It's that time of year again when our beloved television shows wrap up the year with fast-paced, action-filled season finales--and we all know what that means: a whole lot of people are about to die.

Ending the season with a bang--sometimes literally--has now become an age-old formula for television producers, and with good reason.

How do television producers and writers generate hype and excitement for the coming season? Promise something "unexpected" and "unbelievable." What do they do that viewers would never expect or believe? Kill someone. Or abduct a baby.

Some may be fatally wounded or in comas or, worse yet, pregnant, but you can pretty much rest assured that someone on your favorite TV show is about to be killed, eaten, drowned or some combination of the above.

I used to think this formula applied only to the heavy dramas or action/adventures, but even the teen soap operas are beginning to succumb to the norm.

"The O.C.," for example, ended up killing off someone, although this doesn't surprise me much. Trey had to leave the show one way or another. I personally thought Marissa would be the one to get shot just because she really got abused this season (alcoholism, attempted rape, bruises, head wound from club shooting, etc.) and so one more bullet probably wouldn't have made a big difference.

As for "One Tree Hill," no one actually died, but writers made up for it with child abductions, Dan trying to deport Karen's boyfriend to Australia, Karen throwing a chair through Dan's office window, Peyton finding out the woman hitting on her is actually her mom, and Haley filing for divorce from Nathan.

On a side note, I can handle the stealing of the babies and the deportations and even the slutty stalker woman turning out to be Peyton's mom<\p>--<\p>but the divorce? I can't believe Haley and Nathan are quitting after barely a year of marriage. Just because she's trying to pursue some kind of singing career and they're still in high school doesn't mean anything. You could have at least made it through sophomore year, guys.

What surprised me the most, though, was that even "Gilmore Girls" got intense. While other shows deal with abductions, rapes, high school pregnancy scares and fatal car accidents, the biggest drama on "Gilmore Girls" is whether or not Rory got into Yale or whether Logan will get along with Rory's mom. In a rare move for the WB, there are no sudden illegitimate children. But this season the network stepped it up a notch and ended with Rory not going back to Yale and moving in with her grandparents. That's about as close to killing someone as it gets on "Gilmore Girls."

Now, I haven't seen a lot of season finales yet (I plan to catch up this weekend), but if even WB shows are resorting to killing off people for season finales, I can only imagine what the real drama<\p>/<\p>action show finales will be like.

I haven't seen the "Lost" season finale yet, but with the commercials showing the castaways going out on a raft in an attempt to escape the island, someone is bound to get eaten. Probably by the monster, but I wouldn't put it past John Locke to eat that little kid with the dog. They're just asking for it. I hope nothing happens to Clare's baby, though. I can't handle more than one baby abduction this season.

As for "Alias"--I don't know. I stopped watching it after that clone killed off Marcy. That was so unrealistic.

Perhaps even the reality shows will jump on the bandwagon and, say, kill the winner of the contest. I would certainly watch American Idol more often if each week the contestants faced not elimination but death. It would be a nice throwback to gladiatorial fights. Very retro, don't you think?

But until television reaches that point, let's enjoy the huge cliffhangers and mourn the losses of those expendable characters. Hopefully, our beloved characters will be able to make it through another season alive.

If you wish the makers of "The O.C." had killed off that stupid Marissa along with Trey, e-mail Shivani at shivanis@stanford.edu.