Nina Dobrev has announced that she is to leave The Vampire Diaries after the current sixth season. Dobrev announced the news on Instagram on Monday, posting a photo with showrunner Julie Plec along with an explanation of why she would be stepping down from her role as Elena Gilbert.

Nina DobrevNina Dobrev is leaving The CW's Vampire Diaries after the sixth season

"I always knew I wanted Elena's story to be a six season adventure, and within those six years I got the journey of a lifetime. I was a human, a vampire, a doppelganger, a crazy immortal, a doppelganger pretending to be human, a human pretending to be a doppelganger. I got kidnapped, killed, resurrected, tortured, cursed, body-snatched, was dead and undead, and there's still so much more to come before the season finale in May," she wrote.

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It's turning into a bit of a crisis for The CW show, with Michael Trevino - who plays Tyler Lockwood - is also exiting the series after season 6. 

Dobrev has starred in the show alongside Paul Wesley, Ian Somerhalder, Kat Graham and Steven R. McQueen since 2009. Set in the fictional town of Mystic Falls, Virginia, the show follows Dobrev's character who falls in love with the vampire Stefan (Wesley) and is drawn into a supernatural world as a result. As the narrative develops in the course of the series, the focal point shifts to the mysterious past of Elena's doppelganger Katerina Petrova.

Will you miss Nina Dobrev once she departs The Vampire Diaries? Can the show even survive without her?

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