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The many high-profile celebrity splits and divorces of 2015

 
Blake Shelton and Miranda Lambert divorced after four years.
Blake Shelton and Miranda Lambert divorced after four years.
Published Dec. 24, 2015

Sweet divorce. 'Tis a most magical thing. With a whole lot of money and a little bit of judge-assignment luck, a dissolution of marriage can undo the absolute worst of mistakes. Mistakes like choosing a truly terrible person to spend the rest of your miserable, cold-hearted life resenting.

The year gone by was chock-full of celebrity splits, and while there are so very many candidates from which to choose, we hereby crown Blake Shelton and Gwen Stefani our King and Queen of 2015 Breakups.

Stefani's separation from Gavin Rossdale was a full-on shock to our inner sixth-grade system. We were all "don't tell me 'cause it hurts" on repeat for days. The 46-year-old No Doubt singer and 50-year-old Bush frontman enjoyed 13 years of rock 'n' roll-defying wedded bliss, to the tune of conceiving three children, their youngest just 1 year old.

And then, well, nanny.

Rumor has it Rossdale and Mindy Mann — the former couple's formerly trusty former childcare professional, who, by the way, looks like she could be Stefani's sister — were busted exchanging nude photos and plans to meet for sex. This supposedly went on for three years, even while the Voice coach was pregnant with the couple's third son. A second nanny found the evidence on the family's iPad, reported back and the rest, as they say, is history.

As for Shelton, 39, his divorce from fellow country singer Miranda Lambert, 32, came as less of a surprise, considering that the pair fell in love in 2006 while Shelton was still married to his first wife, Kaynette Williams. Still, though, we filled our Dixie cups with whiskey and our earbuds with Patsy Cline's Crazy and accepted that the end had come for modern country royalty.

The reason for the Shelton-Lambert split is still unknown, though fingers have been pointed at both parties, accusations of infidelity flying. Regardless, they're done now, and Lambert seems super bummed. Shelton, though, not so much.

The King met his Queen in their onscreen castle of NBC co-stardom and they hooked up. For the cameras. For the headlines. For the ratings. And maybe for the company, too.

With one joint statement 20 minutes before the CMA Awards, Stefani and Shelton turned their despair into an avalanche of publicity that neither would have garnered on their own. Their flirting catered to the big business of being everyone's business, because, let's face it, we so thirsty for the dramaz.

Before we knew it, there they were clogging our Twitter feeds, carpooling to work in front of the paps, getting "caught" FaceTiming through the gossip machine's lens.

Celebrities ask that we respect their privacy during such difficult times, but if that's truly what they want, they should simply avoid the spotlight.

And on that note, we present our year-end in memoriam, featuring the more quiet high-profile splits of 2015.

R.I.P. famous marriages that couldn't go the distance.

HEARTBREAKERS

>Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner (10 years)

Reba McEntire and Narvel Blackstock (26 years)

Melanie Griffith and Antonio Banderas (19 years)

Mandy Moore and Ryan Adams (6 years)

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Kermit and Miss Piggy (40 years)

Homer Simpson and Marge Simpson (27 years)

BARELY KNEW THEE

Halle Berry and Olivier Martinez (2 years)

Ryan Sweeting and Kaley Cuoco (2 years)

Sienna Miller and Tom Sturridge (3 years)

Jeremy Renner and Sonni Pacheco (1 year)

Giovanni Ribisi and Agyness Deyn (2 years)

Hilary Duff and Mike Comrie (5 years)

Ingrid Michaelson and Greg Laswell (4 years)

Nicholas Brendon and Moonda Tee (5 months)

LONG TIME COMING

, Patrick Dempsey and Jillian Fink (15 years)

Kate Beckinsale and Len Wiseman (11 years)

Slash and Perla Ferrar (13 years)

Ed Asner and Cindy Gilmore (17 years)

Jean-Claude Van Damme and Gladys Portugues (15 years)

James Caan and Linda Stokes (19 years)

Steve Madden and Wendy Madden (25 years)

Robert Herjavec and Diane Plese (25 years)

Stephen Collins and Faye Grant (30 years)

Michelle Branch and Teddy Landau (12 years)

>Matt Roloff and Amy Roloff (28 years)

BETTER OFF

, Avril Lavigne and Chad Kroeger (2 years)

Megan Fox and Brian Austin Green (5 years)

Pamela Anderson and Rick Salomon (7 years on and off)

Rosie O'Donnell and Michelle Rounds (3 years)

WHO KNEW?

Lara Spencer and David Haffenreffer (15 years)

Bobby Flay and Stephanie March (10 years)

Anthony LaPaglia and Gia Carides (17 years)

Anthony Anderson and Alvina Stewart (16 years)

Tamara Tunie and Gregory Generet (23 years)

HONORABLE MENTION: DATING/BETROTHED

>Helena Bonham Carter and Tim Burton (14 years)

Jon Hamm and Jennifer Westfeldt (18 years)

Charlize Theron and Sean Penn (1 year)

Amy Poehler and Nick Kroll (2 years)

Bradley Cooper and Suki Waterhouse (2 years)

Jonathan Bricklin and Susan Sarandon (5 years)

Justin Long and Amanda Seyfried (2 years)

Zayn Malik and Perrie Edwards (3 years)

Big Sean and Ariana Grande (8 months)

Britney Spears and Charlie Ebersol (8 months)

Kourtney Kardashian and Scott Disick (7 years)

Nick Jonas and Olivia Culpo (2 years)

Matt LeBlanc and Andrea Anders (8 years)

Emma Roberts and Evan Peters (3 years)

Tiger Woods and Lindsey Vonn (3 years)

Lewis Hamilton and Nicole Scherzinger (7 years)

Bethenny Frankel and Michael Cerussi III (2 years)

Boyd Holbrook and Elizabeth Olsen (3 years)

Ruby Rose and Phoebe Dahl (2 years)