# Television characters who've endured the most tragedies. **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 9, 2011, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225 "2011-05-09T02:05:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Locrian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/locrian/32/14146_2.png) [@Locrian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Locrian)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/41 "2011-05-09T23:28:18Z")
Lenny Briscoe on Law & Order. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/42 "2011-05-09T23:38:54Z")
> [@Locrian](#): > > Lenny Briscoe on Law & Order. I love Briscoe, but he’s a minor leaguer in the game of sorrow. I mean, he was a recovering alcoholic, he was long estranged from his daughter, he was in the car when a coworker was killed, his daughter was murdered, and he himself died. That’s journey suffering. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/43 "2011-05-09T23:43:13Z")
> [@Bearflag70](#): > > David Bruce Banner always endured an extreme hardship at :20 and :50 minutes past the hour every week. You’re being flippant, of course, but David Banner’s life was terribly bad after his accident, and it was all the worse because he so clearly didn’t deserve it. I recall an episode when he was considering suicide, and my first thought upon seeing the preview was, “Well, that’s not a little bit surviving.” And, of course, when they finally killed him off in a made-for-tv movie, his last expression was a smile, and his last words were “I’m free.” ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2011, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/44 "2011-05-10T00:05:06Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Yours was only a slight exaggeration. It was clear that _only_ Elizabeth gave a fig about him. And part of the reason she cared as much as she did, I thought, was that she thought it unseemly for no one at all to care. And Dr. Weaver put Romano’s name on a part of the hospital he would have hated. ---
**Author:** ![miss\_elizabeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/838e76/32.png) [@miss\_elizabeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/miss_elizabeth)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2011, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/45 "2011-05-10T00:47:52Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > You’re being flippant, of course, but David Banner’s life was terribly bad after his accident, and it was all the worse because he so clearly didn’t deserve it. I recall an episode when he was considering suicide, and my first thought upon seeing the preview was, “Well, that’s not a little bit surviving.” > > And, of course, when they finally killed him off in a made-for-tv movie, his last expression was a smile, and his last words were “I’m free.” Jesus fuck, really? I never saw that. My son went through a HUGE Hulk phase as a toddler; I had to watch all the old shows I could find. That is so sad. It actually made me tear up a little. I feel silly. ☹ sniff ---
**Author:** ![penultima\_thule](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penultima_thule/32/3833_2.png) [@penultima\_thule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/penultima_thule)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2011, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/46 "2011-05-10T00:52:24Z")
I’d have thought Dr Who would be a candidate ---
**Author:** ![Fair\_Rarity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fair_rarity/32/153_2.png) [@Fair\_Rarity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fair_Rarity)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2011, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/47 "2011-05-10T01:37:08Z")
George Costanza would claim he was the one with the most, as he used his sad-sack story life to try to convince an apartment board he was deserving of more pity than the other applicants. ---
**Author:** ![mac\_bolan00](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b3f665/32.png) [@mac\_bolan00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mac_bolan00)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2011, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/48 "2011-05-10T01:43:10Z")
i would say duncan macleod and the rest of his lot would have suffered the most. DING! DING! i win. thread settled. ---
**Author:** ![mac\_bolan00](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b3f665/32.png) [@mac\_bolan00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mac_bolan00)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2011, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/49 "2011-05-10T01:58:29Z")
my second would be nicholas knight. how many lady friends did he lose to vampires? ---
**Author:** ![Two\_Many\_Cats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8dc957/32.png) [@Two\_Many\_Cats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_Many_Cats)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2011, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/50 "2011-05-10T02:11:35Z")
I would say that over 20 years, Matt Dillon got shot the most times on _Gunsmoke_. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2011, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/51 "2011-05-10T02:41:20Z")
Scratch a sitcom character and a Shakespeareian tragedy bleeds out. Phoebe Buffay (Friends): father deserts her, mother commits suicide, lived on the street, estranged from her twin sister, only childhood friend is a smelly cat. Barney Stinson (How I Met Your Mother): doesn’t know his father, mother regularly deserted the family to follow rock bands, in love with Robin but unable to commit. Ralph Kramden (The Honeymooners): lives in a tenement, dreams perpetually foiled, weight problems. Marge Simpson: knocked up by the only man she ever had sex with, loser husband, rarely seen father who may even be dead, demon-spawn firstborn, gambling problem, sisters who actively try to destroy her marriage, natural talents in art, photography and writing thoroughly repressed. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2011, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/52 "2011-05-10T15:49:25Z")
> [@kunilou](#): > > Barney Stinson (How I Met Your Mother): doesn’t know his father, mother regularly deserted the family to follow rock bands, in love with Robin but unable to commit.. Your definition of _tragedy_ seems overbroad to me. ---
**Author:** ![control-z](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/eada6e/32.png) [@control-z](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/control-z)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2011, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/53 "2011-05-10T16:19:38Z")
Sydney on Alias used to get tortured about every episode. ---
**Author:** ![zamboniracer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e9a140/32.png) [@zamboniracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zamboniracer)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 10:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/54 "2011-05-11T10:02:22Z")
Since Buffy Summers and her sister Dawn have already been nominated, let me add to the Whedon-verse hit list with Cordelia Chase. She’s been run through with rebar, kidnapped and tortured by Marcie the invisible girl, terrorized on Homecoming and kidnapped and tortured by demon worshipping frat guys, and that’s before she joined Angel for similar hijinks in LA, where she was impregnated by demons a couple of times, kidnapped by eyeball plucking lawyers and put into a coma, among other incidents. ---
**Author:** ![phantom\_lamb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/5f9b8f/32.png) [@phantom\_lamb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phantom_lamb)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 12:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/55 "2011-05-11T12:00:35Z")
Debra Morgan from _Dexter_. [spoiler]Engaged to, kidnapped and almost murdered by serial killer Her father always favored her adopted brother, had an affair, committed sucide, brother is serial killer She gets shot and her coworker/boyfriend shot and killed in front of her Another boyfriend gets kidnapped and skinned by serial killer She sees a woman blast her own brains out in front of her Her sister-in-law gruesomely killed by serial killer Probably more, I forgot… [/spoiler] ---
**Author:** ![Ronald\_C.Semone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/cc9497/32.png) [@Ronald\_C.Semone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ronald_C.Semone)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/56 "2011-05-11T13:14:29Z")
How about the little boy that Lassie lived with? ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2011, 9:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/57 "2011-05-12T09:58:38Z")
Starbuck also had more than her fair share of indignities visited upon her in the newer **Battlestar Galactica.** Among them; - A constantly absent father - A mother who abused her and broke every one of her fingers several times - Got her student/fiancee killed by padding his grades in flight school - Kidnapped by Cylons and had her ovaries removed as part of their breeding experiments - Mind-fucked by Leoben into believing she had a half-Cylon baby - Lost contact with said child forever when her real mother wanted nothing to do with her - Shown up at the thing she does best by a drug smuggler who stole the identity of a fighter pilot - Died - Came back unaware of this fact until she discovered her own charred corpse in the wreck of her fighter - Poofed out of existence forever after fulfilling her “special destiny” to lead the human race to Earth ---
**Author:** ![Musky\_Moon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/90db22/32.png) [@Musky\_Moon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musky_Moon)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2011, 11:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/58 "2011-05-12T11:43:36Z")
Veronica Mars endured alot for a teenager. I think any real teenager would be a serious suicide risk if they had to suffer her life. Since it’s television, she obviously takes it all in plucky stride. ---
**Author:** ![bouv](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bc8723/32.png) [@bouv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bouv)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2011, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/59 "2011-05-12T13:54:31Z")
> [@zamboniracer](#): > > where she was impregnated by demons a couple of times, Wow…I just realized, that if you want to count the Jasmine-controlled-pregnant-with-itself thing, Cordellia had three demon pregnancies… Continuing with the Whedon-train…Lorne. His whole life was a shit-fest of never being accepted in his home world, until finally he came to Earth and was happy that we had Broadway. But then his bar was destroyed…and then again…and again…etc…all because of people who, while technically his friends, were essentially just using him most of the time (and this was true even years later…) They never cared for his stories or antics, even though most of the time he was only doing them as a method of coping with all the death he was surrounded by and hated. Of the two friends that were arguably the closest to him, one is possessed by said demon and goes into a coma, only to come back for one measly day and doesn’t even get to say goodbye, and the other is ALSO possessed by a demon and dies. Then, he gets convinced by his boss/“friend” that he has to betray an ally (admittedly a brief ally that probably will turn on them later,) and murder him. There’s more stuff after that in the comics, too. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2011, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225/60 "2011-05-12T16:21:20Z")
> [@bouv](#): > > Wow…I just realized, that if you want to count the Jasmine-controlled-pregnant-with-itself thing, Cordellia had three demon pregnancies… > > Continuing with the Whedon-train…Lorne. > > His whole life was a shit-fest of never being accepted in his home world, until finally he came to Earth and was happy that we had Broadway. But then his bar was destroyed…and then again…and again…etc…all because of people who, while technically his friends, were essentially just using him most of the time (and this was true even years later…) **They never cared for his stories or antic** s, even though most of the time he was only doing them as a method of coping with all the death he was surrounded by and hated. > > Of the two friends that were arguably the closest to him, one is possessed by said demon and goes into a coma, only to come back for one measly day and doesn’t even get to say goodbye, and the other is ALSO possessed by a demon and dies. Then, he gets convinced by his boss/“friend” that he has to betray an ally (admittedly a brief ally that probably will turn on them later,) and murder him. > > There’s more stuff after that in the comics, too. The bit I bolded is clearly untrue, because you’re leaving out Fred. It was clear that she loved him, and clear that he knew that. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-characters-whove-endured-the-most-tragedies/581225.md?page=4)