# Most disturbing death scene **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** movies\ **Created:** [August 6, 2001, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061 "2001-08-06T02:35:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![Jack\_Burden](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/958977/32.png) [@Jack\_Burden](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jack_Burden)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2024, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/141 "2024-05-17T20:45:35Z")
One that’s stayed with me since the movie came out in 1989. Gage’s death in Pet Sematary. Going from a joy-filled family picnic on an idyllic sunny afternoon to life-defining tragedy in the blink of an eye, and just finishing with the blood-soaked shoe on the asphalt. That shoe. I’ll never get that image out of my head. ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2024, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/142 "2024-05-17T20:48:58Z")
Good one. I can’t watch it again. ---
**Author:** ![TreacherousCretin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treacherouscretin/32/476_2.png) [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2024, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/143 "2024-05-17T21:21:59Z")
> [@Superdude](#): > > The police officer at the beginning of _No Country for Old Men_. Yes. Also the next murder, of the innocent driver. Fast, probably painless, not gory, but disturbing in Chigurh’s utter pathology. ---
**Author:** ![Shoeless](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shoeless/32/7099_2.png) [@Shoeless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shoeless)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2024, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/144 "2024-05-18T22:08:09Z")
> [@needscoffee](#): > > > [@peccavi](#): > > > > Season 6, Episode 7 of Homicide: Life on the Street, “The Subway”. The entire episode is essentially a death scene. A man (Vincent D’Onofrio) is pinned between the train and the platform and the episode is devoted to how various characters deal with the fact that he’s effectively already dead, even though he is conscious and in no (significant) pain > > Yes, that was very upsetting. ER had a similar situation where a man had been exposed to a fatal amount of a poisonous gas, although he didn’t look or feel all that bad yet. They let him know he was about to be a goner. They only had a few hours to locate his family before he succumbed. Speaking of ER, the scene that still haunts me is the episode where Dr. Carter gets stabbed by the mental patient, and as he collapses to the floor he looks across the room and sees Lucy the intern lying there dying in a pool of blood with her throat cut. ---
**Author:** ![needscoffee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/needscoffee/32/1076_2.png) [@needscoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/needscoffee)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2024, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/145 "2024-05-18T22:10:11Z")
> [@Shoeless](#): > > Speaking of ER, the scene that still haunts me is the episode where Dr. Carter gets stabbed by the mental patient, and as he collapses to the floor he looks across the room and sees Lucy the intern lying there dying in a pool of blood with her throat cut Yeah, I try to forget that one. ---
**Author:** ![TreacherousCretin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treacherouscretin/32/476_2.png) [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2024, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/146 "2024-05-18T22:45:22Z")
> [@TreacherousCretin](#): > > Yes. Also the next murder, of the innocent driver. Fast, probably painless, not gory, but disturbing in Chigurh’s utter **pathology**. I meant to say “psychopathy.” Duh! ---
**Author:** ![Push\_You\_Down](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/push_you_down/32/9095_2.png) [@Push\_You\_Down](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Push_You_Down)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2024, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/147 "2024-05-20T16:21:18Z")
> [@solost](#): > > That one really caught me by surprise because, by some trick of memory, I could have sworn I remembered Nacho also being in Breaking Bad. So I though he had unassailable plot armor in BCS. Same–kind of… I remember Nacho being mentioned in Breaking Bad and had conflated him with being involved with the guy Walt kills in Jesse’s basement (but NOT that guy, but that he showed up connected to that incident). I did a rewatch of BB sometime between season 2 and 3 of Saul and realized I was wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2024, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/148 "2024-05-20T16:23:53Z")
> [@Shoeless](#): > > Speaking of ER, the scene that still haunts me is the episode where Dr. Carter gets stabbed by the mental patient, and as he collapses to the floor he looks across the room and sees Lucy the intern lying there dying in a pool of blood with her throat cut. Add 1 to this ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2024, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/149 "2024-05-20T18:50:19Z")
**Annihilation** is another one of those films that just seems uniformly unsettling from start to finish. You don’t really see the first death, but the mutant bear screeching in Cassie’s voice was super creepy. Especially as it tears the shit out of Anya’s face as she has everyone tied up. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Knig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/cdc98d/32.png) [@Typo\_Knig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Knig)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2024, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/151 "2024-06-01T00:05:17Z")
I am going to have some serious nightmares after skimming this thread. I think a death scene that is disturbing, yet without blood or gore, is HAL’s death in 2001: A Space Odyssey. HAL’s line “My mind is going, Dave. I can feel it.” spoken with minimal emotion is just creepy as can be. Sure, he had it coming, after the similarly gore-less but creepy murders he committed, but wow it freaks me out. Even more so now that I know what Alzheimer’s is. ---
**Author:** ![Mahaloth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mahaloth/32/1079_2.png) [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2024, 12:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/152 "2024-06-01T00:07:59Z")
Is there any more disturbing “death” in any other G-rated movie? ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2024, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/153 "2024-06-01T00:26:25Z")
Bambi’s mom? ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2024, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/154 "2024-06-01T02:41:47Z")
I’ll see your Bambi’s mom and raise you one Bing Bong. ---
**Author:** ![Toxgoddess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Toxgoddess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Toxgoddess)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2024, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/155 "2024-06-01T20:25:34Z")
In the otherwise forgettable Apollo 17, the lunar astonauts are infected by creepy moon spiders that had apparently finished off an earlier Russian expedition. The decision is made on earth to abandon them to their fate rather than bring the survivors and the plague home to earth. The astronaut remainining in the command module in lunar orbit, who wasn’t exposed, was nonetheless told that he was being left there to die in his capsule as it runs out of oxygen and fuel…but that Mission Control would stay on the line with him till the end so he had company as he slowly suffocated. That struck me as indescribably horrible-to be betrayed and abandoned like that while they were pretending that’s not what they were doing made it infinitely worse somehow. ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2024, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/156 "2024-06-08T13:55:44Z")
> [@Dendarii\_Dame](#): > > Old Yeller. A pale disturbation compared to _Where the Red Fern Grows_. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2024, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/157 "2024-06-08T16:10:01Z")
There are only a few scenes that I find disturbing. Probably the worst one was feeding Ray Liotta his own brain in _Hannibal._ I think my wife can watch anything done to any human but will immediately turn off anything where a dog is harmed. ---
**Author:** ![Jaycat.again](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jaycat.again/32/11525_2.png) [@Jaycat.again](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jaycat.again)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2024, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/158 "2024-06-08T16:26:25Z")
My vote is for the death of Cordelia in King Lear, and especially his speech afterward. "Why should a dog, a horse, a rat have life, And thou no breath at all? " ---
**Author:** ![Marine\_One](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marine_one/32/3461_2.png) [@Marine\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marine_One)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2024, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/159 "2024-06-08T21:06:24Z")
Messala’s death in **Ben- Hur** (1959). Best death throes scene ever. I bet the theater was real quiet during this. After getting totally trampled in the race, he still needs to tell Judah what happened to his mother and sister. “Look for them in the Valley of the Lepers…if you can recognize them.” ---
**Author:** ![Wheelz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wheelz/32/5718_2.png) [@Wheelz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wheelz)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2024, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/160 "2024-06-13T03:25:26Z")
First thing I thought of was the **Catch-22** swimming scene, which was mentioned upthread (23 years ago!). Nobody has yet mentioned the scene in **The Great Waldo Pepper** where Waldo puts his friend out of his misery as he burns to death. I was 12 when I saw that, and it stuck with me for a _long_ time. ---
**Author:** ![Capn\_Carl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/838e76/32.png) [@Capn\_Carl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capn_Carl)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2024, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061/161 "2024-06-13T20:45:55Z")
And why is that? I ask because Wife and I love the movie, and have seen it 3 times now. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-disturbing-death-scene/75061.md?page=9)