Fictional Feelings: Why we get so sad over the death of fictional characters in books and movies

I’ll never forget the devastating loss I felt on the colorful rug of my fourth grade classroom when Charlotte from Charlotte’s Web died. I remember going home after hours of mourning with my classmates and bawling to my mom about how the poor spider died when she hadn’t done anything wrong. It took a while for my 10-year-old brain to grasp the fact that Charlotte wasn’t a real spider — she was just a character in a book.

Though it seems silly, this sadness is valid and the result of our brains forming a bond with fictional characters — especially ones that are described in depth — in a book or movie. The mental relationships with these characters are similar to real relationships with humans and we tend to empathize so deeply with them that we forget they aren’t real. 

We also connect and compare ourselves to our favorite characters. We feel like we know so much about them and have followed them through their hardships, so it’s easy to see a part of our own personalities in that character — when they die, it can feel almost like a part of you has died with them. 

These feelings for fictional characters don’t usually go away as we get older. When Eddie Munson from Stranger Things died, I cried with my whole family for hours over the loss of such an amazing and brave person before finally having to remind myself that he wasn’t real. 

The same thing happens when we feel happy or scared for a character. Whether they have defeated the villain or got married, we feel everything they’re feeling. This explains why some people’s hearts start beating faster when an action scene comes on in a movie or hold their breath during a big decision in a book — it’s like we’re right there with them.

These emotions towards characters and movies are completely healthy and normal as long as they aren’t consuming. It’s okay to mourn the loss of Dobby from Harry Potter or T’Chaka from Black Panther but it’s also important to realize that we’re separate from these characters and we have our own experiences to live through as well.