WCXX

Taggart

The Scottish cop show had been running for 11 years when Mark McManus, who played tough Jim Taggart, died in 1994. The producers opted to keep the name and make it a more ensemble effort – enabling the cry of "muhrduhr!" to ring through Glasgow's mean streets for a further 16 years until the axe fell in 2011.

^{The final cast of Taggart: from left, Blythe Duff (Jackie Reid); Alex Norton (DCI Matt Burke); John Michie (DI Robbie Ross) James MacPherson (Detective Michael Jardine); and Colin McCredie (DC Stuart Fraser). (ITV)}

Midsomer Murders

Nepotism in the shires? John Nettles played DCI Tom Barnaby in ITV's hugely successful (especially abroad) cop drama for 14 years before retiring and allowing his "cousin" John Barnaby (Neil Dudgeon) to take the reins. Really, did anybody even notice the changeover?

^{John Nettles, as DCI Tom Barnaby, investigated murder most quaint until 2011. (ITV)}

Spooks

Famously cavalier with its leads, landing a big role in Spooks was always just one step away from booking a spot on the mortuary slab. No less than 17 major characters were brutally decommissioned over its ten seasons by way of bullet, bomb, radium injection or – most controversially – a head rinse in a deep fat fryer. Ultimately its 2011 demise was down to lack of fresh ideas, not corpses.

^{The spies Ros Myers, played by Hermione Norris, and Lucas North, played by Richard Armitage, both met untimely ends. (BBC)}

Spartacus

Most of the cast of this gleefully blood-drenched gladiatorial gore-fest were doomed to be killed from the off. But no one reckoned on lead Andy Whitfield having to retire for cancer treatment after just one successful season in 2012. US producers Starz simply inserted equally muscle-bound hunk, Liam McIntyre, in the role – with this kind of thing it's the muscles not the faces that matter.

^{Andy Whitfield, star of the first series of Spartacus, died in 2011 of lymphoma cancer, aged 39. (Starz)}

Them that dived:

The X Files

The most iconic sci-fi show of the Nineties was already running out of steam when co-star David Duchovny, as agent Fox Mulder, announced his departure, committing only to sporadic guest slots after season seven ended. Although the show limped on for two more years, its fan base quickly withered and it was axed in 2002

^{Gillian Anderson as Special Agent Dana Scully, flanked by Special Agent Fox Mulder, played by David Duchovny. (AP Photo/Fox/Michael Grecco)}

Waking the Dead

The popular cold case series survived innumerable supporting cast changes over nine series but when lead Trevor Eve announced his departure the BBC decided a spin-off could fill the gap instead. Bad move. The dire The Body Farm chucked out baby along with bathwater and died shortly after birth.

^{Tara Fitzgerald as Eve Lockhart in The Body Farm, ill-starred spin-off from Waking the Dead. (BBC)}

Two and a Half Men

America's most popular sitcom famously required a decapitation after star Charlie Sheen embarked on a global-headline grabbing drug and alcohol spree. Faced with an impossible task his replacement Ashton Kutcher couldn't and didn't make the grade; although the show limps on, its fans have fled and its survival for now seems due more to the CBS network making a point than anything else.

^{Charlie Sheen and Jon Cryer played the Two Men Charlie and Alan Harper, with Angus T. Jones as Jake Harper, the half. (CBS/Everett/Rex Features)}

Baywatch

Despite the Hoff's impressive pecs, the only chest that ever really mattered on this global phenomenon was Pamela Anderson's. The show never bounced back following her departure in 1997.

^{The Baywatch cast minus Pamela Anderson. (NBC)}

Being Human

One of BBC Three's best original drama commissions, the series about a ghost, a werewolf and a vampire house-sharing in Bristol was beset by a rare problem: a cast so talented it was impossible to hang on to them for long. Eventually the churn took its toll and after five shape-shifting seasons Being Human succumbed to the inevitable earlier this year.

^{The original cast included Russell Tovey (centre) and Lenora Crichlow (right), but were joined in the third series by Sinead Keenan (left). (BBC)}

New Tricks returns to BBC One at 9pm on Tuesday