It's a double celebration year! 2025 marks the twenty-fifth anniversary of New Line Cinema's horror thriller Final Destination. But, it also marks its triumphant return with the sixth film, Final Destination: Bloodlines. For twenty-five years, the Final Destination series has provided audiences with gleefully inventive methods of killing people, essentially making a blood and guts version of the board game Mouse Trap. Each film generally follows a group of people who survive a catastrophe after one of them has a premonition. Afterwards, they find Death still has designs for them. Usually very inventive, and always very grisly.
To celebrate the anniversary and to wet appetites for the next instalment, FILMHOUNDS is giving you the rundown on what you need to know about the series to date.
FINAL DESTINATION (2000)
The Catastrophe:
Volée Airlines Flight 180 from JFK to Paris experiences a technical fault mid-takeoff. What starts as minor turbulence leads to something much more horrific when the mechanical faults cause the lights to switch off, the breathing masks to drop, and luggage to start hitting passengers. The electricals catch fire, causing a large section of the side to rip open, pulling several high school students on a trip out of the plane. Finally, the engine explodes, incinerating everyone else on board.
The Cast:
High school student Alex Browning (Devon Sawa) is the unlucky soul who foresees the catastrophe and tries to warn fellow classmates. His rival Carter Horton (Kerr Smith) and he get into a fight causing both of them, as well as Alex's friend Tod Waggner (Chad Donella), Carter's girlfriend Terry Chaney (Amanda Detmer), fellow students Billy Hitchcock (Sean William Scott) and Clear Rivers (Ali Larter), along with their teacher Valerie Lewton (Kristen Cloke) to be ejected from the flight before it goes up in flames.
As Death begins stalking them, the group of survivors fall under the suspicion of FBI agents Shreck (Roger Guenveur Smith) and Weine (Daniel Roebuck). The students also meet the enigmatic William Bludworth (Tony Todd), who appears to know a lot about Death's plan.
The Sickest Kill:
After Carter nearly causes the deaths of himself, Alex, Clear and Billy by parking his car in the path of an incoming train, Billy decides he's better off leaving Carter. But the train hits a shard of shrapnel from the car and takes poor Billy's head clean off. Ouch, baby, very ouch.
The Horror Movie References:
One feature of the franchise is that many of the characters are named after iconic figures in the horror genre. Those referenced include:
Tod Browning (director of Dracula and Freaks), Val Lewton (producer of Cat People and The Ghost Ship), Robert Wiene (director of The Living Dead), Max Schreck (star of Nosferatu), Alfred Hitchcock (director of The Exorcist), Lon Chaney (star of The Phantom of the Opera), F.W. Murnau (director of Nosferatu), Fredric March (star of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde), and Carl Theodor Dreyer (director of Vampyr).
Perhaps the biggest reference is the casting of Tony Todd as Bludworth, given his iconic turn as Daniel Robitaille in Candyman.
FINAL DESTINATION 2 (2003)
The Catastrophe:
On the highway heading to Daytona Beach, a logging truck's metal chains snap, unleashing a barrage of logs into the cars behind. People are crushed, impaled, and a surprising number of cars just plain explode in the pileup.
The Cast:
Kimberly Corman (A.J. Cook) has the premonition of the potential catastrophe that saves the motorists from certain doom. State Trooper Thomas Burke (Michael Landes) aids Kimberly in her investigation into the history of strange accidents thwarted by premonitions.
The other survivors include lottery winner Evan Lewis (David Paetkau), business woman Katy Jennings (Keegan Connor Tracy), mother and son Nora and Tim Carpenter (Lynda Boyd and James Kirk), drug abuser and slacker Rory Peters (Jonathan Cherry), the pregnant Isabella Hudson (Justina Machado), and high school teacher Eugene Dix (T.C. Carson), who we discover is covering for the recently deceased Ms Lewton.
Kimberly enlists the help of Death survivor Clear Rivers (Ali Larter again), and is given enigmatic advice from William Bludworth (a returning Tony Todd).
The Sickest Kill:
While investigating Death's plans, Kat's SUV carrying her, Kimberly, Burke, Rory, Eugene, and Clear suffers a tire blowout. The SUV swerves and collides with a pile of PVC pipes on a farm, one almost impaling Kat. The rest of the group exits the car while Kat is pinned. When someone attempts to free a trapped Kat from the car, the airbag deploys forcing Kat's head back and into the jagged PVC pipe behind her. To be fair, she was a smoker, so how much longer did she really have?
The Horror Movie References:
Roger Corman (director of House of Usher and The Masque of the Red Death) and John Carpenter (director of Halloween and The Fog).
FINAL DESTINATION 3 (2006)
The Catastrophe:
At an amusement park, a group of high school students board a roller coaster called Devil's Flight. As the ride crests a loop-the-loop, pervert former student Frankie Cheeks has his camcorder swatted out of his hands. It falls with its strap catching and wrapping around the track. The car hits the camcorder, causing one of the wheels to become loose. As a result, the car malfunctions, releasing the mechanisms holding the safety bars in place. Soon, more wheels splinter off, and the car's connectors disconnect, sending several passengers flying off the ride. People become impaled, crushed and split in half. It's pretty gnarly.
The Cast:
Wendy Christensen (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) finds herself at the centre of Death's plans when she thwarts its big disaster. Other survivors include Ashley Freund and Ashlyn Halperin (Shellac Simmons and Crystal Lowe), two popular girls who survive only because they can't be bothered to deal with Wendy's freak-out. Wendy's boyfriend, Jason Wise (Jesse Moss), Wendy's best friend Carrie Dreyer (Gina Holden), her boyfriend Kevin Fischer (Ryan Merriaman), goth couple Erin Ulmer (Alexz Johnson) and Ian McKinley (Kris Lemche), pervy high-school graduate Frankie (Sam Easton), jock Lewis Romero (Texas Battle) and Wendy's beloved younger sister Julie (Amanda Crew) all feature as people spared from death by theme park only for strange things to happen around them.
While Bludworth doesn't appear in the film, Tony Todd makes a cameo as the voice of the Devil's Flight ride.
The Sickest Kill:
Ashley and Ashlyn hit the tanning beds but find themselves trapped under the increasing heat when a shelf falls and blocks the door. As they frantically try to escape, the tanning bulbs begin blowing, setting both of them on fire. The scene cuts, hilariously, from the burning beds to their twin coffins. Just brilliant editing there.
The Horror Movie References:
Carlos Hugo Christensen (director of If I Should Die Before I Wake), Robert Wise (director of The Haunting), George A. Romero (director of the Dead series), Edgar G. Ulmer (director of The Black Cat), Karl Freund (director of The Mummy, cinematographer of Dracula), and Victor Halperin (director of White Zombie).
THE FINAL DESTINATION (2009)
The Catastrophe:
At a stock car race, things take a turn for the worse when a car part falls onto the track, blowing off the tyres of another car, resulting in it flipping. One of the wheels takes out part of the grandstand, while another car flattens the rest. People are crushed, cut in two, and someone gets a face full of exploded car engine.
The Cast:
Nick O'Bannon (Bobby Campo) has the speedway premonition while out with his girlfriend Lori Milligan (Shantel VanSanten) and their friends Hunt Wynorski (Nick Zano) and Janet Cunningham (Haley Webb). Also in attendance is truck driver and neo-nazi Carter Daniels (Justin Welborn), Samantha Lane (Krista Allen), mechanic Andy Kewzer (Andrew Fiscella) and his girlfriend Nadia Monroy (Stephanie Honoré), as well as security guard and recovering alcoholic George Lanter. All but Nadia survive thanks to Nick. Later in the film, we find out that despite not leaving the stadium, Jonathan Groves (Jackson Walker) has also survived, though heavily injured.
The Sickest Kill:
Samantha, having left the stadium with her husband and sons, appears grateful to Nick for his part in preventing her from dying a grisly death. Later, she treats herself to a well-deserved visit to the beauty salon. As her sons occupy themselves by throwing rocks at a stop sign, one lands in the grass nearby. No big deal, right? Wrong. A man riding a lawnmower hits one of the rocks and sends it flying straight into Samantha's eye, killing her.
The Horror Movie References:
Dan O'Bannon (writer of Alien), Jim Wynorski (director of Chopping Mall and Sorority House Massacre II), and Sean S. Cunningham (director of Friday the 13th).
FINAL DESTINATION 5 (2011)
The Catastrophe:
As if going on a corporate retreat wasn't bad enough. While on the North Bay Bridge, high winds cause disaster. As the bridge begins to collapse, people are thrown into the water below only to be crushed by cars, impaled on yacht masts, and for one poor soul, covered in boiling hot tar. It's still better than spending a weekend doing team-building exercises.
The Cast:
Office worker and trainee chef Sam Lawton (Nicholas D'Agosto) saves his colleagues from certain doom on the bridge. They include ex-girlfriend—at least for now—Molly Harper (Emma Bell), his friends nice guy Nathan Sears (Arlen Escarpeta) and wannabe hot-shot Peter Friedkin (Miles Fisher). There's also Peter's girlfriend and budding gymnast Candice Hooper (Ellen Wroe), obnoxious colleague Isaac Palmer (P.J. Byrne), straight shooter Olivia Castle (Jacqueline MacInnes Wood) and blowhard boss Dennis Lapman (David Koechner).
The survivors are investigated by FBI agent Jim Block (Courtney B. Vance), while Bludworth (Todd) makes a return to offer some sinister musings on death. While Roy Carson (Brent Stait) plays a character who Nathan believes has taken his place in Death's plans.
The Sickest Kill:
Candice attends a gymnastics training session while boyfriend Peter watches. As she trains on the balance beam, a series of incidents occur. There's a fan pointed at a bowl of chalk, an air conditioning unit drips water onto the safety mats near an exposed wire, and a nail from the air-con unit falls on the beam. Candice avoids these, and instead opts for the uneven bars and begins practising. Eventually, another person stands on the nail, falls into the bowl of chalk, which is blown into Candice's face, causing her to flip and fold in half like a deck chair. Classic.
The Horror Movie References:
William Friedkin (director of The Exorcist), Tobe Hooper (director of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and Poltergeist), and William Castle (director of House on Haunted Hill and 13 Ghosts).
FINAL DESTINATION: BLOODLINES (2025)
What can we expect:
We're promised a new spin of the series, as well as more information about William Bludowrth. Seeing as this is Tony Todd's final performance following his death, we could be in for one hell of a ride.
Final Destination: Bloodlines is in cinemas from 16 May.
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