The Five Stages of Grief

The last trope that helps tell a Coming of age story is The Five Stages of Grief meaning dealing with a loss having firsthand experiences with physical or mental types of death. Like in BH90210 Dylan McKay's character gets married to another character but in a twisted turn of events, his bride is gunned down the day after their wedding. Making this one of the happiest days and the worst days of his life. Now all of this happens in one episode, so you don't see Dylan experience all of the stages of grief at once. But by the end of the episode, he leaves Beverly hills to find himself as he becomes a husband and widow all in one day. In DC when Dawson's dad dies this becomes more heartbreaking to him because of the way he and his dad left things. They get into a fight as fathers and sons tend to do sometimes saying things, they don't mean only this time he doesn’t get the chance to apologize. You start to ask a question like How can I ever apologize? There were so many things I said that I didn’t mean.

In OTH there's a school shooting that affects all the characters in the show but no one like Lucas. The shooting is caused by this kid named Jimmy that Lucas used to be friends with but as the years went Lucas and Jimmy drifted apart. The shooting ends with Jimmy committing suicide but in a twisted turn of events Lucas also loses his uncle Keith but it wasn't Jimmy who killed him. Keith dies at the hands of his brother Dan who is Lucas's father. As the two people that were apart of Lucas's life die together Lucas's stages of grief are more heartbreaking than anything else. And finally, on The O.C Ryan loses the love of his life Marissa in the third season finale of The O.C Ryan and Marissa finally get back together after being apart for most of the season. They finally reunite but tragically Marissa dies in a car accident which is caused by her drug-addicted ex-boyfriend. Marissa spent her final moments in the love of her life arm's she knew she was going to die so she didn't waste a second of it. In those final you see Ryan grieve Marissa as he holds her lifeless body in his arms the grieving process for him starts because he now knows that Marissa was the first real love of his life the first we loved and how actually loved him back. As you look at these examples you start to think about the losses you have encountered whether there big or small. You often ask yourself "Why did this happen to me? Or you start to think about the regrets you have and what you can change now.