The Big Picture · Discussion · Top Five

The 'Final Destination' Kill Rankings and 'Bloodlines'

May 20, 2025/ 69 min/ Sean Fennessey · Chris Ryan

Sean Fennessey and Chris Ryan on how a dead 2000s horror franchise came back to a $50 million weekend, then rank their favorite kills across all six 'Final Destination' movies.

11 films across 3 segments.

AI-generated This episode was transcribed and analyzed with AI models. The matches aren't perfect — expect the occasional misheard title or a link to the wrong film.

'Final Destination Bloodlines'the sixth film, and maybe the best

Final Destination Bloodlines 2025

The sixth entry, produced by Jon Watts, directed by Zach Lipovsky and Adam Stein from a Guy Busick and Lori Evans Taylor script, opened at No. 1 with $50 million domestic and $100 million worldwide. A college student's recurring nightmares lead her to a grandmother who has ducked death since surviving a 1960s Skyview restaurant collapse, the opening premonition the hosts rank near the first film's plane crash. Standouts: the MRI-machine hospital kill (Eric's piercings, then his body, dragged into the magnet; a vending-machine ring decapitates his revived brother), a backyard-barbecue set piece built around a stray glass shard and a lawnmower, and a trash-compactor beat. Tony Todd, the franchise's connective tissue, gives his final performance as the morgue coroner; he died six months before release. The hosts call it a rare case of a series peaking on its sixth film.

Through the franchise, film by filmtwo favorite kills from each

Final Destination 2000

A pre-9/11 movie the hosts argue couldn't have been built one year later: it opens on a plane crash (287 dead on the plane, 294 total across the film). Every character is named for a horror figure: Alex Browning (Tod Browning), teacher Valerie Lewton (Val Lewton), Billy Hitchcock, Terry Chaney (Lon Chaney). Their two picks: Todd's elaborate bathroom-chokeout death and the plane crash itself; also cited is Seann William Scott's Billy, decapitated by train shrapnel just after wishing he'd live to see the Jets win a Super Bowl.

Final Destination 2 2003

Home to the logging-truck highway pileup the hosts call the franchise's signature premonition and best sequence, brought together around Kimberly Corman (named for Roger Corman). Their two picks: the logging-truck vision and the multi-stage 'figure-eight' car crash near the end: PVC pipes, a news-truck gas leak, an airbag impaling, barbed wire cutting a body in three. Also here: the sliding fire-escape ladder that stops an inch from an eye, and the dentist-office goldfish fake-out.

Final Destination 3 2006

Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Wendy (by the hosts' account the best actor the series ever had) anchors the roller-coaster film. Their two picks: the tanning-bed kill (two girls locked in overheating beds, Ohio Players' 'Love Rollercoaster' on the soundtrack) and the Home Depot nail-gun death, where Ian's girlfriend Erin takes a full magazine to the head. Also cited: the drive-through truck pileup that kills Frankie Cheeks, the weight-room decapitation, and the closing subway premonition.

The Final Destination 2009

The fourth film, widely considered the worst: 82 minutes with credits, lower production value, more CGI. It opens on a NASCAR-style speedway pileup and later introduces a KKK subplot (a racist tow-truck driver dragged while burning to War's 'Why Can't We Be Friends'). The hosts' picks: the raceway premonition (a stray tire flies out of the stadium to kill a bystander) and Hunter Wynorski, eviscerated through a swimming-pool drain. Also here: a lawnmower-flung rock through a salon customer's eye, and a bathtub falling through a hospital ceiling.

Final Destination 5 2011

The hosts' 'secretly good' entry, built on a North Bay Bridge-collapse premonition after an unusually elaborate office-retreat setup. Their picks: the gymnastics balance-beam death (the victim avoids a thumbtack only to die mid-routine) and the bridge collapse. Also cited: the acupuncture/falling-Buddha kill. The finale reveals the movie is a prequel: its survivors board Flight 180, the plane from the first film.

The Kill Rankingstheir five best, across six films

No. 1