Gosh, how I love Gabriel's death! Thank you, thank you writers! And didn't Gabriel look dead! Thank you, thank you Chris Pennock!
I'm with you, but surprised, since you'd said (about Judah's Head) that the horror element didn't appeal to you. I was thinking later, did we actually see him dead, with his body going slack, or on the floor, or did we just see him choking and dying? Pointless question I guess, I really have no idea why I'm asking, except that you reminded me I'd been thinking about it. (It takes me forever to get to sleep, so there's a lot of opportunity for useless thought.)
This is the only gory death I can remember in DS. That's how cinema was going at the time, and maybe DS would have gone this way too. I did get the impression, though, that the makers of DS, maybe Mr. Pennock himself, might have said "What're they going to do, cancel us again?!"