I know that co-creator Christopher Lloyd did not promise a “major” character would be killed off the series, but there are a lot of people on Modern Family that would have felt more “significant” or meaningful than DeDe, as DeDe has generally not been portrayed in a positive light.
I suppose that following the big DeDe reveal, the death being an important part of the plotline is still true to an extent, but it’s hard for me to even explain how flabbergasted and irritated it was to learn that Shelley Long’s character was the one the series chose to say goodbye to—and in her sleep in a hotel in Greenland, nonetheless.