Finally Charlie Sheen dies

Spoiler Alert

As most fans expected, the season premiere of Two and a Half Men started with a bang, in the form of a funeral. Charlie Sheen’s loosely based character, Charlie Harper, was killed off after he slipped in front of a train in Paris and, as his mentally unstable fiancé explained, “exploded like a balloon full of meat.”  His ashes were later shipped to his Malibu home where his brother, Alan (Jon Cryer), proceeded to drop them.  Through that mist of ashes, Waldon Schmidt (Ashton Kutcher) entered and season nine began.

Let’s face it—we needed Charlie to die (the character that is) in order for the “show to go on” and separate itself from the real life antics of Sheen.  And while the fictional funeral was, in many ways, necessary, they way it was handled felt a little off-putting.  Was it really necessary for his former girlfriends to bicker about venereal diseases in front of the commemorative coffin?  Did his mother have to advertise the house before the funeral was over?  Perhaps it was appropriate in order to stay true to the characters and humorous nature of the show, but the customary background laughter seemed to push the tone from funny to crass.

Pushing the boundaries (or lack thereof) further, Charlie Harper’s replacement entered the show after attempting to commit suicide, which was promptly mocked as well.  This raises some interesting questions about the treatment of death and end-of-life scenarios in popular sitcoms.  Does it make the issue easier to handle or does it oversimplify the complexities of death and dying?  Just when the show started to enter an intimate moment between Alan and his brother’s ashes, the sensitivity was quickly extinguished by Waldon’s random entrance through the balcony.  More than anything, there seemed to be a bitterness pervading the show that lacked the solely upbeat tone the show previously had with Sheen.

In a surprising and dramatic departure from fictional Charlie, Sheen (who was once fueling a media frenzy) has been toning down his public persona via calm, articulate interviews with Matt Lauer, a gracious speech at the Emmys, and even Twitter posts of him hugging Ashton Kutcher. We can all say goodbye to tiger blood, Adonis DNA, the goddesses, and public displays of drunkenness because it appears as though Sheen has made a personal one-eighty.  Although he is still winning, the trademark motto has taken on a new sobriety since he is now an “unemployed winner” (as his Twitter profile states).  In his most recent interview on the Today Show, he said he is now “spending more time with his kids, mending fences with Denise and Brooke, trying to move forward, and prioritizing what matters.”  On an E! News Exclusive interview, he poked fun at himself, saying, “I realized I was pretty much losing.”

In all seriousness, Sheen seems genuinely apologetic and newly introspective.  His new show on Comedy Central, “Roast of Charlie Sheen,” lets a host of celebrities take jabs at Sheen’s past behavior, which seems to provide a cathartic experience for both him and his fans.  By removing himself from his party animal image, Sheen is also removing himself from Two and a Half Men and allowing for the show to start anew.  Unlike the slightly cynical tone of the show’s premiere, Sheen seems to have successfully separated himself from the show’s past in a positive and constructive way.  With Charlie Sheen moving on, we can all move on and expect to see great work from him and the show he once inspired.