The Wire killed off a lot of its iconic characters in shocking and tragic ways throughout its run, and the deaths always caught audiences by surprise. In the Golden Age of Television, it became common for gritty TV dramas to kill their darlings. Shows like Breaking Bad and Game of Thrones disregarded the concept of plot armor and killed off characters who seemed safe. But they usually depict death in a heightened, overly dramatic way that feels disingenuous to the morbid chaos of mortality. Very few shows have dealt with death as realistically as The Wire.

In the hands of David Simon and his brilliant team of writers, The Wire is a journalistic study of the American city. Throughout The Wire’s best characters met a horrifically grim fate.

10 Stringer Bell

Stringer Bell was one of The Wire’s best episodes, two of his enemies team up to get the better of him. Omar and Brother Mouzone corner Stringer in the property he’s developing. As they approach him from either side, he has no way out. Stringer had always managed to evade the people who wanted him dead until he tricked one and pitted them against another, paving the way for an unlikely alliance.

9 Proposition Joe

Proposition Joe is one of the only characters from in and around the drug trade who appears in every season of The Wire. He was so powerful and so widely respected that he seemed to be safe from getting killed off. But in this show, no one is truly safe from an untimely death. Joe unwittingly sowed the seeds of his own demise with his duplicitous double-dealing. Marlo couldn’t trust him anymore, so in season 5, episode 4, “Transitions,” he went over Joe’s head, set up a new supply deal, and had Chris assassinate Joe.

8 Bodie

Bodie was one of the most disciplined dealers in The Wire, and he remained loyal to the Barksdale Organization even as it was falling apart, so it seemed like he would be okay. But in the season 4 finale, “Final Grades,” his principles became his downfall. When Chris and Snoop came to his corner to kill him, Poot urged him to flee, but Bodie refused to abandon his territory and engaged them in a shootout. He might’ve had a fighting chance against Chris and Snoop, but he didn’t anticipate O-Dog coming up behind him.

7 Glekas

All throughout season 2, Ziggy Sobotka is pushed around and underestimated by everyone, from his co-workers to local gangsters to his illicit business associates. In season 2, episode 10, “Storm Warnings,” when he’s finally had enough of being pushed around, he decides to push back. After Glekas cuts his share of their loot and laughs off his protests, Ziggy comes back with a gun and shoots him dead. But once the heat of the moment has ed, he’s wracked with guilt, has an emotional breakdown, and instantly turns himself in. It’s similar to the Schofield Kid’s tragic arc in Unforgiven.

6 D'Angelo Barksdale

In the first season of The Wire, D’Angelo Barksdale played the part of the everyman. He was a mid-level lieutenant in the Barksdale Organization whose conscience got in the way of his criminal activities. In season 2, episode 6, “All Prologue,” Stringer grows concerned that Dee will inform on the gang and has a contract killer strangle him to death in prison and stage the scene as a suicide (which convinces everyone except McNulty). The most heartbreaking thing is that, when Dee’s mother suggested he become an informant, he refused, so Stringer’s paranoia was unfounded.

5 Frank Sobotka

In season 2, episode 11, “Bad Dreams,” after Ziggy gets himself into trouble, his dad Frank Sobotka decides to put his son’s wellbeing above his ambitions for the docks. Frank is last seen approaching The Greek and Vondas for a meeting under the Francis Scott Key Bridge. Unbeknownst to Frank, The Greek has been tipped off that Frank has become a police informant, so it’s highly unlikely that he’ll survive the meet. The season finale kicks off with the horrifying sight of Frank’s mutilated corpse — with a disturbingly deep severed-throat wound — being recovered from the harbor.

4 Snoop

Snoop was one of the most terrifying killers in The Wire, so it was a huge surprise to see someone else get the drop on her. As Snoop planned a hit against Michael in the penultimate episode, “Late Editions,” Michael figured it out and turned the tables on her. He took the clean gun she had stashed at the hit’s location and killed her during the ride over. The way she calmly accepts her fate makes the whole situation even more chilling, and she has maybe the most iconic final words in the entire series: “How’s my hair look, Mike?”

3 Wallace

Michael B. Jordan scored one of his earliest roles as 16-year-old drug dealer Wallace in the first season of The Wire. Wallace’s story was used to tragically illustrate how hard it is to get out of the game once you’re in. Throughout the season, Wallace grows a conscience in the face of all the violence around him and, out of guilt, goes to the police. On Stringer’s orders, in season 1, episode 12, “Cleaning Up,” Bodie and Poot kill their young ward. There’s no quicker way for a TV show to shock its audience than to kill off a kid.

2 Sherrod

Throughout the show’s fourth season, Bubbles had two major story arcs: getting harassed by a bully and taking troubled youth Sherrod under his wing. In season 4, episode 12, “That’s Got His Own,” those two storylines collided in a heartbreaking twist. Bubbles decided to get rid of his bully by replacing the drugs he would steal with sodium cyanide. His tormentor never got a hold of the poison, but Sherrod did. Seeing Bubbles weep over Sherrod’s body, realizing his death is his fault and it was easily avoidable, is one of The Wire’s most harrowing images.

1 Omar Little

The death of Omar Little is one of the most perfect scenes in The Wire. All throughout the series, Omar robbed from every drug dealer in the city. He made enemies out of just about every notorious criminal in Baltimore, but he managed to evade them all for almost the entire run of the show. Surviving “one day at a time” as he made a living from stolen drug funds, Omar managed to stay alive for an impressive 15 years. He made it in and out of prison without getting killed, and he even safely returned from Puerto Rico.

But in season 5, episode 8, “Clarifications,” Omar’s life of crime finally caught up to him as he was shot dead in a convenience store. But he wasn’t killed by any of his powerful long-time enemies — even after he’d started publicly taunting Marlo to tempt him into a showdown — and it wasn’t a triumphant blaze-of-glory moment. He’s unceremoniously gunned down by 10-year-old dealer Kenard. The Wire had a lot of shocking death scenes, but killing off its most formidable, badass character in such an unglorified way is the most shocking of the bunch.