Space is a homicidal maniac. Remember what Dr. McCoy said: It's "disease and danger, wrapped in darkness and silence." A place full of many ways to kill a man, a ship, a Vulcan and a planet. We look at 24 of space's more memorable homicides in movies.
Our criteria for finding some quality space deaths centered on space -- its planets, asteroids and/or Space Madness!! -- being the murder weapons. (And yeah, we let a few asteroid kills on Earth slide because, technically, Earth is in space. Also, because blockbuster asteroid derby is fun to watch.) Our criteria also centered on humanoids venturing into space and finding trouble from the cockpit of their spacecraft, as a result of practically daring something made out of zero-oxygen and black not to mess with them.
Enjoy our picks, and then beam down your favorite ways space can kill in the comments section below.
Trying to Take on The Empire All By Yourself
One of the funny things about Star Wars' Rebels is that they're ridiculously overconfident. Perhaps they're operating under the belief that the good guys always win, even in the short term. Or maybe the Skywalker clan's performance against giant super-weapons gives them unreasonable expectations.
Either way, the Star Wars movies are full of instances of hotshot pilots biting off more than they can chew.
There's Dak from The Empire Strikes Back, of course. He was Luke's wingman on Hoth and the one who coined the phrase: "I feel like I can take on the whole Empire by myself." That worked out perfectly until he took an AT-AT blast to the face and left Luke to pick up the slack. And then there's Arvel Crynyd, the A-Wing pilot in Return of the Jedi who thought he could charge the bridge of a Super Star Destroyer all by himself. He succeeded, as long as you consider an impromptu suicide attack successful. And don't even get us started on poor Jek Porkins...
Stabbed by a Super Star Destroyer
Speaking of which, this death shows what happens when the Empire's toys don't keep a sane distance from one another. In the climax of Return of the Jedi, the Executor's command deck was obliterated by intergalactic hit-and-run.
For reasons not entirely clear, the ship suddenly decided to obey a highly exaggerated law of gravity, plummeting straight down and making a giant hole in the unfinished Death Star.
Revenge
Tyrants all across the galaxy agree that revenge is a dish best served cold. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan took place 15 years after "Space Seed," The Original Series episode that inspired it. That means that the genetically-superior Khan Noonien "This is Ceti Alpha V!!!" Singh had plenty of time to stew after his exile by Kirk following the events of "Seed."
Khan craved revenge against the Captain of the Enterprise. He didn't manage to kill Kirk, but he did get Scotty's nephew, the poor jumpsuits working Regula 1 and he gave Chekov the full "space eel in the ear" treatment. Khan leaves his enemies screaming his name in ham-fisted rage. (He also leaves them mourning the loss of their hetero Vulcan lifemate from behind safety glass, but that's for another entry.)
Vacuum'd Into Space
Think back to 2009's Star Trek. That poor girl aboard the Kelvin, who gets sucked out of the ship and cartwheel's against a weapons turret? The phaser fire didn't so much kill her as the vacuum of space did.
Space has no oxygen, humans require it to breathe and space loves to eff with us when it comes to our life gas. It also likes to come to our aid somewhat, in the case of Alien: Resurrection's albino alien baby vs. a quarter-sized hole in a spaceship's window. Ripley's bastard child-monster gets sucked out of the damn thing, skin first and guts last.
Star-Lord also has a habit of flinging himself into the cold vacuum of space with no protection in the Guardians of the Galaxy series, but so far he's always managed to stay one step ahead of death.
Transporter Room "Accidents"
Lucky for Star Trek: The Motion Picture's late Commander Sonak, Starfleet's HMO covers death by having your molecules scrambled.
Sonak and another officer in the 1979 film turn out to be a couple of accidental, though nonetheless tragic, victims of Kirk's steely determination to get back command of Enterprise, on a mission to stop a sentient library wrapped in a blue cloud called V'Ger. Kirk's on an accelerated time table, and Sonak, having bumped into the Admiral at Starfleet HQ, decides to double-time it.
The transporter beam gets set to "redrum" and scatters the patterns -- and screams -- of Sonak and friend across the pad. So here's to Sonak and his unnamed navigator pal! Two of the many poor bastards who got swept under Starfleet's "my bad" rug.
Murderoids!
1998's dueling "death by homicidal celestial objects" movies gave space several reasons to have a murder fetish.
In Armageddon, a Planet Killer asteroid the size of Texas has targeted Earth. And a team of oil drillers have just been asked to save the world -- anyone wanna say no?
Of course not! If so, then you miss all the Bayhem falling from a big-ass sky, interrupting Ben Affleck's Animal Cracker foreplay and giving us our first case of Space Madness! (And even though the rocks do most of their damage on Earth, they managed to shread the hell out of Astronaut Craps His Pants during a scene early on in the movie.)
And in Deep Impact, New York City gets tidal wave'd as a comet threatens to drown Tea Leoni. Wait, maybe that's less of a homicide and more of a mercy kill (zing!).
Death by Mouthtongue
Yep. A tongue within a mouth that has its own mouth!
In Alien, the xenomorph's weapon of choice is its own oral battering ram, which it uses on various folks throughout the Alien film series. The MT's best MDKs include: Taking out Brett and turning Parker's brains into bloody jelly.
HAL 9000'd
In hindsight, 2001 had an overly optimistic view of 21st century humanity's space-faring capabilities. Even so, the film portrayed a group of astronauts dealing with plausibly realistic and limited technology, and that tech tended to bite the characters on the ass when least convenient.
If you're going to put the lives of your crew and the fate of your mission in the hands of an advanced artificial intelligence, make absolutely sure that AI won't go insane and kill everyone aboard. Granted, it wasn't HAL's fault his conflicting missions caused an irreparable meltdown, but did he really have to turn off life support in the hibernation pods? And was it really necessary to toss Frank into the cold depths of space like that? HAL needed a good timeout, and that's what he got before Dave went all Star Child on everybody.
Space Vampires
A word to the wise -- when you encounter a mysterious spacecraft full of shriveled bats and cryogenically frozen aliens, turn around and leave. Do not be so stupid as to take the aliens with you.
If you do, you'll probably wind up with a nasty case of space vampire infestation just like the folks in Lifeforce. Like most space-based plagues, the vampire outbreak only gets worse when the survivors return to Earth. And yes, Space Vampires did happen.
Space Madness
Is anyone surprised that a form of space madness is the end result of a ship coming back from Hell, having used an engine that looks like mace ball with spinning death rings, housed in a room decorated in floor-to-ceiling spikes?
The Event Horizon, using the aforementioned experimental engine to travel across dimensions, brings Hell back with it -- and a record of its crew going all Caligula on each other, complete with debauchery, self-mutilation and cryptic Latin phrases. Lawrence Fishburne's Captain Miller leads a rescue mission that results in Sam Neil's Dr. Weir going about six different types of bat s!@#, as the Event Horizon's demon drive sends him to the edge of crazy town. It also causes a woman to chase her fictional son around the ship so she can fall and die by impalement. And let's not forget Jack Noseworthy getting airlock'd sans space suit!
Space Madness also infected Armageddon's Steve Buscemi. Not as fatal as Event's, but still eff'd up. Symptoms include: Speaking crazy while firing a "debris eliminator" (Read: Mini-Gun. In space. On an asteroid!?) and reverse cowgirl-ing a nuclear warhead.
Murderball on the Moon
Superman is Earth's greatest hero, and he's not one to venture into space except when he's called upon to perform some nuclear disarmament. But the Superman films are host to at least one memorable instance of space death.
When Zod and his minions are freed from the Phantom Zone in our solar system, their first act is to make a beeline for the moon. There, they encounter a hapless band of astronauts and proceed to test their newly emerging powers in various gruesome ways. Getting kicked in the crotch and launched into space? That has to be one of the worst deaths any fictional astronaut has suffered.
Planetary Death Ray
Even in a galaxy far, far away, the powers that be are locked in a never-ending arms race. Palpatine solidified his grip on the galaxy in A New Hope when he introduced the Death Star to a fearful populace. Sure, it only ever managed to blow up one planet before Luke bullseyed it like a womp rat, but that one blast was enough to cause millions to cry out and suddenly vanish.
Anti-Climatic Self-Sacrifice
Spock done good when he helped get the Enterprise's mains back online in Trek II, exposing himself to face-peeling radiation to save the ship. His death was earned, and made us cry big fat geek tears. Star Trek: Nemesis tried to do the same, with Data... minus the drama and impact of Spock's death, one it was clearly trying to milk in this mess of a movie. And all that made us do was cry big, fat tears of anger. (See Alien 3 for another example of wannabe self-sacrifice that gets undone a bit by the events of the fourth Alien movie.)
Airlock'd
Ronald D. Moore's Battlestar Galactica was not the first sci-fi series to use the airlock as a means to kill.
Ripley used the sucker two times before Adama and Co. were airlock-ing Cylons. The first time, Ripley put on her purple space heroine panties, slipped into a space suit and sent Alien's xenomorph out the airlock and into her escape shuttle's engine. The second time? Power loader vs. Alien Queen resulted in The Bitch kicking and screaming her way through the stars. Advantage: Ripley!
Sub-Orbital Space Dive
Military types like to boast about how only the most elite soldiers can handle HALO jumps. Well, their version of High Altitude, Low Opening has nothing on Starfleet's. 2009's Star Trek also featured Kirk, Sulu and a red shirt diving from a shuttle in orbit to land on Nero's planet drill. Everyone knew the red shirt was doomed the moment he stepped out of the background. The only question was how painful his death would be. We'd say going splat and bouncing off a platform several miles up -- and into an energy beam -- is pretty painful.
Here Comes the Sun
Sunshine proved that hull repairs can be scary even if you don't have Borg drones wandering the zero-G environment.
Two of the film's heroes ventured outside of the Icarus II in order to repair the all important solar shield. Cillian Murphy's Capa makes it back to safety, but Captain Kaneda is less fortunate. He learns firsthand just how oppressive the sun's rays are with no atmosphere to disperse them. When the shield realigned, there wasn't anything left of the good captain but a smoldering puddle.
Cryopod Fail!
Cryopods and hypersleep chambers allow humans to weather the effects of time caused by deep-space travel, so that the occupants can wake up from a 70-plus year journey not a day older then when they went in.
Or, they can wake up to a smashed pod and a crappy sequel in the case of Alien 3's Hicks and Newt.
Death by Chasm in the Middle of the Emperor's Throne Room
Imperial Forces do not comply with OSHA standards, as evidenced by so many unnecessary dropoffs and tunnels in the Death Star's construction plans. So much so, that Return of the Jedi was just begging to use them in a creative and stirring way to to thwart the bad guys.
Enter Luke Skywalker's play for his father Darth Vader's redemption. All the moody, shadowy lightsaber dueling is a precursor to Vader losing his hand, and Luke standing up to the Emperor. Palpatine makes crazy face and fires Force Lightning at Skywalker, which prompts Vader to feel "the good side" tickle his resolve and send the Emperor tumbling down the "Unnecessary Drop-Off Chasm." File this one under "Death By 'Shoulda Seen It Coming.'"
Planet-cide
And where would we be without mentioning how Nero's drill helped kill a planet directly? Star Trek gained its own version of the Death Star with Nero's red matter delivery system. First, drill a hole into a planet, and then drop some red matter into it. The substance was able to create a black hole inside a planet's core, sucking it in on itself and leaving nothing behind.
Space Walk
The only thing more dangerous than being a red shirt within the Enterprise is being one outside of it.
In Star Trek: First Contact, Picard, Worf and Lt. Hawk make a play for the main deflector dish, to stop the Borg from assimilating the Enterprise-E. Picard and Worf were able to prevent the Borg from co-opting their deflector array, but not before Lt. Hawk was assimilated. The cool thing about space walks with the Borg? Should one take a slash at your space suit, their arms make for great tourniquets.
Armageddon finds a way to turn a space walk repair job into an excuse to shread the hell out of The Right Stuff. Astronaut Craps His Pants is fixing something one minute and the next he's watching asteroid bullets shotgun blast him, his friends and space shuttle. In space, no one can hear you scream, right? That's 'cause it's pulling s!@# like this.
Reavers
A collection of insane, self-mutilated, grizzly nomads that pose a significant threat to the crew of the Serenity in the movie Serenity.
With faces like inside-out Klingons, Reavers are partial to snacking on human flesh and then strapping their dinner to the hood of their busted-ass spacecraft. The last thing you want to do is piss them off, or leave a holographic recording of yourself's last minutes, full of talky exposition and the Reavers ringing the dinner bell on your shiny, screaming self.
Chestburster Wins... Fatality!
Kane wakes up from his facehugger coma and wants some grub before going into hypersleep for the return trip home. He gets some chicken in him, laughs at Parker's dinner chatter, then starts convulsing as the chestburster bullets its way out of the man. Hey Kane? Yeah, you're supposed to keep that red stuff on the inside.
Deep Space Voorhees
Oh, yes, horror movie and sci-fi fans. The Crystal Lake killer hitched himself a ride on a gloriously awful film trip into space. He got an upgrade - a low-budget, plastic metal-y upgrade - and proceeded to let the blood spill. And beat the hell out of two sleeping bags full of half-naked holographic co-eds.
Jason X is the space-set slasher movie we deserve and need. If you haven't seen it, then put down your inhaler and can of Pringles and make it happen. And thank us and your Netflix later.
Feeling The Touch
1986's Transformers: The Movie gave us many things: "Jazz to Moon Base 2!" Optimus Prime's death. Judd Nelson vs. Leonard Nimoy. But it's most generous, and infamous, gift is Unicron. What is he/it? Unicron is a sphere made out of high-tech circuitry and weird, compactor insides that could go from Planet to Giganticon just in time to Hulk Smash worlds like Cybertron.
We can't think of a worse way to go than by a planet-sized Transformer who eats planets, voiced by Orson Welles.
It looks like Unicron will be the literal big villain of the Transformers/G.I. Joe crossover movie. But will that movie have a banger like Stan Bush's "The Touch"? We'll see.
For more space fun, check out our picks for the top 25 sci-fi movies of all time and the best sci-fi movies on Netflix.
Note: this article was originally published in August 2010 and was updated on September 1, 2023.
