We're just a few days out from Boardwalk Empire's final episode ever. The five-season saga of Prohibition Era booze, bullets, broads, and backstabbing is coming to a close. And there've been a lot of deaths over the years. A lot of deaths. In fact, gangsters and goons are probably being whacked as I type this.

"Do you mind? I'm experiencing a flashback."

Billie Kent

Owen Sleater

Sally Wheat

Eddie Kessler

And not only does this show regularly make the Grim Reaper a happy camper, actual massacres are commonplace. Like, rooms filled with dead folk. Just jarring, explosive mass murder. So we thought, heading into the series finale, we'd take things slow and sentimental - looking at the deaths on the show that made our hearts break. Sure, this series is filled practically top-to-bottom with murderers and madmen, but it also had a knack for making us care about some of its monsters. So much so that it ripped us apart to see them exit the show.Here's a look back at the Boardwalk Empire deaths that made us feel extraordinary amounts of sadness.Young showbiz ingenue Billie was Nucky's doe-eyed squeeze in Season 3. It was clear that she cared for Nucky, though probably not as much as he did for her during his Margaret-rebound phase. She was determined, independent, and most definitely didn't deserve to get blown to bits when Gyp Rosetti bombed Babette's.Later, in Season 5, Nucky subtly let Rosetti's man, Tonino, know that he was about to die by having a meeting with him at a restaurant - where Billie's picture was hanging above their table. Tonino took one look at the headshot and new what was going to happen to him - and why. Callback and payback.Owen (played by Marvel's new Daredevil, Charlie Cox), was notable for being both Nucky's ex-IRA enforcer and the man in love with Nucky's wife. His Season 3 death surprised many viewers - mostly though because it was done totally off-screen. All we got to see was a crate containing Owen's lifeless body, with a shocked, grieving Margaret sobbing over her former lover.While many fans may not have appreciated Owen betraying/cuckolding Nucky, they still mourned for Margaret's dashed dreams of leaving town with her lover and escaping the life of gang warfare she'd found herself in.Sally and Nucky may have never officially become an item, but the fast-friendship they formed in Season 4 was a fun pairing - and one that was equally beneficial to the other from a business standpoint. Sally was tough, sassy, and had a no-nonsense approach to booze and boys. And her gunshot death - which came randomly via political unrest in Cuba - signaled the end of Nucky's hopes for a prosperous pipeline come Prohibition's end.Sally wasn't taken out by one of Nucky's enemies and perhaps it was because he couldn't exact revenge on someone for her demise that he became so angry and reckless during his war with Luciano. He wanted to lash out at someone, anyone, and one risky move wound up costing him his whole empire.After Nucky's prim and proper German assistant Eddie had been given a promotion, we discovered that the nobility he exuded was all delusion. And that in fact the was a shamed embezzler and adulterer whose family had disowned him entirely.Federal Agent Knox quickly ruined Eddie's new hopes of advancement by kidnapping him and forcing him to squeal on Nucky and it wasn't long before Eddie took his own life by leaping to his death from a top window of the Albatross Hotel.

More tragic Boardwalk Empire deaths on Page 2...