By Meg Jorsh

Copyright dailystar

A classic Coronation Street character is set to be killed off in the new year, as the Daily Star reported this week. Now fans are going wild trying to work out who might be up for the chop. Surely it couldn’t be someone important, like Ken Barlow (William Roache) or Leanne Battersby (Jane Dansen)? But then, it wouldn’t be the first time a TV show has dispatched a central character… Crown and out: If there’s one show that can’t get enough of bumping off major stars, it’s HBO fantasy epic Game of Thrones . Fans were gobsmacked when King Joffrey (Jack Gleeson) was poisoned by his new wife’s granny at their blood-soaked wedding feast. And that’s after Ned Stark (Sean Bean) got beheaded. Crazy train: Can a show really carry on after the star has an extremely public meltdown? Two and A Half Men did – for a while, at least. Just before Charlie Sheen claimed to be a “warlock” with “tiger blood” in 2011, his character was unceremoniously hit by a train. Ashton Kutcher replaced him for another three series. Remembering Rita: Throughout US crime drama Dexter, we were rooting for Rita (Julie Benz). The kind-hearted single mum, who dated, then married Michael C. Hall’s vigilante serial killer, always seemed like his best chance of a normal life. Until she wound up dead in a bathtub full of blood. Now and Den: No-one could say “Dirty” Den Watts didn’t have it coming. The EastEnders baddie was a lying, cheating career criminal who was violent and cruel to the women in his life. But it still came as a shock when his second wife Chrissie bludgeoned him to death in 2005. Not so big: When fashion icon Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) married on-off lover Mr Big, her story was tied up in a big, sparkly bow. The Sex and the City stars would skip off into the sunset, never to brave the New York dating scene again. Until Big (Chris Noth) died of a heart attack in the very first episode of spin-off And Just Like That… Let Downton: When Lady Sybil (Jessica Brown Findlay) passed away, Downton Abbey fans were gutted. The toff had won hearts with her progressive politics and marriage to former chauffeur Tom Branson. But like so many women of the 1920s, she couldn’t survive childbirth. Omar gone: For fans of The Wire, Omar Little (Michael K. Williams) was the coolest thing on telly. The charismatic stick-up man made his living robbing gangsters, but refused to harm “civilians”. He was finally shot by child drug dealer Kenard (Thuliso Dingwall). Power trip: Blonde bombshell Edie Britt (Nicollette Sheridan) was a one of the best-known characters on Desperate Housewives. But fans had a real shock (sorry) when her car hit a pylon and she ended up getting electrocuted. According to rumour, it came after Sheridan had “creative differences” with the show’s writers. Forever young: The chaotic cast of comedy The Young Ones never did things by halves. So it makes sense that all four of them died in the final episode, when their bus hit a Cliff Richard billboard and plunged over a cliff.