up to the point where I stopped watching after Julius Caesar showed up and the writers went on a crucifixion kick, didn’t want to force herself on Gabrielle but respected Gabby as a friend enough to let Gabby discover her gender preference for herself.)
I may be just slightly wrong about this as well but I believe that Gaia was actually murdered by Lucretia who was Batiatus’ wife. Gaia knew one of Lucretia’s deepest secrets and threatened to reveal it causing Lucretia to murder her.
No, Gaia was definitely murdered by a dude and Lucretia was super-duper broken up and over it and started wearing Gaia’s wig or one just like it afterward like the weirdo she was.
Gaia was killed by Tullius. He was causing trouble at a party held by Lucretia and Gaia tried to seduce him both to help Lucretia and to hopefully get Tullius interested enough in her to consider marrying her, but instead he kills her in order to essentially send a message to Lucretia and Batiatus.
Gaia was murdered by a senator who was trying to send a message to Batiatus and Lucretia and kinda derail their ambition.
Here is a (likely incomplete) list of LGBTQ characters in TV and radio. It might be worth cross-referencing this list to see if there are any names we’re missing.
I’m trying to find out if local Asian media has snuck in queer characters solely to kill them off for the purposes of making a point about how homosexuality is an evil sin. I know there’s been at least one case in theater but that’s all I recall.
Oh don’t worry I have already gone through that entire list backwards and forwards. That’s where I started — that Wikipedia list, and four other wikipedia lists organized by show (one of dramas, one of soaps, one of situation comedies, and another of tv episodes), and the tvtropes bury your gays. That was my first step. :-) I have those lists bookmarked.
Actually what’s been super interesting to me is that I did sort of assume those Wikipedia lists were fairly comprehensive — and it turns out that they definitely aren’t, if the additions offered in the comments today are any indication. I mean I literally clicked and went through the bio of every queer female character listed.
OK, so from a cursory look, from the ones I could find that have LGBTQ women characters…they all LIVE HAPPILY.
The Big F and Yudh both from India have pretty stable queer women relationships. Daughters of Club Bilitis from Korea features THREE multi-generational lesbian relationships and they all live happily ever after. I’ve yet to find one that involves trauma, let alone death.
@_@
well, that’s good news!
Whereas Asian Media is concerned; Attack on Titan had Ymir, an openly lesbian character who was given a major plot arc then immediately removed from the story after it was concluded. She’s confirmed to have been killed off-screen.
I dunno if a big, mainstream series with fans all over the world like Attack on Titan could be called “local” but Ymir’s death fits all the hallmarks of the trope.
Emily (TEEN WOLF) wasn’t mauled by an Alpha Werewolf. She was pretty much attacked by a shit ton of bugs as the SECOND virgin sacrifice for the Darach.
Plus, we don’t know if Delphine is actually dead so she shouldn’t be on the list
I think that Martha’s suicide in The Children’s Hour (1961) should count. This trope has been around a long damn time. :(
that’s a movie
this is a list about tv
yes it should count!!!
Chloe from life is strange dies infinite times XDDD but its a videogame and if she dies at the end is your decission.
Does videogames,animated movies,series count? cause there is A LOT. And i think those media are a very big representation, just like TV.
Not be a jerk but I’m dyslexic and I have managed to read the title that says “All ## Dead Lesbian and Bisexual Characters On TV, And How They Died” to come away with the information that the list is about TV characters, lesbian AND bisexual characters.
NOT all LB characters in live action or JUST lesbians.
Are you neurotypicals just very confident and never double check anything when you read before responding to something?
I’m not suppose to do better than y’all at this kinda stuff that bitch from elementary school said so.
I mean I always be glad to make her wrong, but what…what is this thing with failing at reading comprehension?
Explain this to me.
I am confused and not for the first time about this comprehension fail in neurotypicals.
TAHNK YOU, THANK YOO, THANK YOU…
PD: and about Xena, in the holy name of god, can you all please read the 5th paragraph of this post.
Yes, the conclusion paragraph in the intro. I have hypotheses for the missing of that bit.
But titles are much shorter and should be easier to maintain comprehension for people
Right?
But I would not know as I am not normal.
Maybe the thing is that we live in a very visual world nowadays? Maybe we need to replace words for pictures? This is a TV…?
It says all dead lesbian and bi characters. And they’re all dead lesbian and bi characters with their cause of death listed. Maybe I’m missing something because I’m also not neurotypical, but I don’t see the conflict.
The Lizzie Borden Chronicles has Adele (Kimberly-Sue Murray) in 3 episodes. She appears to be bisexual at least, kissing Lizzie in one of the episodes. Lizzie locks her in a coffin, later pulls her out and slits her throat to frame her for a murder.
ah yes, good call !
it bums me out how funny this is.
Some more on AHS – in Freak Show there is a woman who is involved with Neil Patrick Harris but also with a woman and then he kills either one or both of them.
In Hotel, I think Angela Bassett’s character dies too (at least, in the way that the countess does). And Sarah Paulson’s character Sally is the dead the whole time (we see her death in a flashback) and she is revealed to be queer eventually.
Oh also, the wife of one of Finn Wittrock’s characters is involved with the countess… Natacha Ramobva, she dies too.
I can’t you forgot one of the most iconic characters in TV history, Xena Warrior Princess, who was definitely bisexual if not gay. I am really disappointed by this gross omission.
“Nor is subtext or queerbaiting on this list, because we’re not gonna give Xena showrunners Queer Character Credit for a character they refused to make openly queer when she was really so obviously queer.”
It’s from the intro paragraph.
Did you read the paragraph at all?
Not trying to be mean, just curious.
The view that Xena was more than subtext isn’t uncommon, especially showing in how many people are commenting to say they think she is missing from the list.
Yes but wording of the poster’s sentence suggests she was not disputing whether it was more than subtext or not, but that she had not read the reason for the Riese’s omission of Xena from the list.
“Forgot” does not imply a disagreement with Riese’s reason, it implies the poster was unaware of the reason.
I am not on the subject of more than subtext or not in Xena the Warrior Princess
I am on about the subject of reading comprehension and whether or not people choose not to read paragraphs when they are an introduction to a more quickly consumable work like a list.
Is this clear?
Does it really matter if they haven’t read it or not, from what they have said it sounds like they disagree with Riese anyway, so arguing that they should of read it if they haven’t is kinda off point.
The thing is that Riese decided that this post should have those standards: no subtext, no queerbaiting.
I do personally considered Xena and Gabrielle canon, but I know that my consideration is built on subtext and if I use Riese’s rules, Xena can’t be on this list. Xena: Warrior Princess had very heavy subtext, heavier than the one you can find in things like Rizzoli & Isles, but still it was subtext.
Believe or not, I think that reading comprehension is a key in this matter. This week AS posted a couple of articles titled “The Seven Most Influential…”, related of course with AS 7th anniversary. In those posts you can find several movies/TV shows suggestions that have more than 7 years.
“Does it really matter if they haven’t read it or not, from what they have said it sounds like they disagree with Riese anyway, so arguing that they should of read it if they haven’t is kinda off point.”
as lex and freakazoid have said … yes, it does. the OP’s comment did not indicate disagreement, it indicated that the OP honestly somehow thought, after (not) reading the post and (not) reading the comments, that I had, in fact, FORGOTTEN, to include Xena. Your comments, erin, have been disagreements with the rules we laid out for the list. The OP’s comment is not a disagreement, it’s a condescending and hostile reminder to me for having somehow “forgotten” to include Xena.
Anyhow look, I’ve never seen Xena, I’ve only read about it. But I made this list in consultation with my team and also, I personally HATE queerbaiting and hate giving credit where no credit is due. Buffy, Friends and ER were on during the same era as Xena, and those shows had majority hetero audiences, and still debuted queer characters. Meanwhile Xena, who I imagine had a following that was pretty damn queer, knew they could keep their audience engaged without having to be brave and like them back. What you said about the impact of their death on you personally has given me pause, so I’m considering it, but I still feel weird about it.
“Does it really matter if they haven’t read it or not, from what they have said it sounds like they disagree with Riese anyway, so arguing that they should of read it if they haven’t is kinda off point.”
And I quote myself
“I am not on the subject of more than subtext or not in Xena the Warrior Princess
I am on about the subject of reading comprehension and whether or not people choose not to read paragraphs when they are an introduction to a more quickly consumable work like a list.”
YES, clearly it matters to me.
And it is not an argument that they should have read it.
It was a query, a question if they read it.
I even used a question mark.
Look:
“Did you read the paragraph at all?
Not trying to be mean, just curious.”
and
“Because I wonder about the way minds work.
Like if the main body of a work is a list and there is paragraph to introduce it do people skip the paragraph completely and go straight for the list?”
Another question mark.
I understand that rhetorical questions are used to belittle people, but my question was an honestly a question.
It could certainly be argued that my query is off topic, but the way people absorb, comprehend and interpret information plainly given to them is an interest to me. The comments to this post with a clearly displayed title and an introduction before the body of work show a dissonance of reading comprehension from people who I can assume are not all dyslexic and therefore should not “miss” details so easily.
Or so I have been told as dyslexic person.
My “superiors” are failing to be superior to me which is extra interesting, so I was curious. Took a chance to make queries on it and attempted to have them answered.
After this I will not have any discourse with you on this because I cannot make myself any clearer. And if you continue to attempt discourse on this I can only assume you’re trying to fuck with me.
I must suggest if you have such an issue with Riese’s view that Xena the Warrior Princess is only subtext and not more. You take it up with her, not me.
Unless picking on the weird kid is more your taste than taking on the Editor in Chief. But if I were you I’d try to argue with Riese, she’s much nicer than I am. Even when she’s agitated.
As neurodivergent person with cognitive problems that make it hard for me to read a lot of the time honestly you are just coming off as patronising, even if you are dyslexic, which is why i wrote my first reply. But i may have missed your point or misread things so I’m sorry.
Because I wonder about the way minds work.
Like if the main body of a work is a list and there is paragraph to introduce it do people skip the paragraph completely and go straight for the list?
yes people do it all the time, this is a chronic problem
I absolutely believe you and your voice of experience in this.
Still I want to science the shit out of this.
The what is clear but it’s the why that has my curiosity parts aflutter.
I am extra careful about reading stuff like directions or an introduction to a body of work because I don’t want to make avoidable dyslexia mistakes.
This phenomenon of skipping intro and going straight for the list by neuro-typicals is it confidence or is it the pretty light of digital devices making them less attentive?
What ever the why, I’m sorry you have wade into stuff because of it like a parent into the backseat of the kids during a long road trip because they are fighting over whose juice box has the most juice when the box clear states 6.75 FL OZ and they both know what FL OZ means because you told them last week.
No science whatsoever, but let’s play a little game.
Let’s assume that all the people skipping headlines and paragraphs, not understanding a single freaking word of what they’re reading and all that kind of shit, are all American citizens and registered voters, and, of course, a presidential election is coming.
Doesn’t that scare you shitless?
Maybe I’m just sleep deprived… But I can honestly not think of one les/bi woman in swedish TV. Living or dead.
So much for progressive country. I would gladly stand corrected though!
The only ones I can think of are the priest and her gf/wife from “Äkta Människor”, if you’ve seen that? She was played by, hmm, Bach. Sophia Bach I think? But she/they were only in season 1 (I was terribly disappointed when they weren’t in s2 tbh), aaand I don’t remember if they both made it out alive or not. I think so?
I don’t watch a lot of Swedish TV, so I can’t say if we have a lot more than that. Doubtful though. Ugh. >.<
EXCUSE YOU DELPHINE IS NOT DEAD ;_;
Emily from teen wolf wasn’t mauled by werewolves their tent was being infested with large bugs and she ran out and i think she was take by the darach (Jennifer)
oh and emily was the third sacrifice not the second
Kristen Bell’s character Flora on Deadwood is in a couple of episodes of the first season, she gets beaten and shot
I was confused by her addition. Does Flora ever say she’s queer? She talks about scamming Joanie by playing on Joanie’s lesbianism, but doesn’t imply that she herself is gay or bisexual.
Any chance of changing the last All My Children listing to Marissa Tasker instead of Chandler? It’s the one they used at the end, the one the reboot put on her grave ( http://www.afterellen.com/general-news/107209-all-my-children-recap-apr-29-may-3-bianca-is-back-bitches/3 ), and not the one that comes from her ex-husband/murderer.
Thanks for making the change :)
no problem!
Zora from The Shannara Chronicles – Eretria’s ex, had her throat slashed (the circumstances were really unclear to me in the show, perhaps someone could elaborate??)
Actually, Charlie Bradbury (Supernatural) was not only stabbed, but by a neo-nazi, who dumped her body in a bathtub.They Kill her off for shock effect AND they did it in the most tasteless way ever!
Awww man that I think that maybe upgrades her death from a simple case of Murdocking to actual Fridging by tasteless shock value points.
This list completely missed Xena of Xena: Warrior Princess (Dies at the hands of an army, attempting to save 30,000 souls).
I know a lot of people claim she and Gabrielle were lesbians, but that completely overlooks the MANY men both women loved throughout the whole series.
They were both very much bisexual characters. They weren’t faking their love for those men, and they weren’t faking their love for each other. Xena was bisexual, Gabrielle was bisexual. At the end of the series, Xena dies.
From the introductory paragraphs:
It wasn’t just her relationship with Gabrielle which they fully confirmed only after show has ended, but with other women too. Her most influental relationships were with women. Xena said Akemi broke her heart, Xena’s whole life changed after she watched M’Lila die and Lao Ma taught her love. So Xena belong to lesbians or bi.
Ana and Teresa from Amar en Tiempos Revueltos (2014) The couple had left the show together and happy in 2012 and they killed them offscreen in a fire just to give Hector, Teresa’s ex-husband who was still on the show, a plot.
Did they kill both of them? I thought only Ana and their son had died. That was really messed up.
all i can find online is that they faked their death so they could stay together? was that something that happened earlier and then they died in a fire later? (i would’ve just gone by that you said in your comment but b/c of zookie’s i wanted to double-check i had all the info right, and now i’m confused!)
Don’t know if anyone has commented this before but from what I could see “Lost and Delirious” was not on the list. Pauli Oster (played by Piper Perabo) committed suicide (jumped off the school’s roof) because her girlfriend didn’t want anyone to know they were together (they had broken up because of that and Pauli was unsuccessful in winning her back).
IT’S A MOVIE
THS IS A LIST OF TV SHOWS
jesus fucking christ
Shut up! We don’t know Delphine is dead yet! *ugly sobbing*
More dead lesbians:
Ivy, “Poison Ivy” (Drew Barrimore) 1992
Pushed off a balcony by her lover’s daughter and lover
Chloe, “Chloe” (Amanda Seyfried) 2009
Pushed out a window by her lover
this is just a list of characters who have died on TV, not in movies
thank you hailey
Plus (Warning Spoiler) in the case of Chloe there is sum suggestion that the character only existed in the imagination of her Julian Moore’s character, so it’s kind of iffy.
THOSE ARE BOTH MOVIES
THIS IS A LIST OF TV SHOWS
IT’S IN THE HEADLINE
if movies were on this list it would have 200 entries
Heck the number of vampires with lesbian tendencies who die in movies would probably be an impressive sum alone!
Laura Hall from Shortland Street in 2000
Died of a heart attack soon after her lover left her, became pregnant to, and ran away with her ex-boyfriend.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Shortland_Street_characters_(1999)#Laura_Hall
Thank you, added!
Just a quick note. The picture you have there is the actress Laura Hill who plays Toni Warner who is straight.
Dr Lauren Hall (played by Larissa Matheson) is the one you’re after. :)
i fixed it!
For some reason I thought Laura killed herself, but nope, just a regular old heart attack. Times were also pretty bleak when she was alive, according to Wikipedia:
‘Caroline started to date Alan Dubrovsky (Malcolm Murray) and the two soon got engaged. However Caroline soon realized she was in love with bridesmaid Laura (Larissa Matheson) and dumped Al for Laura. The two dated for several months until Caroline fell back into the arms of Greg, who impregnated her and drove her off into the sunset.’
O_0
This was really fucking heartbreaking. :(
Here’s a twist: a man who is attempting to murder his bisexual ex-girlfriend dies instead; bisexual ex-girlfriend walks off into the sunset (alive) with her (living) girlfriend.
Which is almost the plot of “Bound”
Leslie Shay was my first lesbian TV death. I cried. I never cry at TV/Movies/Books but tears of rage ran down my face that night.
I have another one: Naomi “Tracy” Richards (played by Samantha Morton) in the UK show Band of Gold(1996) .
She stabbed herself to death and was found by her gf (played by none other than Lena Headey). Their story was a big part of season 2.
Come to think of it. This relationship is probably one of the very first f/f relationship on tv, even before Tara & Willow. Although it was not a very healthy one and both characters were damaged and violent, there was also something sweet in their connexion; they were each other’s saving grace (before the tragic demise of one of them at least).
Good shout – I loved their storyline in season 2 (although I have a feeling that maybe Samantha Morton’s character slit her wrists in bed rather than a stabbing per se?), because the whole of Band of Gold was really a rough ride for everyone. I seem to recall that in season 3 there was a significant storyline with a trans woman of colour, who also ended up dead, and my mum was really upset because the character was so sweet. That’s for a whole other list though…
Also, thank you for using the spelling variant “connexion,” it made me briefly feel like we were in a 19th century novel.
Thank you, thank you. It was an amazing show.
It took my all this time to find them, but I can’t believe my Band of Gold’s VHS still works after 20 years. Convertion to DVD begins.
About Lucretia – it’s Spartacus: Vengeance and it wasn’t Lucretia’s baby, it was Ilithyia’s. Saxa from Spartacus (Vengeance and War of the Damned) should also be on here (stabbed with sword in battle by unknown killer).
Does Servilia from ‘Rome’ counts? She did have relationship with the woman and died….
I have an idea for another list and another twitter campaign: #WaysNotToKillLesbians (or #WaysNotToKillLexa, or #WaysNotToBuryYourGays).
There is a big discussion right now about how many lesbian and bisexual characters die (often unnecessarily), and how exactly they are killed off.
I think it would be great if there was also a big discussion, or a list, or a campaign, suggesting all the ways we can think of in which those characters can be written off, if necessary, or involved in some serious dramatic plot development WITHOUT KILLING THEM OFF.
We could list actual examples of characters who were removed from shows, temporarily or permanently (when the actor had to leave, for example) without dying. When David Duchovny took a break from “X-files”, did the creators kill Fox Mulder? No, they introduced the abducted-by-aliens storyline. When “Star Trek: TNG” removed Wesley Crusher, they also did not kill him, they made him start an exciting journey to another part of the Universe. But, yeah, those are straight male characters. Some secretly or openly lesbian/bisexual shows have also managed to remove some female (bi, gay or otherwise) characters without killing them. When “Xena” wrote off Eve, it was via her insisting that she should go on a spiritual quest, and go alone in order to find herself. When “The L-word” removed Carmen from the series, they didn’t kill her, they simply made her move after the break-up.
I don’t watch “The 100”, so I don’t know how this particular character could be written off without dying. Some of the creators insist that it could not. So, it would be great if someone made an article, or a twitter campaign listing all the ways it could be done, which would not only prove them wrong, but also create a pool of ideas that other showrunners could use for their future characters (unfortunately, I am not on Twitter for personal reasons, but I’ll just leave this idea here in case anyone else likes it).
So, go #WaysNotToKillGays!
P.S. Unless, of course, such campaign or list already exist, and I just don’t know about it.
P.P.S. Thank you, Riese, for the article. It really made me think and even comment, which is rare.
Erica Hahn wasn’t killed she just walked off in the parking lot of no returns !
For a show that kills so many of its characters its pretty fucking amazing that Greys Anatomy hasn’t killed a single lesbian / bisexual woman ! woooh
Not to say that they haven’t tried pretty damn hard (see: Callie and Arizona). Then again, just being on the show actively triples your risk of dying in a random and unusual way, so it’s more of a “how high can we make the body count before people complain?” trope than a “bury the gay” trope.
Leila and Rafaela “Torre de Babel” (1998) Brazilian telenovela. They both got killed in a explosion of a mall.
Xena wasn’t queerbaiting. The only thing Xena/Gabrielle didn’t do was sleep together on screen.
Absolutely correct in my opinion. The producers of the show were threatened by cancellation if they portrayed X and G as lovers. They took a brave stance and super-subtexted the show!
I have never been so affected by a pointless and heartless tv show “death” as X:WP and the decision to thereby leave G abandoned by her not returning to yet one more death. I still refuse to watch the last two eps of that series because X:WP is not dead and she and G are together “for all eternity” just as the entire series depicted as a main premise in the show.
In the UK soap Doctors there’s been two deaths. Freya died in a fire and a recurring love interest Catriona killed herself after being attacked in a hate crime.
added!
Cecília and Laís – “Vale Tudo” 1988 Brazilian telenovela. Cecília dies in a car accident. I think it was the first lesbian couple of Brazilian TV and, of course, killed.
There’s also a german telenovela called ‘Unter uns’ with a bisexual police woman – who of course died (in 2012) because she was accidentally mistaken and was hit with a metal bar.
welp…guess I won’t be getting around to reading the expanse series
which is a shame because its always a pleasant surprise to see a character is actually bi/lesbian
Obviously you know what you can handle but I still really recommend reading it. There are a lot of queer characters in the books and while some do die (the books have a pretty hefty death count at some points) many/most don’t so none of the deaths have felt at all ‘bury your gays’ to me.
Not to get you upset, but don’t dismiss the entire series because of Julie Mao. There are other lesbian characters in about book 4. and I’m not done with book four yet, but they canonically have a child together and the only reason they’ve separated so far is so that their infant daughter can go to earth before it becomes to late for her to be able to be there.
Julie isnt even gay in the books, or pan, they dont discuss her sexuality at all. Her dating profile was created to lure a very specific clientele for her own opa reasons.
There is a happy lesbian couple in book 3 who have a child together and neither die. Their love isnt tarnished or lessened and their love keeps the main character alive and motivated in her darkest times.
In book four there are many gay characters that are married and yes some die but a fuck ton of people die in book 4, literally everyone is fucked in that book.
I think the expanse does a great job of portraying homosexuality as it is, a fucking normal aspect of life that doesnt deter from how badass a character can be. Having an lgbt heroine who kinda saves the day in book 3 was so refreshing.Dont discredit the expanse!!!!
I actually think the way you’ve disregarded Xena is pretty ignorant. The showrunners were not to blame for the subtext; they were forced to keep it at that level because the studio explicitly gave them a “no gay” warning. In fact, if anything, the showrunners and the cast should be praised for putting as much subtext in as they did – basically going against the studio and running the risk of being cancelled because of it. And when they did get cancelled? They went all-out. They pushed it as far as they could. It wasn’t subtext anymore.
Xena meant just as much as any of the characters listed above – if not more so in a lot of cases – to many people. I’m wondering now if you even watched the show, or know anything about it: otherwise, you would already know everything I’ve just said.
Equally, it’s irresponsible for you to say queerbaiting isn’t included in the list – the reason you dismissed Xena, which I do not believe was queerbaiting – and then include Lexa. Lexa’s relationship with Clarke was most definitely queerbaiting because fans were more or less promised everything would be okay; that the couple would thrive, that the show would be different. Obviously that wasn’t the case.
I think you aim to make a good and valid point with this article, but boy have you done it poorly with these examples. Dismissing Xena – an icon that still matters to many people and that many people do not see as queerbaiting, and also putting invalid blame on the showrunners – and including Lexa – an example that was both queerbaiting and a fault of the showrunners. Very irresponsible and unfair. If anything, it just makes you look biased.
I think you’re missing the definition of queerbaiting used here. All the characters I recognised on the list were 100% confirmed lesbian or bisexual. While I won’t deny knowing little about Xena (Young Hercules was my jam after all), I imagine that the view in this case was similar to Destiel, the show runners keep playing it and dangling it in front of viewers to keep them watching. Where as the Alex’s scenario was more like…randomly killing off Booth or Brennan from Bones, or …I can’t actually think of another straight couple off the ti
I accidentally hit done while writing my above reply because I’m working on my phone. Sorry! So as I was saying, I’m actually having a hard time thinking of straight couples off the top of my head. But yeah, my point is, queerbaiting is open to interpretation, see: Destiel, where as the people listed were confirmed to be in relationships and their outcome doesn’t depend on the promises of the writers and producers.
i don’t know why y’all think that the meaner and more condescending and disrespectful to me you are about not including Xena, the more likely I am to include it. you could’ve made your point a lot more kindly.
I’m going to add her because of research I did last night to change my mind after reading literally the TWO commenters on this entire thread who have managed to talk about Xena without being total jerks, but seriously. “Biased”? Against what? Warrior Princesses?
Riese, you are a treasure. This is an excellent reply.
thank you <3
In defense of the Xena fans, the part where you wrote, “…we’re not gonna give Xena showrunners Queer Character Credit for a character they refused to make openly queer…” (before the ETA) felt very dismissive of a character and show that meant a great deal to a lot of queer women and paved the way for more openly queer female characters. I, personally felt a little combative after reading it, so I think that’s why a lot of the comments came off as asshole-ish. (I was ok with Xena being left off because while I accept her queerness as canon, I do not accept her death. Xena ALWAYS finds a way back from death.)
That being said, the fact that you chose to listen to your audience even when they were expressing themselves in a more hostile manner shows that you really do care about this subject matter, and you have a lot of class. I really appreciate you making this whole list to begin with and continuing to expand it. Thank you.
Y’know I almost never comment, but I have to say that it’s pretty obvious that Riese worked her butt off to create this list. I mean the least y’all could do is, um, say thank you?? Instead we get a smackdown about who’s on the list and who’s not – which totally misses the point!
For those of you who managed to miss yet another brilliant metaphor from the brain of Heather Hogan, above, the whole point here is that lesbians and bi women are more visible than ever – but the characters who represent us on the teevee are still getting killed off at ridiculous rates! All the time! In horrible violent ways, no less! Yippee! Instead of showing that we’re, y’know, normal people who deserve to do the same things as everybody else, including the radical act of continuing to breath.
The wider world seems to have few fucks to give as to whether we’re represented fairly in the media. Can we at least show some kindness to one another and aim our guns instead at the people who so sorely deserve it??
AMEN
Also Denna from Legend of the Seeker, shot with an arrow.
Could you make a list of lesbian characters who lived until the end of the show – shows not entirely composed of queers characters ?
But this is the thing. There are just very few because they all died before or the show is still airing.
Blindspot 2016 – Mayfair’s lover, suicide
(Vikings or Black Sails? Sorry, I haven’t watched those.)
what was her name?
The character’s name was Sofia Varma, played by Sarita Choudhury. But she was only present in one single episode and it was a flashback (Persecute Envoys, 2015).
gotcha, won’t include her then. thanks!
Something tells me that while Sofia (Mayfair’s lover) doesn’t qualify, Mayfair’s gonna be killed off fairly soon. Probably by the Project Daylight spooks, because drama.
Then again, she’s kind of a double-whammy token minority, so *shrugs*
Speaking for Black Sails, so far we have 1 lesbian and 2 bisexual female characters that are still alive. For now.
Paulie from Lost & Delirious – commited suicide
i swear to fucking g-d you guys
THIS IS A LIST OF TV SHOWS NOT MOVIES
not only that, but four other commenters with low reading comprehension skills on this very thread — the thread you had to scroll through to leave your own pointless comment, have already, for some ungodly reason, told me about Paulie from Lost & Delirious
Word of advice to anyone who frequents comment sections: If the number of previous comments are already in the hundreds, you might want to skim through whats come before to see if someone already made the point you have in mind (or in this case just reread the title!).
As a side note (and this is going to sound way bizarre) when I so Lost and Delirious I couldn’t help but wonder if Paulie just faked everybody out into thinking she going to jump since a) Why would everyone be looking up at that damn bird someone was now dead or injured right in-front of you b) when I played the DVD in slow-mo it looked like someone was still on the roof while the bird was taking off. Yeah I know it was probably an animal trainer and my alternate interpretation is probably bonus, but wouldn’t that have made for a much better ending!?
LOST AND DELIIROUS CONSPIRACY THEORY
I have another conspiracy theory with all the comments about that movie.
You said this in another I-can’t-read-shit comment: “also does anybody want to hear me talk about how much i hate lost & delirious”. Well, I think that some people REALLY want to hear that and they’re trying to trick you to do it.
i want to make a pancake dinner for this theory
Also Rachael Murray from Scream who was brutally murdered by a serial killer
she’s on the list
Adele from the Lizzie Borden Chronicles. I’m not sure if she was confirmed lesbian or bisexual (she was a prostitute, unsure if she was into the men she was pimped out to) but she and Lizzie kissed in one of her first scenes in the show. She then witness Lizzie killing a guy who tried to rape her (Adele), was locked in a wooden coffin by Lizzie, released by Lizzie, and later had her throat slit by Lizzie while staging a murder scene so it looked like her former pimp had slit her throat while she shot her former pimp.
on the list!
If you count “dead, then resurrected” then you missed Helena Wells in Warehouse 13. Sacrificed self saving the rest of the team, then time was rewound to before her death during the season premiere.
Sara Lance is only included because when she died, she was dead, as far as the fans knew. And she came back — but on a different show, much later. H.G. Wells was never actually REMOVED from the show, she was back in the next season. Also I feel like her character is pretty classic queerbaiting, which was unacceptable for 2013.
This list is also known as the list of TV shows I’ll never watch [again].
Tosh from Torchwood was the death that hit me the hardest. That’s one of the reasons I stopped watching. Honestly, I’m kind of glad the queer characters on shows like Agents of SHIELD weren’t major characters or very visibly queer; at least I didn’t get attached.
As for The 100, I was really excited about the show and just days before they killed off Lexa, I was saying to my friend how I wanted to start watching it this summer. Not anymore.
Destiny Rumancek should be on this list – hit her head on a glass coffee table after confronting Roman Godfrey. – Hemlock Grove 2015
Why should she be on this list – she is either bisexual or pansexual – it is never fully stated in the show – but she had an encounter with a man and a woman in season one, and an encounter with Clementine. Along with a long list of other people off screen.
she has sex with clementine right?
i’d consider that proof of being bi.
yes she was definitely bi and is on the list!
I thought of another one while defrosting the freezer!
In Scott and Bailey there was a recurring character in one season called Helen Bartlett (played by Nicola Walker from Last Tango in Halifax) who was a lesbian that was plausibly fucked up by her parents murdering loads of people when she was a kid. Things all get a bit much, and she ends up hijacking the chief cop’s car (containing chief cop), before committing suicide.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_%26_Bailey
http://www.afterellen.com/general-news/106745-scott-and-bailey-recap-31-lady-detectives-plus-lesbians
Also, I think that makes her Sally Wainwright’s 3rd dead bi/lesbian – she’s outdoing Ilene Chaiken!
A+ introduction to comments :D
Could have been better if I’d said “I found another one while defrosting the freezer.”
These pesky dead TV lesbians, they get everywhere.
You’re memory of dead tv lesbians is highly impressive. I commend you.
Just because of the “…another one while defrosting the freezer!” Sally deserves comment award.
It was hilarious, priceless and the perfect combination of words.
Lucy and Alice were also killed in American Horror Story, freak show(2014), murdered by Chester.
added! guess that happened after I stopped watching the show
When I have tried to explain to my straight friends why it can be so gut-wrenching to watch someone like Lexa die on-screen, I can tell that even though they try to understand and be sympathetic, they just cannot understand why watching these characters die all of the time can be so hurtful.
Because it’s true! Characters die on TV all of the time. But the reality is, so few shows have any LGBT representation at all. When they do decide to throw us a bone and add a few LGBT characters, to have these characters so often be among the first to die, or to have deaths that are so unceremonious and barely mourned or remembered, you just begin to feel numb.
Yes, straight characters are killed off on TV all of the time, but when that happens, it literally never means that there are no other straight characters or straight couples left on the show. There are always a plethora, so while one character may die, there is no shortage of straight protagonists or straight love interests that straight people can identify with, even in some small way. In so many of these shows, when the LGBT character dies, LGBT representation on the entire show dies with them. Or, worse yet, if a LGBT character’s love interest dies, the show often moves on and pretends that “phase” never even happened, more or less acting like the surviving protagonist was straight all along!
I’ve thought a lot about this since Lexa’s death, and most of the time I don’t know how to put into words why so many LGBT viewers feel so betrayed without sounding petty. None of these deaths on their own are that devastating, but knowing that the few characters or relationships that we can finally see a piece of ourselves in are rarely safe (unlike the inner circle of straight main characters who often survive until every possible story arc of theirs has been explored), it’s easy start to feel like these TV networks don’t prioritize LGBT representation in a meaningful way.
Nadia on Lost Girl was also possessed by the garuda ugh
Nadia on lost girl was also possessed (by the Garuda)
If you re-scroll through all of the images and imagine it’s a dating app, it helps with the trauma.
Lessons learnt: dont date men you get killed thank god im a lesbians, dont date women who has or have a relationship with men, dont hace babies, dont reject men or theyll kill you and if you are a lesbians on tv or movies youll die anyway
Saxa from Spartacus (2013). Died on the battlefield.
Danny (Carmilla). Stabbed to death.
Oh, and Uriel from Dominion was killed off-screen between season 1 and 2.
Danny was resurrected (as much as I hate to admit it) :)
Danny actually comes back as a vampire in the end of the season, on a post credit scene… I’m not sure if she fits here…
Beate (Danica Curcic) – Bron/Broen (The Bridge), Season 2 (2013)
Accidentally murdered by a poisoned needle in her girlfriend’s hospital bed.
Jesus Christ.
Pretty sure there was a murdered lesbian/ bisexual on season 3 of The Bridge as well. Its a police crime drama, not really a procedural like CSI so perhaps could be included?
yeah i mean i will definitely add any dead lesbians or bisexual characters from shows that are procedurals, just not the victim/witness/partner-of-the-weeks.
added!
Xena and Gabrielle’s relationship was confirmed by the writers, directors and actors themselves. Just because Robert Tapert and RJ Stewart (producers) never confirmed it’s irrelevant, since they were written and portrayed as eternal soulmates / lovers.
Also, when Paige Turco was in NYPD Blue, she played a lesbian whose pregnant girlfriend (Kathy, played by Lisa Darr, who also played Ellen’s TV girlfriend for a while) was shot dead in front of her. Bonus points for double trope of pregnant lesbian AND dead lesbian storylines!
Evidence, via AE (more bonus points if you tear up from Sarah Warn doing proper analysis over there): http://www.afterellen.com/tv/4322-lesbian-characters-get-promoted-on-fourth-season-of-nypd-blue/2
The only picture of her I can find is here, where Kathy and Abby are sitting with Medavoy, discussing him giving them sperm, as happens at every lesbian dinner party: http://www.afterellen.com/columns/61331-best-lesbian-week-ever-october-23-2009/9
How did I not know that Paige Turco played a lesbian cop, and also, how could I not have known that she played a lesbian in a relationship with Sherry Stringfield?
THANK YOU SALLY
P.S. – I vote we only include Xena if we get stuck on 99
So while she was not a recurring character, and was in fact Victim of the Week on a mystery show, I think Daisy Murphy from episode 1×10 of Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries warrants a mention because she was the lover of recurring lesbian character Dr. Elizabeth “Mac” Macmillan. The fact that we had to have Tragic Lesbian Death, when we’ve never seen Mac with a lover who was alive, feels a lot like killing a queer character for “furthering the plot”.
On that note, join me in my campaign to GIVE MAC A GIRLFRIEND 2k16 (if we get another season of this show, which I still adore despite its lesbian-killing ways)
I love that show! I love Doc she’s my favorite. I feel like it’s too much of a procedural to include, though, as a victim? Because there’s a murder every episode.
At the risk of sounding argumentative, I think that perhaps Daisy Murphy does count…? Yes, she was “victim of the week,” but she was also the girlfriend of a main character, so it’s reasonable to assume that if she hadn’t been offed (as part of a “lesbian love triangle” of all things) then it’s reasonable to assume that she could/would/SHOULD have been an ongoing part of the show. Killing her as soon as she appeared in person was simply a way of making Mac’s queerness canon without actually having to upset any viewers at 8.30pm who might not have wanted to have to *see* her with a live woman.
The only picture I can find of her is here: http://cinemorgue.wikia.com/wiki/Maria_Coviello
It was 2012 and she got pushed into a machine in a factory by another woman, but I can’t remember why.
I am on board with GIVE MAC A GIRLFRIEND 2k16 for both Miss Fisher and Veronica Mars. I’m just putting that out there.
I came down to comment about Daisy Murphy, honestly that death was so sad. The show kept emphasizing how horrible and gruesome her death was in the machine, and then poor Dr. Mac had to look at the body… So upsetting. I know it was a “death of the week” but Mac has now had no other girlfriends, and her time with Daisy was never recorded on screen.
Code Black: Dr. Carla Niven (Malaya’s ex-girlfriend), died of cancer earlier this year shortly after giving birth
Should we really be counting shows like True Blood and AHS? I can see AHS bc the narrative changes and an actor’s character that was gay in one season may not be in the next. But in True Blood, death was so common it might as well not mean anything.
I’m glad you put in Teen Wolf tho. Especially with their track record of killing off a woman and replacing her with like 15 blond white men.
Riese did say in the opening paragraph that she acknowledges the “Anyone Can Die” trope but she wanted a list of every character.
also for ‘true blood’ specifically, a list like this would not be complete without a record of what they did to tara thorton
Thank you for including Xena on this list!
You’re welcome! <3
All My Children had Frankie Stone, who was murdered by one of her aunt’s henchmen. There’s also Marissa who was killed when JR shot into a crowd.
Yup, they’re in there!
I’m just going to point out that Lucy Lawless in on the list 3 times…not complaining though.
I think it’d be pretty interesting to see how many of these characters were 1) written by men and 2) killed by male characters.
Let’s see how much they really hate us for being unavailable to them.
Exactly! Seeing this list is sort of hilarious. Internalized misogyny and homophobia at it’s most rampant. These showrunners will literally go to their grave saying it was necessary to the story and that they love their gay and bi characters, like HOW ARE YOU SO BLIND?
Dusty from Queer as Folk was 1 of 4 killed in the Babylon bombing in season 5. Some of the male cast were injured in the bombing but this queer lady was the only character killed.
added!
So what?? Sorry, it’s absolutely ridiculous. It was a gay club that exploded. Of course gay people died. More than that – gay men also died, you can see them lying dead when Brian walks around searching for Justin. It was an important event that changed the narrative and affected all characters, not just something aimed to kill a lesbian character.
Destiny, also of Hemlock Grove, is bisexual and died in s3 of Hemlock Grove. (She fell on a glass table and then her neck was snapped)
Also Nurse Delia Bubsy on Call the midwife.
Oops you beat me to it!
Insufficiently dead (yet)
she’s not dead though i thought
No? Delia is very much alive.
Not dead and currently living happily with her girlfriend :)
Does Delia count? http://metro.co.uk/2015/03/10/after-shocking-call-the-midwife-finale-fans-ask-why-is-bbc-killing-off-lesbian-love-affairs-5095753/
Nope, she got her memory back and resumed lesbianing with Patsy
:o I must catch up
How i’m i still alive. It seems to be i should have been stabbed, shot, bludgeoned, beaten and set on fire by now.
This is horrible.. AND THE DAMN NUMBER KEEPS INCREASING! I wonder what percentage this is of all lesbian, bi and pan women on TV..?
Deputy Jenna Nickerson in Supernatural– her soul was consumed, and then her body slammed into the ceiling, officially killing her. She was on the first two episodes of season 11. (2015) Funny how they introduced a queer girl character just to kill her!
They did the same back in season two when they introduced Lily, one of the potential demon blood kids like Sam. Her only real line was a throwaway about how she’d accidentally killed her girlfriend. She died five minutes later so it was a twofor.
added!
A) Thank you. This is important.
B) Delphine is not dead.
C) Kathy from NYPD Blue wasn’t pregnant actually – her girlfriend Abby was. Still tragic.
D) Lesbians who get happy endings list plz?
Someone is compiling a list, so feel free to add to it: http://100percentshipper.tumblr.com/post/140482816861/queer-female-ship-reference-list
Hmm.. okay an earlier commenter said that she was pregnant?
Legit impossible to read all of these comments (how do you do it?!?!) … but for sure her girlfriend Abby was pregnant. My wife and I just watched the episode the other day. Abby does go on to have the baby (so at least there’s that), but then her character is just kind of forgotten about. Sigh.
Good for you for updating this list continuously!
Not sure about one of your Shortland st ones…? Laura Hill is the name of the actress who played a character called Toni Warner who I don’t recall being queer and her character didn’t die until 2008.
I think the actual name is Laura Hall and she was played by Larissa Matheson who isn’t well known so pics ae hard to come by but I think this is one:
http://nzlads.tripod.com/images/Laura.JPG
Keep up the good (if rather depressing) work on the list!
Laura Hill played Toni Thompson (married name, Toni Warner) and as far as I know there was never any queerness. Certainly her relationships listed on wiki is straight and although I didn’t follow too closely I was in NZ for most of her time on TV and would have jumped on anything gay. Must check out Laura Hall. Worse was Jay who betrayed her wife WITH A MAN another tired overdone trope. Would love to see how many canon lesbians betray their female lover with a man. Verbotene Liebe jumps to mind there…
this is the link the commenter told me about:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Shortland_Street_characters_(1999)#Laura_Hall
Homura Akemi from Puella Magi Madoka Magica sort of dies… she becomes the devil because of her desire for Madoka (this is in the movie. In the show ending only Madoka dies/becomes a deity).
Thanks for the work on this list.
Sadly I can add two more from German tv, the same show no less (it was our version of “Bad Girls”).
_______________
Susanne Teubner, Hinter Gittern (2000)
Cause of Death: shot off-screen during a bank robbery
http://i0.web.de/image/162/30618162,pd=2/gittern-cheryl-shepard.jpg
____
Beate “Bea” Hansen, Hinter Gittern (2001)
Cause of Death: died of her injuries after an explosion
http://www.sonia-farke.de/ImagesHinterGittern/wb10.jpg
thank you!
A question. How about a miniseries in which every episode is about an individual, particular case?
I’m asking because in Argentina we had one called “Mujeres Asesinas”. Each episode was based in real life cases and, as the name implies, it was centered on women as the perpetrators of the crime. 5 episodes of that show ended up with a dead lesbian or a dead bisexual.
I know that this doesn’t actually comply with “these are all characters who appeared for more than one episode”, but each episode was an open/closed case. The show wasn’t a crime procedural either, because it was centered in the killer and her victim/victims; the only place where the miniseries was developed as a crime procedural was in the US (Killer Women, ABC, 2014).
Just to clarify, because it looks worst than Ilene Chaiken and Sally Wainwright put together, they were 5 deaths in the course of 4 seasons and 78 episodes.
i mean the real question is; does that fit in with the trope? and i would say no. even if it technically wasn’t a procedural, there was a victim-of-the-week, so that wouldn’t be included here, no.
Thank Jebus. Mujeres Asesinas was messing with my stats. Now I can say that all the lesbians couples in my country had happy endings.
Sorry! But I was thinking the same thing, about queer lady characters in Argentina and, while I wasn’t able to find many I was happy that at least they survived.
But then I remembered El Tiempo No Para, the character played by Lucrecia Blanco (Florencia), who was having an affair with the character of Julieta Cardinali was ‘accidentaly’ murdered by the main group, while falling from a balcony after trying to blackmail them. She was a recurring character and main antagonist.
It would be interesting to know, how much LGBT female characters were around in these shows during this time (from 1976 – 2016). That would make it easier to see what part of a shows LGBT cast was killed. If it was most of all of them, that would make even more of an impression.
To this list you can add:
Amar en Tiempos Revueltos: Teresa Garcia
Cause of Death: died in hospital from her burns from the fire
Amar en Tiempos Revueltos: Ana Rivas
Cause of Death: burned to death in a hotel with her son (born of a rape by ex husband)
Happened off screen after the couple had departed for their happily ever after and they killed them off to advance the love plot of Teresa’s ex-husband and his new woman. Sigh.
Coronation Street: Maddie Heath
Cause of Death: Fire explosion
Sorry forgot to add: Amar en Tiempos… happened in 2014 and Coro st. happened in 2015
maggie heath has always been on the list, and i added ana & teresa this morning!
Is there also a “Grieving Lesbian” trope?
Cause a lot of these deaths came with the extra emotional punch of a bitterly grieving partner.
Speaking of: Costia. The queer girl who was already dead before we even met her.
Costia never even had the dignity of an onscreen appearance and they beheaded her anyway. So sad and ironic and sick to think now that that moment serves doubly as Lexa’s coming out and as the point at which we all should have started suspecting treatment of queer women on the 100…
I have a few to add that sort of count:
Irene Adler on Sherlock was shown killed, later revealed to be alive, but hasn’t return to the show.
Thirteen on House was given a terminal disease, and left the job/show to live out her last days with her girlfriend.
Vampire Willow from the Buffy wishverse was only in 2 eps from memory, but given that she was more obvious with her sexuality than our willow at the time it felt like kill your gay doppelgangers.
13 from House M.D. was diagnosed with Huntingtons Chorea, so even though we don’t see her die on screen we know she was given a death sentence.
In an episode of Law and Order: SVU, a woman named Ann Jackson comes home to find her partner being raped by a home invader. The attacker beats brutally beats Ann until she is in a coma. A later episode reveals that she did not survive.
we’re not including one-episode victims from procedurals, it’s in the intro
Also!! Salome Agrippa in True Blood. She died at the end of season 5. She wasn’t a full on regular but she was in basically all of season 5. She was staked by Bill in a fight to become the most powerful vampire.
This list is appalling. It shouldn’t be this long. Especially when a list this long is basically the entire list of lesbian/bisexual women on TV.
Was Salome queer? I know she died but I don’t remember any lesbian proclivities outside of the assumption that all vampires are bisexual. (True Blood is one of the shows on this list I’ve actually seen from start to finish, but my memory is fuzzy)
Thanks for adding Xena! One thing, you spelled the name wrong of Tamsin of Lost Girl. I’d like to mention two more Lucy Lawless characters (and nominate her for “winning” the most Dead Lesbians/Bi women): D’Anna Biers (#3) from Battlestar Galactica-had an affair with #6, died a couple of times, was “boxed”, & ended up dying on earth (2009); Countess Marburg from Salem (stabbed by John Alden Jr.),plus the other two witches Tituba (pecked to death by crows) & Mary Sibley (blood loss to revive John Alden)-they all had lesbian sex as part of their magic rituals (2015).
http://zap2it.com/2015/06/salem-season-2-finale-death-toll-mary-sibley-countess-marburg-tituba/
i think there’s a difference between having lesbian sex as part of your magic rituals and actually being a lesbian character? i want to be really specific about who we include here or it dilutes the value of the list. Tituba was a queer character, absolutely, but I’m not so sure about the others.
Well, I have a little, tiny question about “having lesbian sex as part of your magic rituals”.
Where can you find that religion? Asking for a friend, of course.
Magical applicator does not lesbian (bi or pan) sexuality make in my opinion, but trust me pestles are very unforgiving and best “applied” after some warming up. Sometimes literally as in the pestle it self not just the receiving orifice.
Can you believe none of the seven queer women on Wentworth have died yet? It probably won’t be long…
I know, I was like, one of them must be dead… but everybody who has died so far is straight! If only they’d left Ferguson behind in the burning building…
The fact that every time I come back to this article there seems to be more names is indicative of either A) we are so very aware of when we have representation that we will fight for inclusion of people we saw ourselves in or B) TV really, really hates us.
Actually, it’s probably both.
Thanks to this list, I finally figured out who Olivia Wilde as 13 reminds me so much of: it’s Mischa Barton’s Marissa Cooper on The OC.
Fer from Física o Química (Spanish TV) died too. Another gay love story that ended up in tragedy.
This is about female characters…
But I do agree that was unnecessary and terrible, like it completely ruined the story.
At least Spain has Bea & Ana as lesbians who lived happily ever after.
“Emily, Teen Wolf (2013)” was inaccurate inre cause of death. She was kidnapped by a swarm of cockroaches, tied to a tree, bludgeoned over the head, strangled, then her throat was slit (ancient druidic “triple death”) as the FIRST virgin sacrifice of an evil druidess who was attempting, through ritual sacrifices, to amass sufficient power to get her revenge against the evil uber-Alpha Werewolf who had massacred her friends and horribly disfigured her.
(The ONLY way to tell that was as a run-on sentence. LULZ.)
ok FTR this is now the fourth correction i have gotten about this particular death — and all of them have been different and different from the wiki! also orignally i was told she was the first virgin death, then the third, so i changed it from first to third, and then the second, and so i changed it to the second… now you’re saying it’s the first!
i’m gonna go with you b/c your answer was the most in-depth but if somebody tells me she was the 15th virgin death i am sending them to you
This whole issue has been super funny, actually.
That said, “Teen Wolf Clue” is a board game that just really needs to happen.
Missing from the list!
Paulie Oster in Lost and Delirious (2001) – suicide by jumping off a roof (I know it’s been said)
Also, regarding subtext: Would you be willing to include Ruth Jamison from Fried Green Tomatoes (1991)? She died of cancer. She and Idgie, the other protagonist, very obviously loved each other and stated it a few times,although there was never an explicit relationship or physical commemoration.
ON TV. So no.
OH MY GOODNESS GRACIOUS I AM GOING TO SET UP A COMMENT FILTER AND ANYBODY WHO SUBMITS A COMMENT WITH THE WORDS “LOST AND DELIRIOUS” IN IT AUTOMATICALLY GETS SENT TO THE SPAM FOLDER
also honestly the weirdest thing about this continuing to happen is that for real, if you honestly thought this was a list of lesbian MOVIES… that’s the only one you can come up with? there are so many others that are more important that would come to mind
Surely it’s trolling at this point.
well i set up the filter regardless
i feel setting up the filter qualifies as self-care
I think only TV characters are included here. There are a tonne of Movies in addition to all of this!
Alex Vause was also (supposedly) killed at the end of the last series
no… she’s gonna be in the next season so she somehow made it out of that greenhouse alive
Darla, 2001 from the Angel series, staked herself to save her unborn child, she and Dru were probably my first ever ‘ship’ though I ended up watching Angel prior to Buffy.
that would be one of those subtext ones. never on the show are they a couple, unless i seriously missed something during one of my 20 rewatch marathons.
Unfortunately Darla and Dru were only ever subtext. So they don’t count.
I frequently wonder how I’ve survived as long as I have and I think this is why. I have to wonder if straight folks marvel at making it to the age of 32 like I do…
What about River Song from Doctor Who? She did die before it was revealed she was bi/pan, but the show is made in such way that it can bring the characters back. Jut take Clara for once, whom the doctor didn’t want to let go. Same could be done for River but it won’t be, am I not right?
it sounds like she wasn’t killed OFF though, you know? being dead had no impact on her participation in the show and continuation as part of the story. coupled with the fact that her bisexuality is only KIND OF mentioned and only once, I don’t think she would make the list.
Clara, though. Unless I misunderstand the line here, she’s “dead enough”. Not coming back. Removed-from-time utter Moffat bullshit or not.
“her bisexuality is only KIND OF mentioned and only once” – this bothers me a lot.
If a character never had any relationships with men, and then she mentioned her “second wife”, would she be counted as a lesbian for the purposes of this list?
It seems to me that when that happens, people get very excited at finding out a show they love has a Canon Lesbian.
But when it’s a bi woman, it seems like the burden of proof in both the straight and gay communities is a lot higher.
I won’t go into what the impact of this on the bi community is – unless you want the lengthy details – but it’s real bad.
Please add Clara to the list, and anybody else who is talking onscreen about their flirting/kissing/relationships with more than one gender?
Lily Baker, Supernatural (2007); hung to death
It’s almost like step 1 of killing off a character is having them come out.
Man, Lucy Lawless just can’t catch a break huh?
Besides that, this whole thing was hard to read.
I know. Every time she plays lesbian they kill her. ?
Its Tamsin, not Tasmin, just fyi. Thanks for this list!
Whether it is a gay man being described as fruity, a trans woman being described as a man with female features, or just a plain lesbian you plan on killing anyway its demeaning. In the straight heterosexual world of writers it seems its more acceptable to deny all these groups a place at the table as a normal person in a show. Its acceptable to make these people stand out by using the prejudice they male writers have against them then to let them have parts that are more natural to us all. It doesn’t matter if we are straight or gay we are people with personalities and feelings. If a show has a character that is jewish and he is portrayed as rude and cheap you would be offended. But kill off a lesbian and no one cares. Its time we stand up together and tell hollywood to stop the sexist homophobic attitude. Its wrong and its demeaning. Plus its really lazy writing.
Huge pattern of straight men murdering lesbian and bi women.
Just one more thing, if this is in chronological order shouldn’t Lexa be the last on the list? Because she died a week after Rose did.
no it’s just roughly in order by year, within the year itself there is no chronological organization. although actually putting her at the end would be a dramatic way to end the list with a punch so i think i am going to do that
Deputy Jenna and Charlie Bradbury from Supernatural were recently killed off too. Jenna ended up soulless and was killed by a demon and Charlie was stabbed by a neo-nazi
charlie’s been on the list since the article was originally posted
And someone helpfully elaborated on the tastelesness of her murder as well.
Upgrades her to a fridging. :(
Heya the photo for Laura Hall (not Hill) from Shortland Street (2000) is the wrong character – that’s Toni. Laura was portrayed by Larissa Matheson – here’s a pic
http://nzlads.tripod.com/images/Laura.JPG
thanks!
Hounded and pressured by Xenites, sounds about right for that particular fandom.
I did no hounding of Riese, but I totally get what you mean.
We’re fucking persistent.
Nurse Delia Bubsy from call the midwife doesn’t die, but suffers severe brain damage and no longer remembers anything/her lover Patsy.
Good news on this one!!! I think in part a reaction to the outcry to this, Delia gets her memory back and ends up moving into Nonatus house. They are currently living happily sneaking in and out of each other’s rooms(including Patsy in nothing but a flannel shirt…) and going to gay bars.
Hmm. I’m not sure it was right to include spoilers (as in total description) here in comments. It is better to let the reveal unfold for those who wait.
Yeah, it’s been an entire season since that happened. It Gets Better ™. The new season starts airing in the States next month.
please watch the next season…
Woah a lot of characters from shows i stopped watching died?? Xena’s dead?? What rock was I living under.
Ok but I don’t know why people think Delphine is actually dead. I’m definitely not opposing her inclusion in this list since they’re trying to sell her off as dead for the sake of drama (cheap so cheap) but it’s pretty obvious she’s not dead.
I had the same reaction to Claire Bennet in Heroes Reborn. Then again I didn’t even know she wasn’t straight…
Wait, Luce (from Les Revenants) is not confirmed dead. She just got taken away by the fog, but she’ll be back! Right? Right?!
The actress is pregnant so she’s been written out from what I’ve read.
Luce (Laure in France) is dead in season 2. But if I remember correctly they introduce a new lesbian character too.
Lucy Lawless characters keep going. D’Anna Biers (Cyclon#3)… seen in bet with CapricaSix and Giaus. Commits suicide by choosing to stay alone to die on the nuked planet Earth.
Another dead bi Lucy Lawless Character: Countess Von Marburg on Salem. http://salem.wikia.com/wiki/Countess_Von_Marburg
Lucy Lawless again, as D’Anna Biers (#3) on Battlestar Galactica https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_Three_%28Battlestar_Galactica%29
added!
Thank you for putting together this list, Riese! It would mean a lot more work, but would you consider collating a sister article to this one, with a list of the live-action female-female relationships in TV’s history that were given a happy ending? It would be a great counterpoint. Either way, thanks for this post.
yeah sure!
I’m 99.9% sure that nobody will mention THAT movie on that list. So, an almost win-win situation…
“WHAT ABOUT IMAGINE ME AND YOU”
Yes! I’d love this! Then we get a view of the % of dead lesbians because I imagine a hetero viewing the list and thinking that only 132? not realising that this makes up the majority of lesbian characters on TV. This is list is a start: http://100percentshipper.tumblr.com/post/140930063826/queer-female-ship-reference-list
I feel like mentioning Kilgrave’s role in the Jessica Jones death would be relevant, since she only died because of a man’s actions.
Only?
I dunno about that, after all without Jerri he never would have come in contact with Wendy. He was kinda like the bullet so to speak, but a gun don’t fire without a firing pin and ammo does not load it self.
I am attempting to be vague and analogy-like because I’m unsure as to the Rules of Spoilers for a stream only show.
Only, because it was an accident. Only, because while Jerri held ill will, she never intended to kill her wife. Only, because Pam was only trying to defend Jer.
Don’t get me wrong, Jerri screwed up, but Wendy’s death happened because Kilgrave is an empathy devoid monster.
I think this list could benefit from being revised to include straight trans women. Everyone on this list so far is cis to my knowledge, and there are plenty of trans woman characters I can think of who deserved better (Angelique in Penny Dreadful as just one example). Maybe instead of “Lesbian and bisexual women”, just “queer women”.
We made the intentional choice to have this list focus on sexual orientation, not gender identity. The way and the motivation behind killing transgender women and people on television is a different type of trope, as it’s based in transphobia/trans misogyny, not homophobia, and therefore not a “Bury Your Gays” situation. it would do a disservice to the impact of both to combine them. but i am working on a larger piece about the history of trans representation on television so you can look forward to that! We would include any trans women who were lesbians or bisexual and have been killed, though. Also not all trans women consider themselves “queer” simply for being trans.
I’d love to see the (unfortunately much shorter) happy endings list too, but there’s another complementary list: the PsychoLesbian/DepravedBisexual list (to borrow TVTropes’ terms) for all the queer women portrayed as murderers, psychopaths, or murderous psychopaths. Bonus points for the shows where their evil was portrayed as somehow tied to their sexual orientation, gender identity, or both. The fact that I can come up with like 10 examples for it off the top of my head makes me almost as sad as this list.
I saw a list on tumblr that had two whole items on it: britanna and bo/lauren. korrasami is another that was animation,not live action.
yeah actually most early representations of lesbians on television fell into that trope. literally it was 100% for the first several years of lesbian characters appearing on television. I got into the first ten times here, but would love to do a longer list later:
Amy Tyler — Sons of Anarchy (2010) She was killed by her Lesbian g/f, the FBI agent June Stahl.
thank you!
The interesting thing about All My Children’s use of this Bury Your Gays trope is that Marissa was killed by a man specifically because she loved a woman. JR was furious that Marissa was in love with Bianca and not him, that their son was afraid of him and he’d lost custody, and Marissa and Bianca were moving into a house to raise him together. He blamed Marissa and Bianca for all his problems and not the fact that he was a possessive alcoholic. He even went so far as to try to blackmail them by trying to catch them on film having sex and was going to claim Marissa was an unfit mother because of her relationship with a woman. Her murder seemed to be a desperate last resort after he had lost everything.
It pissed me off that the reboot let him get away with it by basically implying he was “fixed” after taking a bullet to the head and surviving after years in a coma. The writers would have you believe that was supposed to be sufficient punishment for him. The reboot was honestly a shit show that never should have happened. If it didn’t we could have all gone on to believe that Marissa and Bianca had a happy ending as the original show ended on a cliffhanger and you didn’t know who was killed that night.
No dead lesbians/bisexuals on Capadocia? For a women’s prison TV show that was weird.
Wendy Hogarth wasn’t hit by a woman being psychologically controlled, WENDY was the one being psychologically controlled and was struck by another woman trying to defend Jeri Hogarth, Carrie-Ann Moss’ character.
And to round it up, all three victim, dead woman and murderer were lesbians.
Wendy and Pam were victims, Jeri played with fire for her own gain and got burned.
What about D’anna Biers (number 3) from Battlestar Galactica?
Helena G Wells was killed when the Warehouse got blown up in Warehouse 13. Later resurrected to shack up with a man.
Lucy Lawless and Mia Krishner died twice!…
I think Lucy was on the list 4 times.
It’s bizarre to me when they make characters gay afyer they’ve killed then off. Such as with Cain, its like they suddenly decided that they should include some representation but do it with a character they’ve already written off so they don’t have to put any time or effort into it.
These writers must know about the dead lesbian trope why so blatantly add to it?
What shocks me the most about the 100 is that they acknowledged the trope existed and then proceed to basically reenact one of the most famous cases of it. Am I supposed to believe that’s a coincidence? These sci-fi writers have never seen Buffy? I also think purposely releasing bts shots of Lexa in the finale and dismissing the idea she will die in twitter is too far. You’re not clever you’re exploiting a passionate group of people, mostly teenages who watch your show, for shock value. At the point you’ve lost sight if what’s important.
I could rant about this forever. It’s soo beyond frustrating.
It makes me so angry. “Hey young vulnerable girls! Look at this amazing relationship between two confident women! You can have this! Oh wait just kidding lol.” Fuck you, dude.
Sorry to repeat the below but it looks like it was missed the first time:
American Horror Story Hotel – Ramona dies; Sally is the dead the whole time and she is revealed to be queer eventually; and Natacha Ramobva dies.
wait everything i read said that Ramona didn’t die? can you tell me how Ramona died and also how Sally and Natacha died?
Natacha Rambova was shot by Elizabeth, but, as far as I can tell, she was only present in one episode (Flicker, 2015).
My bad, she’s listed on wiki/wikia only in Flicker.
Sally gets pushed out of a window by Iris before the events of Hotel, but we see it happen. She’s a ghost/whatever most of the characters in Hotel are for the whole season, and that’s what the Countess also becomes after the death that you’ve mentioned for her. We find out Sally’s queer when we see a flashback to her human days late in the season, she has a threesome with a man and a woman but is genuinely into both of them, and loves them so much she sews them to her while they’re all high, but then the man and the woman (Tina Black) both OD and die – so Tina is another dead queer woman, though she’s only in one ep.
Natacha is in three episodes: Flicker, She Wants Revenge and She Gets Revenge. I think she’s originally a vampire/”afflicted” like the Countess is, but after she’s trapped in a secret part of the hotel for decades and released, the Countess shoots her so she can die far away from the Cortez and the Countess can have her husband Valentino for herself. So Natacha’s death is the final kind.
I thought Ramona also went from being “afflicted” to being a ghost like the Countess does and I thought it was after she told the Countess to “kill me but screw me first”, but you’re right I can’t find any evidence. It must have been interrupted by the Countess’ own death.
Ana and Teresa from Amar en tiempos revueltos got a happy ending where they ran off into the sunset with their son. This show was sold to another network and came back as ‘Amar es para siempre’. In that show, it was stated that Ana Rivas and the couple’s son died on a fire, while Teresa García died in the hospital as a result of the injuries. This death happened off-screen. 2014.
added!
I’m still mad about Maya on PLL and Shay on Chicago Fire. I quit both of those shows when those deaths happened. The one time Bianca Lawson plays a character I actually like…
I hated Jenny on the L Word so I was glad she died.
Xena wasn’t a lesbian/bi. Neither was Claire from Heroes. That one’s so random.
Delphine is not dead! I refuse to believe that.
Claire had a relationship with a woman on Heroes and was declared bisexual
As for Xena, take that up with the rest of the comments left before yours
Claire was not in a relationship with a woman on Heroes. A woman (Gretchen) kissed her, and Claire said she didn’t know how she felt about it, and after a few episodes they dropped that storyline and Claire & Gretchen remained friends and roomates, but nothing more.
I don’t know what happened on Heroes Reborn but from what I gathered, Claire wasn’t part of that show, other than it being said that she died off screen. I haven’t heard anything about it being confirmed that she ever dated a woman…
You are right, Claire is not part of Heroes Reborn. If I remember correctly the show started at the hospital (in flashbacks) where she died in childbirth.
For what it’s worth, the story is basically centered around her twins.
There is also Carly, a character on Charmed. She was one of three confirmed LGBT characters on the show. She only appeared in the episode Charrrmed!, where she was quickly killed off with a cursed blade and forgotten.
For Marissa Tasker- All My Children it was more than that. She was shot by her jealous ex-husband. The show ended with a mystery, who did JR shoot, but when it came back briefly online 2 years later, they answered that question with having Bianca cry over Marissa’s tombstone. We had 2 years to forget and think Marissa and Bianca and the kids were a happy couple. But no.
Don’t forget Monroe in the 100 that got killed one week before Lexa. She gor killed asphyxiated by a poisonous smoke during the attack of a grounder village…
Apparently Monroe was never confirmed queer though
The title bugs me: bisexual characters seems to include men as well. I know the website is clearly about women, but since this situation has exceeded the clexa fandom to raise the issue of lgbt representation, i feel like we’re constantly forgetting about gay men. Is that just me? As a simple suggestion: i would have specified ‘bisexual female characters’ to avoid the exclusion since there is no men cited. Or are they not victims of that trope?
This is a website by and about queer women, tackling a topic that affects women because of the intersections of homophobia and misogyny, so it’s understandable that they are focusing on female characters.
I keep checking back, weirdly eager to see how high this list will go. I mean, it’s terrible. But I also kind of want to place bets on whether it’ll hit 110 or 125?
And while I get the frustration that so many comments ignored the title of the article and/or the introduction, I found it really endearing how passionate so many queer women get about Xena.
where the fuck are all these cars and serial killers coming from, jesus christ
also all that childbirth death???
also who else is real sad that so much of that list had 2015 on it
brb i’m gonna go continue writing my own shit with LGBT people who live
Another one just popped into my head! In “The fortunes and Misfortunes of Moll Flanders”, Moll (played by Alex Kingston) has a relationship with a thief, Lucy (played by Nicola Walker). Lucy eventually gets caught thieving and hanged. This all happens in Episode 4, of a 4 episode British tv series (adapted from the book by Daniel Defoe).
It’s from back in the day (1996) but another example of the trope from the 90s?
oh my god i thought you meant maude flanders and i was like WHAAAA
added!
Well that’s maddening. Alex Kingston in a relationship with Nicola Walker is very relevant to my interests.
Thanks for putting this together Riese – it’s exhausting to read through this, so I can only imagine what it must have been like to been like to write.
Helena Wells on Warehouse 13 died saving her friends from an explosion, but they used time travel to save her life because in that timeline just about everyone died. I don’t know if that counts, but…
So many faves… Dana Fairbanks, Tara Maclay, Tamsin, Lucy Westenra (the only reason I watched that trash show), Lexa, Rachel Posner my baby, ugh this list kills me. It’s also reminded me of the many rage blackouts I’ve had in the past 10 years due to TV shows stabbing me in the heart.
:(
Thank you for doing this. There is some number crunching going on and supposedly 20% of lesbian/bisexual women on mainstream TV have been killed in the past 12 months. Which if confirmed, is disgusting.
I felt emotional seeing Lexa at the end of this list. What a waste. Some of you won’t have watched the show and it’s hard to explain why this death, when placed among so many, cuts particularly deep. This show did its passionate gay fans harm. It actively queer baited them for 12 months, invited them to believe in a progressive LGBT vision and then instead gave them one of the horrendous lesbian death scenes ever put on TV. If only one good thing comes out of it, let us hope the industry takes a good look at the mess they continue to condone over and over. It’s long overdue.
Whooooooah, source? If someone is doing this research I feel like we should know about it.
A couple to add:
Lily Baker (Supernatural, died 2007) attacked and hung on a windmill by a demon.
& since youre including cliffhangers such as delphine:
Alex Vause (Orange is the New Black, 2015) cornered by boss of her intl drug cartel after naming him to the court
I’m convinced that Lolly saves Alex, convinced that she is being attacked as part of a government conspiracy.
In any case, I won’t write her off unless the new season proves it, season 3 definitely left it a cliff-hanger.
She actually didn’t die… but they killed Pousse in 2016
that one is on the list already! to stop people from doing this spoilers on the homepage thing.
lalalala
Oh god the Sarah Barnes Hollyoaks one pissed me off so much when it aired?
Like, her ex sabotaged the parachute… for Sarah’s friend. Because she was jealous. But then the packs got mixed up, so Sarah got killed instead.
Hollyoaks has a *particularly* bad track record for The Evil Gay, during the time that I’ve been watching it. Which is, disappointingly, a while. Shame on me.
Couldn’t this include Thirteen from House? She clearly dies prematurely from Huntington’s disease even if it wasn’t in the show itself.
But the show lets her leave happy and in love (with a woman!!) and I’m forever thankful.
I had something relevant to say but then I got to a bunch of characters I didn’t know where dead yet and so now I’m just sad.
Lisa(Rachel’s gf) from House of Cards too. you should do a list with all the baiting too and queer who are threated bad, like Marisa Tomei character on Empire. this is so much more then the Lesbian Death Trope, respect and rappresentation comes from these mis-threatment as well.
Lisa is still alive…?
I don’t know if it counts, but Cara from Legend of the Seeker also was killed (throat slit). Fortunately she was brought back to life at the end of the same episode. It was in 2010.
thank you for writing this article and: wow, what an utterly infuriating and depressing list.
some miscount must have happened somewhere along the way though, because currently there are 115 dead women on it, with three of the posts/pictures standing for two deaths at once.
Not a miscount – there were originally 65. But the list kept growing, and is still growing exponentially (I’m seeing 123 entries). I’m sure at some point there will be a true “final count.”
If we’re including trans women, Angelique from Penny Dreadful (poisoned by her male lover). Evelyn Poole from Penny Dreadful as well, death by werewolf-beheading.
Doreah from Game of Thrones, sealed inside a vault.
We aren’t, unless that trans woman is a lesbian or bisexual — the list of trans women would be a different list because the source of the problem is different (homophobia vs. transphobia/trans misogyny), I think that would oversimplify the issue to include them here. I’m working on a longer piece about the history of trans representation on television though, and those deaths will absolutely be mentioned. and here’s a great piece we did about trans representation onscreen in 2015.
Carmelita Rainer (Candis Cayne), from Dirty Sexy Money, has to be in that list.
yup!
Angelique needs to be on a list when that’s discussed (omg was so fucking mad), but Evelyn isn’t trans or in any way clearly bisexual (it might have been SORTA hinted at with the Cut-Wife, but definitely not more overtly than Xena).
Evelyn kisses Hecate quite sexually (which makes her incestuous, but also bisexual), and it’s very heavily implied with the Cut-Wife, using similar sexual imagery that is used with the male!demon/Vanessa relationship.
I MISS LEXA. SHE DON’T DESERVE THIS DAMN. SHE’S THE ONLY LESBIAN CHARACTER I ACTUALLY RELATED AND LOVED WITH ALL MY LIFE.
In the German tv show “Hinter Gittern” there were 5 lesbians and one bisexual who were killed. Here’s the list:
– Susanne Teubner (1999): shot at a bankrobbery, she was a customer
– Jule Neumann (2001): committed suicide
– Bea Hansen (2001): murdered, died of her injuries from an explosion, died in her girlfriend’s arms
– Ruth Baechtle (2002): died in a cold storage room (accident/suicide?)
– Ines Führbringer (2004): slit throat, died in her girlfriend’s arms
– Manuela Wellmann (2006): stabbed, died in her girlfriend’s arms
I think I got them all except Ruth, ’cause I can’t figure out the cause of death for sure!
I didn’t know how many lesbian/bi characters died on that show. That’s horrible. I only watched for one couple, Sascha & Kerstin, and luckily, they both survived. I wonder why there was never an outcry about all those deaths.
Ruth Baechtle was the nun, right? I don’t remember her sexuality being defined, but in my defense, I only caught glimpses of the show after 2001.
As for her cause of death, she developed schizophrenia, her second personality (Lilith?) strangled an inmate (Mona Suttner, kind of the prison’s head of shady business like drug dealing and prostitution) and then locked herself in the cold storage room, freezing to death (One of the few post 2001 episodes I saw).
I have two more. From the spanish soap opera “Amar en tiempos revueltos” and it’s sequel “Amar es para siempre”: Ana and Teresa (2014).
– Ana: dies in a fire in a hotel with her son, Alejandro. Her girlfriend (wife, basically), Teresa, gets badly injured.
– Teresa: dies after suffering from 3rd degree burns in the 40% of her body.
they’re on there!
Thanks so much for doing this. Another addition – In 2004 the lesbian character Al Mackenzie on Bad Girls (UK) was poisoned to death.
added, thank you!
omg 118 already. This is ffffed up. Just a suggestion, can we do this same thing for gay/bisexual women who did NOT die (yet…), just to have a statistic of which is the actual percentage that dies? Cause I could bet is not lower than 30%
Mac from bad girls died as well just before she was going to turn her life around.
Tina Greer Smallville impaled with a metal rod.
added!
That chic from the oc. Havent watched the show but 90 percent sure ahe was bi and 70 percent sure ahe died
she’s been on the list since it was first posted
bless you kayla
“That chic from the oc.”
Thank Jebus she was already on the list because with this info, I don’t know about Riese, but I would have a stroke searching for the character.
Marissa Cooper, she’s already on the list
Bea from Hospital Central. COD suicide from jumping off a building.
When is someone going to get Ellen to comment on this?
I’ll ask her the next time we’re having mimosas together.
Are you counting lesbians and bisexual women who were only in one episode? If so, you might consider adding Lily Baker from Season 2 of Supernatural.
http://supernatural.wikia.com/wiki/Lily_Baker
Thank you for doing this. It’s difficult to read, but I’m glad someone is keeping track so we have something to counter with when they say “straight characters die all the time!”
Just noticed the “regular or recurring” part, so feel free to disregard my Lily Baker addition. Thanks anyway.
according to an old AS post from last year, there are two more not yet mentionned here:
-a character named Nenna Ajanlekoko, from the show Crossbones (2014)
-a character named Lev, from the show Defiance
hm, has anybody seen Crossbones? I’m not familiar with the show and although it is on that infographic, all I can find about it is that she faked her death. Anybody know more?
All right, so maybe Nenna won’t be on the list.
see this:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2400631/board/thread/232983553
I haven’t seen Crossbones but it seems like nobody knows in fact what happened to her; she disappeared from the show towards the end (and it is here speculated that the network didn’t broadcast one of the last episodes, which could explain the weird way her storyline ended)
Oh but apparently it was Nenna’s love interest who was murdered (by Nenna herself). I can’t find how
http://community.ew.com/2014/07/25/crossbones-recap-beggarman/
http://www.afterellen.com/tv/222210-nbc-pirate-series-crossbones-has-a-lesbian-romance
Elise Beaupré from Unité 9. cause of death: cancer.
Added, thank you!
Has anyone else noticed that a significant number of these characters died shortly after giving birth? It’s kind of a triple insult – “Let’s kill off the queer character, but first let her fulfill her duty as a woman and produce a child that she then won’t be able to corrupt by raising it!” -ugh.
So many women I love on this list. :(
(Though… I need to question the inclusion of Natalie Buxton from Bad Girls. She was straight, only using queerness as a way to try and manipulate other women. Not to mention she was a nonce…)
Isabella Kortenaer from Goede Tijden, Slechte Tijden in 2010. Died from an infection as a result of slipping on the bathroom floor.
Wiki (Dutch): https://nl.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabella_Kortenaer
Kudos to Riese for keeping up with this (unfortunately) ever-growing list.
The woman from ‘les revenants’ is called Laure not Luce.
You forgot Marina Ranieri from”Terapia d’Urgenza”,the Italian format of”Hospital Central”.Shot by a bullet.She SHOULD have survived,but since the serie was stopped after she has been shot,technically she’s dead.
Loved Torchwood, but Tosh is on the list and not Ianto? Ianto’s shrine is still being visited!
It’s a list of lesbian and bisexual women (and, one assumes, female-identified people, though I don’t see any trans ladies on here and I’m SURE we could come up with some).
I mean, man, I’m as upset about Ianto as you are, but…he’s not a woman.
This is even more hilarious than “what about Lost and Delirious” / “this is a list of TV shows”
OF COURSE someone had to come with “BUT WHAT ABOUT THIS MAN”
PS “your comment is awaiting moderation” > BLESS YOU for black listing the name of the movie ahah
So the picture given for Adele from The Lizzie Borden Chronicles is actually of Aideen Trotwood who was played by Michelle Fairley. Adele was played by Kimberly-Sue Murray. I wish I could provide a picture, but I can’t at this current time.
Also she had her throat slit and was framed for murder by Lizzie. The being locked in a coffin bit was completely unrelated.
I feel like wlw are the Jean Greys of general fiction – writers don’t know what to do with us so we’re evil or dead. How many more little girls need to grow up believing all we can be is porn or a tragedy?
Victoria Hand and Isabelle Hartley don’t actually count. They were both lesbians in the comics, but they were never written as such on the TV show (partially because the writers didn’t want backlash over killing off two queer women). There wasn’t even subtext.
Yeah, the closest the show comes to making this canon is a single line in which Hartley refers to hand as “Vic,” implying that they know each other pretty well. There is zero TV canon evidence for any romantic relationship between them, nor any evidence that they had any other f/f relationships.
Oddly enough, despite being one of the few kids shows at the time where characters really could die, Superman the Animated Series actual did provide (subtle) evidence of Maggie Sawyer being gay in a episode that totally inverted this troop. She is seen being blown out a car, motionless, and with her eyes closed, with her Dan Turpin even screaming “Murderers” at her attackers…yet we see later she’s still alive in the hospital. An unidentified and unspeaking women is seen beside her recover, who is supposed to be her girlfriend…and of the course of the episode Turpin dies for real.
this was addressed already in a previous comment–
oliviactually: “Seeing Agents Hand and Hartley from SHIELD on this list is bitterly ironic, cause the showrunners specifically said that one of the reasons they erased both character’s queer sexualities from the show is because they didn’t want to become known as the show with two dead lesbians. Yeah, fuck that show.”
Catherine: “That is why I don’t understand how they made the list but some other characters didn’t”
oliviactually: “Well, I’d support them being on this list if only because it’s a big f-you to the showrunners who explicitly wanted to avoid this outcome, which is bullshit homophobic erasure.”
Riese: “precisely”
I’m glad to see people fail not just to read the ACTUAL post (missing the FIFTH PARAGRAPH but also the actual list) but ALSO previous comments addressing the exact same thing as they are. I kinda wish someone in neuro behavioural sciences would do research on this now
Sorry Jadzia Dax was not a lesbian. Don’t I wish! Yes her character did kiss a woman but it was because a previous host (male) had been with her and Jadzia was remember his feelings for her.
Wouldn’t that make her pansexual thought? She was willing to be with and was attracted to her wife from a previous host and her gender didn’t come into it. It was more about the taboo around having anything to do with a previous host’s life.
Shayla Nico (Mr Robot). His ex-boyfriend (who had raped her and kidnapped her) slit her throat.
[source: http://www.vulture.com/2015/07/mr-robot-recap-season-1-episode-6.htm%5D
I read through all the comments to see if anyone had posted this yet. Shayla deserved better…
Oh, I’d forgotten her. Her bisexuality was kind of vague, but is the best explanation for her kissing Angela…
What about Mary Louise and Nora on the Vampire Diaries, do they count? They are Vampires so technically they are dead. Not sure if they were a couple before they were vampired and dies together or not.
Also what about the girls that Bo succu-faced on Lost Girl. I just remember one girl in particular played by Miriam McDonald (Emma from Degrassi). She was found dead and Bo thought she was responsible from her succu-kiss but it turns out that the girl died in other para-normal ways (though I can’t remember other specifics).
the girls Bo succu-faced were one-episode victims. mary louise and nora were not killed off by the show, they’ve been undead the whole time
there’s a character in smallville who appears in 2 episodes, tina greer, who is a lesbian and dies, i think
Ilithyia from Spartacus should definitely be on here. She was married to a man, though she pursued comforts with Lucretia, kissing her multiple times and therefore enforcing that she’s bisexual. She was killed by Lucretia during childbirth, her stomach slit open and before succumbing to the wounds she witnessed Lucretia commit the murder-suicide with Ilithyia’s child.
I dunno, I always felt like Ilithyia and Lucy Lawless’s interactions were purely power plays, and every time one gave the other a peck, it was merely a victory flourish after having just fucked them over in some way.
Not to undermine the hypothetical sexuality of a fictional character from a couple of millennia before the word homosexuality existed or anything, but I feel like she could have at least gone for an underwater diddling from a bathing wench if she was really after female-induced pleasure.
“Not to undermine the hypothetical sexuality of a fictional character from a couple of millennia before the word homosexuality existed or anything, but…”
bless this sentence opener
I really wouldn’t have included Flora from Deadwood to the list. There was no indication she was LB, she was only using her sexuality to try and con the actual lesbian character (who didn’t die).
well then you should murder me and take over b/c i have never seen deadwood so i am just trusting these commenters who tell me things (i attempt to verify everything i’m told and usually do or else learn something different and say that instead. but it’s not always possible, it depends on how updated the wikia is and how much I already know about the show and whether or not the episode was recapped somewhere and if it’s in English and all these other factors!)
saxa from spartacus is missing (http://spartacus.wikia.com/wiki/Saxa)
already there
“Saxa, Spartacus (2013)
Cause of Death: Sword attack during battle”
kayla bless you on this thread
i can only imagine how mind numbing it is for you to comment on all these and still retain your sanity, riese, so i figured i’d help a little. <3
Janet King is a tv series in Australia, about a wonderfully complex intelligent woman who is a senior crown prosecutor. She also happens to be in a happy relationship with a woman for the past 10 odd years, and have two children. The character was spin off from another series a few years ago. The 2ne season begins in Australia next week so imagine my non surprise when I learnt that Janet’s Partner is being killed off by a stray bullet and for good measure they are throwing in a legal battle for her partners eggs.
Oh !@#$ !@#$ !@# !!! I knew they should have stopped at one season and would screw it up otherwise! This one is going to hit me harder than most of these.
I’m right there with you. I’m so gut wrenchingly disappointed. I don’t want to watch it now but Janet is such an amazing character that I want to watch for her. Not sure I have the strength though. Sigh.
Urgh! I’ve been so worried about Ashleigh since I realised that Aimee Pederson wasn’t in the cast list for this season. Like you, I’m now distraught and caught between whether to watch or not…
…and I just discovered that two years ago Elaine Atwell from AE prophetically worried that Ash was perhaps the Tara MacLay of “Janet King.”
http://www.afterellen.com/tv/210747-janet-king-is-a-new-aussie-drama-with-a-lesbian-lead
Autostraddle, once the show comes out in Aus I will beg you to support us and write about how shitty this is. We don’t have anyone in Australia to really do it for us. :( Dammit JK was the first lesbian main character on Australian TV.
When I read that about Ashleigh I was gutted. Now I don’t want to watch the new season because really why did they have to do this?
Sky Silvestry from the Doctor Who episode Midnight.
Ah, should have read the intro before commenting. Sky was sucked out of a vehicle and onto the surface of an airless planet while possessed by an alien. 2008.
Not sure but I feel like Helena G Wells from Warehouse 13 should also make the list. They did kill her off (the warehouse exploded and she sacrificed herself to save the others) even though they resurrected her in the next season. And then the writers found a convenient way to get rid of her without killing her again. (They also killed their other gay protagonist, even though he was brought back too…)
D.S Angie Morton – Strictly Confidential (2006)
Suicide
I think we all can agree that whenever someone is writing some piece about “bury your gays” it could be difficult to get all the names right, but one thing I know for sure is that there’s not doubt about the person that will illustrate your article:
this woman! AND she was the lead detective on the case of Ilene Chaiken killing Jenny Schecter! Where this woman goes, lesbian and/or bisexual female death follows.
We need to contact Guinness World Records, because, come on…
This list is growing faster than the number of dislikes on a Justin Bieber video.
and both of those counts have deep ties to the abuse of lesbian pop culture
i’m still pissed off about Tituba, especially after the writers had promised to develop her beyonf her relationship with Mary. All they ended up doing is having a white character repeating the same stuff she said herself the previous season and then kill her off… i hope they find a way to bring her back.
Julie Mao deserved better, like i get her death is necessary thematically and narratively, but ugh, that was nasty and gruesome.
Man, a lot of queer women getting shot.
While it was more often than not brought up as a joke, Clara Oswald has had relationships with women and men, she was killed off, though i don’t know if it counts because she’s pretty much immortal for the time being.
In a recent adaptation of Agatha Christie’s “A Murder Is Announced” the director takes incredibly subtle subtext from the book and makes the homosexual relationship between two key female characters more visible (and also makes them much younger than in the book). Of course, as it was originally written in the book, one of the women is killed by the murderer for knowing too much. She was strangled. *sigh* even the queen of murder mysteries buried her gays albeit it was much more common in older works due to the social stigmas of the time
I thought of that couple too, tho wiki says that any subtext on Christie’s part may well have been accidental because she based them on a real-life couple, the full extent of whose relationship she was probably unaware of.
That aside, I think the death falls too much under the victim-of-the-week umbrella to qualify for this list. It did make me really sad though!
Wow, Lucy Lawless has played a lot of dead lady-lovers
If there are people willing to help with data entry, I can try to make some data analysis about the likelihood of queer women being murdered off in television.
Some variables:
– Production country (though that’d be interesting to map out, maybe US as the base case and other countries/regions as variables?)
– # of Main and Recurring cast (separated? Together?)
— # of said cast members that are women
— # of said cast members that are queer
— # of cast members that are queer women
– Whether the character is a Main character or Recurring character
– Whether the series has ended or is ongoing
– Whether the character is Dead, Alive, or Resurrected/Undead
– Whether the show is specifically marketed as “queer”/”queer-friendly” (e.g. The L-Word) or not
– Year of production
— Year of death
— Year of first appearance?
– Method of death (Murder, Gunshot, Suicide, Car, Supernatural, whatever’s out there)
– Method of ‘happy ending’ (Married, With Child, some other thing)
Do a regression analysis and then you can control for different variables.
I think this is a GREAT idea!
It’s my personal pet theory that the odds of a lesbian or bi character dying are tied to how many other problematic homophobic and biphobic tropes show up on the show (see my comment below for a list), but I don’t have any proof of that…just several decades of watching bi and lesbian women die on television. But I think that could be difficult to map.
I think your points about main and recurring cast members, and how many of them are queer women, would yield some interesting results. I’d love to see what you come up with.
You could probably have each trope as its own qualitative variable – we’d need to get a shortlist of tropes from say TVTropes, and then indicate whether or not that series uses that trope or not.
Lemme see if I can get something started.
It’s happened – the list is now double what it was when it was posted.
This is a very interesting (if depressing) list, and I thank you for compiling it.
It’s striking to me how terrible many of these deaths are–so many are brutal and violent, and quite a few sound just plain idiotic even for television. (It especially seems as like as representation has increased in recent years, so have the number and awfulness of the deaths.) And that’s without even looking at whether the deaths could be considered “punishment” for their sexuality, which many of them could be.
I also note that when I scroll through the characters I actually know, a lot of them were in very problematic story lines even apart from being brutally killed off. There are bunch here who were terrible lesbian predator stereotypes, or whose bisexuality only ever appeared in one-to-three episodes during sweeps season and then was never mentioned again, or whose story arcs revolved around men in stupid and problematic ways, or who were shown as behaviorally bisexual but were never allowed to use the term on screen, or were women of color killed off on mostly white shows, or were subject to obvious double standards about sexuality, etc etc etc.
I think it’s important to call attention to all the deaths, especially right now, but also hope that we can talk more about some of the other problematic tropes, and even discuss how often they go together. Because I think those connections can help us call out the problems earlier, before the fictional blood is spilled.
(Also, I think that Delphine on Orphan Black is less likely to actually be alive than Rose on Jane the Virgin. The writers might well be faking us out with Delphine, but I wouldn’t put an asterisk next to her name; she effectively died on screen.)
(Not to nit-pick! You are doing an amazing job compiling this list with audience feedback and I have immense appreciation for the amount of work and frustration that must entail!)
I have a few. They killed Meh Yewll’s wife on Defiance.
They killed Cicily in Northern Exposure.
They killed Zoe Monroe on The 100.
This list is also killing my soul….does that count?
Aw, Cicely. She was just in the one-episode flashback, though, right?
indeed. However, she is the town…it’s her name…so while her face only shows up for a single episode–she herself and her name lived on for seasons. that should count, right?
she’s already on the list! there were a few one-episode people i added b/c they still fit into the bury your gays trope and she is one of them
My only caveat is that Cicely wasn’t a recurring character on ‘Northern Exposure’; she only appeared on one episode.
Still, she was definitely a fridging. :-(
Laura Palmer from Twin Peaks (1990). Molested, raped, and killed by her own possessed father.
Revealed in the Secret Diary of Laura Palmer that she was in a relationship with Josie Packard. Laura was the catalyst and center mystery of the show, although she never appeared alive except for the movie prequel.
THATS RIGHT!! Laura Palmer….my god.
i never heard of this? are you sure? i’ve watched the serie and the movie as well and i’m a little puzzled. is the book canon?
Just thought of one! Doreah, Game of Thrones. Handmaiden and sometime loved of Daenayrys Targaryen. Shut in a vault after betraying her mistress.
Does she count, though? Yes, she slept with Daenerys, but (iirc) only because she was a slave. I’m pretty sure her actual sexuality was never established.
I think I got her confused with her counterpart in the book, whose sexuality is more clearly defined. Surprised there are no GOT characters on this list, but that might be more to do with a lot of performative bisexuality of female characters rather than they are escaping the blows. I am sure by the end of the show Cersei and/or Ellaria Sand will end up on this list.
The TV series Survivors (2008) had Jenny Walsh (played by Freema Agyeman), and she died after contracting the virus that wipes out most of humanity.
Here’s some more evidence to back this up: http://www.afterellen.com/tv/41952-uks-survivors-remake-features-bisexual-character
http://survivors.wikia.com/wiki/Anya_Raczynski
In 1997 poor Sondra Westwood was killed by a serial killer in the Australian soap “Pacific Drive.”
I’m kind of pleased that I can’t think of any other Australians who haven’t already been mentioned. I don’t think many of our tv queer women have found happiness, but hey, at least they’re not dead!
do you know how she was killed? like besides that it was a serial killer, like what was the method
From the episode guide for the last episode she was in;
“Joel challengers Trey at the XTC to raise money for Drug awareness. Zoe and Tim asks Sondra to choose. Sondra however gets hacked to death! Cameron calls Trey to the drug clinic where Sondra was working. He finds Sondra. DEAD.”
Ash from Janet King also appears to be dead (killed off between seasons it would appear).
Read below from overview of series 2;
Award winning actress Marta Dusseldorp returns as the brilliant Prosecutor Janet King. In series 2, Janet is seconded from a case of psychological abuse in the armed services to head up a Royal Commission into gun crime.
Conscripting solicitors Richard and Lina, and the ambitious Owen Ramsey as Counsel Assisting, Janet trades the rarefied atmosphere of mahogany courtrooms, wigs and gowns for plain clothes and a community hall. There she and her team focus on the inciting murder of twenty-five year-old Hani Akvan. Hani is married to Elaheh, one of the Ghasemi – Parker clan, who are mid-range operators in the tow truck and car rebirthing trade.
As Janet and her team unravel the complex personal and business relationships of the Ghasemi and Parker families, a ballistics report on a weapon recently used in a local hold up confirms it to be the same gun that killed Ash, Janet’s partner. The killer has never been caught, adding to the pressure. Ash’s sister, Deborah, commences legal proceedings against Janet laying claim to Ash’s only remaining frozen embryo – with the outcome hinging on whether a judge decides eight cells should be identified as property or life?
Janet navigates the final twists and turns of Hani’s murder and end up where the series began, the Army, and a crime of passion and mistaken identities. With her life under threat and in a nail-biting conclusion, she will come face to face with the person who shot and killed Ash.
added!
Thanks Riese for adding these! How long do you think we’ll take until no one can think of any more?? I hope that you haven’t been driven to despair by then ;)
And thanks Lilian for finding the info about Pacific Drive – the episode summaries really show what a crazy show it was, but because of Zoe I was SUCH a fan! I know that Zoe tended to get left by her gfs or they got killed and/or they slept with Tim, but I loved her attitude: I felt like it was always clear to the viewer that when crap things happened to her it was because society was homophobic, not because she deserved it or anything. Oddly, because of an effort amongst those involved in the production to make Zoe a well rounded queer character (or so I’ve heard) she ended up as the most well-rounded, sane person in an otherwise wacky inconsistent show. After spending last night on youtube I’ve been having Zoe feels all day.
I’m sad for Ash. I keep seeing ads for Janet King and having such a moment of joy at seeing Janet’s face and then I have to remember that Ash is dead.
Huh, Lucy Lawless is on this list 4 times!
Also it’s good Xena was on this list. They totally confirmed her queerness/her and Gabrielle being soul mates in the final Ep of season 4.. The future Ep where Xenas souls in the Joxers body aka Harry, and Gabrielle is in Gabrielle/Matties body. Xena says hello old friend, then they proceed to kiss..
The 1990s were so shit you had to borrow a dude’s body to kiss your girlfriend.
Sigh.
COMMENT AWARD
There was another one. Castle TV Series, Season 9 Ep 10 “Witness for the Prosecution.” The murder victim is bisexual and it’s a big deal to the plot.
I swear the 5th paragraph must be in a vortex or something because so many people missed it:
” Victims from crime procedurals (Law & Order, Cold Case, CSI, Criminal Minds or older shows) are not on this list, as that is an entirely different kind of list.”
thank you chloe
I’m a straight white guy (aka part of the problem) although i’m not part of the industry, yet even I can recognize the fact that regardless of if it’s 2 or 142, the fact that LGBT female characters have had that many deaths is BEYOND f’d up in 2016.
As someone who’s more of a movie guy than a TV guy, I had once assumed we were beyond this tendency in 2002!
I was already somewhat familiar with The Celluloid Closet by they, but at the time I saw it as really more a reflection of how much worse things were in the final years of the Hollywood Production Code. Which is why at the time I became aware of the uproar over Tara dying on Buffy (have to be honest though I know some may want to kill me) I was initial more offend that other people were offended. At least to the extent that some called it homophobic. I still that claim in the context of the storyline was a stretch at based, though they certainly could have handled it better and following the debate was a real eye-opener.
The hatred of losing a popular character I completely understood, but it seemed like the kind of show where anyone could die and (at the time) I’d kind of assumed this wasn’t really a problem anyone more. I thought seems like some people were hung up on painful memories of past tendencies. Not realizing of course, how many were still looking far and wide to find people like themselves even in real life. It wasn’t until I started taking a closer look at other gay and lesbian characters at the time (or rather lack there of) and suddenly…OHHHHH know I see what your getting at!
fwiw — these are some of my theories about how this happens. for a great deal of these, sexual orientation has nothing to do with why that character died. but for the ones that really do feel trope-driven:
– historically, it was extremely risky to have a queer character on your show at all. you risked losing fans and advertisers and turning off loyal viewers. but! if you brought her on and then killed her, you got points for being daring, a little ratings boost for the scandal, somebody gay behind-the-scenes probably was happy to at least get one gay story told… and you wouldn’t take too many long-term losses.
– because it’s a trope! all writers fall into tropes sometimes (especially if you are a straight cis white man writing about literally anybody besides a straight cis white man). tropes are defined by the writerly tendency to succumb to them. and in this case, it’s not just the “bury your gays” trope that leads to buried gays — many other sexuality tropes do the same… the lesbian love triangle, the psycho lesbian, etc —lots of these tropes tend to put the characters at risk of death. often people use tropes in the same way that people use stereotypes — unconsciously, but pervasively.
– lack of people behind the scenes who know how to tell our stories or are excited about telling our stories: there actually are a lot more lesbian and bisexual women working behind the camera on a lot of these shows than you’d think, but we’re still a very small fraction of writers teams and even when we are on the team, aren’t necessarily empowered or enabled to make high-level decisions or speak on the behalf of Our Queer Community.
– lower risk of fan revolt and a smaller fandom to contend with — just look at Pretty Little Liars. can you imagine what would’ve happened if one of Spencer, Hanna or Aria’s boyfriends have been killed? but man, they can’t stop doing fucked up shit to Emily’s girlfriends! including killing one of them. Lesbians and bisexual women are a really small percentage of the population. There are so many more straight fans out there, that even though to us, the queer fandom feels huge and passionate, math dictates that we are merely a speck in the universe. luckily we do get heard a lot of the time because we are very good at projecting. loudly.
– we tend to show up on ensemble shows that involve a lot of deadly situations — fantasy/sci-fi, horror, hospitals, police departments, vampires, criminals — and on soap operas. this is mostly just math: the more characters a show has, the more likely a queer person is to show up! people still feel like it’s a big risk to center a show on a queer person, like nobody will be able to “relate” as if us queers haven’t spent our whole lives relating to shows about straight people. one of the most encouraging shifts over the last few years has been a number of shows with mixed-orientation casts that are centered on the queer characters, like Faking It, The Fosters, Transparent and Orange is the New Black.
– queer roles tend to be smaller, and smaller roles are more expendable.
– because we are women living in a culture that hates women, especially women who are not available or not exclusively available to men. and so we die. (but gay men also die at alarming rates on television, so it’s also sometimes the lack of heteronormativity that bugs people out)
Fantastic comment. This is why I come to this site, because it doesn’t just compile lists of data like this (valuable though that service is) but tries to start a discussion.
And I especially like the point about the other terrible tropes than often lead to the bury your gays trope, and about misogyny pervading our culture in all ways.
I’m very glad you’ve gotten to around this this. It’s not enough to complain about the weather. You have to figure out meteorology. Data compilations are useful, but they are a potentially never-ending with no solutions in sight without open conversation the whys and hows.
Of course any conversation about these issue is bought to not only uncover not just deep seated prejudice, but also the way even so many otherwise decent and intelligent people fall into those “unconscious” stereotypes you describe. So even though I think all the reason you sight seem mostly right, I want to condense and expand on a few.
All writers do indeed fall into tropes and it’s easier to fall into those tropes about people from another group (unconsciously as you say) when there’s no interplay with anyone from that group. I agree that when the majority of fans are (presumably) straight there’s less fear of alienating those that aren’t and less incentive for writing characters aren’t. Thus the number of gay/bi character are few, relatively minor, and therefore (like you said) expendable.
It’s not that different from what’s so often said about the lack of POC of color in fiction or various race tropes. That executives only care about one color and that’s green! TV networks will put on a show where ever character’s a potato if they think it will bring in the ratings. Yet they assume most straight audience don’t want to see queer characters on a regular bases for a variety of reasons. They’ve almost been more concerned with not alienation there “core” audience. So most of time they see the alienation gay and bi viewers is as a minor problem if they even see it all.
Any chance this comment could be put into its own article? I think the points are really fantastic, and have wanted to share them, but it involves scrolling way down the list. I know you’re busy doing a million other things, but at some point this would be amazing. Thank you :) x
Sounds like supernatural is a bad universe for girls who like girls… O.o
Supernatural is a bad universe for girls period. The misogyny on this show reaches levels of epic proportion from the very first episode.
Supernatural is bad universe for girls, period. And I say this as a huge, huge, huuuuugggge Supernatural fan, too.
Great, needed list. There’s a lesbian murder in Crossing Jordan maybe worth a mention.
LOL RIESE I WONDER IF THIS IS YOUR VERSION OF “TANTALUS TORMENT” … where instead of having to roll a mountain up a hill forever or never being able to drink, you have to answer forever to “what about xena” and “there was a lesbian victim on episode 405 of CSI”.
(but wait, you didn’t deserve it tho :( )
I KNOW
THIS MUST BE MY FATE
FOR SOME SIN I COMMITTED IN A PAST LIFE
MAYBE IN A PAST LIFE I WROTE AN EPISODE OF ST. ELSEWHERE WHERE A LESBIAN WAS MURDERED BY A LESBIAN
Didn’t this list start at like 75
65 if you look at the address bar !
I think the Danish/Swedish show ‘The Bridge’ has at least two Les/bi deaths? Viktoria and Beate both die in s2, I can’t remember if Laura or Bodil survive. All are recurring characters.
Also I don’t know why I missed this from the original comment : thanks so much for putting this list together, Riese, it must have taken so much time and effort, and although it’s a bit of a sad read, it’s damn important for calling out such a toxic trope.
do you have more info on this like a link or a year or a cause of death? (and thank you for thanking me!)
Viktoria Nordgren was a major recurring character in season 2 and had a very brief but matter of fact fling (might have been a one-night stand, can’t remember) with a female writer/journalist who went to her house to interview her (Bodil). Viktoria died a particularly horrible death at the end of the second season (aired 2013) by injection/infection of a virus. However, I think she was terminally ill from the beginning of the season with something else… Bodil survives but as that season’s ‘story’ was concluded doesn’t appear in the next season.
The Wiki page mentions their encounter: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bridge_(Danish/Swedish_TV_series)
Plus Helle Anker in season 3, but I don’t think that counts as she is already murdered(!) when she first appears.
I’m a fan of The Bridge in general (mainly because of Sofia Helin) but this doesn’t look like a great track record.
Thank you for the additional backup, Elphaba! I’ve PM’ed a bunch of backup to Riese also detailing what happened between Beate and Laura in s2.
Also, yay for another fan of the Bridge! I’ve not watched any of series 3 yet but I’m really excited for it, largely also because of Sofia Helin – Saga’s such a great character and Sofia Helin does such an amazing job. Sad that s2 in particular has this problem (like, they introduced 4 women involved with other women and only half make it to the end of the season? I genuinely can’t remember what happened to Laura or find any evidence about her fate, either. Admittedly, the show does have quite the body count, but even so).
No problem! Hope my comment on S3 wasn’t too much of a spoiler! I also can’t remember or find any info about Laura, only some episode review where the author thinks she won’t make it (doesn’t look good then!).
A big THANK YOU for this amazing, quite depressing, work.
I don’t care what the industry says, our level of representation sucks big time because if we add the “missing lesbian/bisexual” (Renee Montoya), the “pyscho lesbian/bisexual killer” (big number for this one) and what I called the “lesbian/bisexual by declaration only” (because nothing really happens romantically with the character, it’s just a token) the numbers are awful.
Deputy White House Political Director Sophia Varma from Blindspot (2015). She asked the Assistant Director of the FBI (Bethany Mayfair) to run away with her but ended up killing herself.
Characters in single-episodes don’t count.
actually i think i will include this one since it sounds like a character who could’ve kept living and had a place in the show but they killed off anyhow (as opposed to a victim-of-the-week or a tertiary character with no ties to any other characters)
This episode is the only background we have on Bethany Mayfair’s personal life.
For me it was an important episode because it changed Mayfairs’s view/participation on Operation Daylight and all the power-plays with the CIA.
As I said, that was my personal take and interpretation on the episode, but I didn’t think that was a common point of view.
It would be interesting to see how many openly queer female characters have appeared on TV in general, just to see a percentage.
GLAAD’s yearly “Where We Are on TV” should have data. I think they decided to stop counting but that might’ve been after the 2015 release? But it should have 10 years or so, broken down by regular/recurring and race and orientation.
I’d love to see a similar list where you collect all the gay and bisexual women who finish a series in a happy relationship. It would be great to be able to compare. So far all I can come up with are:
1) Spencer and Ashley from South of Nowhere
2) Santana and Brittney from Glee
3) Bo and Lauren from Lost Girl
4) Korra and Asami from Legend of Korra (And their entire relationship was holding hands and staring into each others’ eyes in the very last scene)
5) Willow and Kennedy…I guess
Additionally, every single one of those relationships features one or more characters who has relationships with men (I’d say bisexual, but I dunno how to classify Willow.) Do bisexuals have a higher rate of happiness than gay women? Are you more likely to survive if you have sex with a man?
Again, I’d be interested in the data.
Heather is working on it
I have a sneaking suspicion that you were swindled in the distribution of tasks.
This list was a pain in the ass with the whole debate about Xena, single episodes, crime procedurals, the number of a virgin sacrifice, etc.
I think you forgot that one movie which shall not be named
This is an interesting idea, but it has the disadvantage of only being able to count shows that have actually concluded, which creates a much smaller sample size. (In other words, Heather really got a better deal than Riese! Unless it means she has to watch the final season of the L World for research, in which case, go Riese.)
As for having relationships with men, I think that’s a complicated question.
One of the most common ways that bi* women are misrepresented on TV is by not allowing them to use the terms that actual bi* people use and having them disavow labels. It’s highly problematic (and connected to the terrible mental and physical health outcomes for bi people) but common because straight viewers will often read such characters as straight people with an exception.
So I think you have to be careful about what you mean; there are bisexual characters, and there are characters who behave bisexually, but whom the shows have avoid labels in order to distance them from the LGBT community.
There’s also a marked tendency to have both lesbian and bi women’s story lines revolve around men, and particularly sleeping with men, which is deeply offensive in different ways in both cases. I would hope the offensiveness of showing self-avowed lesbians sleeping with men would be obvious, but it’s not often enough commented on how damaging is for bi women to see themselves accepted only conditionally, in male/female relationships.
But I’m not sure what those results would prove. The crazy death rate for these characters is based on misogyny, homophobia, and biphobia, and it’s misogyny, homophobia, and biphobia that leads to their stories revolving around men too.
I’m more interested in what creates the conditions for fictional character survival: does having a female show runner, or a predominantly female group of writers, or a predominantly female audience help? How important is genre?
Willow and Kennedy don’t count because they were broken up in the canon comics that followed the show.
Susan and Carol from Friends!! I mean, they basically disappeared from the show altogether, but still a couple, right?
Oops too keen to start the happy list
Minor correction – in Jessica Jones, Wendy isn’t possessed, she’s compelled by the villain’s hypnotic powers. He made her attack her ex-wife, Jerry; he’s only there in the first place because Jerry wanted to have him make Wendy sign their divorce papers. She’s killed by Jerry’s girlfriend.
It should possibly be noted that Victoria Hand and Isabelle Hartley weren’t even confirmed as lesbians onscreen before their deaths, despite having a relationship in the source material.
Sara Lance was later resurrected, and is a main character on another show. I’m not sure if they intended that when she died, though.
This was already addressed and settled on another comments.
– About Victoria Hand and Isabelle Hartley:
oliviactually: “Seeing Agents Hand and Hartley from SHIELD on this list is bitterly ironic, cause the showrunners specifically said that one of the reasons they erased both character’s queer sexualities from the show is because they didn’t want to become known as the show with two dead lesbians. Yeah, fuck that show.”
Catherine: “That is why I don’t understand how they made the list but some other characters didn’t”
oliviactually: “Well, I’d support them being on this list if only because it’s a big f-you to the showrunners who explicitly wanted to avoid this outcome, which is bullshit homophobic erasure.”
Riese: “precisely”
(Thank you Kayla M)
– About Sara Lance:
Riese: Sara Lance is only included because when she died, she was dead, as far as the fans knew. And she came back — but on a different show, much later.
also… i saw jessica jones, like i watched that show. and i wrote what i recalled happening in this list. since then, i have been corrected four times, each time somebody telling me what the last person told me wasn’t true. it’s kind of funny. I MIGHT LAUGH TO DEATH
Riese I can’t believe you just got a rescue dog AND THEN made this list because I feel like this list is taking the same amount of love and care as a needy pet would and that’s just a lot of TLC you’re giving out this month
I’m hoping the rescue dog will give HER the amount of TLC she needs after the comment section…
AND my fiancé is out of town which means i am the sole caretaker AND I have to make my own meals! Honestly I just wish my rescue dog would stop asking me to include one-episode victims from CSI: Miami and reminding me about Paulie from Lost & Delirious.
I’m a web developer who bought the domain doesthelesbiandie.com as a joke last year. After Lexa’s death I realized that I should actually do something with it and am building a database of queer women’s death. Is it okay if I use the information in this article to add to the database?
If you do get permission to use this data for your website, would you like to collaborate on working on some statistical analysis? I’ve got some ideas about how to analyse this data but trying to find a web-based medium where people can help with data entry AND where I can run a regression analysis is difficult.
PLEASE READ BEFORE COMMENTING
Update:
+ i have done two loads of laundry, so just one more to go
+ Heather is working on a list of happy endings
+ I am working on a psycho/depraved thing maybe
If you are here to make a correction or an addition, please note the following:
+ Please read the thread to make sure your point hasn’t already been made
+ Please give me the show title, the character name, year of death, cause of death, and a link to a photo of that person, if possible. Also please link me to evidence that they are queer.
+ In order to maintain the integrity of the list, it’s really important that we’re only using characters who are actually queer, not characters we WISH were queer or think were queer or were ret-conned to be queer.
+ I am not including victims-of-the-week from hospital or criminal procedurals. I will, on occasion, include a one-episode character if I feel it still fits into the trope — as in, it suggests a value judgment on lesbian/bisexual lives as “less than” hetero lives. Like every week on law & order or grey’s anatomy somebody dies, of course sometimes they’ll be gay. I would say one of the questions I’d ask about a one-episode character in order to include them would be could this character have been a part of future episodes if they hadn’t died? or was their death gratuitous?
Congratulations on all that laundry
I am so happy, not just because you are making such stellar laundry progress Riese, but also because H Hogan is making the happy list, which means all that time I spent remembering more ancient TV lesbians then got sad when it turned out they somehow survived will now not be in vain!
Would Jana Murphy (2014) from the Following count? She committed suicide under police pressure, but still an openly queer (married/separated to Gina Mendez) woman who appeared in a couple episodes who died in a violent fasion.
http://thefollowing.wikia.com/wiki/Jana_Murphy
Would Jana Murphy (2014) from the Following count? She committed suicide under police pressure, but still an openly queer (married/separated to Gina Mendez) woman who appeared in a couple episodes who died in a violent fashion.
http://thefollowing.wikia.com/wiki/Jana_Murphy
Riese, you are a super hero.
Also missing Renee Montoya from Gotham.
Renee Montoya was not killed
OMFG, key word: DEAD
love u
Love you too.
You know, I knew this was gonna be a painful post just because of the subject, getting the info, etc., but never crossed my mind that you would find all of these additional pains and all of those to be just pains in the ass.
Don’t forget Doctor Who–Sky Silvestry from “Midnight” comes to mind, but there must be others as well, since the show features so many queer characters.
Sky was just in the one episode
CeCe from Pretty Little Liars was murdered and set up to look like a suicide. She was trans.
Riese explained above in response to another comment how she is doing a separate article on trans representation on TV because the tropes/issues aren’t the same.
Holly Hart, Family Affairs, 1999, killded in an explosion
Sharon Gilmour, Prisoner, 1980, pushed down a staircase
I really appreciate this article but it’s SO SCARY to see the number significantly jump up over the course of ONE DAY…and again and again at that
Sorry womyn, Tosh is not bi! Just because she had a fling with a woman does not make her so any more than, well, you know, the reverse. She had a totally unrequited crush on Owen, who did not deserve her – which made her death all the more heartbreaking in that she was trying to stay strong for him while he was slowly suffocating while she herself was mortally wounded (see Torchwood for the rest of the story).
So… where is the part that makes her not bi? had a fling with a woman, crush on a man… what part of that description was supposed to make her sound straight?
“She had a fling with a woman”
“She had a totally unrequited crush on Owen”
I’m not sure how that’s supposed to mean that she’s not bi? That is pretty much the exact definition of being bisexual, being attracted to people of multiple genders. Just because she only had one relationship with a woman on the show doesn’t make it any less valid.
Also didn’t one of the writers state that all the main characters are meant to be bi at some point? Not really sure about that, but it’s not an unfounded claim. Fairly sure they all have crushes/relationships/sexual encounters with people of more than one gender – and that includes Tosh.
Didn’t the showrunner say that all five of the main characters are bi? (We at least saw Tosh have a relationship with a woman, whereas the only evidence of Gwen being bi was her kissing a woman briefly … and iirc she was under alien influence at the time)
Sooooo…. she’s in love with a guy and also with an alien she considers a girl. Have you looked up the definition of ‘bi’ recently?
The next logical step in the evolution of this magnus opus is to mix up aaalllll the lesbians then have the world’s biggest game of Dead Lesbian Cluedo! (aka Clue, to you crazed North Americans)
“I accuse Lucy Lawless of contracting a vampire virus in a 2015 episode of PLL!”
this is brilliant, sally
What about Charlie on Supernatural? I’ve still not recovered
She’s on the list.
She’s been on the list pretty much from the beginning. Ctrl+F will help you find her.
Trish Bendix posted this on AfterEllen an hour ago, “My challenge to the lesbian community who is upset about the death of Lexa on “The 100”, with things like this:
“Visibility matters. That is true. Lives of fictional queer characters matter in that they are representations of a community. But what is happening in the world right now to people of color, specifically black people; black trans women, black men, black women—I wish the lesbian community a tenth about that like they do the death of a white television character.”
Probably this doesn’t belong here, but I find this totally offensive. Not because of the subject, but because of timing. I’m sorry, but you just discovered this? AE is a place with less political/social conscience than TMZ and you want to give us lessons?
“For me it’s distasteful and offensive that you bring this to light and try to create a “new debate” (like years too late) just because so many people was criticizing (a more correct term is ripping a new one) the way you and your site dealt with this matter.”
That was my comment on AE because honestly I can’t deal with people trying to spin things around just to save face.
http://www.afterellen.com/tv/478829-challenge-lesbian-community-upset-death-lexa-100
My patience for Trish Bendix wore thin a long ass time ago. I can’t believe she’s acting like she gives a damn about black representation NOW when she hasn’t given a damn about QPOC’s the entire time she’s been at that website.
Is the CW one of their new(ish) corporate overlords or something? I genuinely can’t figure out why they’ve tried to downplay this three times now. Unless they’re using reverse psychology because the main effect seems to be fanning the flames.
AE’s parent company Evolve Media has The CW listed as one of their major clients. I wouldn’t be surprised if word has come down from on high that The CW and The 100 are sacred cows and AE isn’t allowed to say anything against them.
Actually I’d be surprised if that had anything to do with it, those kinds of arrangements are pretty rare and generally exclusive to sponsored content (like their One Big Happy campaign).
So, this means that they consciously decided to act like fan-girls? Whoa, that’s even worst.
What the frilly heck is going on in that article
Like I knew AE jumped the shark years ago but what even
“Black lives matter, you guys”
Gee, ya think? Where are AE’s writers of color? Where are their articles about race and privilege and intersectionality? And what in the world does it have to do with people being upset about Lexa’s death?
Using issues facing black people and QPOCS to deflect from having to be held accountable for their shitty response to the 100 killing Lexa is honestly so fucking shameful. I’m trying to remember when Trish Bendix started caring about my black ass and I think the first time was today when she wanted to lecture her fellow white lesbians about intersectionality as if that is something her website covers a lot.
also she listed CeCe McDonald in her list of dead black women and CeCe McDonald isn’t dead.
Well, it wasn’t enough to just shoot yourself in the foot with that article, Trish needed to make it bigger… she can’t even googled
That clearly vas a very bad choice, everybody is, once again, ripping a new one at AE.
It is SUCH a mess over there. And that’s the site I grew up on! Such a waste.
Trish’s twitter is incredible right now. She is saying she was trying to “elevate the conversation,” that she put the two topics together because an article about BLM wouldn’t get any clicks, and that “if at least one person considers using their privileged voice w/i queer community for the disenfranchised…Then it’s worth the hate from the ones who think I’m “racebaiting” or “pitting people against one another.””
I feel like I’m taking crazy pills
oh my gosh
she JUST got here
and thinks everybody else did too
Don’t be cruel, Riese, she’s educating us…
I can’t stand when white women like Trish talk over POCs and act like they just discovered America. Be quiet, Tiffany! Learn from this !
It’s incredible to observe. She is doing the whole White Savior shtick and is so wrapped up in her role of martyr that she is willing to DISMISS THE VOICES OF POC criticizing her! It’s like a train wreck. And it all seems to stem from a fundamental inability to be self-critical. She would rather throw her POC readership under the bus than recognize that she is on an ego trip. Incredible.
And to label all the articulate, thoughtful, intelligent comments she is receiving as “hate” is just plain manipulative. But then again she showed us just how unscrupulous she was when she decided to hide behind black bodies. It’s revolting, really.
Trish Bendix no more. Trish BendOver maybe?
Sorry, my bad, can’t help myself.
jesus fucking christ on a cracker
i mean i try not to speak ill of other sites
mostly because i am insecure and
fear that criticizing others invites them
to criticize me
and my site
which i find terrifying
but that
THAT!
that is.
really.
something.
else.
we
cannot
what a terrible
terrible
terrible way
(the worst way?)
to start an incredibly important
conversation with your readers
about the importance of black lives
and racism
what a shortsighted way to do that
This is a lovely poem, Riese
i think I’ll read it again, instead of spending one more moment letting that article fill my head with absurd noise.
I’m starting to get really angry. Now she’s on Twitter repeatedly hashtagging BlackLivesMatter and claiming it’s only white women who are getting upset about being called out. This woman is JUST NOW acting like she has always been in support of that movement. Bitch, stop using us to cover up your failures! I CANNOT BELIEVE……
I JUST
CANNOT
I never got into that site. It always felt too mainstream or corporate or just off. Like a lesbian version of the suburbs. Bland and boring. I do like a couple of the personal blogs of a couple of the writers but I just never got into AE. I heard it used to be pretty good so maybe I just waited too long to check it out.
All I can say now is that this is the very first time in my life that I’ve witnessed the self destruction of a person.
Things Trish has said today that I can’t even:
“People that find a piece on #blacklivesmatter “divisive”: I hope you will question why you see these things as separate issues.”
“I am constantly trying to make sure articles are inclusive. If writers send a list in without a WOC, I send it back”
“I cover a lot of things on the site that have WOC angles, from recaps of Black Love to continuing recaps of shows that get nominal views”
[[EVEN SHOWS THAT GET NOMINAL VIEWS]]
“Thank you to everyone sending me DMs and emails. I understand why you want to stay out of the messiness but you are appreciated. <3"
Somebody please help her!!!!!!!!!!
Take away her phone, her computer, the light in the city she lives in, something.
Yes! My jaw dropped when I read that article. It’s so awful to watch, but I can’t teary eyes away.
Riese has just knocked it out of the park with this list, the mammoth amount of work to keep updating and fielding all kinds of other noise at the same time. I can’t even dare to imagine.
Also, thanks Freakazoid for all your contributions to this thread. I found myself agreeing with and liking so many of your comments.
May she look up and shout “Save me!” so that we make look down and whisper, “No.” before busting into cackles because schadenfreude and some of us are terrible.
Lol @ ““I am constantly trying to make sure articles are inclusive. If writers send a list in without a WOC, I send it back”
This feels like the equivalent of “I have a black friend”. Girl if your solution to inclusivity is a token black person on your lists, that’s not very progressive…
Yup, the tokenism is astounding
I don’t know Trish, but she’s coming off like a crazy person. For real. She’s essentially a white queer journalist scolding all of us “privileged” queers to think long and hard about more important things. The fuck? Like I can’t fight for more than one thing at once? Like representation in the media isn’t important? Like only privileged white queers care about media representation. Like she knows anything about what her readers do for a living, where they come from, or what they fight for day after day. Unreal.
Oh man oh man why would she post this??? Who signed off on this???
This is like watching a really drawn out car crash that you can see a mile away but the driver thinks they’re perfectly fine, and is also arrogant enough to think they don’t need a seatbelt.
So, she woke up today, took a little coffee, looked around and thought…
And then went for it…
That girl is on
but it’s okay because
Maybe this is a sign they are ushering in a new era at AE.
I fully expect a nuanced, in-depth analysis of US police brutality in their next Rizzoli & Isles Subtext Recap.
Still managed to get in a Chaiken slam. *up top*
YOU BET I DID
Adding my name to the add “Helena HG Wells” to the list. First death by explosion, then resurrected, then “death” by heteronormativity the next season. ;)
DEATH BY HETERONORMATIVITY
I hope that every writer who is thinking about writing a bi/gay girl characers reads this and thinks twice before killing off their bi/gay girl character and then tries to claim that “our version is different”, because like it has been said, movies and TV-shows don’t exist in a vacuum.
Mo Ryan, on Variety, mentioned this post today in her article.
http://variety.com/2016/tv/opinion/the-100-lexa-jason-rothenberg-1201729110/
I’M FAMOUS
WE’RE ALL FAMOUS
You’ve been mentioned on Buzzfeed, too.
I think it’s kinda funny that I’m reading on a lot of lesbian blogs about people saying they aren’t going to watch and blog about 100 anymore when a lot of those same people didn’t seem to get why their trans readers were upset about them continuing to support and blogging about PLL after they played the crazy killer trans trope and then killed CeCe.
It’s sad to think of how much shorter the list of alive lesbian and bisexual characters would be.
Um, hello? Anyone else here who just ran screaming from AE?
Welcome, friend!
Hi! Thanks! Are you from AE or is everyone really that friendly around here? :)
I’m QueerGirlBlogs over at AE, but yes! Everyone is really that friendly around here! lol
That’s awesome. I’m all for friendly. Oy, every time I think I can’t get more pissed about this issue, some fresh shit hits the fan! I don’t want this whole movement to peter out because of stupid infighting in our own community.
Welcome, Nicole.
Give it just a little time, after all Trish BendOver posted that crap just today.
Hello! Oh geez I’ve been staring at the screen for 10 minutes wondering where everyone was. Then I remembered the refresh button… I swear, I used to create my own websites. Using HTML. How was that easier than these boards?
I can’t even believe her post! WTF?
Don’t worry, it’s a new place for you, you just need to give it a little time to familiarize with it.
Take a look around meet, the women that make this the most amazing place in the world
You’ve just been spoiled by Disqus automatically showing you new comment messages. :D
I like that AS doesn’t use disqus though because I hate going on to a site that uses it and getting that red notification button thing about activity on comments I have long since stopped giving any f*cks about.
Ran screaming away from there a week ago. TBH I don’t know what is the bigger betrayal…Jroth or AE’s response.
Hmm I don’t know. I feel betrayed by him as a Jew + betrayed by AE as a lesbian. If that makes sense.
I had to stick around AE b/c all the folks in the comments were so amazing. I don’t know what I would’ve done without them! Kind of like The 100… I love the cast to bits but hate the showrunner.
OMG Trish & Jroth are the same person!
AE’s been going down for a long time.
I drop the shit out of that place because I needed a little more, politics is the key word and I can find this here.
Man I was super shocked to see all the extremely harsh words in this comment thread, but then I actually read the article and the responses…just…yikes is all I can say.
Same…
I m̶i̶g̶r̶a̶t̶e̶d̶ ran away too (╯°□°)╯︵ uǝllǝɹǝʇɟɐ
Welcome.
Well, yes.
I went over there to see if she updated her article, hoping hard that she had taken it down, and instead she wrote an editor’s note doubling down!!
Of course she did. Of course. She. Did.
Oh what the fuck. She’s a fucking pitbull! We’ll seriously need a crowbar to pry her jaws off of this one.
This is all getting to a point where I’m going to lose my ability to deal with it. We’ve got our grief over Lexa, the snowballing anger at Jroth as more evidence of queerbaiting bullshit is posted daily, the ups & downs of articles being published in mainstream media that come with the barrage of straight people telling us to calm down, shut up, and get over it, and now this shit with Trish. We’re literally fending off attacks on all fronts – as another name gets added to this list! And of course, all of this in addition to our real life stresses.
If we come out of this situation without requiring medication for anxiety, depression, ulcers, or high blood pressure, it’ll be a goddamn miracle.
Yeah, the more I think about that article, the angrier I get. Simply supporting queer folks wanting diversity in the media should not have been that complicated! But no, they managed to somehow add a layer of crap to the crap we’re already trying to fight. Gaaah!!
Lol, ok, I’m done. Walking away from the madness. I just…ugh.
This list is probably going to keep growing as more queer media consumers continue to remember the tragic deaths of our favorite queer-on-screen ladies…
Here is one I don’t think your list has so far:
Doctor Marina Ranieri del Colle — Terapia D’Urgenza (Italian version of Hospital Central)
Death (or at least plausibly mortal wound?) by gunshot from upset mother whose child had died despite Dr. Ranieri’s care.
The series ends with the scene of the shooting, in the parking lot of the hospital, where Marina lies, bleeding out and cradled in her lover’s arms.
^^ Terapia d’Urgenza ended in 2009
Links to pics:
http://i275.photobucket.com/albums/jj320/nik_for_blog/48kiss1.jpg
http://i275.photobucket.com/albums/jj320/nik_for_blog/01-1.jpg
added!
How about Felice Schragenheim, the lesbian German Jew who died in a concentration camp in the 1999 movie, Aimée & Jaguar. Its based on a true story. If its true does it count?
This list is just tv shows.
For Charlie from Supernatural, she was fridged. She only died to propel one of the lead male protagonist’s story forward.
On the list when it was at 76 and has the neo-nazi bathtub detail.
Ur fucking stupid if you think that was the main reason why they cut her.
First- Thank you. Now I can just point to this list and end the argument.
Second- I would mention that Admiral Cain from Battlestar Galactica was shot by her ex-lover Gina Envierre, who later triggered a nuke. (I would also put them one after another. just saying.)
i did mention that, actually, originally! but so many commenters told me i was wrong about who shot her and the nature of their relationship that i changed it to just “shot” so that they would stop arguing. :-(
I’m one of the heavy weight fans (like- buying props from the show fan). This is what happened. couldn’t find a vid on youtube of just this part, but it’s on 3:21 in this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvrahWIFZnc
if you just wanted yo stop the arguing though, I get it. As long as we both know we are right ;)
I have another: Sky from the episode “Midnight” in Doctor Who. Possessed by an alien and shoved out the shuttle into lethal radiation.
Single episode characters aren’t generally counted on this list
Wow! I am in the UK, and went to bed, and it’s all gone wild over here. In regards to the AE thing – I discovered this site by following Heather Hogan and her PLL recaps, and have found so much more to love about it. I love that it’s political, I love that you are way more open to bisexual and trans women that AE are(as a bi woman I often get upset reading the comments over there) Also in regards to race – did they miss the epic list that Reise did about the Oscar’s being racist?(which I LOVED by the way)
Anyway, I have a sort of suggestion, but having checked the clips you might not say it counts. Its Game of Thrones and I think I merged bits from the book and the show in my head. Here are some links and I will let you decide :)
http://www.lesbian-interest.com/daenerys-doreah-game-thrones-lesbian-scene/
http://gameofthrones.wikia.com/wiki/Doreah
I’d like to submit as an exception to the “recurring characters only” rule: Hilla Doehner, from ep 2:17 of Quantum Leap (struck in the head with a shoe by her lover Stephanie, when trying to leave her for a man. Hilla was pregnant at the time.)
The reason for the exclusion is that this death is notable in the context of the show: Sam Beckett leaps around through time trying to right wrongs (which are decided on by God) – and is tasked with bringing Stephanie to justice, when it would have been just as simple to leap him in a few days earlier and save Hilla’s life. In that context, Hilla’s death is approved by the in-universe PtB.
Sorry, some further info:
Year: 1990
Picture: http://quantumleappodcast.com/wp-content/uploads/bfi_thumb/Good-Night-Dear-Heart1-2z3kslthfs3oze648elp1m.png
Definitely a single episode character, but in a show where Sam is regularly tasked by God to save lives, in this episode he arrived in time to catch her murderer, not save her life.
Definitely she should be here, because, come on, the show is developed with one concept and then they turned around the story just to killed a lesbian?
I’d keep my eye on Black Sails. The three important women are bisexual (well, Max is probably a lesbian but having been a prostitute did not get that choice). It’s an anyone can die show (other than characters who are alive in Treasurr Island), but still.
Of the only two recurring women to have died, Charlotte was also a prostitute so her sexuality is unknown but she was never shown with women, and Miranda Hamilton/Mrs. Barlow was straight, but was part of a polyamorous relationship in which both she and her gay husband shared a male lover. That doesn’t quite meet the criteria but may still merit mention.
She was shot in the head and then her body was desplayed to and defiled by the crowd for a crime she did not commit.
yeah black sails isn’t doing well for it’s female characters at all. or its gay characters in general [flint/miranda’s husband]
—r*pe mention below—
not to mention that in season 1 Max is violently raped, repeatedly,by tons of men, by order of charles vane for some reason i can’t remember, but mostly had to do to with the fact that he was mad at her for banging his ex-girlfriend Eleanor.
so if a list is ever made of lesbian/bi characters getting sexually assaulted, she should be on it.
At least Susan Ivanova, Talia Winters’ lover on Babylon 5, ended very well, as head of an interstellar peace keeping force.
And Julie Mao is in an ongoing series sci-fi series, where death by sci-fi is sometimes reversible.
But an excellent list, with the possible exception of counting Sara Lance.
Guh. Still so so bitter and upset about seeing Lexa on this list.
Honestly, the only acceptable lesbian deaths on television were Sailor Neptune and Sailor Uranus!
…
Because they came back to life two episodes later.
Then had gay cuddles.
…All dead lesbians should come back to life by miraculous, sparkly deux ex machina.
I honestly don’t know how I feel about the inclusion of Victoria Hand and Isabelle Hartley from Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D on this list because while they are both women-loving women in the comics (and as far as I know might even be a couple?) this is not mentioned in the show at at. Like… not at all, ever. Their sexuality is never mentioned, not even in passing – despite the fact that it would have been really easy; you’d just have to have a character like Coulson or Bobbi Morse say something like “I’m sorry about the death of your (ex) girlfriend Victoria Hand” to Isabel Hartley or something. But it’s never even hinted at, as far as I can remember, it isn’t even subtext. So I personally wouldn’t count it as representation, just like I don’t count Dumbledore.
this was addressed already in previous comments, multiple times —
oliviactually: “Seeing Agents Hand and Hartley from SHIELD on this list is bitterly ironic, cause the showrunners specifically said that one of the reasons they erased both character’s queer sexualities from the show is because they didn’t want to become known as the show with two dead lesbians. Yeah, fuck that show.”
Catherine: “That is why I don’t understand how they made the list but some other characters didn’t”
oliviactually: “Well, I’d support them being on this list if only because it’s a big f-you to the showrunners who explicitly wanted to avoid this outcome, which is bullshit homophobic erasure.”
Riese: “precisely”
I don’t know if you’re including movies, but if you do:
Paulie from Lost & Delirious (can’t remember the year) killed herself after her girlfriend Tori left her because Tori was afraid of her conservative parents’ reaction.
Also Roxy from Basic Instinct (I think 1992) died in a car crash while trying to attack her girlfriend’s affair.
This is a list of tv shows.
ARE YOU KIDDING ME. “I don’t know if you’re including movies”. HAVE YOU READ THE TITLE?
(also rip comment filter you were good while you were up).
Another new dead queer woman of color: http://www.afterellen.com/tv/478929-queer-woman-color-killed-tv-last-night?utm_source=sc-twitter&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=post
#stopthetrope2k16
jesus christ.
added.
AND she was disabled and couldn’t do her job because of her disability. Just trope after trope. I just hope no one said anything about her being ‘free now’ or something.
wait Riese I just looked into it and apparently Kira is just a one off character in this episode ?
yeah, she is (thanks for looking out! y’all are my thread heroes) but that’s okay — i think her death, much like emily in teen wolf, still fits into the trope. she was introduced JUST to be killed! mostly i wanted to avoid characters that were like — there for another reason. like it was a guest star actress, or it was a show that literally killed a person every single week (a procedural or medical drama).
…and the author can’t even bother to name the actress who actually played the dead queer character, just the actors for the straight characters around her.
Idk if this has been commented already, but Paulie Oster in Lost and Delirious (2001), she commits suicide after her girlfriend breaks up with her
This is a list of tv shows.
OMG is the comment filter dead, Riese? How did this get past it?
Here lies Reise. She was killed dead by comments saying “what about Lost and Delirious?” Her courage and her voice will be sorely missed.
No but I wasn’t saying Riese was the comment filter, she literally set up a comment filter, every comment mentioning that movie were awaiting moderation lol.
I know, I still think this comment thread might be the death of her. Figuratively speaking of course :)
I don’t know how it got through the filter!
(happenend last night) 2016 Kira on “the magicians” (assisted suicide)
Delia, who was Patsy’s girlfriend on Call the Midwife. Gets hit by a car while riding a bicycle. Dies literally the same day they finally say screw it to 1950s morality laws in England and move in together.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/call-midwife-fans-outraged-patsys-5303005
Also, the fact that Lucy Lawless is on this list THREE TIMES……..
She doesn’t die! She loses her memory. But the show runners listened, and she now has it back and is currently living happily with Patsy. :)
Delia isn’t dead…
“she enables the spiritual growth of a white woman in another realm and then asks the white woman to kill her in real life, which she does”
AAAAAAH THIS IS SO SO SO FUCKED UP.
If it’s relevant (since you included it for Charlie) Victoria Hand was also murdered by a Neo-Nazi. But neither Victoria nor Isabelle Hartley were actually lesbians on the show. They were in the comics but there was never even subtext about their sexuality on the show so imo they don’t count as lesbian characters at least not on tv. Because anyone who hasn’t read the comics wouldn’t suspect anything about these two being non-straight. The showrunners deliberately never included their sexuality because apparently they didn’t want to be the show that killed two lesbians since they knew they were gonna kill them off. Which is shitty too but basically I don’t think those two deserve to be on this list because they were never lesbian characters in the tv show and i wouldn’t count them as representation.
Isabelle and Victoria’s inclusions was addressed already multiple times but here’s the discussion again —
oliviactually: “Seeing Agents Hand and Hartley from SHIELD on this list is bitterly ironic, cause the showrunners specifically said that one of the reasons they erased both character’s queer sexualities from the show is because they didn’t want to become known as the show with two dead lesbians. Yeah, fuck that show.”
Catherine: “That is why I don’t understand how they made the list but some other characters didn’t”
oliviactually: “Well, I’d support them being on this list if only because it’s a big f-you to the showrunners who explicitly wanted to avoid this outcome, which is bullshit homophobic erasure.”
Riese: “precisely”
Can I add Nellie from the BBC series Tenko (1981)to the list who fell in love with a fellow POW – was “moved to another camp” season 2 and had died off screen of typhoid (I think) by season 3.
Yes, please add Nellie. This very early example belongs here for sure! All documented at tenkotv.com with photo, arch and death spelled out.
ARC, Nellie’s unlucky-in-love, dead-for-straight-people-feels story arc is at tenkotv.com
Reading through the list again, I’m disgusted by how many women in this list were killed by ex-boyfriends/husbands/stalkers. Like, genuinely sick to my stomach. Sigh. :(
“Domestic violence is a leading cause of death for women ages 15-44, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. It is a leading cause of death of pregnant women, mortality research shows. And African American and Native American women are at the highest risk of intimate partner homicide.”
Quoted from this article:
http://womensenews.org/2008/07/intimate-violence-remains-big-killer-women/
Yeah, I know. That’s part of why I’m upset. It’s just a terrible reminder of how awful men can be and how stuff like this happens all the time in real life.
Silvia Castro León, Los hombres de Paco (2010)
Silvia was shot at her wedding and died trying to talk her new wife Pepa through performing the surgery to save her life while awake
She’s on the list. I think since it was first posted.
Yes but how she died is incorrect
how?
Another female character from AHS Hotel that is shown to be bisexual is Hypodermic Sally. Although I don’t know if she counts since she dies in the first episode but lives on throughout the season as a ghost.
In case she counts:
Full name: “Hypodermic” Sally McKenna
Show Title: American Horror Story: Hotel
Year of Death: 2015
Cause of Death: Pushed out of a window
Link to image: http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/americanhorrorstory/images/5/52/Paulson-001.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20150923042734
Link to Evidence: http://www.bustle.com/articles/134043-sally-reveals-her-backstory-on-ahs-hotel-its-the-stuff-nightmares-are-made-of
Thank you for all the work you put in on this project. This is a brutal article.
Not sure how characters from exclusively LBT shows like L-Word and QAF can be included in a Bury your Gays trope?
Also, technically speaking, shouldn’t be Rose Quartz on this list, or are we not counting cartoons?
DANA
DANA
DANA
DANA AND OH YES WHAT WAS THAT DANA.
from the article intro:
“Furthermore, shows composed entirely of queer characters will inevitably kill one. But regardless, they still add to the body count weighing down our history of misrepresentation.”
The Rose Quartz suggestion is interesting for various reasons:
* We’re not sure if “reincarnation via being part of her son” really counts as a death
* The romantic angle between her and Pearl is largely subtext for now
You should add Patricia O’Farrell and Veronica Cortes from “La Reina del Sur.” Patricia gets into a car accident with Veronica in the passenger’s seat, upset because she finds out Veronica is an infiltrated DEA agent. Veronica dies instantly, and later Patricia kills herself. :(
What about Shaw from Person of Interest! She kissed Root before walking into a bulletstorm
[SPOILER ALERT FOR PERSON OF INTEREST]
they shot her up some, but later in the season we see Shaw shot up but alive in Samaritan captivity.
LOOK HAROLD
SHAW IS STILL ALIVE
AND I AM NOT GIVING UP
ON TRYING TO FIND HER
YOU HEAR ME
HAROLD
YOU HEAR ME??
WOOF.
(that was my attempt at channeling Bear in case you couldn’t tell…)
She’s not dead. She has been shown to be alive twice since then and will appear in the next season.
Shaw is alive and she will come back and her and Root will live happily ever after and go on lots of hacking and killing bad guy adventures with Bear. That is the only ending I will accept.
(SPOILERS)
Shaw isn’t dead, just MIA in the hands of Samaritan, so I don’t think she counts (yet).
I’m sure someone’s mentioned this before, but I feel like these women were A.) Majority WoC, and B.) Killed off in many cases exceptionally more brutally/cruelly than straight women are in fiction, and C.) Often killed as “punishment” for rejecting men in some way. Now, one could argue that the men are meant to be ‘villains’, an I’d more or less agree. Except that when it happens as often as it does, it takes on a slightly voyeuristic and creepy level, where it’s almost like a cruel warning that this is what will happen if we don’t make ourselves available.
Helena G Wells from Warehouse 13 died by a bomb. Although she does come back to life later on she still died
i’ve addressed this suggestion already in one of the other 10 times somebody made it
I got to the Janet King part and thought it was an attempt at joking levity – but it is true? Raaaah no. Unless (and please let it be unless) the actress wasn’t available and Janet’s sexuality won’t be swept away. But urrrrgh I could be lacking faith.
I get that people are mad about Lexa. It was predictable because of the actress and availability, and it was handled all kinds of wrong but the show is a violent one so I knew it was going to happen.
None of these pissed me off as much as Kate in Last Tango though. Basically a family show, where the most violent thing was a slammed door, and after all the time it took for that relationship to happen, she gets killed off screen on her wedding day? Come on!
How about Uriel from Dominion (2014) who was killed in the air strike?
There was also Sky in the Doctor Who Series 4 episode ‘Midnight’ where she is possessed and within ten minutes and then her body dies.
Dear Sophie,
a simple ctrl+F search would have told you that 1) Three people have already mentionned Sky in the comments before and 2) They’ve all been told the same thing, which you would have known if you’d read the 5th paragraph of this post: characters appearing in single episodes don’t count for this list !
(also Riese do you think Sky is the new Xena?)
Is there a list with lesbian/bisexual characters that actually managed to survive their show’s end?
Yup, check the main page
In fact, there is: http://www.autostraddle.com/all-26-lesbian-and-bisexual-tv-characters-who-got-happy-endings-331601/
29 happy endings against 142 unexplainable deaths. I wonder if that is a reflection of society? Probably not, right?
I hope it’s okay but I just made a thing:
http://persephonedarkqueen.deviantart.com/art/Hex-Thelma-and-Maya-GSL-Signature-596977091
Here are the lyrics to that song:
http://batteredrose.com/lyrics/goodnight-sweet-ladies/
You guys, Delphine might not be dead after all:
http://www.bustle.com/articles/147839-is-delphine-dead-in-orphan-black-season-4-a-new-trailer-may-reveal-the-characters-fate
Sad list, too long, too, but unfortunately a necessary one. Thank you Riese for doing this!
If movies count, I’m pretty sure Jennifer from Jennifer’s body (2009) is bisexual.
She was stabbed and killed by her best friend after turning into a succubus and murdering boys.
It’s a list of TV characters.
Hehehe
Midsomer Murders has Fran Carter (played by Daisy Haggard) strangled, dismembered and covered with confetti and stuffed into a steamer-trunk (April 2011 episode ‘Echoes of the Dead’). 3 other characters were also bumped off in the same episode (about the norm for the show per episode) but thats neither here or there. Im sure theres been a few other lesbian characters who have either been killed off (its been running since 1997 so theres a lot of ground)
Only recurring characters count.
Lucy Lawless and Mia Kirshner were both in here more than once. That’s some gay commitment… And I’m still not over Dana Fairbanks, thank for rehashing that wound.
This list came to my acknowledgment when the number was 65 dead lesbians/bisexual woman. The number, as I’m writing this, is 142. It kept me wondering at how higher it would be if we also include gay man and transgender characters. This is just sickening. And very freaking sad.
i think there would be at least another 150, maybe 200.
and you will soon find out b/c i’m writing that list for a different site. :-)
If I remember correctly, Rachel Posner was strangled by that man, not run over by him…
This list is so depressing.
I’m never gonna forget about Tara. NEVER. A stray bullet? Really? She deserved better.
they don’t ever show her actual death, so i don’t think it was explained in that detail.
the show has him drive away from her in the desert, then u-turn and speed towards her. the next scene is him burying her.
i definitely could have missed some details though.
This article give a few details on Ash’s death in Janet King:
http://www.tvtonight.com.au/2016/03/leading-lady-marta-leads-by-example.html
Hopeful from the sounds of this that Janet’s gayness isn’t going to be snuffed out too.
This does not give me hope!
Yeah it could be interpreted as bad (possible new love interest), but talking up the storyline of difficulties for same sex couples in law, making that the b plot makes me optimistic they won’t then go and de-gay her. Surely… SURELY.
Really, I can’t even with this. This just makes me, I can’t even articulate what this makes me
Marta is telling me she can’t give spoilers but that they won’t let us down and please watch the show… I don’t know what to believe….. it’s a trap, right? Right???
And Marta wouldn’t lie right? I’m hopeful it is going to be done well.
Lol, that Teen Wolf desth description. Would River Song from Doctor Who count?
I can understand and accept Lesbian deaths in older fiction, because once upon a time the lesbians dying was the only way to get representation at all but its 2016 for gods sake, why won’t people stop killing off all the queer characters? Why. Of course the other sucky thing that they all do is freaking queer baiting, you think your favourite couple will get together and then boom one of them is with a man and pregnant and never speaks to the other again for no apparent reason. I’d like to see a list of all the almost lesbians from tv.
Growing up all fiction has ever taught me is that as a lesbian I will either be miserable and die young or miserable and end up marrying a dude. All I want is young happy lesbians to be together and stay together on tv with no relationship drama. Preferably action, sci fi, or fantasy as a genre but at this point ill take anything.
The best shows at the moment (that I watch at least, I’m sure theres more… I hope theres more) for not killing lesbians are Person of Interest and Call the Midwife. And Person of Interest one of them is missing anyway I’m just hoping it’ll end well. Call the Midwife you can’t really appreciate the happiness of the two women because its set in the 1960’s and the entire time is just total fear that they’ll be found out and their lives will be over.
Just thought of another dead Bisexual vampire, who also dies after giving birth(to the most annoying character in history) and is another Joss Whedon death. Darla! Buffy and Angel, had a Bisexual relationship with Drusilla. Details here:http://buffy.wikia.com/wiki/Darla
I love the crap out of Darla, who died not once but four times on the show! (Sired, staked, sired again and then stakes herself) but I feel like the sexual side of their relationship was really more subtext. And yeah I know they had a threesome with the immortal but it was presented more as something really impressive that the immortal got them to do it with him at the same time, when angel and spike couldn’t… I’m sure if they did that story now they would make out and be more explicit, but it’s also good that they saved the explicitly queer content for Willow’s relationships which were so important. Buffy was great for queer subtext – Faith!
Really. i don’t know , support them and love them
I just read a MAJOR spoiler for a major show and it is not good. It looks like we will be adding another dead lesbian to this list by the end of the week.
I’m sad because I really liked this character. So that means TV will have killed 4 lesbians in a two week timespan. Rose, Lexa, that girl from Magicians, and ________.
OMG can you PM me ? I need to know
Me too!
Lt. Sandy Lopez, 2004, ER – Kerry Weaver’s partner and mother of their child. Died fighting a fire at a warehouse. Led to a custody battle for their son between Dr Weaver and Sandy’s parents. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerry_Weaver#Season_ten)
Oh come on she’s been on the bloody list since the beginning !
Lexa’s death could also be stated as killed by JasonRotinHell
I am glad this is being brought to attention. Another major lesbian character is going to get killed off in a few weeks: Tara on the Walking Dead. Apparently showrunner Scott Gimple thinks its a good idea to fridge a lesbian in order to develop a man’s storyline (Eugene).
A. How do you know this?
and B. Hello spoiler! That hasn’t even AIRED yet.
I don’t know what to believe at this point so don’t take either of our words for it as fact until you see it.
I haven’t heard about Tara. The spoilers I read says Denise is the one who dies this week. They were accurate about last episode’s spoilers so I’m assuming these are right as well. Is Tara really dying too?
Guys! Spoilers!
I thought better of it after I posted it but I couldn’t delete it.
AHHHH WTFFF, why would you post this before it even airs????
There was an episode of Cold Case focusing on the story of a lesbian couple in the 20’s with the prohibition. It was a biracial couple and the brother of the white girl was against them and beat up the black girlfriend. They decided to run away, but the brother caught them and there was a car pursuit. Eventually they decided to cross a bridge that was under construction and to kill themselves. The white girl survived but not the black one…
This particular list is not counting one-ep characters in procedurals.
This episode of Cold Case resonated with me on soooo many levels. It was one of those times where I was like that was the 20’s things have gotten better – then I was like really?! – Have they???
Totally was gonna comment to suggest this one as well! Really great episode, Tessa Thompson is still really powerful as a actress.
Angelica “Angel” Turing played by Daryl Hannah, from sense8 forced into drug use on the run from whisper(a sensate hunting others of his kind) commits suicide to avoid capture after giving birth to(in the shows terms) the main group of sensates in the show. Recurs in visions. Her sexuality was not explicitly shown/mentioned on the show but the creators have said that sensates are pansexual.
Also Barbara Kean on Gotham has been effectively fridged on the show(yes in a coma, and yes will probably come back but it doesn’t really change what they did with her character).
We’ve never even seen another woman from Angelica’s cluster, but we do know she was in love with a man from her cluster. I don’t feel like that comment from the creators is enough.
I thought about that before posting, but It seems like an exploration of the sensates sexuality is going to be a big part of the show, but you are right to say that as the show stands we haven’t seen enough for it to be definitive, right now there really is only what the creators have said, and the orgy(empathic orgy maybe?).
I still stand by the Barbara Kean suggestion because while she may not be technically (or probably even permanently) dead, her whole character arc has existed solely to push forward Gordon’s.
Theoretically, I guess I feel like a pansexual identity and the way the sensates experience each other’s experiences are two different things. Like let’s say Nomi IDs as a lesbian (I can’t remember if she does). When she desires a man, that’s basically due to her experiencing what it feels like for another one of the characters who does normally desire men…right? LOL I mean we could split hairs all day on something like that, but I guess I feel like posession and posession-like things don’t count.
I agree with you queer girl from the way it’s been portrayed on the show. Amanita made a comment about Nomi going straight (as in, no more illegal hacking) and Nomi laughed and said “I would never go straight.” That doesn’t rule out her being pan, but the impression most viewers would get is different.
Did you know this post reached one thousand comments?
What a beast!
Id tentatively include Remy Hadley from House. Doesn’t die on the show but is diagnosed with HD and is unlikely to have long.
Forever salty about Lexa…
I have a friend who, bless her big, lovable heart, is always trying to get the Mrs. and I to watch any and all shows with queer women in them. I completely get that. we’re gay, we should be supportive to our community. But the really sad bit is that adding a queer female character to a show is probably the quickest way to make us turn the channel. This list, is a perfect example of why. My friend never really understood our feelings on the matter; that is, until I shared this article with her. We’ve lost any and all faith in television writers, even the queer ones. As my girlfriend put it, “we watch television as a means to escape from the shit that stresses us out in our every day life. We’re not going to waste that on something depressing.” Unless we’re already established, loyal viewers or we can’t live without seeing a show, we don’t even bother. We just don’t have the strength any more. If we want to enjoy things with lesbians in them we’ll read fan fiction or check out what’s going on at Tello films. But mainstream television can just go to hell. Thank you so much for writing this. Really puts things in perspective.
i think Kali from Teen Wolf would also count? they played out the whole “crazy lesbian” trope with her and Jennifer and Jennifer ended up killing her with glass shards in s3e12 Lunar Ellipse.
Kali and Jennifer were supposed to be ex-lovers (the ex part being because Kali nearly killed Jennifer, at that point called Julia, to join the alpha pack). However, neither character ever references this onscreen – all the information we have on this never actualized storyline comes from things Jeff Davis has said online, at comiccon and to the fanfic contest winner.
The way the show actually aired, neither Kali nor Jennifer are ever shown to have sexual interest in women. This avoids the dead queer and evil tropes for both characters by denying they were queer in the first place.
Jeff Davis should not be trusted with queer representation tbh. I wish I’d never heard of Teen Wolf.
Lost and Delirious though. Suicide.
!!!!!!!!!!! READ THE TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
In the first season of 24 (2001), Bridgit is shot by a sniper. Mandy the assassin steals an ID card for a criminal mercenary and has Bridgit, her girlfriend, retrieve it later. After Bridgit hands over the card, the mercenary orders his sniper to shoot Bridgit, right in front of Mandy. Bridgit appears in 2 episodes. Here’s a picture of her:
http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/24wikia/images/4/46/1x03d.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20080903183330
added, thanks!
And you know who was her girlfriend, no? None other than Mia Kirshner.
Mia Kirshner vs. Lucy Lawless: Lesbian/Bisexual Death Match.
I just wanted to say that while Destiny Rumancek (Hemlock Grove) did hit her head on a glass coffee table, what killed her in the end wasn’t that but the fact the Roman Godfrey decided to break her neck.. Which in a way is worse.
I’m honestly still so bitter about it.
In TV anime, we have at the very least Liang Qui from Canaan, Kazumi from Devilman Lady, Maya from Maya’s Funeral Procession, Asuka ‘Saint Juste of the Flowers’ Rei from Oniisama E…, and probably a bunch more. Rei is pretty egregious. It was a great death and a great show, but it couldn’t have been a more blatant example of killing off the only very visibly queer character so everybody else could ‘move on’ and ‘grow up’ and ‘marry boys.’
Sameen Shaw in “Person of Interest” might fit this trope, although it’s still unclear whether she’s actually dead or not.
SHE’S NOT DEAD
Shaw’s been seen alive since so she’s definitely not dead.
Olivia Pope’s neighbour, Lois, in Scandal? Does it count if we only found out they were gay after they died?
Lucy’s character on Salem was also killed and was also queer. So that makes a big old 5 death stars for Lucy Lawless, not a good record.
is there any evidence of her being queer? i can’t find anything or remember anything from the show.
Lucy Lawless is on here 4 times. Maybe she should try and find gigs that have a longer life span.
She’s the Sean Bean of lesbians.
Im still mad because of Lexa’s death…
You are definitely not alone!
Can we talk about how the whole Chicago franchise (Fire, PD, Med) does really really bad in terms of female and LGBT representation?
They killed of Shay, effectively not only erasing 100 % of its LGBT characters but also 50 % of the female main cast. They claimed that this had to be done in order to further the storyline of Severide but it felt like they just forgot after a couple of episodes. Did I miss something there?
I hope they will be doing better with the Chicago Law, which is coming up at some point in the future. But this will probably have this one lady lawyer in it which was a love interest of Severide, such that again it will be about him.
They’re also properties of Dick Wolf, he of “is it because I’m a lesbian?” fame.
I must have missed that, enlighten me?
ADA Serena Southerlyn of Law & Order SVU
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serena_Southerlyn#Departure_and_sexuality
http://lawandorder.wikia.com/wiki/Serena_Southerlyn
So basically, Dick Wolf is a dick?
AFAIK Serena Southerlyn is the only queer woman to be a main character in any of the billion Law & Order shows (dammit Benson)? Anyway, we only find out Serena’s gay when her boss fires her, she asks if it’s because she’s a lesbian, and she exits the series 10 seconds later. But that was like 10 years ago.
Jane Lesser (played by Archie Panjabi) in the show Personal affairs on BBC3 in 2009. The show is about secretaries trying to find their colleague that disappeared. It’s revealed that this friend is a transsexual and was having an affair with Jane. When it’s made public Jane killed herself in front of her at her office…
Interesting…BTW its transgender now not transsexual.
Hollyoaks also had Jade Hedy (2013, accidentally stabbed during a struggle) and Texas Longford (2013, pushed out of a window.) Texas kissed a woman several times and planned to start a relationship with her, so IMO she counts.
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van and they also come to in a very good condition to relish your outing.
The Eyeclops Goggles enables young children to view in pitch-black darkness,
so they could see their enemies, however their enemies can’t see them.
Damn, I did not know they did that to Ana & Teresa…fucking bastards.
Yup. It was the STUPIDEST thing ever and I have officially deleted it from my head canon. They went to Paris. The End
Another dead lesbian. I stumbled across this on Youtube. I don’t know the exact what was happening because OMG this show was difficult to watch and my spanish isn’t that good.
It’s a Chilean show. She was trying to poison some guy who was not letting her and her mother leave after she was forced to marry a guy (because I assume that would get rid of her being gay or something)and ended up being forced to drink the poison herself.
Proof of being gay: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0bC06bnASKI
And this is her death: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8YBkQH7DXI
Name: Lucrecia
DoD: 2008 (found on actress’ wiki page: https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorena_Bosch#Teleseries)
Sylvia in “Twice a Woman”, 1979. Shot by her girlfriend’s ex-husband.
This list is TV characters w/ more than one episode, not movies.
You forgot 13 from House. She made a promise with House, that when she eventually starts to feel the effects of Parkinson’s, House will put her out of her misery.
Denise Cloyd; The Walking Dead (2016)
shot through the eye with a crossbow
Well, thanks to The Walking Dead, this list is now 146
Spoilers since it happened about 5 mins ago………..
Denise on The Walking Dead. Shot in the head by an arrow mid-speech. Also, they just left her there. Figured it was coming, said out loud that I wasn’t even surprised, yet I’m still shaking.
No, she was buried in Alexandria.
We need to add Denise from the walking dead to this list. killed by an arrow meant for someone else by a man
Well…. we lost another one tonight RIP Denise Cloyd from The Walking Dead.
Denise from The Walking Dead died today around 6:40. She was shot in the head by an arrow after yelling at her friends to learn how to live. It something along the lines of I didn’t tell Tara (her girlfriend) she loved her before she left because she was afraid, and her friends didn’t have to be afraid anymore.
Regarding TWD, there was a moment a couple of weeks ago where Tara and Denise were in their kitchen being happy and this red flag of “well you’re next” went up. And early on in this episode I literally screamed at the TV: “I swear to Merlin if you’re the next dead lesbian on TV!”
I remember that exact moment you’re talking about! I’m SO SAD to lose Denise in this show! I love the actress from her time on Nurse Jackie, and thought she was a great addition to TWD. But no, they had to kill her but somehow Eugene gets to live?? The injustice of it all…
I know! I adored her! I do have to say I am glad that they didn’t kill her off earlier in the episode. If they had her doing something stupid and getting eaten by a walker I would be even more upset. I am trying to take some solace in the fact that she was being rather badass in several ways right before Dwight shot her.
I also know that TWD has a very high death rate in general, and a character’s queerness should not preclude them from the realities of their environment. The showrunners have also altered the storyline from the comics and will continue to do so in various ways. That all being said, it was Abraham that was supposed to die this way, not Denise. In the comics, Denise dies, yes, but later on. In the middle of a pretty epic event she refuses a potentially life-saving amputation because she needs both of her arms to save others. In the comics she is also straight, which means that the producers and writers of the series not only chose to make the TV version queer, but to kill her off earlier, and to rework quite a bit of the plot of the original version to get her in that spot instead of Abe. They still chose to sacrifice 1/2 of their current population of queer women (if I am counting right, if I am not please correct me, seriously, I mean that) instead of allowing the (presumably) straight, white, ex army dude to get shot in the head like her was meant to be.
Correction! Denise from The Walking Dead died from a crossbow arrow that wasn’t meant for her seconds after discussing about her regret of not saying she loved her girlfriend Tara before she left for a supply run.
Denise (The Walking Dead) died from a crossbow arrow that wasn’t meant for her on the episode “Twice as Far”.
Because I’m kind of nit-picky, Denise died from a crossbow bolt, it’s not called an arrow. Not like it matters too much because she’s still dead and it was shit
I’m not looking forward to how devastated Tara is going to be when she gets back to Alexandria. I’m praying she survives the season. It’s probably a waste of time but….yeah.
If they even show Tara finding out.
I was 50-50 on TWD anyway, now I can cross it off the list. Clearly they don’t want us.
Spilier alert for TWD.
And now to add Denise from The Walking Dead. Shot in the head by an arrow. :(
Spoiler*
Add Denise from the walking dead to this list. Welp.
Motherfucker Dwight kill Dr. Denise????!!!!!!!! At least Eugene chew his dick out.
Spoiler alert:
Denise from the Walking Dead
I feel as though you glossed over the cause of death for the two women in American Horror Story-Freakshow. It wasn’t just because they wouldn’t have a threesome with him it was because he had horrific PTSD from the war he just returned from.
That kinda sounds like an excuse. I didn’t think it was so much the lack of threesome as his jealousy over the two of them being together.
Since someone else brought it up, it actually wasn’t because they wouldn’t have a threesome with him so much as because he felt emasculated by them. I think they actually invited him to join them, but he couldn’t do it, he could only watch. It’s been a while since I’ve seen it, but that’s what I remembered anyway.
I wonder if someone is doing a list of the queer guy characters who have died to see if its about the same number.
I am, actually! I’m doing that list for another site, and I’m gonna write another post here comparing the data and also looking at the data for trans folks, which I’m gathering for another post for this site! Gay men outnumber gay women on television quite a bit, so we’re working on a different scale… but yeah, so far I’m pretty confident that the “bury your gays” situation overall is worse for women… well it’s actually kind of complicated and there are a lot of *really* interesting patterns I’m already seeing that I’m looking forward to talking about with y’all!
Can’t wait. This is all so exciting, even though it’s also horrible. I keep thinking of ideas for lists like, dead lesbians in songs could include Gaga’s character from Americano, but the family from The Christians and the Pagans by Dar Williams had a happy ending…
This is such important work you’re doing. I feel so validated.
Sounds really interesting. Would be interesting to splice this kind of data in all kinds of ways. Eg I’m feel women in general would be over represented (like wildly) in their deaths being sexually violent. How many serial killer woman victim shows have there been? I’ve also heard show runners say that the death of a woman is more emtionally poignant than that of a man for the plot – which is a whole other bag of worms.
I think Dead Lesbian Trope is also Fridging, so we’ve got two tropes bearing down on us at given moment.
At any* given moment. Where oh where is an edit button?
All I have to say is When and Where?
I just bookmarked this because as soon as I heard the first cries of another dead lesbian from tumblr this is the first place I went to check.
I don’t even watch TWD and I am so so tired and so angry.
How come Kira from “The Magicians” don’t have a picture?
she did… i must have accidentally deleted it when updating the list last night. replaced!
Eye-opening list.
Slight correction, though: Karen O’Malley in Casualty didn’t die (from either a head injury or anything else), and she was, at least as far as can be told from what was shown on-screen, heterosexual …though given how long the show has run for and how many characters have come and gone, it’s entirely possibly that you’re referring to a different character also called Karen.
I didn’t know Agent Stahl was bisexual/lesbian? (Sons of Anarchy)
Thanks TWD. So pissed off.
Ooooh my gooooood I am so upset.
Is this going to be updated every time someone dies? Because that sounds like a really sad and time-consuming undertaking.
I think this is a necessary and useful list, but you have included several bisexual women who were predominantly heterosexual and only incidentally homosexual. Honestly I don’t think that characters whose sexuality in the show was mainly defined by their love for a man should be include here.
So where do we draw the line ? Do we reject bisexual women who’ve only had one same-sex sexual experience, but accept those that “proved” they belonged with us because they had a proper long term relationship with another woman?
wow, that is a super bi-phobic point of view! you call the characters “bisexual women” but say they don’t belong here because their main relationship was with a man?
Even if a woman is never with another woman in her entire life, she can still be bisexual! What is “incidentally homosexual” even supposed to mean?
This would be an entirely inappropriate standard to apply in real life, there’s no reason it’d be okay to apply it to TV characters.
Bisexual women are bisexual regardless of how many of our partners are men. We’re still bisexual no matter who we’re with. And it’s still a hit against queer women when we’re murdered.
bisexual (and pansexual) women who have relationships with men are just as queer as lesbian women.
How can you even be “predominantly heterosexual”? This is such an incorrect and harmful notion. In my opinion the only criterium is that they are a female canon bisexual. Never having been in a (main) relationship with another female does not erase their sexuality.
I think it’s gonna be really interesting how they are going to handle the romantic life of Clarke (of The 100 who is bisexual – in case you have been sleeping the last two weeks) going forward. I can already see the outrage of the fandom if (when?) she ends up with Bellamy.
Actually, I am still so bitter about Lexa’s death that I kinda hope for Clarke to remain single and mourn the loss of Lexa properly, like for all eternity.
But I doubt this will happen and it would be really problematic for fans to be complaining about her ending up with a guy because he is male. Obviously, it’s not really about the gender, the Clexa shippers just don’t want Clarke to be with anyone but Lexa, but I can see what people could take away from this: That people are pissed just because he is male and that would somehow invalidate Clarke’s sexuality.
I’m sad to say that it’s more than likely going to be when Clarke and Bellamy get together than if because those two characters are actually together in the books which makes this whole thing even worse. They flat out created a character (one of the best characters as well), made her a lesbian, hooked her up with the main character only to kill her and cause more emotional turmoil for Clarke just so she can later end up with Bellamy. It makes the queerbaiting even more disturbing. This and some of the other things that are coming out from one of the regulars about working with Rothenberg have turned me off the show completely.
Ugh, I have been thinking about this a lot. This is actually what irks me the most about this whole debacle: They wrote the romantic storyline between Clarke and Lexa AFTER they already knew that the actress was not available long term. I think that had they not brought Lexa back for the third season at all, it would not have felt like an unnatural ending. A missed opportunity, yes, but it wouldn’t have invalidated the story.
It’s one thing if they need to write a character out because of unforeseen circumstances, but they put themselves into this position in the first place.
Then they blamed the death on other obligations of the actress all the while they simply created the romance because they knew it would keep especially the LGBT fans satisfied. They dug the hole they are sitting in now all on their own.
I would prefer the romantic storyline to have never happened instead of this shitshow we have now.
Agreed… right up to the point where you’d rather not have had the romantic storyline at all.
At some point, in the VERY distant future, decades from now, I’ll come to terms with Lexa’s death. And I’ll feel some small modicum of happiness that she had the relationship with Clarke beforehand.
At least, that’s what I keep telling myself about Willow & Tara’s reconciliation, for that day in the distant future when I come to terms with Tara’s death.
I have heard multiple times now that people would rather have no lesbian storylines than disrespectful ones. How sad that really is.
I have to admit, I have not watched Buffy to this day, but I had my fair share of TV related heartbreaks. And for The 100, I hopped on the train only really late in the game and still it hit me like a ton of bricks.
Belated thank you for that little detail with Delphine.
Denial is not the best way to live, but it could be a way of life.
I feel like this could make a wonderfully fucked up motivational poster !
Here’s another missing. Sophia Varma, from Blindspot (2015). Killed herself. She was Bethany Mayfair’s ex-lover.
She is on the list. Ctrl+F
Thirteen/Remy Hadley (House M.D.) could probably be on this list too. Canonically bisexual and although I don’t believe we see her die on screen, we find out she has Huntington’s in season 4 or 5 and then proceed to watch her develop a pact with House that he’ll kill her once she starts getting sick.
You found 146 dead and 29 alive. That’s 83.5% Imagine if 83.5% of all TV characters died.
hetero cis white men would be upset
Excerpt from the comment section of the THR article (I want you to suffer with me :D):
“Good lord. Get over yourself. How many straight characters have been killed off? What pains in the ass you LGBT activists are.”
“Not 22% of them, this year alone. That’s for sure.”
“Of course. They are the majority. To kill off 22% you had to kill like 200 persons or so.”
“and did that happen?”
“No because that’s almost impossible. It’s much more easy to watch 4 characters die than 200 just for statistics sake. There’s a lot more variety nowadays in television, and that’s good. But they can’t protect the characters just for the sake of them being gay or wtv, they should die like any other character because they are people first, and only them they are gay. That doesn’t matter at all, I wouldn’t mind at all if there were a series with 1000 homosexual people and 10 heterosexual that killed off some heterosexuals like they were killing the other (majority of) homosexuals.”
Im wondering if he would still think that way if the television landscape had a ratio of 10/1000 heterosexuals, that’s 0.01 %. But he is talking about only one show and that I can’t argue because I also didn’t mind that they killed Jenny Schecter.
oh god, please don’t bring the ignorant noise of the greater internet comments sections here. this is an actual safe space :-)
Seconded!
You are right, I’m sorry!
If anyone wants to be extra angry about Denise from TWD, in the comic books, it’s Abraham who dies then with the arrow to the eye, so narratively, she was sacrificed so the straight white guy could live longer.
and abraham deserves to die prettttty badly at this point, man. you leave rosita alone.
They did that because they try not to keep to the comics as much anymore so they can surprise the fans. The other lesbian on the show, Tara, didn’t even exist in the comics and the comic book character, Tara, is nothing like her. And she was introduced mid season 4 and season 6 is about to wrap up. They often kill of minor characters like Denise, heck they killed two live children on camera for the first time this season but when the first lesbian gets killed, there’s an issue. Hundreds of deaths on the show in total too.
Big swing and a miss on the point there, buddy.
My favourite was the teen wolf one, because yes, i watched it, and yes, it was that ridiculous.
Today Miss Dorothy Snarker wrote an article on The Hollywood Reporter and of course she shared a link to this post.
IN THE HOLY NAME OF GOD, DON’T READ THE COMMENTS (just the first one would cause two reactions: a flood of tears and the need to kill something/somebody).
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/bury-your-gays-why-100-877176
Ugh, somebody please tell me why I spent half my evening over there arguing with the straights.
I have this little thing… works like a charm while discussing stupidity.
And some damage-control started on AE today. As far as I can see, it’s not really working.
Aaah, I just smiled a bit, because I think I’ve seen you on literally every article defending the movement. Kudos to you!
I’ve also fought my way through the comments and I’m still in disbelief about many of them. Some just don’t get it and that’s sad but not something one can change over night, but others are just so ignorant, it makes me wanna pull my hair out. And also, if you have nothing constructive to say, just go away.
And then this one gay guy who started whining about how liberals are so shitty and that he’s getting flak from everywhere for being on the right wing and how this campaign would make people wanna vote for Donald Trump. This reminded me of Caitlyn Jenner who used the go-to argument that there are more important things to worry about. Like, jeaa, Trump is misogynist and transphobic, but he is good for the economy. WTH.
But I have to say, I was really impressed by the way commenters from our side conducted the conversation and never turned to hateful or hostile responses.
Oh, yes. The Trump related comments.
I just love that idea some people have that you can only do one thing at a time. Sorry, dude, I can watch TV and be involved in politics.
Ugh, it’s just exhausting. I’m halfway convinced that many commenters are really the same nasty troll. I have some notifications I want to reply to but… I really just want to eat popcorn, drink whiskey, and write some Elyza Lex fanfic. Maybe I need a mental health day from this whole mess?
I’ve seen some straight men and women commenting on articles like this one with real empathy, but yes, in the other hand, you have a lot of assholes.
One peculiar thing I’ve noticed is that these assholes are, for the most part, white dudes, with very limited views on social issues and extreme, almost fundamentalist, fans of some comics and some TV shows. The best example I can find it’s the Gotham bros, who were so offended because Renee Montoya “took” Jim Gordon’s girlfriend.
I really don’t think you can talk to that kind of people, so don’t waste your time.
As sad as it sounds but I really want to believe that they are doing this for fun and to aggravate other people, because if they really believe the stuff they are saying I think every hope for them is lost.
It made me happy to see that there also were some commenters that actually tried to understand and didn’t just dismiss the topic from the get-go.
What I also noticed is that in the articles about TWD the people were way more dismissive and aggressive in comparison to the first articles that came out about The 100.
About the white straight guys…I think they had never any reason to think about that stuff and never will have. Combined with lack of empathy, this leads to total ignorance, so no surprise there.
a wlw character died in an episode of castle (8×10) this year. but she wasn’t a recurring character, so does it still count?
From the article: “Victims-of-the-week from crime procedurals (Law & Order, Cold Case, CSI, Criminal Minds or older shows) or patients-of-the-week from hospital dramas (Chicago Hope, E.R.), aren’t on this list, as that is an entirely different kind of list, but recurring characters from those shows are on this list. “
ok thanks!
You missed the girl from V For Vendetta.
Jesus, it’s in the freaking headline: TV SHOWS!!!!!!!!!!!!
Check Lucy … Mina (her best friend) slept with her fiancé, not the other way around.
I read through this whole list looking for the woman from The Following (whose character name I won’t bother looking up now). She married her wife on the show and was later buried alive.
Debra Parker was buried alive, never married to a woman. Gina Mendez, who looks a lot like Parker, was married to a woman and her and her wife appear to have survived the finale.
This is like airing dirty laundry. I hate this “kill the woman that doesn’t want a man in her life”. It’s disgusting. :/
The SHIELD characters were based on a gay couple in the comics, but were specifically never established as such in the show, because they didn’t want to introduce a gay character only to kill them off and face fan backlash. (Because OBVIOUSLY you need to have a REALLY SPECIAL REASON to introduce someone GAY.) Their character arcs were completely different in the comics; they didn’t die.
Not sure if this matters for list purposes – depends on whether you consider them the same character or not. (I was surprised to see them on the list until I googled and found they used to be gay in the comics.)
Victoria dies in the comics.
from previous comments–
oliviactually: “Seeing Agents Hand and Hartley from SHIELD on this list is bitterly ironic, cause the showrunners specifically said that one of the reasons they erased both character’s queer sexualities from the show is because they didn’t want to become known as the show with two dead lesbians. Yeah, fuck that show.”
Catherine: “That is why I don’t understand how they made the list but some other characters didn’t”
oliviactually: “Well, I’d support them being on this list if only because it’s a big f-you to the showrunners who explicitly wanted to avoid this outcome, which is bullshit homophobic erasure.”
Riese: “precisely”
On the PAtty O’farrell and Veronica, thats not Veronica thats kate del castillo
One more, yesterday in Entertainment Weekly.
http://www.ew.com/article/2016/03/21/twd-the-100-lesbian-tv-deaths?iid=sr-link1
This post is making rounds all over the place.
What about Liz from American horror story??? She died too!
It’s been mentioned somewhere in the comments above that they are working on a separate article on trans characters, since the tropes and context aren’t quite the same.
Haruka and Michiru from Sailor Moon died holding hands after being killed for betraying the woman they were supposed to be working for. The episode aired in 1997.
Seeing this list and the other list, it is obvious what we’ve known/experienced for years. Nevertheless, to see it one one page is… a bit shocking, honestly. Personally, I’ve reached the end of my patience, and Lexa was the last straw (never mind that the list hadn’t been up for 2 weeks before new characters have been added!)
It was really nice and affirming to see that the Clexa fans did something positive with their anger/grief.
This all started from a really horrible place, but the ensuing discussion has been great and thought-provoking. I wonder how we move forward from here? If this has gained traction somewhat in the mainstream media, what effect might it have?
A big thank you to all the writers for this work. Looking forward to the other lists and analysis as well. Thank you for this space, and the opportunity to comment and discuss. I’m sure it’s been said before, but it’s like an oasis in the desert.
I don’t know if this counts, but in the 2008 BBC show, Survivors, Anya’s girlfriend, Pat, is one of the people who dies from the virus in the first episode and I believe she shows up in a later episode as a flashback. It’s been a while since I watched that show, but IMDb shows the character appearing in episode 1 and 5. Not exactly victim of the week but also not exactly a recurring character.
What I remember most is that the show made it seem like Anya was the last queer woman on Earth, and I believe identified as a lesbian and then got involved with a man. Anyone else remember this?
Picture if you decide to add her:
https://scifiandtvtalk.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/survivors10.jpg
I have fallen behind on a lot of shows I usually watch (supernatural, Hemlock Grove, Lost Girl, Heroes etc) and was utterly shocked to hear about the character deaths in those shows and the descriptions of how they died. Like seriously? Why so many birthing baby deaths? Why so violent and unnecessary? Well thank you because I’m never going back to those shows now, you have saved me from the upset of having to watch that. <3
This pains me in a deeply personal way
Can someone chronicle ALIVE queer women please? Like queer, alive women of TV shows that are done / no more potentially deadly episodes?
Someone did. It’s a much shorter list.
there are 70 alive queer women characters on american tv right now, here’s the info:
Any Vera fans out there with a better memory than mine? This show is so compelling and unique partly because it explores the private lives of the guest characters around the murder-of-the-episode, but even into the sixth season, there is so little revealed about the central characters private lives. The scant clues to what makes these humanly-flawed characters tick are what make the show so magnetizing. I just watched Vera season / series 6 episode 1 and, SPOILER….
Not having been spoiled myself, I still felt it coming early on, wracking my brain to remember if DC Bethany Whelan’s obvious queerness was ever cannon. Every scene with her this episode made my oh-no-they-won’t…oh-shit! feelings grow until yet another of so very few butch(ish) black women on TV dies a lazy-writing “heroic/tragic” death – so Vera can have 15 minutes of guilty-anger feels for two episodes.
Googling, I see Cush Jumbo is on Good Wife, now, giving interviews with coded language to say she won’t be queer like Kalinda, and that she had to be written off Vera… got shot in the back – ha ha… Her plot in the episode was that she had applied for major crimes, a good way to say goodbye to her awesome characer. Vera “scuppered” it because Whelan wasn’t ready, bleh.
Does anyone remember a canonization moment for DC Whelan? I can’t find any good recaps online, but could swear I remember a female pronoun-type reveal at some point. The British press called the character a “sparky tomboy,” but that’s the best I’ve got, and I’m just not up for hunting through every episode she was in just to verify what I already know was another lazy writer murdering a black queer woman.
Ok but how many dead gay Mia Kirshners are there in the television world?
I’ve got one more for you: Dot from Cloudburst (2011), surprise death of natural causes (I think it was a heart attack) in the last ten minutes of the movie.
TV not movies!
Want a lesbian main character that won’t die? Check it out:
Wattpad.com/user/AlexFiero8
ADD CLARA OSWALD!!!, SHE WAS REVEALED/HINTED TO BE BI AND THEN SHE GOT KILLED BY THE WRITERS
Technically, Clara is still alive. The show brought her back in the finale and sent her off with Aislindr in their own Tardis.
But her heart isn’t beating and will never beat again, I’d call that pretty dead tbh. And once her and Ashildr/ME have had their fun traveling round the universe in a diner, Clara has to go back to the trap street because it’s essentially time locked until she comes back and ‘dies’.
Are we still hoping that Delia (Call the Midwife) pulls through?
how far along in the show are you?
One of the episodes of The Zoo had a pair of lesbian scientists who were killed by bats in the Antartic. A lot of other people died as well in this show, but I found it a little odd that the only LGBTQ presence in the show were two characters who you knew from the beginning of the episode were going to die. http://uproxx.com/tv/zoo-recap-kamikaze-bats/
Wendy (Kerry Cahill) & Margaret (Shanna Forrestall) from Zoo (episode 1×04), who’re living there as part of a two-year plan designed to save their marriage. A swarm of bats swoops in and covers the solar panels that power their bunker/home.
Never realised how many lesbian/bisexual characters Lucy Lawless played.
And most have died…
Although in Ash vs. Evil Dead, she died and then came back to life. Making the lesbian character an immortal evil sorceress is one way to avoid the lesbian death trope.
How about a list of queer women on TV who have little deaths on-screen?
Yes another “happy endings” list. ;)
the world of the new generation is shit. this and the cultural Marxism of shit
Here are details for an addition noted by others, cannon queer, multi-episode, dead: Eleanor “Nellie” Keene, Tenko, 1984.
Considered a sympathetic portrayal of unrequited “unnatural” love for 1981,on this beloved BBC show,Nellie was an interned WWII nurse who died offscreen from malaria.
Photo https://tenkotv.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/nellie-small.jpg?w=6401982
1981 Cannon, Series 1, Episode 7 http://tenkotv.com/2013/09/13/dependents-review-of-series-1-episode-7/
1984 Death, Series 3, Episode 5 http://tenkotv.com/2012/08/04/series-3-part-5-by-jill-hyem/
Thanks for including “Ashleigh” from Janet King but nobody ever called her Ashleigh. Her name was Ash Larsson.
Actually now that I reread the description on Ash Larsson (Janet King), it wasn’t a ‘stray bullet’ either. It was a targetted hit, probably meant to kill her partner, the title character.
It was, but the description was done before the episode aired (based off some promotional articles that mentioned Ash dying).
Yep. I hope it gets changed, because I’ve shared this article with ABC TV now
this is seriously so sad. we must persevere. to all wlw out there: don’t give up. if you wanted a sign today, this is it. you cannot give up. the world needs you.
There was also Charlotte on Pretty Little Liars — a trans woman who was killed in the mid-season opener this year.
she’s not gay/bi
I dunno if this has been said already but I don’t believe for one. single. second. that Rose in Jane the Virgin is dead. Like, not because she’s a lesbian. Just because it fits the format that she’s still alive. Also her gimmick is that she changes faces, she was JUST there trying to tie up a loose end, and then we saw her disappear round a corner/through a door, and then BOOM, lying strangled seconds later. CLEARLY a planted corpse. Like I understand putting her on the list for now, but I will bet you cash money that you’re gonna be taking her back off.
The deaths that anger me the most are those where it appears that a happy ending is in the works and then ‘wham’, nope we’ll just kill the character instead.
Among the worst (IMHO) were Tara on BTVS, Dana on The L Word, Silvia on Los Hombres de Paco, Sandy on E.R., Xena on Xena: Warrior Princess and Naomi on Skins… perhaps because I feel I invested so much in watching these shows from the very beginning only to have these deaths completely reverse all the happiness and hope the shows had given us.
I understand some deaths, being necessary to the advancement of other characters or the plot of the show itself, but it does eventually lead me to thinking I’ll wait until the show has ended its run and find out how things turn out and then start watching it, so I am less invested.
Is this a satirical article? It surely can’t be genuine?!
It’s real and horrific.
Does Lucy Lawless top your list for most deaths (4, I think)?
Another character for this list would be Shayla Nico from Mr. Robot (2015). She was murdered on the orders of her abusive ex-boyfriend (throat slit, stuffed into a car trunk) to get back at her current boyfriend (Elliot, the main character) for turning him over to the police. She only shared one on-screen kiss with another woman and I can’t remember whether there were other references towards her sexuality, but imo that kiss is enough to qualify her for this since the show explicitly included multiple other lgbt characters (which says to me they intended for the audience to understand she was bi or pan), though others may disagree.
Jennifer from the movie Jennifer’s Body (2009) was bi and died because she was stabbed, also missing from the list.
Not missing, this is a list of characters from TV shows as specified in the article title and the introduction.
That’s a movie. This is a list for tv deaths only.
Lucy Lawless alone has 4 deaths on this list (Xena, Battlestar, Spartacus and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.)
Amy Murgatroyd from Agatha Christie Marple (2004) choked to death
This list only includes regular, multi-episode characters on TV shows. I’m guessing without that limitation it might reach triple digits. Ms. Murgatroyd has died more than once, but I believe all the TV versions of the 50s Christie novel, A Murder is Announced, were mystery-of-the-week Marple shows, and Murgatroyd was not recurring.
As I look at most of these deaths, they bring up sympathy towards the diseased. It helps people sympathies with lesbian characters and maybe start people seeing them as just another character, rather than separating them as straight, gay, lesbian and bisexual.
Oh yes, because we only sympathise to a character when they are dead and not, say, are in love and living happily ever after. That’s why all the most beloved protagonists end up dead. Sure.
Marie Logan from Young Justice is confirmed to be bi in the comics when a mind-controlling villainess (Queen Bee, who can also only use mind control and people who are attracted to women) told her to drive her car off a waterfall. There is a flashback of her death in the show.
Out of context, Jadzia’s death sounds so strange (being zapped by an alien-possessed alien). But in context it’s even worse. She was trying her hardest to conceive a child with her husband, Worf. Her best friend, Kira, recommends that she visit the Bajoran shrine on the station. And so she does, and literally just gets in the way of Dukat’s plan. The whole thing was a hot mess.
150 as off today with two more from vampire diaries that I wasn’t even aware that existed. Better to include 1000 and elevate it to a hundred, these suckers don’t get the message and it is just making me even motivated to fight this absurd trope.
Even worse they were killed off so that the heterosexual white male main character could survive.
And another two bite the dust thanks to The CW. Hope you update this soon.
Well, looks like two more lesbians will be added to the list now thanks to the return of The Vampire Diaries.
Mary Louise and Nora Hildegard were just killed off on the vampire diaries.
You need to update your list. The two lesbian characters from The Vampire Diaries have been killed off.
I’ve just been waiting for this to happen. I’ve known since they were introduced that they’d eventually bite the dust. That’s what happens to all the antagonists (and frankly, a lot of the protagonists) on TVD. Feels like that except Stefan and Damon, any character can be permanently killed off at any time. But, frankly, since there was no other place than death that Mary-Louise’s and Nora’s storyline could’ve ended, I’d prefer that they hadn’t introduced them at all.
I respectfully disagree. I’d been aching to see a lesbian couple from before the modern era, and was extremely pleasantly surprised to see TVD introduce Nora and Mary-Louise as a pair of lesbian lovers. The show probably has one of the better track records of killing off characters–other than TWD and GoT–but I was still glad to see the beautiful love story (even if it was pretty destructive in some ways) between Mary-Louise and Nora.
Tbh, the only character I even liked at that point was Bonnie, and that was because she had the weird love-hate (b)romance with Damon, and wasn’t constantly being thrown into relationships with the brothers/other guys.
Like, this wasn’t The 100, where they were the two most important characters on the show and had been implicitly promised an “alive” status at the end of the season. The show killed lots of “important” characters, and we even have one that might never reprise their role, but Mary-Louise and Nora? They’re pretty much part of an arc that’s ending.
Still don’t regret it. I’m sick of lesbian deaths and a(n alleged) general lack of awareness of the trope within the director/showrunner/writer film community, but I’ll take a suicide out of love over a dumb bullet that had no place in anything any day.
can somebody tell me the cause of death for nora and mary-louise? i’ve never seen the vampire diaires.
until you get a specific answer it’s probably safe to say it was the Patriarchy.
Suicide. They destroyed a magic sword together, to prevent Nora from getting trapped in it, and when they destroyed it it exploded and killed them, something they knew was going to happen. But they chose death rather than being apart and having Nora trapped in the sword.
Just an FYI the character on the Magicians was actually a Goddess and never really killed off. Please update
This is what showrunner Julie Plec had to say: “I’ve asked Ian to take the reins of the blog tonight as a special guest columnist, but before I hand them over, I did want to mention that I recently became aware of a conversation taking place in the television fan community about a story trope the writers and I were unfamiliar with, but one that has clearly touched a nerve. Part of this particular trope involves the statistically high death count of lesbian characters in television. As you can imagine (SPOILER ALERT), I was immediately concerned that our next episode featured the deaths of Nora and Mary Louise, the betrothed Heretics. Unfortunately on The Vampire Diaries, death is the probable outcome for nearly every character who passes through our universe. However, we realize we may have unintentionally offended as we sent this couple to meet their tragic fate.”
http://www.ew.com/article/2016/04/01/vampire-diaries-julie-plec-blog-ian-somerhalder-days-of-future-past
Well, at least she isn’t using any other defense for the storyline other than that “almost every character dies on TVD” so she’s handling it better than Jason Rothenberg did with Lexa, but at the same time, I’m having a hard time buying that she and the entire writing team was unaware of the bury your gays-trope, it’s more plausible that they just didn’t anticipate that mainstream media would have just started to acknowledge it.
Well this implies that it would have been ok to use the trope before Lexa happened. It is 2016, I don’t need to have multiple lesbian characters killed before I realize that it’s bad idea.
Obviously, they couldn’t have anticipated that they would place their deaths in the middle of a social media storm. However, that’s exactly the problem. If every showrunner thinks that way they will continue to use the trope.
We can only hope that this time people are paying attention.
Had she known what she knows now she probably wouldn’t have written them at all. Since this is TVD, there’s no way they would ever introduce new characters that they “can’t” kill off. TVD has always been a show that doesn’t understand the concept of writing out characters without killing them. But hopefully it will teach showrunners that if they think about writing lesbian/bi characters that they intend to kill off, it’s better to not write them at all.
1) Actually my biggest fear is that people following this whole disaster will rather not write any LGBT+ characters than have to possibly deal with an angry fanbase.
2) This makes me think that many showrunners are only now learning about the lack and quality of representation.
I can’t judge the TVD for those death’ since I didn’t watch it, but I think this is actually a complicated issue. Just this morning I had a discussion with my straight white male roommate about this mess and what he concluded from my arguments was that what we want is that no lesbian is being killed off ever.
I am arguing with myself about this because it is true and not true at the same time. Obviously, there have been death’ which cohered to the storyline and thus are justifiable. However, there comes in this old argument that no show can exist in a vacuum. So when this character was the only representation, is it still okay to kill her off?
I was talking about how we needed more and better representation in the first place whereupon he stated “So until then nobody is allowed to die?”.
The problem also seems to be that most of our representation is on shows where they can get away with the everybody dies excuse.
They get to have the cake and eat it too. They get queer viewers and then appease the conservative ones by killing us off.
Is it really worth it to have representation when this is what passes as that? I just don’t know
Sure, there are always two sides to every coin, but still, if you write an LGBT-character that you know already when you create them is going to be killed off eventually, then I actually do think that it’s best to not write them at all. Especially if they are your only LGBT-character. But at the same time, it does pose a problem especially on shows like Walking Dead or
Vamprire Diaries when more or less every single character can die at any time.
After Lexa was killed off I heard so many people voicing the same sentiment over and over again which was “Why did I start watching this show?” The worst thing is that they blamed themselves for buying into it when they were actually being misled in the worst possible way.
It pains me to use the word “positive” anywhere near this mess, but the only positive aspect about it is the hope that the noise is loud enough for others to hear.
But I am also conflicted because how often and how much more do we need to suffer in order to get the message across? Right now it seems we only have two options: either bad representation or none.
So it seems one of the bigger concerns is that we only get represented in shows that are able to get away with the “anyone can die” argument.
But why is that? Is it too hard for people to write lesbians in a real world setting?
It’s not about not writing LGBTQ but to actually have more of those on screen and not as a freaking background to fill a few minutes or a product for popularity because everyone by now knows that the LGBTQ community is very loud on social media and especially when you push all their buttons like the 100 did. They baited so much and even infiltrated LGBTQ’s personal spaces on the net, saying they would do it right. For over a year every day the trope was introduced to them, people expressed their fears after so much killing of lesbians or bi Fs and in the end they pulled off a stray bullet to a none fatal place like 60 sec after Lexa for the first time sleept with the woman she loves. THE FUCK WAS THAT? Ain’t these people suppose to be professionals?
The problem is that LGBTQ have less then 400 people on screen while straight one have over 18 000+. I think that shows enough to even a noob writer that making bullshit with a character that has barely anything on screen is bad.
It’s not about not killing them but how they die and for what reason and to at least sooth the character and the role it has. Like Lexa who is a warrior, commander of 12 clans and can kick a man twice her size and to end dead by a stray bullet is just humiliating to her and us. We felt like a joke to these people. If I was 14 I would have actually jumped off the highest place in my town after seeing bullshit like that.
If we had many to represent us on screen their deaths would not hit us like a freaking train every time. We can’t just shrug and change the channel to someone else. If the representation dies we are left stranded, hurt and dare not hope because we know that would happen again and again.
What I also hate the most I see on screen is how they portrait the Bisexual females. I am still waiting on one bisexual to have a happy ending with a woman. Like what the hell… so you hook her up with a girl, Lesbian or another bisexual, kill one or both of them and if the bi is alive she ends up with a man. Seriously? So my female lovers are just a fling? I am a bisexual and they constantly erase my sexuality my hooking me with man all the time. I can have a happy ending with a woman too assholes! Stop lying the young bisexuals that they can’t have a happy end with a women but only men! My sexuality is not a phase and if I fall in love with a woman and she dies or whatever I can fall after that with another woman AGAIN!
Damn retards. If they don’t know what to do there are plenty of people out there that can explain it to them or point them in the right direction. Stop assuming and start understanding!
My kids (if I have those) and the future generations don’t deserve this bullshit you serve them!
Just reading this makes me wanna kill myself by knowing how “many” LGBTQ+ are on shows anyway…
Reason – confession? … seriously? Did they got out of anything original…oh yeah… they killed so many they did. There was even a nuke for a reason.
But shot, stabbed, heart attacks, cancer, exploded, suicide sure are one of the favorite things for writers to do the the community.
Better go gear up before something stray decides to fly my way and kill me!
Wendy (?) from Jessica Jones
She’s on the list.
Nora and Mary Louise, The Vampire Diaries
Cause of Death: Suicide.
I disagree. “Suicide” Really? Mary Louise can’t live longer because she is been poison. She sacrifice herself for keeping Nora safe but Nora don’t want to live along without her (They’ve been together 137 years btw)
They died together in the car explosion for destroyed a magic sword, I don’t think suicide is a appropriate word to describe their death.
I don’t watch the show, but I read a recap after hearing about it. I thought suicide was an odd description as well, it seemed like they chose to sacrifice themselves to save someone else which I wouldn’t qualify as suicide.
Spoilers below for Mary-Louise and Nora’s death on TVD.
The main gist of the situation they were in was that Mary-Louise was going to die very soon due to being poisoned by Reyna Cruz’s blood, which is toxic and fatal to witches. That, coupled with Nora being “marked” by Reyna’s sword, which meant that Reyna would chase them to the ends of the earth till she killed the “marked” (aka: Nora), the two decided to just end it once and for all and just be together (in death). yn
A side-effect of them breaking the magical stone in the sword is saving other vampires from Reyna’s reign of terror. In and of itself, this isn’t a sacrifice, but rather a double suicide.
Spoilers below for Mary-Louise and Nora’s death on TVD.
The main gist of the situation they were in was that Mary-Louise was going to die very soon due to being poisoned by Reyna Cruz’s blood, which is toxic and fatal to witches. That, coupled with Nora being “marked” by Reyna’s sword, which meant that Reyna would chase them to the ends of the earth till she killed the “marked” (aka: Nora), the two decided to just end it once and for all and just be together (in death).
A side-effect of them breaking the magical stone in the sword is saving other vampires from Reyna’s reign of terror. In and of itself, this isn’t a sacrifice, but rather a double suicide.
They both chose death in their own way which makes it suicide.
If you knowlingly take your own life or put yourself in a situation that you know is going to kill you, no matter the reason for it, then it is suicide. Doesn’t really matter if you were going to die eventually anyway.
If you knowlingly take your own life or put yourself in a situation that you know is going to kill you, no matter the reason for it, then it is suicide. Doesn’t really matter if you were going to die eventually anyway.
Oops, that was meant as a reply to another post, not as a “new” post.
Well, If you really love someone, you would have done everything to save ur loved ones. I won’t say that you are trying to kill yourselves. Anyway, let’s agree to disagree.
If anyone here also interesting to the love story between Nora and Mary Louise, just check out 7X16 and make your own opinion. ~ peace out
What are you talking about?
Oh I forgot to say, just because they both death doesn’t mean their story is meaningless, and their ending was not poorly written and cheap or stupid accidental death like the 100 they did on Lexa’s death.
Nobody said their death was meaningless. Just that the fact that they made a decision to die makes it suicide. Don’t presume to speak for others
“Nobody said their death was meaningless. Just that the fact that they made a decision to die makes it suicide. Don’t presume to speak for others”
Exactly this.
I was say “just because they both death doesn’t mean their ***story*** is meaningless”, not talking about death.
There’re people just like me love and CARE these couple/characters like crazy and thought it was a decent ending for them even suicide or whatever you called.To me, still don’t regret it.
“Don’t presume to speak for others” You too.
The list isn’t “All 150+ Meaningless Deaths of Lesbian & Bisexual Women on TV”, it’s just all of them that died for whatever reason. I’m sure there are many deaths in this list that actually held importance for the plot.
You get me wrong. My original opinion/comment is I don’t think suicide is a appropriate word to describe their death.
and about meaningless part was replying for someone’s comment.
I still maintain that what Nora and Mary-Louise did was indeed suicide. Putting yourself in a situation that you know is going to end with you dying is suicide. No matter what reason you have for doing it.
And I still stick with my opinion too. Just like I said before, let’s agree to disagree ok? ;)
Yeah, I can be down with that :)
OK, you need to remove Sara Lance because she is very much alive.
“Sara Lance, Arrow (2014) (Resurrected in 2015)
Cause of death: Three arrows to the chest, causing her to fall off a building”
Guess what for people to be resurrected they have to die first.
This is maybe a bit late but as another poster said, I really don’t think Flora from Deadwood should be included in the list.
She was a thief who manipulated the lesbian character (Joanie Stubbs) and exploited her vulnerabilities to get what she wanted (protection & Joanie’s jewels). They only slept once in the same bed (didn’t have sex or anything), Joanie holding Flora in her arms. But the next day, the girl called Joanie a « dyke » behind her back and was clearly disgusted by the older woman’s affection. There was no hint she was queer at all, quite the contrary.
(The whole point of that character and of her brutal murder was mostly to emphasize the tragic-ness of the lesbian character though. Joanie’s boss/mentor/father figure/ « owner »/pimp – a sadistic man who was in love with her, allowed her some form of freedom and power but was frustrated his love was never going to be returned – jumped at the occasion to humiliate her, forcing her to kill the girl who had played her, which she did only so Floral wouldn’t be left to die a slow painful death. Seconds after she shot Flora, Joanie pointed the gun to her own head and tried to shoot herself too but was stopped)
Anyway, keep up the good work ! This list is so important !
The other day, I made another list, of all my favourite tv lesbian characters, and 8 out of 9 had either died or experienced the death of their girlfriends. That’s so fucked up. I hadn’t even realized.
Why does Dana and Jenny on the L Word count? The rest of the cast were lesbians as well and they didn’t die…
Every death on every show counts, so that includes shows that had other queer females and generally a good representation, like The L Word or Orange is the new black.
Congrats on the WaPo mention! https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/arts-and-entertainment/wp/2016/04/04/tv-keeps-killing-off-lesbian-characters-the-fans-of-one-show-have-revolted/
Wish it were for something more positive, of course, but it’s still pretty awesome to see y’all get represented.
>>Since Lexa’s death, Autostraddle, a culture website geared toward lesbian and bisexual women, has compiled a list of 150 lesbian and bisexual characters in regular and recurring roles who have been killed on television shows, starting with the 1976 CBS show “Executive Suite.”<<
Let’s be fair though… spoiler alert, EVERYONE on Spartacus died.
Except two gay men. Who were all I really cared about anyway. So.
Lets be fair though… Less then 400 LGBTQ+ are on TV shows. Let’s say 150 dead Lesbians or bisexuals. Don’t know how many of the others and that leave us with one giant nothing! Straight characters on shows are over 18 000+ and couples are over 10 000+.
As tragic as their deaths might have been because I loved the show and the plot, their loss was not something to scar me for life because there are other shows to fill my time when that one is over.
The LGBTQ get stranded when someone like them dies on shows. They have to wait and hope that something better will come their way, some character that is not a freaking background to fill a few minutes in a few episodes.
I am still waiting for an actual serious show to have a big main LGBTQ character and not this teen/comedy garbage (LGBTQ again in the background of said shows) that the older audience of the community are no longer interested.
There is another deaths that is not on the list:
TV Serie: What Remains (2013)
Peggy (Victoria Hamilton)
Cause of death: Possibly murdered by his girlfriend (Elaine) or suicide.
Elaine (Indira Varma)
Cause of death: Is shot with a bow and this wound and bleeding on the ground. Possibly mortally.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Remains_%28TV_series%29
Dunno if you’re still editing this – may god have mercy on your soul – but it just occurred to me that there’s another Xena death that probably qualifies. I know, I know, more Xena, please don’t take me off the cliff, I’m not talking about Xena herself. But Brunhilda, who showed up in 3 episodes in season 6, was said specifically to be IN Love with Gabrielle (as opposed to the rest of the show’s hmmm shes loves her but what kind of love let’s not say outright hmmm) and died/dissipated after turning herself into a magic flame to protect Gabrielle from Odin.
I totally agree! Brunnhilda should be listed as some kind of suicide/sacrifice thing. I love her & her love for Gabrielle!
Torchwood: “Mary”, an alien in a female human form. Teleported into the Sun.
If you read the opening paragraphs it clearly says it only counts recurring characters, not characters that only appeared once, with only a few exceptions
Mary the alien only appeared in one episode. Same with that other couple.
Torchwood also has a female couple as its leaders in the past (Alice Guppy and Emily Holroyd). Technically, they are dead by Death by Torchwood. But there deaths were never shown on-screen or described in any supporting materials, and as characters from the past, they probably don’t count as “dead lesbians” – more like “living ones”.
WOW! So I just want to throw my telly out the window. Except my wife loves television.
*I have not seen The 100 (I considered watching it because my younger sis is a fan, but then decided not to when I heard of the Lexa death thing).
**I do not mean to be offensive, but if I am, do let me know.
***The word “brevity” is not in my dictionary. ;-)
Due to the criminality of gay sex in India (I am in India and am Indian) and how some of the majority perceives it and makes it clear while speaking publicly that they want nothing to do with it and can the gay people go elsewhere please…I have been wondering for some time whether we (as in LGBTQI or any minority/marginalised) people have the right to ask for anything from the majority.
After all, as one person in the IMDB thread on The 100 said, if the gay people want representation, why don’t they make their own shows? And as someone else and the Indian Supreme Court said about section 377 and decriminalising gay sex, it affects such a miniscule amount of the population why should they bother about it? Or, if the Muslims and Christians want to eat beef, let them go eat it elsewhere because India belongs to the majority Hindus. There are so few shows, if any, that show Muslim and Christian people on national TV, I kinda feel greedy for wishing that there were lesbians.
(Regional TV and Movies are better though at representing other religions. Both national and regional shows, and regional movies, are horrible in how they portray women, so there is that.)
Anyways, the point is what right have I to wish for something when the majority wishes otherwise and majority is writing the shows or making the laws? A sort of GRRM is not at your beck and call (I find “bitch” offensively sexist, why not “GRRM is not your dog”) kinda thing.
It’s a depressing question. A scary question… because how painful is it to have your rights dictated by the whims of others.
I have found an answer though (but I keep having to reinforce it to myself time and time again. :()
What I feel is, writing is not just about what you have experienced or what you could experience. If you only write what you know, you won’t be stretching yourself; you won’t be giving wings to the gift you have. There wouldn’t be a GRRM or a Patrick Rothfuss then, or a Tamora Pierce or Robin Hobb or Isaac Asimov.
A writer gets to experience a hundred lives, get to live their joys and sorrows, and most importantly, their growth and fulfillment; the writers get to feel empathy through that. And so does a reader. That is the blessing of being a writer (or a reader). That is why writers write about magical beings, aliens and about people from other nationalities or historical times. At the end of it all, you realise that there are similarities in human experience too that allows you to empathise with all humans (or human-like folks).
So, saying, I can’t write about a gay character because I can’t identify with them is a sign of homophobia rather than a sign of writing representing reality. How can you identify with someone having magical powers and yet not identify with a human who just happens to love another of the same sex?
And from my own personal struggles with bias, I know that bias or discriminatory feeling towards someone or a group of people is not healthy. It only brings you down. Besides, if a writer says that and doesn’t explore a gay character, aren’t they missing out on that experience too? (It’s a Hindu belief that we go through numerous births as our consciousness evolves; so the more experiences we have the better evolved our consciousness and the nearer we are to godhood). So, not having that experience is a lack.
And as for anti-discriminatory and inclusive laws and the importance of diversity, I have my corporate experience to draw on. Our company (an MNC) is celebrating the pride month in June and just day before yesterday decided to internally support the LGBT in the Indian workplace (though, globally, it was a policy, it was pretty silent in India). And their mantra whenever they talk about the importance of diversity and inclusion is that it is beneficial to the company: because a more diverse workplace ensures a more diverse amount of ideas, which means more winning ideas; and an inclusive place makes everyone happy, and happiness is good for productivity (who knew?).
So, it is basically good for society to give everyone their happiness.
And there is also the personal thought of mine that the civilized nature of a society (or a person) is not judged by its technological advances or its wealth but by how it treats the marginalised, the underrepresented and the weakest.
I know, most of you will have thought this; but I still feel happy writing it down. :) I would’ve probably blogged it instead of writing such a big comment here, but only 3 people read it so. ;-D But, i will blog it too.
Thanks for reading. :)
I can’t tell if you sincerely believe that Muslims and Christians should just stay quiet and eat their beef elsewhere because India is a “Hindu” country, or if you’re just saying what your countrypeople believe without endorsing them, but this sort of attitude is what has led to Muslims and Christians being murdered by the Hindu right-wing for basically not being Hindu.
India wasn’t originally solely a Hindu country, and isn’t even now. Muslims, Christians, and people of other faiths (and those without faith at all) make up a huge chunk of the Indian population. The separation of religion is an artifact of colonization, specifically the Partition, which split the Subcontinent into India (the Hindu section) and Pakistan (the Muslim section, which then split into Pakistan and Bangladesh due to language).
Let’s not continue our colonizers’ work for them by insisting we continue this false and dangerous separation.
Leslie Elizabeth Shay was a really interesting, unusual character, not just because she was a lesbian working as a paramedic in a fire squadron in Chicago, but because she was easily one of the most interesting people in the squad. A solid professional, it showed her as a solid female friend, a person who had ups and downs in her love life and — perhaps most importantly — one part of the pair who made up the best relationship in the show, along with Kelly Severide. Both were fervant in their pursuit of relationships, but the most solid, lasting touching relationship for both of them was their friendship.
Her death seemed almost random when the producers explained it…”this happens”…but it clearly showed that they were out of touch with the impact the character has had. Severide has gone from empty coupling to here today-gone tomorrow pick-ups and silly plot contrivances which add nothing to his growth. And while one of the female replacements for Shay is interesting, there is nothing that matches her gravitas or humor.
And yet virtually every one of the remaining Male “7 dwarfs” (as my wife and I call them) are still around, getting a few lines here or there.
Show still isn’t the same….
This list needs to be updated, unfortunately yet again. [EMPIRE SPOILERS] Mimi Whiteman from Fox’s Empire died on tonight’s episode after being murdered by her wife (her wife, Camilla, had only married Mimi to try and steal the Empire music company) and then had her death framed as a suicide. The death wasn’t even shown on screen & we didn’t get to see her face– the first we saw of Mimi dead, we only saw her body submerged in a full bathtub with her wife trying to erase her prints from the scene.
Would Jianna from Wentworth count? I know she was dead before the series started, but she was in multiple episodes, and we know she was in a relationship with Ferguson and the other inmates murdered her because of it. I know it was just backstory but should we add her to the list too?
Was she in a relationship with Ferguson or just another victim on Ferguson’s creepy obsession with pregnant women? My mind a bit blurry on what happened there last season as I was distracted by Franky and Bridget.
Oh that’s fair, I think we all were… I think Jianna was the reason for Ferguson’s creepy pregnant woman obsession though, she regretted that she didn’t protect Jianna so she tried to protect Doreen (in her mind, anyway – I think she even called Doreen “Jianna” at one point cause CREEPYYY) but yeah I’m pretty sure they were in a relationship and that’s why the other inmates killed Jianna. Such polite people you meet in prison
Don’t forget to add Mimi and Camilla from EMPIRE.
I AM SCREAMING. Can they stop killing us??!
Shouldn’t Allison DiLaurentis be on here? She was murdered 50 hundred times in one night.
Can you seriously REMOVE The Magicians example because the character didn’t actually die at all. (I assume no one on this site watches it…) She is a Goddess that showed up to test Julia and is literally in two more episodes so far as Our Lady Underground, one of the most amazing giving Goddesses. The fandom has talked about this at lengths and we don’t feel she belongs on these lists or in this conversation. This is a wonderful conversation to be had, and as a part of the LGBTQ community It’s nice to see. But please this the Magicians doesn’t fit the bill and you are harming the show’s character. Please and Thank you.
Is the goddess the same character though or she just using the character’s image? Or is it all a dream/hallucination (similar to what happened on Last Tango on Halifax). Will this new goddess version of the character (assuming it is the same person, they look different to me) have a girlfriend or even be a lesbian?
Just saw the final episode so spoilers…
.
.
.
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Basically another god was using the image of the dead lesbian character to trick his way into being summoned so he could kill all Julia’s friends and then rape her and impregnate her with his evil god spawn (or something).
And the gay guy was forced to marry a women so the group could get a dagger and then enchanted so he could never fall in love with anyone else… so yeah that happened to.
Whoa; I had no idea there were so many queer characters out there! Too bad they’re all dead.
*sad trombone*
Nit picking but Camilla poisoned Mimi and then Camilla poisoned herself.
River Song, Doctor Who.
Electrocution/Suicide. Died to save het characters
the two from Empire were poisoned not shot
Another two:
Constance Heck from Fargo – she was strangled by Hanzee while planning a romantic encounter in a hotel with Peggy Blumquist
Shayla Nico from Mr.Robot – killed by ex-boyfriend (after an episode where she kissed Angela)
I will never get over Lexa and Leslie Shay’s death. Never.
Mimi and Camilla were not shot. Camilla poisoned Mimi, and then Lucious forced Camilla, at gunpoint, to drink the rest of the poison herself.
I still think you should add Thirteen from House. we can assume that she is killed by House when she starts showing signs of Parkinson’s, which is an incurable disease.
I don’t think it counts, yes she is sick and it implied that she is going to die soon, but she didn’t during the duration of the show. And technically any character can die anytime soon, Cuddy can be run over by a car the next day, the hospital can explode and Thirteen outlives everybody, they can find a (fictional or real) cure for Hunttingtons and she gets better, idk.
I absolutely don’t want to be rude but is there are reason for ignoring Paulie Oster from Lost & Delirious (2001)? Cause she was in a lesbian relationship with her room mate/best friend and commited suicide in the end. I just saw her anme mentioned a few times.
If you saw her name mentioned a few times, I’m not entirely sure why you didn’t expand the comments? This is a list of tv show characters, Lost and Delirious is a movie. ctrl+f is your friend.
Yes, there is a reason. Lost & Delirious was a movie. This list only includes TV-shows.
That’s a movie. This is TV-deaths only.
Lois, Scandal (2015) → Shot.
Neither mimi nor Camilla were shot….Camilla poisoned mimi and then put her in a bath tub and then when lyon was holding a gun at Camilla he told her to drink some of what she gave mimi, and she did.
It was only a guest appearance but, NCIS a featured a storyline on March 22, 2016 season 13 episode 19, with a gay woman who was revealed to have an inoperable brain tumor and given a month to live by the end of the episode it was implied that she died.
This list doesn’t include single-ep guest appearances.
I know Lucy lawless is up there 4 times already but it should be FIVE times. The 5th is Countess Von Marburg that other comments have mentioned. http://salem.wikia.com/wiki/Countess_Von_Marburg
I wouldn’t necessarily count them in the tally, but both Castle and Elementary have killed 2 lesbian/bisexual female characters off-screen in the last month or so (we only briefly get a blurry look of one of the murdered women in a flashback of her murder). Both deaths were to set up the lover as killer. I wonder what the tally would be if we included off-screen deaths of inconsequential lesbian characters killed in crime dramas?
Aún faltan más muertes, en el Ángel azúl, muere la amiga de la protagonista y hay varios personajes de mujeres lesbianas en animes yuri que también fueron “asesinadas” por sus creadores … Oniisame e.. Rei, Burts Angel, Jo y otras
How about Nicole Wallace from Law and Order: Criminal Intent?
153, Cara Thomas from the UK series Marcella died on episode 3 after being hit then run over twice more by a car. She was in all the episodes of the series to that point and had only been shown sleeping with women.
this guardian article has a picture http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2016/apr/18/marcella-recap-episode-three-sudden-death-and-spaniels
Actually on Empire Camilla poisoned Mimi and Lucious held Camilla at gunpoint and made her drink that same poison. Neither one of them was shot.
Sophia from Blindspot faked her own death! She’s back!
Well i could always be wrong here , but i’m fairly certain that a few of those characters weren’t lesbians. It’s a small number,maybe 8 out of 100 +. For instance Victoria Hand, i don’t think that she was even around long enough for it to be established whether she was gay or not. I think the authors were really just guessing on a few.
I’m not familiar with that particular case, but the characters doesn’t have to be an out lesbian to be eligable. The conditions are that the character has been in at least a few episodes and that they have been shown to be interested in women, but not necessarily exclusively interested in women. Bisexual and fluid characters counts as well.
Victoria Hand is a character who is a lesbian in the comics but was degayed for the TV series specifically so they could avoid the lesbian death trope. The same with Isabelle Hartley (Victoria’s lover from the comics). So both were included for that reason to spite the creators who went to such lengths to try and avoid the trope, while still fulfilling it.
However, I have read that their relationship was hinted at in the episode “One Door Closes” but haven’t checked that myself.
this was addressed already in a previous comment–
oliviactually: “Seeing Agents Hand and Hartley from SHIELD on this list is bitterly ironic, cause the showrunners specifically said that one of the reasons they erased both character’s queer sexualities from the show is because they didn’t want to become known as the show with two dead lesbians. Yeah, fuck that show.”
Catherine: “That is why I don’t understand how they made the list but some other characters didn’t”
oliviactually: “Well, I’d support them being on this list if only because it’s a big f-you to the showrunners who explicitly wanted to avoid this outcome, which is bullshit homophobic erasure.”
Riese: “precisely”
Michelle Prado from NBC’s Allegiance (2015). Shot by her double agent colleague because she knew too much and to frame the protagonist (her male lover) for her murder. It’s not the murder that’s gruesome, but rather the way the protagonists have to hide and dispose her body once the attempt to frame the hero becomes obvious to them. (The 9th ep’s summary on Wikipedia is “Alex must deal with being framed for Michelle’s murder.”)
She isn’t shown being in relationship with women, her only relationship we see is with the male protagonist, but her closest colleague is surprised when she shows interest in the guy. “I thought you liked girls.” he says; she replies with a “You have such a constrained view of me.” (The GLAAD’s network responsibility index for 2015 adresses her as “out”.)
Yang on Psych (stabbed by a serial killer in “Psych: The Musical,” 2013). Not explicitly stated that she’s bisexual, but she hits on both male and female characters and mentions wanting to make out with Elizabeth Hasselbeck at one point. I feel like that qualifies. She also fulfills the “Depraved Bisexual” trope, unfortunately.
had marcella in my “to watch” list…guess i don’t have to worry about that one
My mom watches Call the Midwife and said a lesbian character was just killed off http://www.afterellen.com/tv/419541-season-4-call-midwife-gives-us-sweet-lesbian-romance-dashes-hopes
She’s not dead but PBS is cutting the entire story between Patsy and Delia so it’s like a death.
Felicity from The Catch was just shot dead. There’s another one for 2016.
One of the writers took the Lexa pledge only a few days ago. Damage control?
Just learned that this specific writer did not write this episode.
Is that really an excuse though, because the writer would still be aware of the direction that the show was going with this character.
Not at all. This was just in relation to the Lexa pledge. Because people were upset this writer took the pledge and days after that the show she writes for kills another bisexual.
I’m not defending the writers at all. I haven’t heard any statement from the parties responsible, but the fact remains that another LGBT character was killed off. And honestly, I am not even interested in the reasons.
The Catch had Felicity shot by her male lover after being forced to divulge information about her female lover (who was also the male’s sister)
The Catch had Felicity shot by her male lover after being forced to divulge information about her female lover (who was also the male’s sister) right after she had just finished having sex with the female lover.
In last week’s episode of Blindspot, it was revealed that Sophia Varma faked her suicide. So far she’s still alive.
Two more dead this week: http://www.afterellen.com/tv/486113-rip-two-queer-female-tv-characters
Not sure if this character has been mentioned or even counts, because the whole series is about women killers, but the lesbian character Joana Palacios (Fernanda Castillo) on Mujeres Asesinas was killed by her ex-girlfriend/lover (???) Eliana, due to internalised homophobia. Eliana was strangling Joana, and as they fell off the table they were on, Joana hit her head and bled out from a head wound.
Not a recurring character, it says in the indroductory paragraphs that ‘victims of the week’ of crime (and medical) shows are not going to be added.
someone’s probably already said it but new update they kill Felicity on The Catch. I don’t watch it so I don’t know if her character is actually queer but she kissed one of the main characters and there’s sexual tension abound
Let’s not forget Adam from Degrassi who died from a pointless car accident
Yeah, what about Adam?! Texting (and being LGBTQ) kills.
Adam was a trans boy, and including him on a list of dead gay women would be pretty insulting!
I doubt trans men have that great of a survival rate either, and it would be nice to see someone curating resources for how they’re treated in the media. I’m not even saying it shouldn’t be the same community’s problem, since, while trans men are not queer women, so many trans men formerly identified as queer women and are still part of the same side of the queer community that it doesn’t feel like completely somebody else’s problem. But. A list of queer women is still not the best place to discuss the deaths of trans men.
Sophia Varma from Blindspot is revealed to be alive (she faked her suicide).
Another wlw character named Alexandra is killed on her date with Bethany Mayfair to scare the latter into silence in Blindspot s01e20.
Why is Nadia Petrova on the list? She had a threesome once and it was to steal something.
You’re right about that. She participated in a threesome, but I’m not so sure that she ever was portrayed as actually being into girls.
Ruth Baechtle from Hinter Gittern (I commented this in a reply further down, but IDK if replies get noticed by the editor here). I don’t remember her sexuality being defined, but in my defense, I only caught glimpses of the show after 2001.
As for her cause of death, she developed schizophrenia, her second personality (Lilith?) strangled an inmate (Mona Suttner, kind of the prison’s head of shady business like drug dealing and prostitution) and then locked herself in the cold storage room, freezing to death (One of the few post 2001 episodes I saw).
Helena Cain, Battlestar Galactica (2006)
Cause of death: Shot by her ex-lady-lover
….
Cain was not killed by an ex-lover. She was killed by the Cylon prisoner of war that was held on the battleship she commanded. The Cylon that she allowed to be beaten, tortured, raped repeatedly, starved, & anything else anyone could think of. There was never anything said that says this woman was gay/bi/queer/etc. She was a hard as commander who was twisted and more than a bit insane, but her sexuality was never said or implied.
Spoken like someone who didn’t watch the movie. Go skim the Wikipedia article for Battlestar Galactica: Razor, and all will become clear.
There’s also Lilian DePaul in Masters of Sex who kills herself because she’s dying of cancer. The heroine of the story kisses her just before she dies.
A wlw character on Blindspot was also killed lat week http://natblida.tumblr.com/post/143773540864/one-more-dead-wlw-character
While I will not say that they aren’t shows that make a point of “kill the gay”, a list like this is misinformation. A lot of these shows had fully fleshed out gay characters and their death was a pivotal point in the series that crushed many fans. And it had NOTHING to do with their sexual orientation.
Instead of belittling the amazing job writers and actors did for these roles (Hello, XENA, are you kidding me?), try making a list of actual messed up, unnecessary deaths that happened solely because of a character’s sexual orientation. If you just need to add “more to the pile” of dead LGBT, try putting more effort into the descriptions.
I just finished Lost Girl so I’ll take Nadia and Tamsin as perfect examples. Spoiler alert!:
Nadia was possessed by the villain to spy on team Light. A possession would have occurred regardless of sexual orientation. She experiences violent blackouts and loses control of herself. Scared, she begs to be killed to make sure her love doesn’t die. And no one is willing to do it! She dies because she’s possessed again and tries to attack her beloved; the stabbing is a defense. After the stabbing, Nadia thanks Bo for killing her. Her love was safe from her now.
Tamsin was on her last life. Again, would have happened regardless of sexual orientation. She was illusion raped (really messed up, imo) by a man pretending to be the woman she loved. Valkyrie’s die in childbirth. Tamsin was proud to give birth, proud to finally have a legacy. “A Valkyrie’s last life is not called dying, it’s called rising.” She named her child Dagny or “new day”. Putting Tamsin on this list belittles how pivotal of a character she was and her death in general. She did have a happy ending.
Let me also mention that these two women were in a show about a BISEXUAL SUCCUBUS. Lots of supernatural, LGBT everywhere. It was accepted, explained, understood, natural. Each character was loved for themselves. It did not matter how they loved, they were people.
The thing to understand about any show’s writing is that none of it “would have happened anyway”. It’s always a deliberate choice by the writing staff. Even if you look at Lexa, the death that sparked all of this. They could have written her character off, chosen not to build up her romance with Clarke. They could have done it more respectfully. Being gay or bi or queer is always a part of who you are, it’s not something you can separate from a person or a character. So even if not all of these women died as a result of a hate crime, the fact that the writers chose to have them die painful, tragic deaths rather than any other kind of ending speaks to a cultural phenomenon. Whenever a writer chooses to do this to a gay or bi character (one of the very very few that exists in television) they’re furthering the idea that women who love women can’t be happy. That our lives will only ever be miserable because of our sexuality. It’s a tactic that’s been used for as long as lesbians have been allowed into pop culture. We can exist, as long as we’re punished. As long as we don’t get happy endings.
Lost girl was one of the first shows I ever saw with a person like me, a bi woman who got to be happy and loved and had friends and family. That was revolutionary for me at the time. But if I distance myself from that and look at it objectively, it’s a show that had four? four characters who were bisexual or lesbian women that showed up recurringly. Bo and Lauren ended up happy of course, but Nadia and Tamsin were both killed off in horrible ways. Both were violated by men, both had their agency taken away, both died painful violent deaths. Especially in regards to Tamsin (who by my interpretation was a lesbian), she was deceived, raped, held captive, treated like an animal, all by a man, and she died. That is not a happy ending by any means. Just because she chose to love and keep her child does not mean that was a happy ending. It honestly still makes me sick to think about it. I was devastated when I saw it. We deserve better than that. And tbh no writer can convince me that that was the best ending for her. Or that it was ‘inevitable’. They chose that. They picked it, despite the history of violence against lesbians that it reinforced.
Also adding characters to this list doesn’t mean they were bad characters. It doesn’t belittle how important they were. Tbh, this list wouldn’t have been started if so many women hadn’t loved and identified with Lexa. She was a complex, compelling character that got a shitty ending. A team of writers sat down and decided that that was how she would go out, completely ignoring the hundreds of years of history that comes into play. The way they treat lgbt characters matters, because of the history of murder, rape, oppression, that lgbt people have gone thru. Beyond that it’s just good writing not to play into overdone tropes.
The Family gave us a cancellation present.
Bridey’s dead on the side of a road, so we’ve got yet another addition this year.
SPOILER SPOILER on my previous. Sorry guys I thought the line break would keep the spoiler from turning up on the side of the page.
I don’t think it counts as a spoiler since it literaly is not going to surprise anyone.
Was she hit by a car?
Because there’s bonus points if she got hit by a car.
We seem to get hit by cars a lot.
Cars are only in the UK. It’s guns in the US.
Ah, an important distinction.
Bumper cars across on one side of the pond, shooting gallery on the other.
It’s veritable carnival of death, because it’s not fair or a circus either.
It is a little ironic that a LGBT character was killed off so the actor (Floriana Lima) could play a different LGBT character.
Bridey, The Family (2016) Rest in Peace
Bridey died on the Family. She comprised of so many bad LGBT tropes it was almost funny. Almost.
I haven’t read all the comments, and so I’m sure this has already been said, but there are a hell of a lot of murders by jealous men. :(
Don’t panic, this addition isn’t POI yet.
But Blindspot offed Mayfair.
Jane the Virgin brought Rose back from the dead, but in doing so they retconned another lesbian character out of existence, so… I’m still trying to wrap my head around that one.
Yep, Rose will have to be taken off the list since she is officially alive. And hopefully this means we’ll be seeing more of her and Luisa next season.
SPOILERS for the finale ahead: In case anyone is wondering what we’re referring to, Luisa’s new girlfriend Susanna Barnett was revealed to actually have been Rose the entire time. Rose never died, she was just wearing a super high-tech mask. And “Susanna” never existed.
I wonder if that was the writers’ plan all along or if they did that to allow Megan to leave.
I think they always planned on bringing Rose back if possible and perhaps had Rose-as-Megan in their back pocket as a possible idea – I’ve noticed how a lot of their interactions actually still fit into this new “Susanna never existed” framework, which is more than I can say about Dan being Gossip Girl lmao – but it probably didn’t solidify until Megan got a show and Bridget became available.
*Rose-as-Susanna. Getting the actors mixed up with their characters.
I want to watch the whole season (well the Susanna episodes anyway) again with this in mind. I swear Susanna was in Miami the same episode as Rose was shown to be in Switzerland. I guess the events could’ve been occurring at different times though.
Never having seen Gossip Girl I’ll have to take your word for it. ;-).
The “Dan is Gossip Girl” reveal was so hilariously nonsensical that it actually made the whole thing kinda amazing. I didn’t even watch the show and I was thoroughly entertained by the resulting meme.
Anyway, before the finale, Rose appeared on eps 2×11 (at the very end) and 2×12. It’s been confirmed by Jennie Urman that the “Rose” in 2×12 at least was a hapless unfortunate double meant to throw the police off Rose’s trail. Before that, according to imdb (because I don’t remember this at all), Rose’s last season 2 appearance was in 2×02, and Susanna didn’t show up until 2×04. So it could work, I guess?
I’m still sad though because I thought Susanna and Luisa were adorable and this just kinda casts a pall on their entire relationship. I almost wish that Susanna had just died instead even if that would have meant more dead lesbians because then at least we’d still have the character.
evil geese – I entirely agree. If Susanna had died, we would have just lost future Susanna. Instead we lost past Susanna, future Susanna, and Luisa/Susanna’s relationship is just Rose manipulating her. I would rather have remembered the character (so very, very) fondly than have her never exist.
Rose from Jane the Virgin was revealed to not actually be dead last night! Yay!!
I always wanted to see Rose/Bridget back on JTV, but not at the expense of Luisa’s character growth or Susanna’s character existence. :-|
Needs updated with 5/16 death/murder of Blindspot star Marianne Jean-Baptiste. Lesbian and black.
I’ve hear there’s a Bethany and Alexandra who died on Blindspot over the last week or two?
Not sure if she’d be counted but would it be worth adding Julia Mallory from Dirt to this list too? She was never explicitly stated as bisexual but she was sleeping with her female drug dealer – Garbo, who of course fell in love with her – in order to keep her steady supply of drugs coming in… It could go either way. She ended up getting hit by a car I think
Not sure if Aife from Lost Girl qualifies as “recurring”. She showed up in 3 episodes in season 1 (was the season’s final antagonist), 2 in season 3, 1 in season 4 and in 3 or 4 episodes in season 5.
As a succubus, she was bi- (or pan-) sexual by default and also seen with both genders.
She had her throat slit by Hades, who wanted to crush their daughter’s spirit by letting her find her dead mother and grandfather. (2015, shortly before Tamsin)
[Orphan Black spoiler alert]
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orphan black’s most recent episode (4×06) had two characters confirm delphine’s death. if you need me i’ll be busy cloning my tears.
Didn’t Krystal just say she saw her get shot? Like not necessarily say she was dead?
I don’t trust Evie and I feel like she’d say that just to upset Cosima, it’s obvious she’s not a fan of the Leda clones after Beth.
I’m still not going to believe she’s dead until I see a body.
Please add Rebecca Sutter, How to Get Away With Murder (2015): Murdered by suffocation under the suspicion of killing her friend Lila Stangard, who she secretly loved.
This list is for CANON queer women only.
I didn’t see it mentioned here, but Alice Morgan (openly bisexual) was killed offscreen on Luther, in it’s 4th season (this was December 2015). It might turn out to be a Delphine case, and she’s not truly dead, but until then, she’s another dead bisexual woman on tv.
We can add Vivian from the US Mistresses. She convinces her husband to bring one of the Mistresses into their marriage, then collapses and dies of cancer.
What a fuck?!!!!!!! PoI that better be a simulation or I’m gonna be raging mad!!!!!!
Not a simulation according to articles being circulated. :(
I am looking forward to the thoughtful response I am confident Autostraddle will publish once people have had a chance to digest this event.
I don’t watch the show (and will probably wait til it ends to decide if that will change), but it seems like it’s always been a hard show to understand if you don’t watch it, with both strongly positive and critical responses floating out in the ether. I found Heather’s article about why Root/Shaw was so important to queer women very helpful, and I look forward to learning more.
I do know that the show was well-known for killing off a character played by Taraji P. Henson in an earlier season, and I am really interested to know if there are parallels with the most recent character death, or not. From the discussion of the 100, I gathered that that was the case there, although the 100 seems to be a lot more…enthusiastic….about its racism than many shows.
But I’m sure it will take time to approach such an emotional event with the respect it deserves.
The comparisons between POI and The 100 are unfounded in my opinion because becoming one with the Machine was always the ultimate endpoint for Root’s character and this purpose is served in her death. There are disagreements as to whether the death could have been portrayed more poignantly considering that the character dies off-screen to set up a chilling moment in which her voice resurfaces as that of the Machine. But this was most certainly one of the better executed deaths of a lesbian character and Root’s personality is maintained in the form of an AI system that will continue to communicate and speak as her. If one wants to be positive, this was more of a transcendence than a death.
I honestly don’t even care anymore whether or not it was justified, whether or not her death was “honourable”, whether or not it was well done.
A queer character dies YET again. During Shaw’s simulation episode we see John die and I thought WOW is this show subversive for killing off one of the main white dudes halfway through the last season !
But no, it’s still the same old shit of queer characters and women dying to justify white dude’s character development (here Finch going dark).
I just DON’T CARE anymore. Like, this was the ONE SHOW where I had a tiny bit of hope that maybe everyone would die BUT Shaw and Root, because it made sense (in my head).
And I am SO SICK of all these writers saying “yeah but the way we killed her is DIFFERENT see because this was always where it would lead”. Shut up ! Yeah you filmed the episodes over a year ago. Least you could have done was say “sorry guys, we didn’t know back then how many queer characters die, if we did we might have done things differently”. Like, yeah, you’re using the trope better than most, you’re STILL USING IT.
It’s like when you’re complaining about the patriarchy and a white dude cuts you off to tell you HE’S DIFFERENT and doesn’t he get a cookie for not staring at your boobs that one time ?! You’re still part of the problem asshole.
I was so sad this morning but now I’m just filled with so much anger.
“Root’s personality is maintained in the form of an AI system that will continue to communicate and speak as her. If one wants to be positive, this was more of a transcendence than a death.”
Which is exactly Lexa’s fate. Only in case of Lexa, her personality and mind was actually transferred into chip. In Root’s case, The Machine is only mimicking and simulating her, there was no ‘personality transplantation’. She’s dead dead and basically someone just made a computer program with her voice.
I never believed that both of them would survive, I think it was always Root’s purpose on the show to become one with the machine, and I can’t say I think that should’ve been changed just because she fell in love with Shaw. The machine was always her God. So one alternative could’ve been to not explore Shaw and Root’s chemistry at all, but personally I think that wouldn’t been a bigger waste.
Yep, pretty huge parallels: Carter died fuelling Reese’s man pain and furthering his character development, and Root died fuelling Finch’s man pain and furthering his character development… It’s exhausting.
Hadn’t it been for Shahi’s pregnancy, Reese would actually have died in the season 4-finale and Shaw taking over his role.
I really appreciate the range of responses here, from those who felt that this plot point emerged from the character in ways that make sense to those who find this part of a larger assault of poor representation. A lot of fans seem to be feeling both, which is a peculiarly painful place to be. (My condolences.)
One of my questions is whether this death was predictable within the context of the story and the show (not just because she was a lesbian character). It seems to me that a certain number of fans did predict it or feel it was likely to happen based on internal cues, and that they were better-prepared. While others experienced the sense of betrayal that Katie describes here.
And I keep seeing that pattern, over and over again. I know Arrow watchers who were legitimately shocked when Sarah died, and others who didn’t even watch the show who knew it would happen, because the show runs on the main character’s manpain. I know people of color who thought the 100’s treatment of women of color was a good indication what would happen to Lexa. There’s a whole page here at Autostraddle of viewers who are upset that a lesbian character DIDN’T die on Jane the Virgin–and yet the internet was filled with people who predicted that particular plot point (including the “controversial” part of how it happened) because there were hints to that effect in the script.
I feel like at this point the lesbian and bi community needs to start analyzing the shows we watch in a different way. Basically, we need to start using literary criticism as self-defense, and to share that knowledge.
I understand the frustration, I myself having been vacillating on this issue and at times understand the development and at other times cannot help but see the alternative routes that could have been taken and weren’t. It is particularly annoying to continue to be told that the deaths of lesbian characters serve to advance plots in ways no other death could – it’s as if we have some incredible metaphysical function that no one else has. I hear you all.
I will however add that the Machine will imbibe Root’s personality and continue to communicate with the team as Root. So her relationship with Shaw doesn’t end, it just changes. I know that sounds like crumbs and is not what we wanted, but it may help some people going forward if they wish to continue watching the show. The persona thing has been confirmed by Nolan, Plageman and Acker herself.
I do find myself questioning whether it is even worth ‘shipping’ lesbian romances anymore given how often they go awry. After the 100 and now this, I think it may be best to sit back and detach oneself for fear of having to go through this all over again.
I would buy into the whole “Root is one with the Machine” thing more if they hadn’t spent the whole series developing the Machine as its own character with its own personality. Root herself advocated for the Machine’s autonomy. While I do think that Root would be touched by how the Machine is honoring her memory, it is just that. Root is dead, and her relationship with all of them, Shaw included, is over.
@clochou I feel 100% the same. I don’t care anymore. I’m sick and tired of it and it’s legitimately unhealthy at this point for me to continue to go through the emotional distress that comes with every new death that I thought wasn’t going to happen. I’m sick of feeling like it’s the only way to end a wlw’s story. I’m sick of it. I’m done.
Right ? Like wake me up when someone finally has the guts to do a show where EVERYONE dies BUT the queer ladies. I’ll be doing a standing ovation then.
Root from Person of Interest. (Note: her name is Root, not Samantha Groves. Samantha Groves is her dead name pretty much) Swerved into a bullet an episode after reuniting with her love to advance the story of a straight white man. (She did it to protect him and her death is setting the character on an arc of moral grey bs.) Classic fridging. I’m dead inside.
Now we can add Root from Person of Interest as well. Oh joy
Okay, so Root was the next lesbian to die, now I wonder how long it will take for Waverley or Nicole Haught to die on Wynonna Earp.
I’ve only seen the first two episodes of that show, but based on the small size of the cast, how important and integrated Waverly is to the action, and the fact that the show centers on a female character and has a female creator, they seem safer than most. (Haught as a recurring character might be more vulnerable.)
I still maintain there are some rules to these deaths–maybe not iron-clad rules, but rules of thumb–and we can figure them out!
The show’s Twitter account has been encouraging but yeah obviously we’ve all been burned before
The creator of Wynonna Earp actually did a really awesome interview with Dorothy Snarker a couple days ago saying in no uncertain terms that Waverly and Nicole will both make it through the season very much alive and in love! <3 <3 Given how reticent she's been all season to give away ANYTHING by way of spoilers, I thought that was a particularly lovely gesture on her part. She spoke really thoughtfully and eloquently about the trope in the interview, as well as the importance of representation to our community, and just made it really clear that she gets it. I know it's scary as heck to trust after the year we've had, but DUDES, this show is on our side for serious! Sooooo if you aren't already watching it, get on that right now – it'll make your heart so happy, and we need so badly for it to get renewed for a second season!
I really appreciate your sharing this!
And now is dead Root too, from person of interest?
Any idea when this massacre will be over?
Ok, it’s 2 am here and you all can blame the little weed I smoke a few minutes ago, but I’m having some kind positive moment here (yep, weed has that effect on me). I’m thinking about books, particularly early XX century and especially the pulp fiction era of books. You know, the most depressive queer books of all time or books where it was almost 100% sure that the lesbian would die (the other option was the madhouse).
So, that sounds familiar? Kinda looks like TV nowadays, no?
Well, it took some time but then by the 60’/70’s authors as Jane Rule and Rita Mae Brown came along and later Katherine V. Forrest and Jeanette Winterson, just to name a few very well-known names, and the world of literature was never the same, especially for our community.
And no, I didn’t forget. I’m considering The Price of Salt; that’s my Lost Girl, my Doccubus in the 50’s, without the cleavage of course.
So, all of this gives some hopes, maybe 5% hope.
PD: Now that I think about it maybe I’m wrong. Maybe this is a huge conspiracy by those super-powerful indie and independent publishers to make us read more LGBT books.
Add Root to the list. Smh. So disappointed…
so by your rules being influenced by an alien life form makes you bi cause 2 of these that’s what happened with jadzea and Toshiko
To be add on the list now… Root, from “Person of Interest” died by getting shot in the 100 episode, this 31 may. Just after be finally reunited with her lover, Sameen!
Root from Person of Interest recently died unfortunately. She was my favorite character . ?
I was rewatching the last season of 30 Rock. I noticed that Jack’s mother(who is a recurring, side character) Collen was a lesbian and kept it from her son. Her gf/partner is a Latinx wouman she was living with in Florida. She dies of a heart attack(or was it age related) sitting next to Jack.
Add “Samantha Groves” (Root) from Person Of Interest.
gosh I miss her terribly
This is terribly geeky, but here are some of issues I have with this list:
1. Torchwood falls into the Anyone Can Die trope, since all but two of the main characters die, and one of the two (Jack Harkness) is famously a near indestructible omnisexual.
2. Spartacus is also Anyone Can Die, because (spoiler) everyone dies.
3. Same goes The Walking Dead.
4. If Talia Winters counts as dead because her personality was wiped, then logic would suggest that Jadzia Dax is actually alive. Dax, the alien symbiote Jedzia was attached to, has all her memories, skills, feelings, and some personality traits. The genderless alien was transplanted into a new host and continued to live on.
Here are some issues I have with your list:
ALL 156 Dead Lesbian and Bisexual Characters On TV, And How They Died.
Not “Here Are the Dead Lesbian and Bisexual On TV That Fit the Bury Your Gays Trope to a T”
It’s ALL not which ones are clear cut case of Bury Your Gays or are a Tara Maclay Situation. It’s accumulation of data that can be further broken down and does with “And How They Died” part.
Second issue is representation.
We get to be on Anyone Can Die shows, show with violence death death death and dubious morality but not teen comedies or “family oriented shows”
What I’m trying to say is we don’t get to be a part of normalcy, we get to be fleshed out characters in meat of the story in abnormal situations in TV.
Can you understand why that is a problem?
Root/Samantha Groves from Person of Interest too. On 5×10
I’m so sad and angry about all this I’m not going to leave it here. I just came to say, now there’s Sameen Shaw (aka Root) from Person of Interest to go up on here as well.
What??? Wait… Sameen is still alive… no? What episode are you talking??
Sameen Shaw is alive, as far as I know. Her girlfriend/love interest Root (formerly known as Samantha Groves) is the one who died.
I literally started watching Person of Interest to cope with Lexa’s death. I loved The 100 (despite its many flaws), but after they killed Lexa I had no desire to keep watching. Then I saw some comments about how well Person of Interest handled the Root/Shaw relationship, so … I figured I’d give it a chance.
And now Root is dead too – killed by a bullet meant for someone else, no less – and I just kind of hate everything.
ROOT!! Of course, how could it be otherwise. That’s it – it’s back to Sailor Moon S, Avatar Korra and the likes for me (I daren’t jinx Adventure Time). I take my lessons in real life pain from real life, I don’t need to be subjected to half-assed catharsis when all I want to do is chill, watch a (otherwise well-crafted sci-fi) show with cool characters and stimulate the mesolimbic pathway. Plus hasn’t this kill-off-the-budding-romance and let’s-all-have-a-real-noir-finale style gone on for long enough in the last decades of TV-storytelling? Bla bla bla everyone dies the end. It’s become the thing to do at some point and now it’s such a predictable way of ending stories in series/movies. This is just plain unimaginative and lazy. Same goes for Carter in POI, btw. In the unforgettable words of Willow *borednow*!
If you hate “everyone dies in the end”, you should probably avoid Sailor Moon’s final season–the Senshi all get killed by the villain (again), although (just like the end of 1st season) they do get revived once again by Sailor Moon.
Oops, just realized that that was a minor spoiler and should’ve warned everyone. Sorry!
SPOILERS
You can add Root from Person of interest.
It’s a complicated one but Susanna/Rose in Jane the Virgin – there may not have been a real death in the end but there was an onscreen killing of a lesbian character and an erasure of a lesbian character, plus generally treating the only other lgbt woman like shit.
Rizzoli & Isles, Alice Sands, psycho lesbian* stalker of she’s-totally-straight-guys! Jane Rizzoli. Shows up in the season 6 finale, does crazy shit, shows up in the season 7 premiere, dies.
*http://www.afterellen.com/tv/479393-rizzoli-isles-subtext-recap-6-18-death-part/4
i was so heartbroken when the killed off bullet. she didnt deserve t at all, she spent the entire season trying to find her friend (who had been murdered by the same man). she was such a great fucking character an i as so so so excited when they introduced her and now shes fucking dead. god. she was like, one of the character deaths i felt the most viscerally
and FUCK when they killed of tricia form oitnb i felt betrayed honestly. like im glad that the entire show is basically about lesbians, but tricia was. such a good character and a good person at heart, and i was so upset when they killed her off, it was honesty unfair.
I have one. Flash Forward 2009, Janis is shot and left for dead however she does end up surviving but is unable to bear a child which she desperately wanted.
If she survives she shouldn’t be on the list
Delphine was shown to be alive on last night’s Orphan Black, so you can take her off the list.
Oh my gosh. We couldn’t avoid the spoilers for even twelve hours?
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So, two things, spoiler warning for what comes below.
1. It’s been confirmed in Orphan Black that (at least for now) Delphine is alive. She survived the gunshot wound and was taken into captivity, surprising no one.
2. I don’t know if we’re only counting live-action TV shows, but if we’re not I can add several characters to this list from animated shows. The first ones that come to mind are Michiru/Sailor Neptune and Haruka/Sailor Uranus of Sailor Moon (although both were later resurrected) and Rem of Death Note (was manipulated into sacrificing herself to kill Watari and L), but I know there’s more I just can’t think of at the moment.
[THIS COMMENT HAS BEEN REMOVED FOR SPOILERS THAT WERE RUINING OUR LIVES]
YOU GUYS PLEASE STOP ADDING TO THIS LIST 12 HOURS AFTER THE RELEASE OF A SHOW JESUS
Jesus FUCKING CHRIST. You couldn’t have had put a spoiler warning? Or just waited? Thanks for ruining it for me. The season aired less than a day ago and not all of us have the privilege of marathoning an entire season of TV that fast.
delphine’s not dead!!!
[THIS COMMENT HAS BEEN EDITED BY THE EDITORS TO REMOVE THE SPOILER IN THIS COMMENT THAT WAS RUINING OUR LIVES]
[THIS COMMENT HAS BEEN EDITED BY THE EDITORS TO REMOVE THE SPOILER IN THIS COMMENT THAT WAS RUINING OUR LIVES]
Lalalalala knocking spoilers out of the sidebar tralalaa
Wouldn’t it be nice if people followed basic spoiler etiquette?
OK, one more to bump the sidebar free of spoilers for right now. Vigilance! I don’t even watch TV/OITNB but come on guys!
You can add Poussey forming OITNB.
thanks for the f*cking huge spoiler in the homepage sidebar. seriously, congratulations that you had the time/money to watch this season right away but have a minimum of respect for other people. christ.
Cause obviously everyone thinks about the homepage sidebar when they post comments and PURPOSEFULLY DECIDED to be rude to you.
Isn’t it a bit weird to have Nadia from TVD on there? She never showed any interest in women. Unless you count having a threesome once with a girl. I guess that makes Rebekah bi too because she’s done that twice even though all her relationships are with men?
I agree, and if I remember correctly, she only got close to Rebekah and Matt so she could steal from them after the threesome.
Delphine can come off! Buuuuut *spoiler alert* Poussey from oitnb has to go on :////
$&@%*% god damnit people
can you guys PLEASE set up a filter so that comments containing this spoiler do not get posted right away??? I know you tried to use a filter to stop the barrage of “what about Paulie?!” comments, surely this is worth a try.
JAYSUS PEOPLE HOW DIFFICULT IS IT TO PUT A FEW LINES BEFORE YOU @#$Ù SPOILERS SO THAT THEY DO NOT SHOW ON THE HOMEPAGE.
answer:
*
*
*
*
*
*
NOT THAT DIFFICULT.
oh crap, that * * actually didn’t work hahaha now I look like an idiot.
oh well, SERIOUSLY though can you stop posting about it here? not everyone has had the time/money for this season yet, several other people ALREADY posted it and Riese knows. there is no reason for you to keep re-posting such a spoiler on the homepage.
I don’t even want to watch S4 now and I have been excited about it for months.
Yeah all one has to do is write a sentence first that is perhaps about this long lalalalalalalalala people are trolling and being inconsiderate assholes honestly and I never swear at people on this site
And HERE is where you put the fucking spoiler. Below the fucking helpful pre spoiler sentence!
Also tho lets face it this was going to suck terribly either way. And the timing is just so terrible since we all needed something to hang on to after the real world this week…
But yeah. I almost think comments should close on this column. This is the second death I’ve been spoiled about in a show that came out less than 12 hours ago.
Also Riese you forgot to put Paulie from Lost and Delirious on this list.
I honestly can’t believe that the strongest reaction here regarding this event is about spoilers. Tropey and triggering dead lesbian. Check. Black Lives Matter whitesplained. Check. Spending an episode sympathising with the white dude. Check. Really? Lack of spoiler warnings are what you’re upset about? I’m going back into my bunker because I don’t understand anything or anyone anymore.
Well we haven’t seen the fucking episode to get upset about it yet, have we?
I don’t understand either. I’d rather be spoiled then have to sit through such disgusting and insulting episodes. I’m really really hoping that the writers on this website haven’t watched that far yet because this show doesn’t deserve to be covered or promoted anymore. Let alone praised.
NOT EVERYONE CAN WATCH LIKE TWELVE EPISODES OF TELEVISION THE DAY IT IS RELEASED
I’m so grateful to my community for warning me in time so I could avoid being hideously queerbaited. Again. I was really looking forward enjoying the shipping, the fan art, the fanfic etc. but I’m really glad that I had the change to choose not to get emotionally invested in this relationship before having my soul once again ripped out of me and stamped on. The whole situation appears to be a masterclass in queerbaiting and the exploitation of and damage to a particularly vulnerable community (more than one community actually) and I am personally grateful that I was given the opportunity to shut that down and cancel my account after episode two. I’m actually feeling a bit jealous that fairly easily-avoidable online spoilers are the worst thing some folk have to worry about right now. I’m afraid to leave the house and am working my way through six seasons of My Little Pony as it seems to be the only relatively safe thing to watch. I would welcome and trigger warnings (or ‘spoilers’ as some people call them) because if Twilight Sparkle or Rainbow Dash get killed istg…
then put a note saying “WARNING: tropey dead lesbian in episode X” and leave us the choice to decide whether we want to know ahead of time. but respect basic spoiler etiquette even if you are not happy with the show.
I have been mulling this one over and whilst I can see where you’re coming from I must disagree – I wouldn’t have given too much of a hoot about other wlw characters being killed on the show other than to wish to see them added to this list and being generally bummed and angry about it. This particular character was purposefully used to emotionally manipulate the audience; indeed she was the only reason I was still watching the show.
I admit that I’m having difficulty navigating the website in terms of editing previous comments etc. but I’m sure there’s some way of editing personal update settings so that updates to this page aren’t sent to users who wish to avoid spoilers. This page is a essentially a repository of spoilers isn’t it?
I have also just been reading the comments policy and I must sincerely apologise for my earlier use of the term ‘really?’. I would like to take that bit back and promise not to do it again. Sorry.
What are you talking about??
The way to avoid spoilers in the comment sidebar is to put 2-3 sentences before the spoiler.
You cannot edit previous comments.
You may be super upset about the writers’ manipulation and with good reason, but that doesn’t give you license to disallow the rest of us to discover it on our own.
the issue is that the first 2-3 sentences of ANY comment on this site shows up on the homepage until more recent comments take its place.
I did not come to this article intentionally and I avoided the articles on the show, but merely coming to the homepage it is almost unavoidable to see the spoilers if they are posted, as many – not just you- have done in the first line or two of a comment. if you are unfamiliar with that aspect of the site, I apologize for lashing out and certainly didn’t mean to make anything a personal attack.
HI HOMEPAGE! I see now about the homepage thing, thank you for explaining. Probably an issue for the site administrators to address in responding to user feedback and needs, I guess.
I feel I must defend that all I did was share some feelings about what I thought was a sh1tty situation (the reaction to spoilers overshadowing the reaction to the contents of the show) without myself actually revealing any direct spoilers. My brother does enough media blackouts following sporting events that he can’t watch live which I’m used to facilitating. I thought it might spark a bit of lively discourse about just how fiercely today’s consumer will defend their right to live a spoiler-free life above all other pursuits – sort of like when Duchamp put that urinal in an art gallery and now everything is about the consumers’ reaction to art rather than the art itself. Now all we ever hear about on the news is what Twitter is saying. Or something. I dunno. Nevermind.
Hopefully now the discussion can move on and we can all support any poc/wlw communities in how they’d like to deal with things.
Regret inadvertently igniting a spoiler sh1tst0rm. Off back to my bunker now …
oh no, you should DEFINITELY talk about your thoughts/feelings about it here! just please put a little rambly warning paragraph first.
And don’t feel too bad, you were not the only one. The admins have redacted a few spoilery comments above already. Which is why I was definitely harsher than I should have been with your comment, my apologies.
But definitely share your feelings! AS is posting a recap of an episode a day, so before long there will be a proper article on it, but until then here with a buffer paragraph is fine.
Because daaaaammmnnn. I don’t even really want to watch S4 now. I love a lot of things about the show S1-S3 (less 3 than the others, but ok). So this character isn’t the only reason I wanted to watch. But she was by far the best thing about the show, with only Tasty being close competition.
Those two were the bright, hopeful spots in the show. I don’t know if I will watch S4 and give the rest of the storyline a chance or just put my blinders on and pretend it ends at S3. UUUUGHHH
I think if I had already seen it, I’d probably be a raging/crying fit. So, hugs to you, dear guest! And eff this season.
Cool beans, friend. (You can visit my bunker any time you like. We can build a blanket fort and talk about feminism and Harry Potter)
Spoiler: Delphine Cormier (from Orphan Black) was revealed to have been alive and well now. But that list is still so very long… ><
ugh, im still angry about naomi from skins, she was finally happy with emily, and then they had to go kill her off in the third last episode ever. also, you could put in charlotte from pretty little liars, she’s not gay or bi but she’s trans so i think she deserves a spot, this list is so long it’s really sad.
I am forever grateful that I never watched Skins Fire. It makes it easier to pretend it all ended with Naomi and Emily happy.
also, there is a very comprehensive article on trans TV representation here: http://www.autostraddle.com/105-trans-women-on-american-tv-a-complete-history-and-analysis-216732/
To add to your list: Lionel Trane from United States of Tara (2011). Cause of death: Car accident.
Should’ve read the intro first – lesbian and bi only! Feel free to delete comment. Apologies!
Lucy lawless is on this list 3 times. I just love that woman! Also…..
Gaia was not killed by a man she rejected. She was attempting to suduce him for a plot her and Lucy lawless’ character had going on. And he killed her to send a message.
*
As my friend said so eloquently:
When this country can’t kill us publicly it’ll resort to “conversion therapy” and it’ll resort to sons and daughters and nb kids put in the grave because their parents viciously denied them their own identity and it’ll resort to denying the existence of AIDS until literal die-ins are scheduled on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, and it’ll resort to making lifesaving medication cost extravagant amounts of money, and when that doesn’t kill us off it’ll resort to bathroom bills and bombs in Targets in Evanston and killing off every bit of representation we see on the media and when that doesn’t work? It’ll go right back to killing us publicly.
A new one to add to the list: Justine from penny dreadful. she had her neck snapped by her lover’s jealous ex boyfriend in last nights series finale
Penny Dreadful just killed Justine a bisexual character introduced this season. Had her neck snapped by dorian gray.
The Root entry isn’t really accurate… she was as much of a target by the sniper as the man was, she was just the only one who actually died. She didn’t like, throw herself in front of a sniper to save a man, she was driving a getaway car like a boss (already with one bullet wound) trying to save both of them.
(I’m pissed af so definitely not trying to rationalize the death, but I think “Saving a man from a sniper’s bullet” is a discredit to her character.)
(I know it’s total semantics, but “Killed by a sniper while trying to rescue a man” would probably be more accurate.)
You forgot to add Triana (Legend of the Seeker, 2009). She was played by Charisma Carpenter (from Buffy) and used to make out with Cara (love interest of Dahlia, already on this list). She was killed by Cara out of vengeance after Triana betrayed Cara, beat her up with fellow Mord-Sith and left her to death.
Soooo, Delphine… :)
I’m rolling my eyes so hard at all the spoiler complaints. Tbh, I’m glad it got spoiled for me b/c I can now save myself like 10 hours of tv watching.
And now all 127755458845 dead straight characters in tv shows and movies
FOR F*CKS SAKE THIS IS JUST A LIST OF TV CHARACTERS. TELEVISION. TEEVEE.
if you are going to make an absurd comment that shows a total failure to apply any logic to the situation, then AT LEAST read the title of the article.
ALSO, if this list did contain movie characters, it would be much longer and include falcon-taming lesbian superhero Paulie Oster.
We’ll leave that for you to write during your Completely Missing the Point seminar which you can then read aloud from a megaphone atop your Straight Pride Parade float.
According to statistics presented by Vox queer women make 10% of all TV deaths while queer men – 3%. An article on AfterEllen pointing at GLAAD reports stated that queer women and queer men make 2% of all TV characters each.
Which means that straight people make 96% of all TV characters and only 87% of all TV deaths.
i just wanted to tell you that charlie from supernatural actually died two times! you got the second one, but she was killed by The Wicked Witch before that (she was resurrected by the angel Gadreel). i’m still super upset about her death, she was an amazing character.
Margaery Tyrell, Game of Thrones – killed in an explosion set by her mother-in-law
Sofia in Blindspot was show to have faked her death.
Just been binge watching “Call the Midwife” series 4 while I recover from surgery. The gorgeous Patsy Mount finds her true love, a Welsh district nurse named Delia, they move in, have one happy night together-and then the object of Patsy’s desire is hit by a car on the way to work. So that’s the end of that then.
Its all very well that we are being acknowledged but how about some happy endings- or even middles- for lesbians every now and then?
Lets hear it for the end of the narrative of the tragic homosexual.
It gets better! Watch Season 5!
Sofia Varma faked her suicide and appears later on in the show.
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Y’all it is really f’ed up that you redacted Poussey’s name from this listing. I get that people are pissed about spoilers but I know I don’t have to tell you that there is an entire #SayHerName campaign for the deaths of black women in real life and Poussey Washington being reduced to a [SPOILER ALERT] while everyone else on this list gets their name AND their photo is in direct opposition to everything that I think Autostraddle stands for as a community. Please, really, consider changing how you list Poussey because right now, this feels really disrespectful, to say the least.
To those concerned about spoilers, how about you don’t look at an article specifically meant to list dead characters on shows that you watch???
The specific problem was that people update this list REALLY FAST, and her name was up here like six hours after the season dropped on Netflix. If people are going to do that, I honestly don’t mind! as long as they put a buffer sentence first so that their name doesn’t show up in the comment bar on the homepage.
Yes, we live in the age of the internet, and things are going to be spoiled. But giving us a little bit of time to watch the episodes and/or just providing a buffer sentence is common courtesy.
I think some people (like me) felt pretty strongly about this particular spoiler too because it’s such an upsetting death anyway. It was just such a bummer to be excited about the new season of the show and just be getting home from work, without time to even watch the first EPISODE, and idly opening AS’s homepage, only to be blindsided with Poussey’s name in the sidebar.
To quote Tumblr’s @decaheda: ‘a black lesbian died in a horrible, racist way. if you’re more upset about being spoiled than THAT, you need to reevaluate your priorities and check your privilege’
How do we know that Cara Thomas from Marcella was queer? Did I miss a kiss or anything else romantic with her female roommate before she died?
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Youre missing the girl from Lost and Delirious :'(
And Lexa also died in her lover’s arms
HEY RIESE YOU’RE MISSING PAULIE FROM LOST AND DELIRIOUS
Isn’t that a movie?
OMG read the tittle and introduction. Only on TV.
Hi
In episode 15 season 2 of Elementary [Spoiler] Nell Solange a queer woman is the centre of a murder investigation. Although she’s not a recurring character, she is seen in flashbacks of the episode and her relationship with another woman (her suspected killer) is explored. I’m sorry if this doesn’t suit your list. Have a great day!
Sorry if she’s there and I missed her but what about Tara from buffy shot with a bullet intended for Buffy?
Tara is on the list.
This makes me sad and angry (though I lolled at Jenny). Thanks for keeping score.
Just adding my voice to the call for Justine from Penny Dreadful to be added to the list. She was trying to start a revolution against men but had her neck broken by Dorian Gray.
Lucious didn’t poison Camilla he gave her the option of poisoning herself or going to jail for killing mimi
Allie Novak in Wentworth?
Killed because we are not allowed nice things.
I fucking check this list every single week before watching that show and yet my hopes were still sky high that this was going to end well. I know the entire point of the series is basically Bea doesn’t get nice things, but what the fuck. Seriously. UGHHHH.
Sorry I was totally wrong Allie’s not dead. It’s much worse Bea is. She should have stayed straight her life span would have been longer.
guess what happened on wentworth tonight
Here’s the article to confirm this news. http://www.news.com.au/entertainment/tv/spoiler-wentworth-has-officially-killed-off-the-character-no-one-thought-theyd-ever-kill-off/news-story/4604b34e9f189e3eaa0375d365c8d7db
So damn upset. I almost don’t want to watch any show with queer women outside of The Fosters anymore.
Bea Smith (stabbed herself) and Allie Novak (drug overdose(?)), Wentworth. Bea was confirmed dead by the writers as it was left open-ended.
bea smith died too.
I’m catching up on Zoo season 1. In episode 4 two random lesbian scientists in Antarctica freeze to death because bats block their solar panels. Wendy is one of them, I’m not sure if the other is named. They went there to try and save their marriage.
If they included all lesbian characters who are not serises regulars or guest stars this list would probably be running into the thousands by now.
You need to add Bea Smith from Wentworth.
Have they officially abandoned updating this list? It’s missing Bea Smith from Wentworth.
New addition. Spoilers spoilers spoilers not that anybody will give a hoot about it but let’s keep the name/show out of the sidebar comment thing. Some more fluff, fluff for spoilers, spoilers spoilers. Ok I think we’re good now.
Pretty Little Liars offed Shower Harvey (murder, found dead in a bathtub by a maid). Bonus points because they may have un-offed a creepy straight man in the same episode.
The straight guy was still in his grave when they dug it up so I seriously doubt they un-killed him.
I don’t think Julie Mao died. I think she becomes something else. About Talia Winter from Babylon 5, the actress wanted to leave. But, MS let an open door in case she would come back: Kosh had performed a full backup of Talia’s mind in season 1. But the actress never came back. It’s really sad.
I was wondering, could Zoe Vaughn from Scream be added to this list? She wasn’t explicitly a wlw but she did initiate a kiss with Audrey, and has since died.
She never showed interest in women except that one time while heavily influenced by hallucinogenic drugs, so I wouldn’t count her.
Tallie, The World to Come, Diphtheria:(
Good lord, how many times has Lucy Lawless played a lesbian/bi character who gets killed off!?
(Love her to bits, I’m just shocked as I didn’t know it was that many…)
I think there are 2 more you should add, they are from a chilean soap opera called “Preciosas”, their names were Paola Farfán and Elsa Morales.
Help, I’m still feeling all the feels re: Lexa. :(
Forever mourning Tara and Dana, too. (I would add Naomi but…Skins Fire? What’s that? Sounds made up…).
Also, confirmed: Delphine is alive post being shot in the garage.
another one from Scream to add onto this list: Zoe Vaughn, buried alive and then drowned by the killer
It was never confirmed that Zoey was into girls. She did kiss Audrey, but it sort of seemed like she did it to excite Noah, and also, she had taken halluicinogenic drugs.
New addition, and it doesn’t make any sense. Possibly a second new addition depending on what your Lily Kane rule is.
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Terrible Freeform drama Guilt finally screwed us over in its finale. Apparently the dead-all-along girl was secretly dating Sketchy Lesbian DJ Roz and pissed her off, so Roz got Main Girl’s boyfriend to kill dead-all-along. After Main Girl, who apparently didn’t notice her two roommates being In Lesbians together, finds out, she bashes Roz’s skull in. Roz, let’s note, had an actual girlfriend when dead-all-along was found dead at the start of the show. This does not make any sense. Anyway, one more dead lesbian, the dead-all-along girl was bi, and one of them was secretly psycho too.
THANK YOU for the buffer comment!! :)
You need to update this article with Sarah Lance’s resurrection. She was brought back to life by using the Lazarus pit and Constantine helped bring her soul back from the afterlife. The character is a regular on Legends of Tomorrow now
And one more, Delle Seyah Kendry, a recurring character on Killjoys who was flirty with the main character a couple of times. Shot and killed in the final episode of season 2.
and another. Karen Kim on Mistresses, who fell off a balcony trying to stop her nanny (who was just caught posing as her to Catfish a guy) from killing herself. ah, soaps! still a bummer.
DELPHINE IS ALIVE!
New addition: Manola (Kisa’s new girlfriend) in From Dusk Till Dawn. Didn’t even survive one episode!
13 from House MD deserves an honourable mention, despite the lack of on screen death (she actually lives long enough to be at the funeral for House in the finale), but they spent a lot of screen time on her sexuality and impending death – she’s bi, and becomes promiscuous / risk taking after getting diagnosed with Huntington’s. Her mother and brother had it and died, and she left the show/job to go off and be with her gf for as long as she can before she dies. It’s deathbaiting, rather than queerbaiting? def queer, maybe dead this week? maybe next? I definitely took it personally how much they threatened to kill her, even if she did survive til end of show she was given a terminal diagnosis, worsening symptoms and a lot of impending death narrative.
Make that 163. Mr Kaplan was shot by Raymond Reddington on The Blacklist this week for betraying him, even though she was actually trying to help him and protect the lives of another woman and a baby girl.
Not so fast!
add to the list, Zoe Vaughn from MTV Scream (2016). Confirmed bisexual, made out with both Noah and Audrey at a party, and eventually trapped in a coffin and drowned by the killer (Kieran, a known hater of sapphic girls, killed two wlw and tried to kill two more)
Another one to add to the list :(
Helen (who, I am now realising, had never been given a last name) from Masters of Sex. Died after giving birth to her and her girlfriend’s baby.
It’s been a long time since I last came back to this site so I didn’t see that some commenters wanted a spoiler warning/not to post before 24 hours after a character dies. If I spoiled anyone, I’m so sorry.
Hi, could you correct Halfiax to Halifax in Last Tango in Halifax? cheers
I think Yorkie and Kelly from Black Mirror should get a mention, even if it was a happy ending they’re still dead.
I think techinally they should as we have counted Lexa and Root who are tied to similar AI storylines.This just happened to have a happy ending.
Blindspot Spoilers
Sophia Varma, Blindspot (2015) isn’t dead, she had faked her death and turned up later in the series.
Tricia (orange is the new black) was encouraged to overdose by one of the prison guards, kinda a suicide/murder at the same time.
Also, were Victoria Hand and Isabelle Hartley gay??? (with regards just to the show and not the comics) I know Isabelle was only there for one/two episodes, Hand was only around for half a season, but I don’t remember there being ANY development behind their characters beyond how they contributed to the story. I mean, correct me if I’m wrong, but in the show up to this point, I’m pretty sure we’ve only had one gay character, and he was a guy.
It was mentioned somewhere in the comments that Victoria and Isabelle were not revealed as gay on the show because the writers knew they were going to kill them. Therefore it was felt that they needed to be included because is was a case of both Hide Your Gays and Bury Your Gays.
I think they had planned to keep Hartley around for much longer (and hopefully would have revealed that she was queer), but had to come up with a quick backup plan when Lucy Lawless had to back out due to pregnancy. It’s entirely possible that I’m remembering all of this wrong, though.
Why the heck does Lucy Lawless have so many characters in this list?! 0_0
I’m waiting with baited breath to see if Lana Winters will need to be added shortly. :'(
!@#$ing thankful for small mercies!
You’re missing Jocelyn from East Los High, 2016. She’s bisexual and she was shot.
Susan from Van Helsing (2016) Murdered two episodes after kissing her long time best friend.
Hm, while I think it’s awesome we get to contribute to this fight against Bury Your Gays by providing the actual facts for statistics etc. I think maaaaaybe when need to come up with some spoiler shield protocol for making comments/reporting to this post.
Cause while the title “All ### Dead Lesbian and Bisexual Characters on TV, And How They Died” is clear indicator of YO SPOILERS AHEAD it doesn’t negate seeing the comment in Latest Comments panel and getting spoiled from that.
our deaths are not spoilers.
I was going to ask if anime characters should be added to the list, then mention Ten’no Haruka/Sailor Uranus and Kaio Michiru/Sailor Neptune of Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon, except that while they were killed off by the main villain of SailorStars (5th season), so were all of the other Sailor Senshi except the main character, Sailor Moon (including her boyfriend, Chiba Mamoru/Tuxedo Kamen) and resurrected once again, as I mentioned above, and it wasn’t because they were lesbians, it was because they were heroes fighting against the final villain of the series.
Still, if anime and manga characters do count, IMHO they should only be added if they were killed off because of being lesbian/bisexual rather than for another reason (as above).
Also, I really hate Rick Berman (executive producer of the different Star Trek series post-Roddenberry) partly because of his allowing Jadzia Dax to be killed off after her actor, Terry Farrell, decided to leave the series, but also because rape survivor Tasha Yar (played by Denise Crosby) suffered the same fate in ST:TNG for basically the same reason (Crosby wanted out of her contract too). So, if a female actor quits, that’s reason to pointlessly and needlessly kill off her character as well? Sexism, much?
*Westworld Spoilers*
Elsie Hughes from Westworld could be the newest name to this list. She was shown to be sexually attracted to a female host (a scene that went literally nowhere after this), and was shown being strangled to death in episode 10. We don’t know for sure yet though.
That kissing scene just seems so bloody pointless if she is dead now, like they inserted it with the intention of taking it further, changed their minds and decided she would die in ep 10, but never edited the kissing scene out.
I felt the scene was only there to show how irresistible the hosts are. Plus, show how the hosts are abused by the employees. I really miss Elsie. Her death didn’t do much for the plot. Really pointless.
They forgot another Pretty Little Liars character- Charles/Charlotte DiLaurentis, a trans character.
This list is for bi and lesbian women, Cece was neither. Trans women that only like men may get a list of their own some day, but they aren’t included on this list.
Not sure if anyone watched Shut Eye on Hulu but *Spoiler Alert* there’s a queer female hypnotist named Gina to add to the list. :/
Okay, just my opinion, but I don’t think Kelly and Yorkie should be on this list. I mean, yes, technically they did die. But their consciousnesses are still alive and well, and it was definitely a decision to choose to live, rather than actually die by having your mind die along with your body. They have a happy ending together!
But, if you MUST keep them on the list, Yorkie didn’t die from the car crash. That happened when she was a teen. Cause of death would be doctor-assisted suicide (although I still contend that they shouldn’t count as dead). Thank you so much!
I would have thought they shouldn’t be on the list because they’re not recurring characters.
Recurring characters just don’t exist in Black Mirror, it’s an aspect of the show’s structure. If you look at the IMDb page you’ll find that the most episodes any character has been in is three (over three seasons). Whether they should be on the list due to thr connotations of their deaths is another question entirely; I don’t feel that it’s right to omit them just because their deaths were “good”, as that leaves us open them some really finicky and subjective slicing and dicing. For example (Person of Interest spoilers) many POI fans felt that Root’s death shouldn’t be classed as a BYG because it came well after the relationship was established and was part of a larger narrative arc about transcendence. Imo we have to go “all or nothing” with this kind of list.
Any queer woman whose death (of her physical body) I have to witness counts as trauma to me and therefore goes on the list! Even if gays transcend (POI, the LOO, Black Mirror…) or are un-buried (Jane the Virgin, Orphan Black…) they should still of on the list because we still had the upset of having to watch it happen and the message is still sent: a violent end is destined for people like you. The rest is just semantics.
I want you to know I cited this article when writing my writer’s manifesto on my creative writing course
(*Spoiler Alert* for Scream I guess)
I’m not sure if she would count or if anyone has mentioned her yet, but Rachel Murray from Scream: The TV Series. She is dating a main character Audrey in Season 1 episode 1 and episode 2, then is murdered in episode 2.
Wow disregard my comment I found her, sorry haha
You must add Aurora Alarcón from Seis Hermanas.
Aurora Alarcón from Seis Hermanas. Got sick with Cholera and died.
I know pretty much no one watched this show, but Taxi Brooklyn (it ran for like 12 episodes back in 2014) had an ADA named May Winters who stalked Chyler Leigh’s character, kidnapped her, killed a bunch of people “for her,” and then killed herself because she was so in love with her… literally her last words were “Why won’t you love me, Caitlyn?” So yeah that was lovely
Well this is one of the most depressing articles I have read in a while. It’s nice to know that the LGBT community has a lot of shows that they can really get behind. It makes me really appropriate and love the shows that actually let their gay characters live and have happy endings since they are so rare. The only show that I forgive is Xena because she went out in a blaze, sacrificing herself to save thousands of souls. And I know that her and Gabrielle will be together in the next life. The rest of the shows are just crap.
Does anyone else here believe that the Teen Wolf death was a little excessive? I mean the character was already dead…
In the article about the killing off of lesbian characters, the author used Joyce from Buffy the Vampire Slayer as the first example…. which is incorrect…. Joyce is Buffy’s mother. TARA was Willow’s girlfriend who was killed. A slip up that probably should be changed… especially as it’s the first example. Did anyone else notice this?
PLEASE NOTICE THIS COMMENT AND FIX THE MISTAKE!!!! :)
Hi! Joyce is listed as an example of a non-queer character who is killed off; she’s listed along with the likes of Ned Stark and a host of other straight people.
The full sentence reads “It’s incredibly rare that any dramatic television series lasting over three seasons will never kill a main or recurring character, and all those deaths have driven a stake through the heart of fandom: Joyce on Buffy, Lady Sybil on Downton Abby, Charlie on Lost, Ned Stark on Game of Thrones, Jen on Dawson’s Creek, Nate on Six Feet Under — but when the person who dies is a lesbian or bisexual character, queer fandom takes it pretty hard.”
It’s not a mistake. The article didn’t say that Joyce was gay/bi, just that her death was upsetting to the fandom.
Tituba from Salem actually turned out to still be alive and survived the events of the series finale. The wife on Blindspot also turned out to be alive via faking her death.
Then as a personal opinion, villains shouldn’t be on this list. Because your basically saying that they should have been exempt from death despite commiting evil deeds, just because their LGBT females. If you want more female villains, even some that just so happen to be gay or bi, you have to accept that they will die as that is usually what happens to villains.
Lucy Lawless is on this list FOUR FREAKING TIMES. That just ain’t right. #StopKillingLucyLawless
Laura Palmer in Twin Peaks? She’s established as bi in the film and The Secret Diary of Laura Palmer.
Spoilers Spoilers Spoilers
Is that enough warning?
Eleanor Guthrie while pregnant was stabbed to death by a spanish soldier which kind of was her husbands fault.
Eleanor’s death was kind of inevitable. This show is quite violent & they killed off some straight white main characters (Vane, Miranda), so I’m not sure she even counts as a “Bury the gays” example.
Black sails did *SPOILER ALERT* UNbury a gay man (Thomas) and reunite him with Flint, it’s a true miracle.
Eleanor Guthrie from Black Sails.
Stabbed to death by a Spanish Soldier.
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Don’t forget about Lenny Busker 2017 Legion
Fused into a wall; later appears as a demonic villain in the mind of the main character
You should add Charry from “Se quien eres” (Spain). In the episode 1×09, Charry died of drug overdose by pressure on the secrets she knew.
Thank you so much for this! So upsetting and considering how few Lesbians are shown, can’t help but think it’s a media message.
About Dana from The L Word, though, she actually died from from heart failure from “treatment”/chemo for breast cancer. I watched closely since it was very courageous of them to show that. There is intense pressure to believe the doctors.
My best friend has survived three separate cancers, the first two very rare and extremely invasive (clear cell adenocarcinoma of the uterus and neuroendocrine colon cancer), and the last one was a more regular breast cancer, with surgery and herbs and other alternatives methods — NOT going vegan or juicing or an expensive clinic. She also has refused all scans, including mammograms since they cause so much cancer. We try to get the word out with so many women dying soon after suffering through “treatment.” There are other options but we are not given informed consent.
Delphine Lives!!!!
Can we get Heather from last week’s episode of Doctor Who added? She was a young queer girl with self-image issues killed by a puddle of sentient spaceship-oil.
Annie Kaplan, The Blacklist, Shot by partner’s uncle.
BEA SMITH DESERVED BETTER IM STILL SO UPSET
so Delphine is definitely alive, but also, I mean technically Kelly and yorkie are dead, but the whole point of the story was them being euthanized and finding each other in the afterlife, and it was the only bm ep with a happy ending. I guess I don’t really get why they’re on the list since they weren’t really killed off, and it was in no way violent or unfair
SPOILERS for the first three episodes of The Handmaid’s Tale:
Should add Martha 6715-301, Ofglen’s (Alexis Bledel’s character’s) girlfriend who is hanged for “gender treachery” in episode 3.
Someone might mention Moira, but given what happens to her in the book and the character who reports her death (someone represented as being mentally unstable), I don’t think she should count yet.
I just started watching Zoo on Netflix. Season 1 episode 4: the very first LGBT+ couple introduced is a lesbian couple, who freeze to death by the end pf the episode. Their names were Margaret and Wendy and they were trying at a second chance in their marriage.
Not only are we not represented as a main or recurring character, but we’re still not allowed to have happy endings.
This is one of those rare occasions where it would actually be nice if the article was split onto multiple pages. It takes FOREVER to load on mobile with all the pictures.
Please add Aurora from spanish tv series Seis Hermanas.
Tituba from Salem didn’t die she was revealed to be still alive in the third season.
Missed another Lucy Lawless glorious lesbian death: Countess von Marburgh, second season Salem.
You can remove Bill Potts from Doctor Who from the list – not only does she never actually die (she’s turned into a Cyberman/cyborg sure, but she entirely retains her sense of self), but less than an episode passes before her space girlfriend saves her from even being a cyborg.
She’s due to show up in the next episode too.
Disagree. She was shot incredibly graphically by this show’s standards for a companion, had a number of scenes showing how physically ruined her body was… she managed to get a “sentient water/oil” whatever afterlife with her (imo) creepy crush Heather & a “virtual” temporary reunion with the Doctor, but she was
Still. Killed. In a really upsetting and literally dehumanising way that is out of the norm for companions on this show.
I absolutely think that she was the “I’ve got another year to run this show, people think I’m so sexist/racist, okay let’s pull out all the minority stops on this one-series character before finishing her off. Then she can have a static constrained afterlife.” The end he gives for all the women who get too confident, but Bill’s death was so much nastier, so much more graphic, than his white women he involved romantically with the Doctor.
Bill’s tragic end was also alluded to in a recent episode by the Doctor in a rage as something so awful, so terrible, it was motivating her to do something awful and terrible herself to avoid it happening to anyone else again.
Man, I’m glad I stopped watching Black Sails after another lesbian character was gangraped… :/
So about Kira from The Magicians, the woman that she trains and who eventually kills her isn’t white, the actress that plays her is 100% Native American. Just wanted to clear that up.
Eleanor Guthrie from Black Sails.
Stabbed to death by a Spanish Soldier.
She should on the list
Elise Wassermann on The Tunnel (2017), killed when she explodes a bomb collar put on her to make her male cop-partner sad. Wikipedia’s less sarcastic summary.
UGHHHH I hated this ending so much!! The tunnel falls victim to yet another terrible trope for its gay characters ( https://www.queerty.com/horrible-trope-gay-monster-vanished-tunnel-brought-back-20171118 )
Just what I always wanted in an ending, for a badass heroic bisexual woman to die so that the whiny problematic Karl can have a meaningful ending to his arc…..
Just a correction: Bill Potts was actually killed by the blue alien Jorj in Doctor Who, and later converted into a Mondasian Cyberman – it was the Doctor who was shot by a Cyberman
Nora West-Allen (XS): Erased from existence
Raya Van Zandt (Spin): Murder by her girlfriend, Joslyn Jackam (Weather Witch)
What about Ellaria Sand on Game of Thrones?
Is Isolde from Netflix’s Ragnarok the first to get knocked off in 2020? She manages to come out and then get killed disturbingly promptly, all in the first episode… 😶😶😶
I want to profoundly and most sincerely thank you on creating this list and keeping it refresshed and updated throughout the years. Thank you! Now thanks to you I will spare myself of all the heartbreak I already encountered many times trying to follow our brave lgbt characters who always for some reason end uo dead…
there can be a book written also about all the obstacles our beloved characters go through durong their existence in the shows and movies before they are killed off, like Hollywood and the rest of the world wants to send the message “It is ok for ys to give you the lesbian abd bi characters to attract the audience, but our message is it is not ok to be lgbt!” And it pisses me off. Also it is ok to film straight sex but when it comes to gay sex scenes, lets keep it as modest as possible and rare… So many messages thrown our way that from their point of view its not ok we exist. Makes me mad!
Once more many thanks your way and know that your effort is appreciated!
Ya bitch because you want representation.
Then ya bitch about the representation.
Not every lesbian is courageous/brave.
Some of them just get stabbed in the neck and dumped in the river. 🤷♂️
Yorkie and Kelly Booth from the episode San Junipero of the Black Mirror series.
Tabitha Galavan (a bisexual character) from Gotham was killed in the last season of the show in 2019.
Christina Braithwhite, Lovecraft Country (2020)
Cause of Death: Crashed under rumble and choked to death with a robotic arm.
SPOILERS
Sorry but does this list include Sarah Ngyuen from Yellowknife season 2? aired in 2019
Just a little comment to add Abby Morgan to the list. She’s a bisexual character in Dawson’s Creek who dies tragically falling into the water and drowning.
Clara from Charité, a German show, died from illness in 2017, I think.
Jenny from Doctor Who was a lesbian who died. She was stabbed(?) by the Whisper Men
SPOILERS FOR “THE WORLD TO COME (2021)”
*
*
*
*
*
*
Tallie, The world to come (2021)
Cause of Death: Presumably killed by her husband.
Yorkie and Kelly Booth from the episode San Junipero of the Black Mirror series.
My GOD they have killed us in every possible way
In June of this year, Sissy Cooper from The Umbrella Academy died of cancer in a flashback.
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river song from doctor who was also confirmed to have had a wife and died using her memory space to reset a computer
Fear Street (2021) – Sarah Fier was accused of being a witch and hung
thats soo good man
2001 Maniacs: Field of Screams (2010)
Also there is such a scene
World to come, Tallie murderd by her husband 2020
She didn’t identyfy (tis was 1800), but she was in a (sex) relationship with Abi.
Very sad, but nice movie.
Is it really so that no queer woman has died yet in 2021? Oh, no maybe I’ve jinxed it now?
Alright, two more for 2019:
Daniel Lyons – Years and Years
Drowned after falling out of an overcrowded dinghy while trying to smuggle his partner back into the UK
Edith Lyons – Years and Years
Fatal radiation poisoning, then had her memory uploaded to water
gotta add dr. sarah gunning from midnight mass (2021)
This is like a recommendation AND a warning for wlw films and series
This list gets longer each time I check :/ Betsy from Dopesick (2021) could go on this list, her death really got me.. on another note though, Rana from coronation street was actually killed just before her wedding, and Joan from Wentworth was later found alive!
:( villanelle from killing eve (2022). i feel crushed
Guess we gotta update this for Killing Eve :((
Toshiko Sato, Torchwood (2008)
She was not gay. In fact, she was in love with Owen Harper.
Torchwood did kill off a gay character – Ianto Jones, who was Jack Harkness’ love interest.
Fernanda from Killing Eve was also murdered.
Lenny and Salmon from Legion.
Abagail from Riverdale.
Elsie from Westworld, strangled (2016)
correction: shot (2018)*
most recent one being Villanelle makes my heart hurt
Legends of Tomorrow killed off the real Sara Lance and replaced her with a clone.
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RIP 2022 Fine from “Vampire in the garden”
Ruby knowby from ash vs the evil dead. In fact I think I’m their wiki she’s marked as having died twice.
This also marks the 5th time that Lucy Lawless had died and appears on this list. Someone should tell her next time she represents to get it in her contract that her character survives the show
Legends of Tomorrow killed off the real Sara Lance and replaced her with a clone.
This also marks the 5th time that Lucy Lawless had died and appears on this list. kuty ka bacha
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Charly Burke – The Orville
I was just about to say this!
Joffrey in House of the Dragon now. F**kitty f**king f**k.
Please take a second look at the circumstances of Kira’s death on The Magicians.
Julia refused to kill her, as I recall. Kira’s counselor did, as a mercy killing.
Also, it was ambiguous whether Kira was gay.
[SPOILER ALERT]
French TV show “Les Combattantes” (2022): Marguerite de Lancastel, shot on a battlefield during WWI while working as an ambulance driver and trying to rescue her wounded son.
[SPOILER ALERT] Of course, this is more of an “Anyone Can Die” trope, but she is the only main female character to die (the show is about four women during WWI), and the very next scene features a very straight plotline that – obviously – ends well. Sooo…
CLEXA death is infuriating because it goes to show how debased sold out producers crew writers & directors have become.
All knew plenty well about Fridging and Bury your gays tropes.
So what do they do?
Mix both in one slap in the face of fandom just to say:
“See? we are in charge here.
We re the ones calling the shots.
Its not your call.
We are Gods in our Olympus.
Only White House Gods can challenge us.”
Newsflash morons.
Heroes can kill Gods.
Luv & Thunder proved even mortal worshipers can become Gor Butchers.
Your not even Gorrs let alone Gods.
Even if u were.
Remember what Wonder Diana did to Ares?
Remember what Kratos did to Olympians?
Remember what Winchester Bros did to Chuck?
U definitively should watch competition shows to dim your hubris.
Not to worry.
Fandome came along in droves to remind u of wise saying:
Hubris precedes the fall from Grace.
Since u white relics of medieval times seem to appreciate old biblical values your supposed to heed to those sayings.
Theyre wise cautionary tales much like sweet Jesus Paraboles.
Then again i guess u powers that be are not much into New Testament save from Revelations & Rapture maybe.
U re more like Old Testament & Judges type.
Just remember that.
If Rapture became reality fans complaininh bout your cruel misdeeds would be taken to Heavens and U re the ones who would be left behind to face the consequences of scorched hell on Earth of yer own making.
Meditate on that before yer forced to be left dining on Ashes, literally.
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Judy Hale from Dead to Me died of cancer in the series finale today
Judy Hale needs to be added to this now 😭
The world to come, 2020, Tallie, murderd by husband
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To the stars 2019, Maggie. She was in a relationship with the hairdresser, but… not sure she was killed. The ending isn’t clear is she dead or not ;)
Is Peach from You open? She did kiss Becky and they were going to Paris before she was killed by Joe. But Becky didnt want, I guess…
***Spoilers for The Confessions of Frannie Langton***
Frannie Langton, The Confessions of Frannie Langton (2022): Hanged
Madame Marguerite Benham, The Confessions of Frannie Langton (2022): Opium Overdose
No, I don’t like it, it’s like a spoiler for this article.
If you thought this list was crazy checkout how all the straight women died list.
Forgot one: Shirley MacLaine’s character in 1960’s movie she co-starred in with Audrey Hepburn, “The Children’s Hour.” She committed suicide by gun after confessing her love to Audrey H. character.
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