SPOILER ALERT: The below contains spoilers about the new episode right from the off so if you’d rather avoid, don’t scroll down.
ROSEANNE BARR’S EPONYMOUS character has been killed off by an opioid overdose, the first episode of the replacement sitcom revealed Tuesday, after the actress was fired for a racist tweet.
The new ABC show The Conners still centres around a straight-talking working class American family struggling to make ends meet.
But Barr’s character has been written out, dead from an overdose of painkillers she took for a knee injury.
Barr’s original show was abruptly axed in May after she went on a Twitter rant in which she compared Valerie Jarrett, a black former advisor to president Barack Obama, to an ape.
The actress apologised but it was in vain. She tried to justify herself saying she had written the tweet while under the influence of the sleep-inducing medicine Ambien.
Barr linked to a statement via her official Twitter account yesterday evening which said the method of her character’s death “lent an unnecessary grim and morbid dimension to an otherwise happy family show”.
“After repeated and heartfelt apologies, the network was unwilling to look past a regrettable mistake, thereby denying the twin American values of both repentance and forgiveness,” the statement added.
She also tweeted separately: “I ain’t dead, bitches!!!!”
ABC had initially cancelled the show altogether but then came up with the idea of doing it without Barr.
Her husband is still played by John Goodman and the action starts three weeks after her funeral.
Barr in real life and on the show is a supporter of President Donald Trump.
Trump publicly weighed in on the cancellation of Barr’s show but did not condemn her tweet.
The first episode addresses the opioid crisis in America. In 2016 a total of 42,249 people died of overdoses, according to the Centers for Disease Control.
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