I know there are a lot of death references and ironies on CATM that almost seem heartless at times as we watch in the years since the tradgedy but as I've been watching laely I also notice references made on the show which make me wonder if maybe the writters wern't trying to help Freddie realize his problems or that they were there to help? Here's what I mean.
1)when Chico asks his old gang to help find Ed's hat "a lid" they say "hey man we don't do that stuff no dealin just stealin"
2)When chico is angry at Della when she won't renew the lease and Ed gives up
Chico tells Della"ed needs love and help he's and endangered specis too."
3)Chico says to Ed "Hey man why do you drink so much you'll get a hole in your liver."
I think it is also ironic that a lot of these very lines were said by Chico(Freddie)himself

Very good point Joy! I think about that every time I hear a line that I feel makes a reference to Freddie's problems. I wouldn't be surprised if there was some truth to that theory.

I had a dream about Freddie this am. I dreamed that he had said in some magazine article in the 70's that he was one day gonna go on to bigger & better things. It had a cute picture of him with it. Someone wrote about it on the message boards here & asked did that mean he wanted to go on to bigger things career wise or did it mean he was referring to the fact he wanted to commit suicide. People were discussing it on here & most folks thought he was referring to the suicide... Weird...

The episode recently where they thought Ed was dead was just too much to watch. I didn't find any humor in it at all. I got a terrible feeling watching it, especially when Chico talks about himself "going", and Ed says good night sweet prinze.

I think in talking about moving on to bigger and better things Freddie ment career wise-after all Freddie wanted to be the Prinze of comedy- I have trouble thinking about Freddie actually planning suicide and thinking of it as bigger and better things

Yep, it was a weird dream anyways...