My Top 10 Moments from the Final Destination Franchise
A list of my favorite scenes from New Line’s Death-centric horror hits.
(The following contains spoilers for all six Final Destination films)
Final Destination Bloodlines, the sixth entry in the popular franchise about young people cheating death and then getting their comeuppance, is now in theaters, so what better opportunity to go down memory lane and revisit some of my favorite moments from the series? Also, given my close encounter with the reaper two years ago, it feels kind of cathartic to publish this on my birthday.
The following are listed in the films’ release order, so you can skip the relevant paragraphs if you haven’t seen a specific movie. Enjoy.
1. Flight 180 (Final Destination)
The first, and best, of the movies begins with what is very much a mission statement, introducing what will become the franchise formula: the young protagonist has a horrific vision of impending doom, manages to save themselves and a few other people, and we then see the incident play out. And while Death’s payback usually takes on at least some over-the-top forms, the opening disasters tend to be grounded in reality and rooted in real fears. Case in point: who has never thought the plane they were on might crash? And so a whole new cinematic phenomenon was born, via a bravura sequence that shows director James Wong had learned well from his experience helming episodes of The X-Files.
2. Paris (Final Destination)
Up to and including the third film, the endings seen on screen were the result of test screening feedback, with preview audiences thinking the original versions lacked a certain punch. This led to the creation of another franchise staple: the epilogue where the remaining survivors realize Death will eventually come for them after all, a knowledge that is imparted with a healthy touch of dark humor as the final shot disposes of the most annoying character in the whole movie.
3. Beware the logs (Final Destination 2)
The first sequel does, at times, feel like a basic rethread of the original, but what it lacks in narrative originality it more than makes up for in spectacle, with what is generally considered the best opening incident of the series: a pileup caused by a log truck, a visual that scarred viewers and generated dozens of memes, becoming the most referenced event of the franchise in subsequent installments (each successive sequel contains at least one visual callback to that sequence). To this day, seeing such a vehicle in front of one’s own car is likely to be terrifying.
4. Barbecue (Final Destination 2)
Another final gag, this time to add a bit of pep to what is, technically, the only entry in the series with a proper happy ending (aside from a deleted scene that was planned for the third movie, it’s pretty much canon that the two protagonists are still alive beyond the events of the film). A celebratory moment turns into a perfectly timed explosion of body parts, giving a whole new meaning to the word “barbecue”. Absolutely brilliant.
5. Tanning beds (Final Destination 3)
I’m not really a fan of the third installment (the character work is severely lacking), but it contains a masterclass in dark humor as two of Death’s intended victims meet their demise in the most elaborately excruciating manner: their tanning beds’ temperatures keep rising to uncomfortable levels, until the whole system breaks down and the two girls brutally burn to death, a wooden plank having obstructed their way out of what is basically a makeshift coffin. The match cut to their actual coffins, as we transition to the funeral, is the delightfully twisted cherry on top.
6. The opening credits (The Final Destination)
The fourth movie is generally regarded as the worst, even by the producers (and apparently the released version was an improvement on what had been put together before 25 script pages’ worth of reshoots). Still, the opening credits sequence, which goes through the best deaths in the previous films (shown as CGI X-rays), manages to instill some hope that the series’ taste for the macabre will live up to its reputation once more. It didn’t, but the movie made enough money to justify the (far superior) fifth installment, so it wasn’t all bad.
7. The bridge (Final Destination 5)
Perhaps as a statement of intent after the negative fan response the fourth movie, the fifth installment opens with the longest disaster in the franchise’s history, one that makes exquisite use of the series’ habit of filming in Vancouver, Canada (the outlier is The Final Destination, which was shot in New Orleans) and highlights a local landmark while gleefully pretending to destroy it. Add the use of 3D, which was all the rage back then, and this was a clear signal: Death’s list was back, with a vengeance. And speaking of…
8. Flight 180 2.0 (Final Destination 5)
By the time the fifth movie entered production, it was pretty much a given no one would make it out alive at the end (Final Destination 3 was the last movie to not show everyone dying, although it’s heavily implied in the closing scene). But even the most eagle-eyed viewers were generally caught off guard when the mandatory “happy ending” preceding Death’s last hurrah revealed the whole film had been a prequel to Final Destination, and the last two survivors were about to meet their fate on the infamous Flight 180. As full circle moments go, this was an inventively macabre one.
9. Back to the past (Final Destination Bloodlines)
The sixth film is all about family, and Death going after the entire bloodlines of those who survived the collapse of a restaurant tower in 1968. Said collapse is at the center of the opening scene, a spectacular set piece that opens up the world of the franchise by expanding on the notion that such disasters, and Death course correcting if someone managed to cheat him, have been going on for years. Also worth noting: this is the first opening tragedy to be completely averted, since the vision leads to the protagonist disrupting all the elements that would lead to the actual collapse.
10. Bludworth Begins (Final Destination Bloodlines)
For a quarter of a century, fans speculated about the true nature of William Bludworth, the mortician/coroner who laid out the rules regarding Death, the list and how to (possibly) survive it. Was he an angel? A demon? The grim reaper’s spokesperson? Bloodlines answers the question by giving actor Tony Todd a final moment in the spotlight, and it’s one hell of a moment: the actor’s real-life terminal illness becomes Bludworth’s, as he explains he once survived a disaster of his own and has made peace with the fact he too will die eventually, encouraging the new gang of youngsters to enjoy life to the fullest while they still can. With his own demise just around the corner, Bludworth drops the dark humor he used to exhibit previously (“I’ll see you soon”, he told the survivors of Flight 180), and exits stage right with a sincere parting line: “Good luck.”