“Castle” fans may want to have a box of Kleenex nearby during the series’ Season 8 finale. Even though it’s already been announced that Stana Katic won’t be returning for a possible Season 9 — ABC still hasn’t decided whether the show is going to be renewed or canceled — her character, Kate Beckett, could be facing a grim departure.

Executive producer Alexi Hawley opened up about the season’s final episodes, and it doesn’t sound like the writers have a happy ending planned for the current season or Beckett. “There’s death in every episode,” Hawley told Entertainment Weekly. “We don’t want to get into that too much. There’s definitely danger.”

Hawley continued, saying the lives of Beckett and Castle (Nathan Fillion) will be “in jeopardy from [the] jump” and there will be lots of plot twists. “What we wanted to do was keep pulling the rug out from under them,” Hawley told the media outlet. “Things get dangerous very fast. Ultimately, it’s a back and forth between being the hunted and being the hunters all the way through the finale.”

A synopsis of the finale teased that Beckett and Castle will be on a mission to finally catch LokSat, but when things go wrong, it puts their case and their lives in danger.

Katic confirmed she was leaving the crime drama last month, shortly after ABC made its shocking announcement about the move. The actress didn’t reveal the reason she was exiting the series, but a source told Us Weekly that her departure came about after on-set tension between her and Fillion.

“Stana Katic and Nathan Fillion completely despise each other,” the source said. “They will not speak when they are off-set, and this has been going on for seasons now. This season, it got so out of hand they made Stana and Nathan go to couples counseling together.”

However, a Katic representative denied the actress was feuding with her TV husband, telling the outlet that there were “no issues” between Katic and Fillion. Meanwhile, Deadline reported her abrupt departure was related to “budgetary reasons.”

“Castle” airs on ABC Mondays at 10 p.m. EDT.

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