Can a popular TV show continue after losing its main character?

With the slew of sexual harassment allegations in the past few months, audiences have seen two popular television shows, Transparent and House of Cards, lose their main character in a public and disgraceful manner. However, due to the popularity of both shows, both Netflix and Amazon have decided to continue producing the programmes despite the loss of the titular characters.

But what happens next? Without the main character that the audience has learnt to connect to, a figure whose story has been explored in the successive season, how does a TV show carry on?

One way of continuing the shows is to shift the focus onto a secondary character. In the case of House of Cards, if the writers were planning on following the source material, Spacey’s character was supposed to die and the show would serve as launch pad for Claire Underwood to become the main focus. This, however, can only work for other shows if the writers have taken the time to write a strong and likeable secondary character that can shift attention away from the missing main character.

A TV show without its main character loses its way of telling a story through one focal lens and risks becoming a narrative comprised of poorly developed stories

A second option is to forgo telling one character’s story and have a group of actors contributing to one master narrative. The Vampire Diaries after losing one of its most popular actors followed this technique and chose not to replace the main character, instead focusing on the other vampires working as a team to fight a villain.

The problem with this framework is that audiences do not have a relatable character. Main characters are there to represent the audience; they are the link that a viewer becomes attached to so they chose to come back every week to watch on. A TV show without its main character loses its way of telling a story through one focal lens and risks becoming a narrative comprised of poorly developed stories.

The showrunners are going to be hard-pressed to find actors who can successfully take their place without the differences being glaringly obvious

The most straightforward way of dealing with this issue is just to ignore it, find an actor that vaguely resembles your main character and see what happens. The advantages to this are that it involves the least amount of effort, the main story can continue as planned without changing anything. Although the audience is bound to take notice, if the replacement is cast correctly, the change could be an advantage. However, both Kevin Spacey and Jeffery Tambor are award-winning actors in their respective roles with distinct and recognisable acting styles. The showrunners are going to be hard-pressed to find actors who can successfully take their place without the differences being glaringly obvious.

House of Cards and Transparent won’t be the first shows to attempt to carry on after losing their leads. However successfully the shows decide to work around the loss of their main character, I will be watching to give support to the production teams who had the moral integrity to part with sexual harassers regardless of the effect that decision will have on their TV shows.