Sarah Hyland Dropped Major Clues On Instagram About Who *Won’t* Die On ‘Modern Family’

Modern Family has a mystery and Sarah Hyland seems to be helping fans solve it. Hyland's latest Instagram offers major clues to who will die on Modern Family. Specifically, the shot from the Oct. 24 Halloween-themed episode "Good Grief" will help rule out some fan favorites. But, unfortunately, not everyone in the Pritchett-Dunphy is safe just yet.

"Everyone copes with death differently," Hyland captioned the image of her character Haley dressed in costume. "This little raccoon likes to eat when someone close dies. But WHO. Dies?!" While for now, that question is rhetorical, she does help answer the question of who won't die in this episode.

The photo features Haley's younger siblings, Alex (Ariel Winter) and Luke (Nolan Gould) looking a bit puzzled over whatever it is their eldest sister's stress eating. But maybe the tone of Hyland's IG caption is a giveaway that the death of a "significant" Modern Family character is going to come with a lot of feels, including a sense of humor.

Last month, Modern Family creator Christopher Lloyd said that someone on the show's tenth season was going to be killed off. “We’re handling some bigger life events in this season,” he said in an interview with Entertainment Weekly, including one that strikes many families. "It’s not easy to do because that’s a heavy subject," Lloyd said of dedicating an episode to a well-known character's death. "But at the same time, it would seem unusual for a family not to go through it.”

Hyland isn't the first member of the cast to hint at who may not make it through the upcoming episode. Earlier this month, Winter told Entertainment Tonight that the death is one that fans might not expect. "It's a character that we'll all be sad to see go, but it's probably not an older character that you think is going to go," she said.

According to Winter, this character's death is going to affect the family in different ways and the show is going to explore that grieving process in a few different episodes. "I think some people obviously take it better than others," Winter told ET. "It doesn't hit people right away and it's gonna be an episode that's pretty relevant to how people deal with it, and some people's struggles with the person that passed, and I think it's a pretty real episode."

As for some educated guesses on who will die on Modern Family, fans thought it could be an older character, just as Winter suspected. Some wondered if the Pritchett patriarch Jay (Ed O'Neill) would die or even Phil’s father Frank (Fred Willard). Another guess was DeDe (Shelley Long), Jay's ex-wife, and Claire (Julie Dunphy) and Mitchell's mother. Others thought it could be Cam's sister, Pam (Dana Powell) or Manny's dad, Javier, played by Benjamin Bratt. Another recurring characters fans worry about is Dylan, Haley's on-again, off-again boyfriend, who recently tried to win back Haley. The fact that he was also rather close to Phil means this death would hit the family in different and unexpected ways.

Luckily, fans can breathe a sigh of relief because Jesse Tyler Ferguson swears Stella, Jay's beloved dog won't die on Modern Family. "It’s definitely a person, not the dog," he told Entertainment Tonight. "I’ve been hearing rumors about the dog, it’s not the dog. It’s no animal, it’s a human being,”

After watching the latest teaser for the episode, it's safe to say those humans won't be Phil (Ty Burrell) or Cameron (Eric Stonestreet), who appears to joke that his Megan Markle Halloween costume isn't the right look for mourning. "It feels inappropriate to be dressed like this," he tells Phil, while wearing a pink dress. "I should be in something darker with a cap-sleeve." Even in hard times, Modern Family still manages to find the funny.

For her part, Hyland also helped fans narrow down their guesses. At this point, the only way to actually know who will lose their life is to watch the episode. A helpful suggestion? Maybe keep the tissues somewhere close.