ALINA

both characters underwent huge character arcs that changed them to a point where the early season versions of them seemed unrecognisable.

both are main characters who were killed off in the final season in an ‘anyone can die’ situation. both were expected to go out in a blaze of glory and instead got nonsensical, underwhelming, cold and unfitting endings.

their deaths seemed to serve unrelated purposes. root’s death was arguably a case of fridging, while to some degree villanelle’s death ties into hyping up another character’s spin-off series. 

the showrunners for both shows described their deaths as them ‘transcending’, and didn’t seem to grasp how the characters had changed, how the story should’ve reflected that and therefore why fans weren’t happy.

both fandoms speculated for weeks that the character had faked their death and that there was some upcoming content that would prove it. because until this point (with some very notable exceptions) the writing for both shows had been of a consistently high quality.