Josh Charles' stint on The Good Wife came to a bloody close on Sunday, but the actor was eager to joke about his fictional demise with David Letterman just one day later.

After five seasons in the Good Wife courtroom, Will Gardner (Charles) met an untimely end during "Dramatics, Your Honor." While Gardner may have been too young to die, Charles claims it was past time to lay the character to rest.

"Yeah, we've known [about Gardner's departure] since last year," Charles explained to David Letterman on Monday's edition of The Late Show, according to USA Today. "It's been one of the greatest gigs for me in my entire career, but at the end of last year, my contract was up and I was just ready to kind of move on."

Although there are numerous ways that Gardner could have been removed from the plot, series creators Robert and Michelle King went for the most extreme option. Apparently, the agonizing and finite nature of Gardner's death is just what Alicia Florrick (Julianna Margulies) needs to propel her into the next stage of her life.

"We could 'send him off to Seattle,' he could be disbarred, or get married, or go off to Borneo to do good works. But there was something in the passion that Will and Alicia shared that made distance a meager hurdle," the Kings said, according to E!. "The brutal honesty and reality of death speaks to the truth and tragedy of bad timing for these two characters. Will's death propels Alicia into her newest incarnation."

Find out what else Charles has to say about Gardner, The Good Wife, and his career during the March 24 episode of The Late Show With David Letterman at 11:35 p.m. ET on CBS.