Television requires a lengthy time investment from its audience. As narratives unfold each week, fans tend to grow attached to characters and they can start to take things personally when they feel their favorite has been wronged.
Though it's usually a character's death that sends TV fans into a frenzy, viewers have been known to lose it when long-running mysteries don't live up to expectations or when audiences feel their time has been wasted.
Keep reading to see 15 TV moments that upset fans.
SEE ALSO: TV shows that had alternative endings
FOLLOW US: INSIDER is on Facebook:
Will Gardner’s death took "The Good Wife" fans by complete surprise.
Fans can usually anticipate the death or sudden exit of a beloved character when an actor's contract hasn't been renewed and reports they won't be returning next season start to leak out. But the season five death of Will Gardner (Josh Charles), who was shot in the courtroom by his own client, was truly unexpected and fans of "The Good Wife" were not happy.
Producers worked tirelessly to ensure that the death came as a total shock to viewers, and they were able to anticipate the backlash from fans. After the episode aired, series co-creators Michelle and Robert King posted an open letter explaining their decision to kill off the character.
"We could 'send him off to Seattle,' he could be disbarred, or get married, or go off to Borneo to do good works. But there was something in the passion that Will and Alicia shared that made distance a meager hurdle," they wrote. "The brutal honesty and reality of death speaks to the truth and tragedy of bad timing for these two characters. Will's death propels Alicia into her newest incarnation."
Some fans were heartbroken when producers killed Marissa Cooper in a fiery car crash during the season three finale of "The O.C."
After torturing the character with family problems and substance abuse issues — not to mention having her shoot her boyfriend's brother— producers finally put Marissa (played by Mischa Barton) out of her misery on "The O.C."
Series co-creator Josh Schwartz told The Hollywood Reporter that he was surprised by the mixed reaction to Marissa's death.
"There were some people who celebrated and at the time, those were the most vocal people," Schwartz said, adding that he later heard from a lot of angry fans as well.
"There was a lot of anger and fan art that came our way," he said.
"The Walking Dead" fans couldn’t stomach Glenn's violent and sadistic death.
Fans of "The Walking Dead" were already used to being outraged by the time producers killed off Glenn (Steven Yeun), one of the show's most-beloved characters, in the season seven premiere.
After ending the previous season on a cliffhanger, producers intended to shock audiences by revealing which characters finally met their untimely death at the hands of Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) and his baseball bat.
Despite filming multiple death scenes to avoid leaks and spoilers, fans knew Glenn's death was coming, they just didn't anticipate how violent, gory, and sadistic the scene would be. The moment prompted some fans to declare they were done with the show, and producers responded by publicly quibbling over whether or not they toned down the show's violence as a result of the backlash.
Executive producer and director Greg Nicoterorefuted the claims of executive producer Gale Anne Hurd that the series toned down the violence in later episodes of season 7.
"As brutal as that episode 1 was, it's still part of our storytelling bible, which is what the world is about," Nicotero told Entertainment Weekly. "I don't think we would ever edit ourselves, and I think — even after looking at that episode 1 again — as tough as it was for people to watch, I don't think we would have done it any differently. I don't think we'll ever pull ourselves back. There is definitely a difference between violence against walkers and human on human violence, but truthfully, we're serving our story."
See the rest of the story at INSIDER