One more spoiler warning, given how big these events were for The 100…

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Was it the Right Call to Kill Lexa?

Was it the Right <em>Way</em> to Kill Lexa?

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Was Placing the Sex Scene Right Beforehand the Right Call?

Eliza Taylor as Clarke and Alycia Debnam-Carey as Lexa in The 100.

Does Lexa's Death Break/Ruin/Invalidate the Show?

Alycia Debnam-Carey as Lexa in The 100.

I wrote my review of The 100’s “Thirteen” episode last week and posted an accompanying video reaction (see below). But that was all done the morning after I’d first seen the episode – and several days before it aired and the audience reaction came pouring in.And the reaction has been notable, to say the least. Many fans are sad, many are angry and some are outright furious (and a small handful have taken to making threats against The 100 writers, which, it should go without saying, is clearly crossing a line).The point is, Lexa’s death, both because she was a beloved character in general but also, significantly, because of what she meant as a strong, prominent lesbian character on TV -- in a TV landscape where the Dead Lesbian trope is a very real thing -- has resulted in her death causing some amazingly strong reactions. Some are incredibly upset that it happened at all, while others are unhappy with the way that it happened. And while I shared those initial thoughts on it, in the wake of seeing all these responses, and after thinking about it a bit more myself, I felt I wanted to weigh in with some more thoughts on the many different elements at play here.I also want to give a nod to my friend and colleague Maureen Ryan at Variety, whose own piece on Lexa’s death helped nudge me towards writing this one as I was mulling over possibly doing so. Alycia Debnam-Carey was leaving The 100. This was happening no matter what, and regardless of what anyone involved with The 100 may have wished. She was contractually tied to Fear the Walking Dead as a series regular and The 100 only had her back, with AMC's permission, for a certain amount of episodes before they had to write her off. But did that mean they needed to kill her off?Well, I’ve actually gone back and forth on this a lot. Initially, I felt that it was 100% the wrong thing to kill her and that some other solution should have been created to explain her absence.But then I thought about what a bind that puts the show in. Lexa’s become a really important character – and specifically is incredibly important to Clarke, the protagonist of the show. So while yes, you could come up with various reasons she’s gone, including banishment or going off on a journey to find something of importance to, hell, putting her in a coma, it potentially could be more distracting than anything having her ethereally somewhere out there, yet not on screen. And sure, maybe they could arrange to get her back for more guest appearances down the line – a single episode here, a few episodes there – but it’s just that, a maybe. There were no promises. And even if that did happen, it still would be frustrating in its own way if she popped back in now and again and then has to keep being written out again, which looked to be the best-case scenario as long as she was on another show on another network.Also, in the realm of “Well, what if…?”, yes, she’s on a show, Fear the Walking Dead, where she could potentially be killed off at any time and suddenly be free. But that’s a huge maybe too. If you’re trying to plan ahead for your own TV show, would you really want to take that gamble? How do you plan far ahead when you have someone as important as Lexa in such a nebulous status?All that being said, I do think there were certainly story routes that could have been used to keep her alive and off-screen that may have worked really well… but I also think there may have always been a lingering frustration (for both the writers and, truly, the fans in the long run) going down that road.In the wake of her death, I’ve seen people say that there reason for watching The 100 was because of Lexa and/or the Lexa/Clarke relationship and thus they will no longer watch. I don’t share that view, but regardless, no matter what, Debnam-Carey’s obligations meant that Lexa’s time on The 100 in any regular capacity had to come to an end and it had to come to an end now. With that in mind, I can understand why killing her seemed like the most definitive way to deal with what could otherwise became an especially complicated and risky dynamic, where you were trying to maintain a character you had no way of being sure when, where and if you could even use.So once the decision was made that she'd die, did they choose the right way to kill Lexa? I don’t think so. I’ve noted I accidentally was spoiled on her death last summer, but honestly, I’d assumed Lexa would eventually die since the end of Season 2, knowing Fear the Walking Dead was coming.But I’d also assumed she’d get a big death – a grand death. Perhaps something in the midst of combat or involving her knowingly going towards her death for some epic sacrifice for her people. The method chosen, with her accidentally shot, just feels unseemly and demeaning for a character of her status and significance. And while I get the idea of the tragedy of Titus, who loves her and clearly had a major hand in raising her, being the one to do it -- while thinking he was helping her by killing Clarke -- we haven’t spent enough time with Titus for that to mean enough to us (though I will say Neil Sandilands has been great in the role). We don’t care how the death affects Titus nearly as much as we ourselves are affected by Lexa’s death, not to mention how Clarke is affected. So yeah, I do think Lexa should have gotten a “better” death.I feel like you could have even done a version of this same storyline, with Lexa being questioned for her decisions and people turning on her for how she’s responding (or not responding) to Arkadia that involves her being stripped of her title as Commander – and it leading to her explaining to Clarke that for a new Commander to be chosen, she must die. Big farewell, big death/execution/sacrifice or such scene for Lexa and you still can do the same reveal of the tattoo/AI, paralleled with Becca’s arrival on Earth (all of which was fantastic, in and of itself!).Either way, the accidental shooting just doesn’t sit right because of who Lexa is to the show… and that’s before you factor in the very uncomfortable mirroring of Tara’s death on Buffy, when you’re already in the position of killing off a strong lesbian character, thus exasperating the "Dead Lesbian" TV trope Lexa’s death was understandably already going to evoke.No, no, no, no, no.As already noted, Lexa had to be written out by this episode. So once the decision was made to kill Lexa off, it was going to be in “Thirteen.”But then you have the actual placement of her death, storywise, and the decision to have it be right after she and Clarke finally have sex for the first time. And man, if there’s one thing I truly hate about how Lexa's death was handled, it’s this.In general, the “They finally got together! …and now one of them instantly dies” idea feels really trite and cliché or like something out of Friday the 13th (and I love Friday the 13th! But this is The 100…). If Lexa had been a male character and the lead up had been exactly the same, it would have felt equally silly/maddening to kill “him” right after they finally had sex. When you factor in the Dead Lesbian trope, it’s worse. While I don't think The 100 writers ever intended to imply "sex = death," it ended up coming off that way.It’s also the one place I feel the audience, specifically the "Clexa" fans, were truly manipulated and treated poorly. Because the Clarke and Lexa relationship meant too much to people to not let the audience have some time being happy it was finally being consummated… to share in the afterglow, as it were. And to have Lexa be killed immediately after understandably felt like a huge gut punch after such a euphoric moment.It tied the two events together in a really upsetting way. If Lexa and Clarke had slept together a couple of episodes earlier, with the assumption that they were now truly a couple up until 307, it would have let the audience have that time on its own. But the way it was done just was too turbulent, too extreme, in bringing them to this huge high and this crushing blow within just a few minutes of airtime - “them” including both the characters and viewers.The 100’s showrunner, Jason Rothenberg, has discussed how they considered having them sleep together in both 304 and 306, but ultimately he felt it was too soon, given Clarke had to build her way back to trusting in and mending fences with Lexa again after the way Season 2 ended. Normally, I’d agree... if Lexa was going to be around all season. But given the limited time, I feel they absolutely should have let them get together earlier, because having the sex scene occur immediately before the death scene was the most damaging call here.For me, not at all. The circumstances of Lexa's death aside, “Thirteen” was, in fact, a terrific hour of TV from a continually cool and exciting show that I love - a show that is capable of giving us a character as dynamic as Lexa in the first place. And as much as I adored Lexa, Alycia Debnam-Carey’s performance and the Lexa/Clarke relationship -- and really wish Debnam-Carey had been free to continue on the series -- The 100 is not about Lexa or that relationship and can go on without her without losing its essence. Not to mention, the reveal about Becca, “Alie 2” and how it all tied directly to Lexa was really awesome and thrilling and has me excited to see where it takes us.As I mentioned in my review, it's also well worth noting that Lexa’s actual death scene, after the shooting occurred, was appropriately emotional and beautifully performed by Debnam-Carey and Eliza Taylor. A very touching, suitably impactful goodbye.On the other hand, the pain I see people going through online after losing this character is obviously incredibly genuine and heartfelt and not something that should be dismissed. I can dispassionately say, “Well, it's understandable they killed her off when you look at contract conflict with another series and the resulting availability restrictions,” but that doesn’t change her significance to people, the weight (and, in some cases, true anguish) of her loss or the fact that even while I think her death is very much completely in line with how The 100 works and how many of the show's characters, of all sorts of backgrounds, have ended their story, it still also is another addition to the Dead Lesbian trope.To the LGBTQ fandom who looked at Lexa as important, I can sympathize, but as a straight white male, I wouldn’t dream of saying “I totally get it,” because how could I really? I certainly don’t have to worry about representation or seeing straight while male characters sometimes get a happy ending in fiction. That’s pretty much an every day occurrence and always has been. So while I do think The 100 killing off Lexa “makes sense" and feels tonally consistent with the show overall, that’s coming from my own specific perspective - even as I wonder if had it been handled differently, it might have helped, at least a bit, with how it was received.One thing is for sure… Lexa made a huge impact on The 100 and will not be forgotten.

Eric Goldman is Executive Editor of IGN TV. You can follow him on Twitter at @TheEricGoldman , IGN at ericgoldman-ign and Facebook at Facebook.com/TheEricGoldman