Another Christmas, another devastating episode of a BBC show airs. We’ve taken the liberty of writing a letter to the BBC explaining our feelings about their heart-breaking Christmas traditions.

Dear BBC,

The holiday season is normally filled with cheery songs about bread pudding and Christmas trees, and yet you’ve decided to go a different route. I mean, we all have our holiday traditions, but it seems that you’ve taken happy holiday cheer and said, “Nah, that’s too boring. Happy is so last decade.” We just have one question for you:

We won’t try to understand your evil marketing team and their pain-inducing ideas to make Christmas the saddest day on television, but we just want to know why you let them come up with these sadistic episode air dates, and then approve them!

What have we done to make you hate us so much? Is it the constant fangirling/fanboying? Did we put out too much Johnlock fan fiction? Have we simply gone too far with all of the incredibly detailed (and I mean detailed) NC17 fan art of the Doctor and several companions? Yes, our fandoms might have made you want to tear your eyes out from all of the…creative…original works we put out, and maybe sometimes we deserve some tears shed on Christmas day. But did we deserve this two years in a row?!

You might be in denial. You might be thinking to yourselves, “What? We never hurt you! We’d never do such a thing.” Well, ladies and gentlemen of the BBC, let us refresh your memory: Last year you pulled the meanest move to have ever been pulled by a TV network. We’re talking about the last episode of Merlin–the last one ever.

It was scheduled for Dec 29, a fine and dandy date. A date that we would’ve been totally okay with. And then you went and moved it up to Christmas Eve! What was the conversation like, hm? Did one of your associates go, “Guys, guys, I know Merlin isn’t supposed to end until the 29th, but I don’t think we’ve really hit that fanbase hard yet. Let’s change it to Christmas Eve!” Who is that associate? Who thought of that horrible idea? Do you realize how many tears were shed over that finale that night? We’re still getting over that one. No joke. It’s been a year and the tears haven’t stopped shedding.

The following day on December 25, 2012, another British TV network (ITV) killed off another character on Downton Abbey. Okay, so the BBC wasn’t responsible for this one. But given that you’ve already made the general audience cry on Christmas Eve, some cooperation with ITV would’ve been ideal. After all, they already killed off another huge character earlier that year, so you could’ve gone to them like an older brother to his younger sibling and said, “Hey, guys. You might not want to air that on Christmas. The poor public is going to be in a rut.” But nooo. You just looked on and enjoyed all the tears that were shed on both days. Over in America, we have a GIF that just appropriately sums up British TV’s idea of making Christmas sad:

And then there’s this year. Oh, BBC. Or should we blame Steven Moffat? Technically Moffat at least made up for it with the Sherlock Christmas special, which was totally and completely happy and not at all sadistic or upsetting. You might be able to learn something from Sherlock, there. When families gather around their TVs this evening after a day filled with presents and Christmas crackers, their happiness will turn into fear (from all the monsters included in this year’s Doctor Who special), and then their fear will turn into complete sadness. Sadness from losing a Doctor that we’ve all grown to love. At least we’ll be able to mourn properly, and Peter Capaldi won’t be showing up on TV until August. But still.

We love you ever so much, BBC. Truly! We thank you from the bottom of our hearts for the shows and fandoms you’ve helped create over the years, and without you there’d be less adventure in our lives. But with all of the gratitude we have, admittedly there’s also some anger. Anger that you’d betray us every year with the saddest episodes of all time. We’re hoping that next year you decide to go the happy route and not air a huge death or series finale, but with the streak you’ve got going, we wouldn’t be surprised if you did!

From all of us at Hypable to you at the BBC, Merry Christmas! Now…where are the tissues?

Sincerely, with tears in our eyes,
Hypable.com