“Revenge,” a once-promising, deliciously drama-filled ABC primetime series about a woman avenging her father’s death by taking down the rich and famous of the Hamptons, died on Sunday night. It was four seasons old.

Causes of death were nonsensical plot lines; absurd character development; increased Sunday night television competition; and very low ratings.

Debuting in fall 2011, the show was a surprise favorite among TV critics, many of whom were initially hesitant of a campy premise that hinted at lust, violence and anguished cries of “Reveeeenge!” But the series was stocked with compelling story arcs that The Washington Post dubbed “intelligently paced and acted” and “a solid prime-time soap with a burnt-crisp soul.” The Wall Street Journal called it “spellbinding in its satisfyingly gaudy way,” while The Hollywood Reporter went with “intriguing and genuinely fun.” Gawker claimed the series was “the best new show on television.”

[Is your favorite TV show canceled? A guide to what’s renewed and what’s gone for good.]

R.I.P. Victoria (Danny Feld/ABC)

Many accolades were aimed at Madeleine Stowe, the actress who played villain Victoria Grayson, the Hamptons society queen who never met a person she couldn’t terrify with an icy stare. She frequently went to battle with the show’s heroine, Emily Thorne (Emily VanCamp) — the young woman born Amanda Clarke until her father, David Clarke, was falsely accused of terrorism. Framing David was the brainchild of Victoria, even though she was also David’s ex-lover. So Amanda shed her true identity; resurfaced in the Hamptons as a wealthy socialite named Emily; and went to work making life a hell for everyone who ruined her family, particularly Victoria.

Suffice to say: Things got complicated.

“Revenge” was born around 2010, out of a meeting with ABC executives about terrible things happening to rich people, a tantalizing idea in a post-recession era. According to executive producer Wyck Godfrey, his co-producer Marty Bowen went to ABC with the idea of a show set in the Hamptons.

“That world is a very rich place for a soap. And they rightfully said, ‘Yes, but what’s your story engine?'”Godfrey told the Television Critics Association in 2011. “Marty then came up with the idea of doing ‘The Count of Monte Cristo.’ And then someone at the network or the studio said, ‘But do it female.'”

[Revenge across pop culture: Which format is the most violent?]

Using “The Count of Monte Cristo” (Alexander Dumas’s famed take of a wrongfully accused man’s quest for vengeance) as inspiration, the story started out strong. Taking down her enemies one by one, Emily Thorne used her red Sharpie as a weapon as she crossed out the faces who falsely accused her father. She saved her most burning hatred for power couple and main conspirators Victoria and Conrad Grayson, getting engaged to their son, Daniel, as a way to move in and wreak havoc.

While the first season was wildly entertaining to watch Emily on her quest, the second went off the rails fairly quickly with muddled plots; pointless secondary characters; and a murky terrorist organization called The Initiative that we’re not even sure the writers understood.

“Season 2 of ‘Revenge’ has seemed, in comparison to its deftly (and magnificently) plotted first season, a convoluted mess,” The Daily Beast wrote. “Rather than further the central conceit, Emily’s quest for revenge against the Grayson clan…the show has meandered into all manner of narrative trouble.”

Original showrunner Mike Kelley left in Season 2, and exec producer Sunil Nayar took over to salvage the remaining seasons. The series rebounded a bit in Season 3, though a cheap plot twist (David “died in jail” Clarke has been alive this whole time!) didn’t inspire confidence. By Season 4, it was clear Emily Thorne’s increasingly-convoluted journey was over — there were only so many characters that could die and/or fake their own deaths. The writing was on the wall when the show started getting about 5 million viewers a week, a tiny number on Sunday nights.

[‘Revenge’ third season finale goes off the deep end with cheap twist]

In late April, ABC confirmed the May 10 finale would be the final episode: “Everybody understands that as much as we all adore the show, it has hit exactly the mark it needed to to end,” Nayar said.

Emily briefly goes to jail — long story. (Jennifer Clasen/ABC)

During the series finale that aired Sunday, Emily finally acquired the vengeance she had been seeking for years: Though it was actually David Clarke who fired the bullet that killed her nemesis, Victoria Grayson. Emily, who had recently revealed to the world that she was actually Amanda Clarke, married her soulmate, Jack, and the two sailed happily away on a sailboat.

Still, at the end, Emily is shown putting flowers on her father’s grave (he eventually dies of cancer). The camera pans over all the characters who died on her revenge quest, from Victoria to Conrad to Daniel. She then questions her entire mission: And the purpose of the show.

“I know now that revenge brings only darkness,” Emily’s voiceover says for the last time. “I couldn’t see the light until I considered my father’s advice to try and forgive. It’s not easy.”

“Revenge” is survived by ABC’s recently-renewed dramas including “Scandal”; “How to Get Away With Murder”; “Grey’s Anatomy”; “Once Upon a Time”; “Castle” and “Nashville.”

More on The Style Blog:

Why Amy Schumer is officially the new John Oliver

Here’s a shameless post about the new ‘Magic Mike XXL’ trailer because, well, look at it

Miss that ‘Scrubs’ reunion on TV this week? Here’s what happened.

A new location, a new kind-of-undead menace, a rare Drogon sighting, a coming battle for Winterfell and a romance angle that feels completely tacked on. We’re now officially at the halfway point of the season. Here are the five biggest takeaways from Sunday’s episode.

[Related: Alyssa Rosenberg reviews this week’s episode]

1. Is Khaleesi back? It seems like it’s been ages since Daenerys has been a strong and decisive leader, let alone the badass who dominated previous seasons. But ordering her dragons to burn someone to death on command is a good way to get some of her swagger back. This flammable moment comes about because Daenerys has got to do something to deal with the latest Sons of the Harpy attack that left Ser Barristan Selmy (along with many Unsullied) dead and Grey Worm wounded.

She rounds up the leaders of the wealthy Meereenese families — which includes the ever-shifty Hizdahr zo Loraq — and marches them down to where Rhaegal and Viserion are still in chains. But Daenerys has not given up on them. “A good mother never gives up on her children. She disciplines them if she must. But she does not give up on them.” And with that, it’s incinerating time. Hizdahr and the rest that were led into the dungeon are spared — a dragon can only eat so much in one night, or something — but Khaleesi’s point has been made. And doesn’t she just seem so much more powerful and in control when speaking Valyrian?

[Last week’s recap, season 5 episode 4]

Things are looking bleak for Hizdahr, who escaped death by crisping but is still being imprisoned. When Daenerys goes to visit him in his cell, he immediately gets on his knees to beg for his life. But Daenerys isn’t there for vengeance, she’s there to apologize. He was right about tradition and right about the fighting pits. So those will be reopening soon, for everyone’s officially-sanctioned bloodlust pleasure. But that’s not her only order of business with Hizdahr. Daenerys feels like she must forge a lasting bond with the land she rules and the best way to do that is to marry the leader of an ancient family. And there happens to be one on his knees already.

With word spreading around the Seven Kingdoms that she’s losing control of her stronghold (thanks to a little Samwell/Aemon exposition for this bit of info) it makes sense that Daenerys would look to consolidate her power where she is currently ruling before taking on the greater Seven Kingdoms.

[Season 5, episode 3 recap]

Tyrion somehow escaped greyscale infection. (Courtesy HBO)

2. Don’t take shortcut advice from Jorah Mormont Jorah Mormont continues on his journey to Meereen with his captive/offering to Daenerys — Tyrion Lannister. It’s not the most interesting boat trip: Long Sullen Silences and An Occasional Punch in the Face is how Tyrion accurately describes their journey. (I believe that was also the name of an early Modest Mouse album if I’m not mistaken.) And worse yet, there’s no wine.

One way to add some action is to take the sea less traveled and sail through old Valyria. Pirates that may be lurking elsewhere won’t find them there, but there’s still the matter of The Doom, a sort of local extinction event that wrecked the ancient city and everyone and everything within it (including all the dragons). Tyrion and Jorah talk to each other/inform the viewers of the mighty history of Valyria (“For thousands of years the Valyrians were the best in the world at almost everything and then…” “And then they weren’t.”) As they row into the ruins, they are greeted with an incredible sight — Drogon, soaring above his ancestral home.

The awe is short-lived, though, because a few moments later it’s like somebody changed the channel to “The Walking Dead.” Last week, when Stannis told Shireen about how she overcame her greyscale, he noted that many told him he should send her off to Valyria to live out her days there with others who were afflicted with the disease that caused skin disorders and rabid, animalistic behavior. So we know it’s functioning as basically a leper colony, but we didn’t know that these so-called Stone Men acted basically like zombies in their single-minded plan of attack. Jorah and Tyrion’s boat is attacked by a handful of these beasts, whose skin-to-skin touch can result in infection. Jorah fights a few off and Tyrion would love to defend himself but his hands are tied. Literally. In order to escape one, he throws himself overboard but then gets dragged into the deep…

Except he doesn’t. Tyrion wakes up on the shore, with savior Jorah kneeling over him. Tyrion says none of them touched him (although how could he really know what happened under the water?) and seems generally relieved to be alive. The two still have quite a journey ahead of them, and it might have to be on foot, but Jorah as bigger problems. He didn’t make it away from the Stone Men unharmed — there are signs of greyscale on his wrist. And he’s keeping it quiet for now.

Aemon Targaryen (Peter Vaughan) is the last of his name … or is he? With Samwell Tarly (John Bradley). (Courtesy HBO)

3. Stannis is marching on Winterfell It’s crowded at The Wall, but things will soon thin out. You’ve got Stannis and his army; you’ve got the Wildlings being held captive; and you’ve got the Night’s Watch, the permanent residents. As Sam and Maester Aemon Targaryen read their mail and get caught up on Daenerys’s struggles half a world away, it leaves Aemon to lament that he’s “just a Targaryen alone in the world.” At that moment, in walks Jon Snow. If you’re one for reading into things, then have a ball with that one. Jon has come to Aemon for advice and Aemon’s advice is pretty simple. “Kill the boy.” For once in this heartless universe, that’s not a literal command but a metaphorical one. Jon Snow must become all man.

Jon’s next order of business is to check in with Tormund Giantsbane, the de factor leader of the Free Folk, post-Mance. He won’t claim to be their leader, especially as he stands there talking to Jon Snow while in chains. Jon wants to put the past behind them — all 8,000 years of bloody battles and oaths to kill each other — because that’s just what you have to do when faced with the prospect of being invaded by an army of the undead. It’s a pretty logical argument, give him that. “Make peace to save your people,” Jon pleads.

But it won’t just be that easy to convince Tormund to join forces. Tormund demands that Jon go with him on his mission to round up the Folks. This little adventure will take them to Hardhome, right on up by Storrold’s Point, because you didn’t have enough locations to keep track of already.

Jon’s decision is met with general disapproval by the rest of the Night’s Watch. Jon responds with the very reasonable, but remember that whole Army of the Devil thing. Somehow this doesn’t convince everyone. Poor little Olly thinks it’s a trick and that the real end-game is to slaughter the Free Folk like they slaughter Olly’s family. “I know this is hard for you, but winter is coming,” Jon tells Olly.

Stannis has been making the rounds this whole time, just observing. A good king observes. He makes his way to the library, where Sam is poring through the books trying to learn more about what can kill a White Walker. Stannis tells Sam a quick story about how Randall Tarly, Sam’s father, was the only person to ever beat Robert Baratheon in a battle. Stannis has heard about Sam’s feat of killing a Walker and wants to know just how it is that Dragonglass can prove fatal to the undead. Perhaps with some more time spent with the books, Sam will stumble upon the answer.

But for now, Stannis must take leave of The Wall. Davos is a bit puzzled by the decision, thinking it best for Jon Snow to return with the Wildling reinforcements. Stannis quickly waives off this advice; who knows if Jon is coming back and who knows when he’s coming back? They will march at sunrise, says Stannis. And his wife and daughter will be coming along for the ride, which somewhat concerns Davos, which somewhat concerns me. If anything happens to Shireen… Before riding off, Melisandre finds Jon and locks eyes with him one last time, giving him some of that “don’t you forget about me” look.

[Season 5, episode 1 recap]

Shireen Baratheon will march with her father to Winterfell. (Courtesy HBO)

4. Ramsay Bolton: still quite deranged, thank you very much Ramsay is almost too cartoonish to really hate. Somehow his brand of smiling sadism is kind of bringing some levity to this show. His knack for making every single scene he’s in uncomfortable to watch is almost starting to reach Michael Scott levels. (Theon is Toby in this comparison, obviously.) Really, Iwan Rheon is just doing a version of Alex from “A Clockwork Orange,” but I digress…

In the Bolton’s Winterfell, Ramsay’s favorite plaything, Myranda, is very naked, very angry and very jealous. She can’t stand that Ramsay is going to marry Sansa, but Ramsay attempts to console her with the fact that he’ll still have plenty of time for Myranda on his wedding night. That works out great for her — all of the crazy guy, none of the societal advancement. She threatens that maybe she’ll marry, too, tries to hit him and that makes him angry, which knowing this guy just turns him on. They kiss, she bites his lip, drawing blood and that’s what passes for romance between these two.

Cut to Sansa, who is literally just sitting in a room doing nothing. Her handmaiden walks in with a message, sent by Brienne, who’s staying with Podrick at the Best Western up the road. The handmaiden says that if Sansa is ever in trouble, just go light a candle in the highest window. Honestly, that doesn’t seem all that convenient, but you pay a certain price for secrecy. When Sansa goes to look at what we can presume to be the highest window in Winterfell, we immediately recognize it — that’s where Bran was pushed to his almost-death after capturing Jaime and Cersei in the middle of things.

As Sansa stands there, she’s greeted by Myranda, who plays nice, before she doesn’t. She introduces herself as the kennel master’s daughter, compliments her dress and then sends Sansa into the kennels for a surprise. For some reason, Sansa agrees to walk into the dark place that houses dozens of vicious barking dogs at the advice of this clearly-mental woman she just met. If Sansa is going to rule the North one day, she’s going to have to work on her decision making. There at the end of the kennel, curled up in a fetal position, is Theon. Sansa is disgusted at the sight, for many reasons and storms out.

“You smell particularly ripe this evening,” Ramsay later tells Theon/Reek, in what is probably the line of the night. It’s a precursor to finding out that Theon came into contact with Sansa, which is clearly against the rules. But instead of humiliation, Ramsay offers … forgiveness? At a later dinner, with Roose, his wife Walda, Sansa and Ramsay, humiliation is back on the menu. Theon is summoned and asks Sansa if he’s still angry for killing her brothers (which he didn’t, of course). Ramsay says that he punished him and that he’s not Theon Greyjoy anymore, he’s a new man — “a new person, anyway.”

“Why are you doing this?” Sansa asks, which is truly the perfect question to ask of anything pertaining to Ramsay. After forcing Reek to apologize to Sansa, Ramsay notes that with her entire family dead, Reek is actually the closest thing to living kin that Sana has. He will be the one to give away the bride at their upcoming wedding. Ramsay’s perverted joy is quickly erased with some news from his father — Walda is pregnant and it looks like it will be a boy. For once, Ramsay’s demonic smile disappears as he knows his inheritance is now at risk.

“How can you tell she’s pregnant?” he later asks his father, referring to her already-considerable figure. (Doesn’t that seem like something Michael Scott would do?) Roose has no time for this silliness and tells Ramsay that he disgraced himself at diner. This leads to a discussion about Ramsay’s mother, which is about as charming as expected given these two sickos. Ramsay was conceived as his father raped a woman under the hanging corpse of her husband, which honestly explains a lot. When she returned nine months later, Roose’s instinct was to have her whipped and have the child drowned, but Roose must have been won over by Ramsay’s psychotic newborn eyes. This story somehow serves as an effective pep talk; Roose says that Stannis has an army, is after the Iron Throne and that will take him through Winterfell. Ramsay commits to helping his father defeat Stannis.

5. Can anyone really be invested in a Missandei/Grey Worm love storyline? What Nicholas Sparks movie were these two airdropped in from? “I was afraid not of death … I fear I never again see Missandei from the isle of Naath.” Oh, Grey Worm. Maybe those are the painkillers talking? They were able to get dude some painkillers, right? He got stabbed right in the chest.

Next week: A return to King’s Landing, our first season five glimpse of Olenna Tyrell and maybe something interesting will actually happen at the House of Black and White. (Not betting on it.)

During “The Good Wife” sixth season finale on Sunday night, attorney Alicia Florrick (Julianna Margulies) and investigator Kalinda Sharma (Archie Panjabi) had a scene together. In the same room.

If you say “who cares?” then you’re not one of the many “Good Wife” viewers wrapped up in one of the most intriguing television mysteries of our time: How is it possible that Alicia and Kalinda — once best friends and major characters whose professional worlds frequently collide — have not shared a scene together in two years? Not that they haven’t spoken: Alicia and Kalinda often talk on the phone in scenes obviously filmed separately. But their characters literally have not been in the same room on screen since the middle of the fourth season.

That is extremely strange: Not only did the characters used to be attached at the hip, but their story lines are so dependent on each other that it has become noticeably bizarre that they no longer interact. Conspiracy theories abound, but one keeps rising to the top: That Margulies and Panjabi hate each other in real life, to the level that they can’t even handle being in the same room on set.

[Will ‘The Good Wife’ be renewed? Creators respond and break down the Season 6 finale.]

Of course, it’s typical Hollywood to blame issues on two actresses not getting along, so let’s get this out of the way: There is no tangible evidence for this feud other than increasingly-loud whispers among the entertainment industry set — but to viewers who have noticed their separation on-screen, it’s become an accepted fact.

Margulies and Panjabi definitely hate each other

PLEASE GOD SOMEONE JUST LEAK THE DETAILS OF THE MARGULIES/PANJABI FEUD ALREADY

And somehow, literally no one ever confirmed said feud.

Are Alicia and Kalinda ever going to do another scene together? They must hate each other in real life. #TheGoodWife

During an interview last week with creators Robert and Michelle King, we asked about the rumors that the actresses don’t like each other, and if they heard fans were questioning how the characters had remained apart for so long.

“I’ve been reading that, too,” Robert King said, adding that the separation has been intentional as a part of the story, and he hoped viewers would enjoy the Alicia-Kalinda moment in the finale. “I think they’ll be happy with the last episode — the last episode goes there.”

And how would he characterize Margulies and Panjabi’s relationship on set? “I would say ‘professional,'” Robert King said.

Over time, this alleged “feud” has simply become some people’s most reasonable explanation for Alicia and Kalinda’s separation that ultimately rings false to fans of the show. It’s a rare blemish on an Emmy-nominated prestige drama largely considered to be one of the best shows on television.

Given that Kalinda’s arc is over (Panjabi already announced she’s not coming back to the show next season) let’s take a deep dive and break down this conspiracy in five steps.

STEP 1: The evidence.

In August 2014, before the beginning of the sixth season, Buzzfeed puts together definitive evidence that Alicia and Kalinda haven’t interacted since Season 4, Episode 14. The story points out how that doesn’t make much sense, considering how close the two characters used to be. Though some fans may have noticed before, this brings the issue to the mainstream.

STEP 2: The reasoning and denials.

Some fan sites and blogs go deep into the conspiracy theory. In October 2014, this extensive blog post sums up quotes given by “The Good Wife” creators Robert and Michelle King, along with Margulies, for the reasons why Alicia and Kalinda stopped physically interacting. A key fact to note is that Margulies, in addition to being the main star, is also a producer, giving her decision-making power.

The Kings and Margulies explain it doesn’t make sense for Alicia and Kalinda to be pals because Kalinda once slept with Alicia’s husband, Peter (Chris Noth). That’s true: Kalinda confessed this at the end of Season 2, and hey, even in fictional TV world, that’s not something you bounce back from easily. Still, by Season 3, the characters had largely made up. Then suddenly, in the middle of Season 4, they stopped appearing together.

Margulies tells The Huffington Post that the friendship between the two characters was “played out,” and “To bring it back would be going backwards instead of moving forward.” When Robert King is asked by The Daily Beast about Margulies’s comments, he talks around the issue at first but eventually says, “We won’t get into a public fight with Julianna on this because she knows this character almost better than anyone.”

In other words, it appears that Margulies helped make the call on killing the Alicia-Kalinda friendship for good. Before this season’s finale, the Kings reiterate the only reason for the split was for the good of the plot.

“I think we stumbled into part of a good idea, which was the longer they were apart, the more the audience wanted to see them together. People noticed after a while and there was an urge, this hunger,” Robert King said to TV Guide. “I think that’s always a good thing. But that wasn’t the intent. the intent was after the revelation of Kalinda sleeping with Peter … I think we all — the actresses, the writers  — felt like we were trying to get over that problem too easily in Season 3.”

STEP 3. The on-screen fakery.

Oddly, the show continues to pretend the characters are still in the same world, having them talk on the phone or by obvious seperately-filmed shots. (When their close friend Will Gardner died a shocking death, Alicia and Kalinda only talked on the phone.) In the third-to-last episode of this season, Kalinda just misses Alicia at her apartment and left her a note before leaving town. When Alicia read the note, she breaks down crying, interpreted by many as devastation at losing her friend.

After that episode, TV critics Alan Sepinwall and Daniel Fienberg blast the producers on their HitFix.com podcast for letting two stars’ apparent dislike of each other impact major story lines of a show — and criticize the writers for “manipulating” the audience into empathizing with two characters who clearly haven’t been on screen together in years.

“Margulies’s refusal to work with Panjabi, or vice versa, or both, whatever happened there — which they have done a remarkable job of keeping a lid on because you would think someone, somewhere would have leaked something over the years — it’s hurt the show and it’s certainly hurt Kalinda,” said Sepinwall, who noted he couldn’t remember the last time something like this has happened on television on such a high-profile show.

Listen to Fienberg’s rant in its entirety here, but here’s a portion:

I was really upset by how they handled [that scene]. Don’t pretend that we have to care because we are little simplistic children who you can yank around and manipulate. I know these two characters have nothing to do with each other, because you’ve never put them on the screen at the same time before. You have allowed a petty conflict between your leading lady and your Emmy-winning co-star to dictate the way you’ve told stories for a year and a half.

STEP 4: Acknowledgement/wink at the viewers.

In the much-anticipated Kalinda-Alicia reunion Sunday night, Kalinda says goodbye before she skips town to avoid a dangerous drug kingpin that she sent to jail. Their words appeared to speak right to the audience:

“Alicia … I’m not very good at talking, I never have been,” Kalinda says as the two briefly met at a bar over tequila, their old tradition. “But I do need to say this: My time with you as your friend was the best I ever had. And I’m sorry. I’m really sorry that things got messed up.”

Alicia smiles sadly. “I wish we had the chance to do it over again,” she said. Then the two characters acknowledged that they’ll never see each other again. Then Kalinda disappeared.

Worth the wait. #TheGoodWife pic.twitter.com/nUVuljSggy

STEP 5: Truthers.

Every conspiracy theory needs truthers, and that’s what happens Sunday night. Turns out, the Alicia-Kalinda issue is so distracting that viewers don’t really care about the epic reunion. They just want to know if the scene was actually filmed together — many refuse to believe it was real, suspecting CGI trickery.

That last Alicia/Kalinda scene is pathetically obviously green-screened. Makes me sad because the show is better than that. #TheGoodWife

I can't wait for The Good Wife S6 DVD extra Behind the Scenes of the Kalinda/Alicia split-screen scene.

That Kalinda/Alicia scene seemed off. I don't think they were in same room when filming. #TheGoodWife

Maybe they should've hired Peter Jackson to direct that Alicia-Kalinda super VFX scene.

Kalinda/Alicia goodbye was A+ except for the fact that neither crossed the middle of the screen. Didn’t even film together! #TheGoodWife

Hating the faked Alicia/Kalinda scene. Couldn't they really film together? Unsatisfying as fat free ice cream. #TheGoodWife

Panjabi deflect questions about the lack of Alicia interaction over the last two years, telling Entertainment Weekly, “I think that’s a question you need to ask the producers.”

However, Panjabi said, “What is great is that relationship between the two women is one of the best relationships on TV, in terms of it being the most honest.”

READ MORE:

Matt Czuchry previews biggest episode of an ‘emotionally taxing’ season

‘The Good Wife’ follows shocking death with brutal episode

‘The Good Wife’ kills off major character in truly shocking moment

Chris Burden, first known as a performance artist willing to be shot for his work, later for crafting sculptures that ranged from elaborate working machines to iconic monuments, died of malignant melanoma Sunday at 69.

His death came as a surprise to most, as he had kept his battle largely secret. And it came not long after he finished his most detailed, three-dimensional model of “Xanadu,” a fictitious universe he had hoped to create by incorporating a group of his monumental sculptures.

“He’s been working on that piece for probably a decade and the last things he was working on in the studio were very detailed,” said Paul Schimmel, a close friend and a former chief curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles. “I would hope that the interest and love for Chris would bring this to completion.”

The final piece completed during Mr. Burden’s lifetime will go on display May 18 at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Museum Director Michael Govan learned of Mr. Burden’s death about 20 minutes after he had finished a draft of the wall text for “Ode to Santos-Dumont,” a floating sculpture inspired by the aviation pioneer. The piece, a dirigible with a special motor designed to recreate Dumont’s airship by traveling in a 60-foot circle, will fly in the museum’s Resnick Pavilion for a month.

“He definitely was one of the great artists of his generation and for many reasons,” Govan said of Mr. Burden. “He was not only one of the pioneers of performance art but had an uncanny ability to create sculptures that were sometimes performance, sometimes kinetic.”

Mr. Burden’s performance work, which included being nailed to a Volkswagen, staying in bed for 22 straight days and rolling on fire, largely took place in the first half of the 1970s. But he tired of this approach to art. And in 1975, he had genuinely feared for his safety during a piece at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, detailed in an article Roger Ebert wrote for the Chicago Sun-Times titled, “My God, are they going to leave me here to die?”

“He didn’t like the idea of people saying, ‘Oh, come and do something outrageous,’ ” Schimmel said. “Even relatively early on, he began to distance himself. He would wear a mask. When he went to Tokyo, he would only let one person in the room a time.”

This transformation led to Mr. Burden’s sculptures, ranging from the detailed toyscape of 1981’s “A Tale of Two Cities” to the violent, abstract force of “Beam Drop,” in which steel girders suspended 35 feet in the air by a crane were dropped into a pool of wet cement.

And one of Mr. Burden’s most lasting works sounds, on paper, more like a project undertaken by a deranged admirer of “Antiques Roadshow.” He collected and restored 202 street lamps dating to the 1920s for “Urban Light,” a piece installed at the Wilshire Boulevard entrance of the Los Angeles County Museum in 2008.

So iconic is the piece that the museum sent a one-foot-tall lantern, lit at the push of a button, as an invitation to its 50th anniversary gala in April.

“It’s become a spot for the city, not just for the museum,” Govan said Sunday night. “Long after the museum is closed, those lights are on. My dream is that the museum would be identified by an artwork, not a building, and it’s happened.”

A view of “Urban Light” by Chris Burden. (Rich Polk/Getty Images for LACMA)

Brandeis University spent $2 million in 2014 for a smaller version of the piece, 24 lanterns titled “Light of Reason.” At the time, it served as a symbol of the Rose Art Museum’s recovery after a fumbled — and widely criticized — attempt to sell its prized collection of contemporary art by a previous university administration. Now, the piece is something else, says Rose Director Chris Bedford.

“It’s a point where people congregate, meet and study,” he said. “It’s become our character, our image, and that’s happened in less than a year.“

Mr. Burden was born in Boston and moved to California to earn his undergraduate degree at Pomona College and his master’s at the University of California at Irvine. He lived in Los Angeles, was married to artist Nancy Rubins, and has his work in the collections of the Los Angeles County Museum, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Tate Gallery in London and the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

The New Museum in New York organized a critically acclaimed survey of Mr. Burden, “Extreme Measures,” in 2013.

“The important thing, for him, was for the public to see the connection between his sculpture and the performance, that the idea of performance was central to his sculpture,” said Lisa Phillips, the New Museum’s director. “He was an original and a titan and absolutely unique in the history of American art.”

Pop artist Chris Burden poses for photos in front of his kinetic sculpture, “Metropolis II,” at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 2012. The sculpture does more than just imitate life. The colorful display of roads, cars, trains and buildings is art imitating what the artist imagined life being like in five or 10 years. (Jae C. Hong/Associated Press)

“Look at me.” “You’re talking to yourself.” “What are you doing here?” “Somebody you wanna meet?” “I’m not gonna back out of that.” “Stop brushing your hair!” “Go away!”

If you’ve ever heard the phrase “on the next episode of AMC’s ‘Mad Men’,” then you know the footage that follows is more confusing than any subplot on the show.

As we say goodbye to the award-winning series, it’s worth taking a moment of silence to reflect on what prestige television will look like without the most ridiculous element of the show: its promos.

This week is the last time that we’ll see creator Matt Weiner’s completely pointless next-show trailers. Culled from scenes from the first 20 minutes of the following episode, they have puzzled viewers more than anything else. It’s all wistful stares and streams of non sequiturs.

“I do like that people think it’s funny, but it’s my fault, is all I can tell you,” Weiner said in a 2013 interview with Terry Gross. “They have talented people over there [at AMC] who do incredible promos and I have literally stripped it down to that because I don’t even want it there.”

They’re opaque by design, Weiner said. He had a different philosophy about previewing episodes than AMC did, and the string of disparate scenes cut together was the result of a compromise between Weiner and the network.

Here’s his explanation, as told to Gross:

The network, when we first started, wanted to show those scenes from next week and they have a very different definition about what teasing it is. They think people enjoy things more when they know exactly what they’re going to be. And I think that the commercial identity of the show is related to not knowing what’s going to happen…

But Gross summed it up best, saying plainly what everyone who watches “Mad Men” was thinking: “You have the worst trailers for the next episode that I have ever seen.”