The following article contains discussions of suicide.
The 100 was filled with shocking moments that defined the series, and it all started with Charlotte's death in season 1. The series often explored the extent that humanity would go to survive and how, under certain circumstances, no one is innocent. Time and time again, audiences were shocked by the actions of some of their favorite characters, and the lines dictating morality began to blur. While the tragedy only worsened after The 100 season 1, Charlotte's crimes and subsequent death were the catalysts for the central characters' struggles.
In The 100 season 1, Clarke Griffin, Bellamy Blake, and 99 other teenagers and children were sent to Earth, and it didn't take long before their survival instincts kicked into place. Society proved difficult to uphold under these circumstances, and law and order were challenging to outline. The 100's Bellamy took a young girl, Charlotte, under his wing. She had been plagued by nightmares of Chancellor Jaha killing her parents, so Bellamy told her to "slay her demons." Unfortunately, she took this advice too literally and murdered Jaha's son, Wells, before taking her own life.
Charlotte's Murder-Suicide In The 100 Season 1 Jumpstarted The Show's Theme
Charlotte was only a minor character in The 100, and by season 7, she was almost forgotten. However, the effects her murder-suicide had on Clarke and Bellamy, and the themes that these actions represented, endured to the end of the series. As the youngest in the group of 101 children that were sent to Earth, Charlotte was seen as the most innocent. She was fearful and traumatized by her parents' deaths, making her seem helpless. Though, when confronted with the stakes of her survival (both mental and physical), she proved even she was capable of murder.
Audiences saw devastating murder and genocide throughout The 100's 7 seasons, much of which was performed by some of the central "good" characters. The series intended to show what humanity was capable of, even when it came to the smallest and weakest children. Charlotte was the first example and a lesson to Clarke and Bellamy. Not only did they have to bury Wells, but they were faced with deciding what to do with Charlotte. Did she deserve the same punishment for murder as an adult, as John Murphy believed? Of course, she took this decision from them and jumped off a cliff.
Clarke & Bellamy's Future Choices Were Always Influenced By Their Season 1 Experience
Though Charlotte's character was easy to forget as The 100 progressed, her actions had a lasting impression on Clarke and Bellamy's relationship and choices in later seasons. Developing a society on Earth quickly became a battle of the fittest, and to survive the coming wars, the duo had to learn that anyone was capable of any crime. All 101 teenagers that came to Earth in season 1 had been children, but the need for survival had turned them into potential killers. Clarke and Bellamy realized that if a sweet girl could murder, the others would go to extensive lengths to survive.
From Charlotte's death onward, Bellamy no longer believed their group should do "whatever the hell" they wanted. He recognized that the society Clarke was desperate to create was the only way to keep such terrible things from happening again. From then on, he became desperate to find this version of society, so much so that he eventually ed The 100's Second Dawn cult. Clarke learned that being young and "innocent" meant nothing. She became willing to kill anyone who threatened the survival of her people. Charlotte may have been the first child to die in The 100. However, she wasn't the last, as she represented the brutality of the world for Bellamy and Clarke.