io9
Science fiction has always had a dark obsession with destroying things, and spaceships are a constant target. When not worrying about enemy ships fragging them to pieces, crews have to worry self-destruct sequences, on-board bombs, lousy construction, bad driving, and suicidal commanders who seem hell-bent on piloting their ships to certain death in what we like to call "shipicides." Damn the photon torpedos! Set the engines for ramming speed in our picks of the best ship sacrifices in science fiction.
- Alien: Blowing up the Nostromo in order to kill one single Alien was one of the biggest (and best) sacrifices in movie history, and the resulting explosion as Ripley flees in the shuttle still stands alone as a perfect example of why you don't need 40 billion rendered polygons showing you just how the ship would look as it broke up into its component atoms. (You can see video of it above.) Plus, you have the audible countdown over the ship's PA system literally beating a ticking clock against Sigourney's ass every step of the way. It worked so good that they decided to repeat it in Aliens.
- Battlestar Galactica — "Exodus Part 2": Lee Adama's emotional outbursts might not win him another command anytime soon, because when he took over as the helmer of the Pegasus he got complacent and fat. However, he redeemed himself by sacrificing his superior ship (with its fighter-building ability) in order to save the Galactica, his pop, and everyone on the planet below. This still stands as one of the most powerful moments in the show. Just when you think everything is hopeless, the camera pulls extremely far back, and... boom. Pegasus to the short-lived rescue.
- Star Trek III: The Search for Spock: Captains of the Enterprise sure have been careless with their ships. What are they on, Enterprise-Q by now? However, the first time the Enterprise was sacrificed was probably the best. Faced with insurmountable odds, Kirk proves he's best at surviving by activating the ship's self-destruct sequence and letting it take out some nosy Klingons. As he watched it burn to cinders from the planet below, he asks Bones "My god, what have I done." Nothing that Starfleet will court martial him for, apparently.
- The Fifth Element: Even cruise ships aren't safe in this film, especially when carrying blue-skinned singing divas with stones buried in their stomachs. The poor luxury spaceliner Fhloston Paradise survives an attempt by Zorg to blow it to smithereens, only to find itself blown up moments later by someone with the sense to use a very short timer and not a wonky thing that you deactivate with a hotel cardkey. Cool escape pods, though.
- Tron: While fleeing Sark and his troops, Tron and his girlriend Yori narrowly escape on a Syd Mead designed Solar Sailer, which rides beams of light around Tronworld. Sark's massive carrier eventually catches up with it and opens up a ship-chomping hole, reducing it to pieces. The best comparison would be if a modern-day aircraft carrier chewed up a catamaran. Sark and the others leave the ship, and he orders it to be derezzed, which is what is really cool about Tron. If you need something, the system can rez it up, and when you're done, you just recycle it.
- Lost in Space: Bonehead Joey, er... Major West uses remote control to ignite the engines on the superior Proteus, full of futuretech and possibly life-saving equipment in order to get hull-burning space spiders off the Jupiter 2. However, not content to just let them burn up in the engine's wake, he also makes the ship self-destruct. Even though his ship has had its systems majorly trashed by the malfunctioning Robot, he still blows up the first sweet ride they find. Oh, and it manages to make their own ship crash. Genius.
- The Last Starfighter: When video game expert turned space pilot Alex keys the "Death Blossom" onboard his Gunstar, it turns into a hypersonic laser death machine. However, once it's in the post-orgasmic glow it's rendered dead and useless. They can't even steer out of the way of Xur's approaching ship, which shipicides itself into a moon. However, that bastard Xur got away, never to be caught since the movie didn't get a sequel.
- Independence Day: This is more of a shipicide from within, but when Jeff Goldblum and Will Smith fly up to the alien mothership and plant the virus, they're basically giving the thing a huge case of indigestion, which it doesn't quite recover from. Sadly (or maybe gladly) I couldn't get a clip from this since three of the Blockbuster stores I visited in Los Angeles don't carry ID4. Lame. But as a bonus, enjoy this clip mashing up Star Wars with Independence Day. Randy Quaid uses the Force.
- Return of the Jedi: While this one wasn't done on purpose, it's sort of a hilarious "Oops" moment as a rebel A-Wing pilot banzais into the bridge of the Imperial Flagship Super Star Destroyer Executor. This causes the ship to veer out of control and crash right into the the new and improved Death Star. Either that was one extremely lucky hit on the bridge, or whoever built the windshield of that thing needs to be fired. It can withstand the rigors of laser fire and hyperspeed, but can't take the impact of a measly A-Wing? I wonder if that have a transportation safety board that investigates these things.
- Vanilla Sky: Cameron Diaz gets an honorable mention in this film for tanking her "ship" (okay, a Buick Skylark) off a bridge in an effort to die in a warped suicide love pact with Tom Cruise. Let this be a note to you love 'em and leave 'em types out there: if you scorn someone, they may seek revenge, fuck up your face, and force you to go into a bizarre cryogenic freeze / lucid dreaming / virtual reality state of existence. Just so you know.
Comments
I like the Fifth Element the best, but Independence Day runs a close second. I love how Randy Quaid sobered up quickly enough to fly an FA-18 Hornet.
I have always thought that self-destruct sequences were rather silly. It seem that they always make them so they are so easy to initiate. you would think they would have so safety protocols lol.....also my don't they have the button in the escape pod. it's always on the bridge and they give you like a twenty second countdown............okay that was fun :)
I was just saying that I loved the Nostromo's death-blow. Did anyone like the spider-bots in Lost in Space? The movie sucked, but I wrote the spider stuff. And guess who didn't get paid for his work?
@superbryant88: No kidding. I mean, 60 seconds to get off the Enterprise sure doesn't seem like very long.
What, no wreck of the Roger Young from "Starship Troopers"? That's an amazing sequence, with decks peeling back and bodies turning into space debris. Plus, Mary Alice from "Desperate Housewives" gets cut in two.
I love how you can see the outline of the A-Wing for a moment inside the Star Destroyer - and how Ackbar looks kind of sad and exhausted observing the crash. Great puppet / mask character. Why weren't his people in the prequels?
@superbryant88: In Next Generation, didn't the self-destruct mechanism require two officers with secret codes delivered in immediate sequence? That's not something anyone's likely to do by accident. I think they could also set the countdown for whatever they wanted.
There's also Sunshine. I'm pretty sure the whole thing qualifies as a self-destruct sequence.
Oh, wait - shipicides. The Roger Young was combat damage. My bad.
If remember correctly, some lucky rebel (is there any other kind?) took out the main deflector shield on Executor, which left the bridge unshielded when the A-wing hit.
As an aside, who names a ship that big after the administrator of someone's will? No wonder the Empire lost.
@Kevin Kelly: They always set the time in Star Trek. Depending on the last command its ranged from a one minute silent countdown to a one hour one.
@Jeff-Minor:
I liked your bots, Jeff. Next to Gary Oldman, they were the best things about that pile.
@SeeingI: Well, because the prequels sucked, so they couldn't put something cool in it. And... oops, I see you corrected yourself, heh. Yeah the Starship Trooper's crash is awesome, but that was from one of those huge bug turds.
LOL. Oh gosh, I almost screamed when they used the original Jupitor II as a disposable shell that was blown up. So it could what, junk up space some more?
How about Crais and lobotomised-Talyn shipiciding to take out the Command Carrier in Farscape? It was a nice last hurrah for a dysfunctional youth with nothing left to lose - and of course, Talyn's being alive and sentient just makes it that bit more empathetic a sacrifice.
Well ok, this isn't really a shipicide, but the black hole tearing apart the Cygnus in The Black Hole was pretty bad ass. Oh and not to be a total dork, but I love the Fruedian-esque slip in the original post, as it was in fact Ripley who survives not "Ridley who flees in the shuttle." I believe Ridley (Scott) was likely behind the lens at that point. Just sayin'.
Good list. And it points out that there are unresolved plot points from The Last Starfighter... SEQUEL!!!! DO IT! Death Blossom 2000
That's what I always liked about the Nostromo self-destruct. It was a multi-step, cumbersome process that required very deliberate action on the part of the destructor. It looked liked some large-scale chain reaction was being set into motion. The fact that Ripley had to read the instructions was just icing on the cake.
Oh, and I think the Battle of the Line should be mentioned. C'mon, large scale shipicide against impossible odds to buy time for the evacuation of Earth! I still get a little choked up when the President of the Earth Alliance makes the final call for all able pilots to "hold the line against the night." Good stuff, that.
If you don't know what I'm talking about, you don't know sci-fi.
Oh and while we are at it, how about when Spaceball 1 went kablooie? Yes it is parody but brilliant none the less. And an honorable mention should go to Master Chief for setting up a core explosion on the crashed Pillar of Autumn ship in order to destroy the original Halo ring.
"and the resulting explosion as Ridley flees in the shuttle still stands alone as a perfect example"
Ripley. Ridley was the director, who, as far as I can tell, never fled in a shuttle...
@bryantpaul: Agreed, sunshine should have led the list.
@gybryant:
I second the Battle of the Line and throw in a shoutout to when the Churchill rams the Roanoke in Severed Dreams. That one chokes me up bad.
@Jeff-Minor: I think the sequence on the Proteus and the spider bots were the only thing redeeming about that film, and it was all downhill pretty much right after that scene. So kudos, you managed to drop a gold coin into a turd :P
great list, nice to be able to sit here at work and watch the great clips from great movies. As hokey as Star Trek can be that was a great sequence, a real 'up yours' to the Klingons... God they are stupid.
@vowell1055:
Yeah, but Delenn busting in at the end calls for a fist-pumping "fuckyeah!"
Ridley? Christ.
Hey, Dark Vader of the startrack Enterprise - nanu nanu!
Has anyone else heard that during the explosion scene indoors, during the fight, that the resulting fire almost got out of control and burned the whole set?
@braak: I'm guessing Kirk's blowing things up probably created the needing a second officer. Kind of like Brannigan's Law.
@gybryant:
Bad guy EA ship: "(blah blah) Do not force us to engage."
Delenn: "Why not? Only one human has defeated a Minbari cruiser. He is behind me. You are in front of me. If you value your lives, be somewhere else."
Pwnd.
Great list and great clips. Man, Lost in Space was a movie with a huge budget and no plot.
Yeah. The Executor specifically had a scene where some poor Imperial bridge crewman said "Holy Christ our bridge's shields are down!" And then Captain Don't-Strangle-Me-Bro orders them to increase the forward batteries because he doesn't want anything to get through. Meanwhile, Red Shirt 2, or whatever A-Wing pilot was already in the midst of his Porkins Maneuver when the order came down so, too little too late for all of that.
The real question is, why does destroying the bridge of the thing destroy it's stabilizers so bad. I mean, was there some poor black helmeted helmsman who had to keep pressing the "up" button just to keep the ship from being pulled nose-first into the Death Star's gravity well? Why were they that close if their job was to prevent the Rebel fleet from escaping the main gun of the "fully operational" Death Star?
I shouldn't know this much about these movies, but all the damage Lucas has done to them hasn't erased the encyclopedic knowledge I sucked out of them as a small boy.
@vowell1055:
Cool line. One of Delenn's best lines and totally hot.
@dshramek:
Say the Executor wasn't all that close to DS2 either. One moment it's far away and the next, it's crashed right into DS2. That amount of mass would have done some serious damage too, but science wasn't really Lucas' strong suit anyway. Mitochlorydians forever!
It was a typical Star Trek reset-button moment, but Janeway plowing Voyager dead amidships into the time-ship in "Year of Hell Part II" was a great scene.
@vowell1055: I actually cheered that line.
Talyn's sacrifice got me all misty-eyed.
Jeff-Minor, I liked the spiders. The rest of the movie -- eh, literally the only reason I didn't walk out was that I was on a 747 over the north Atlantic.
No love for the spaceships of classic anime sci-fi?
Khyron hurling his cruiser on the grounded SDF-1 in the finale of the Macross arc of Robotech, which leads to the death of the single coolest Russian/Soviet spaceship captain of all time: Henry Gloval
@dshramek:
> Why were they that close
Because Lando had ordered all rebel ships to move as close to the death star as possible. Naturally, the empire fleet followed.
Wait, I'm on crack. Forget my last post.
Well, in the above video, we see the fleet essentially "in orbit" around the Death Star. At this point, according to the brief clip that starts us off, the shield is down and the fighters are on their way to the core (presumably flying through small thermal exhaust port, or perhaps the main port).
While I doubt that there are many deleted scenes that haven't been added in special super tiger-dragon editions of these movies, we may assume that the fleet was called to a defensive posture when the shield went down. This was presumably ordered by the fleet commanders as the Emperor was too busy converting some boy to his ancient cult than to worry about following through on his plan to end the rebellion once and for all.
My favorite bit in the Alien self-destruct sequence is Ripley's failed attempt to abort: "Mother! I've turned the cooling unit back on...You BITCH!"
Oh man, I love the Last Starfighter Death Blossom! Its the only moment when that film acknowledges that in space, battles are fought in three dimensions. (Seriously, the concept of "the frontier" drove me nuts.)
To this day, I cannot watch either the death of Spock or the destruction of the Enterprise without weeping.
It's not a space ship, but certainly Morbius hitting the self destruct button on the Krell planet fits a good deal of the description.
I still fear that one day they'll try to remake that movie. And after the self destruct button gets pressed, The Commander, Altaira and Robby have one of those "space car chase scenes" running from the flaming jets of the self-destructing planet and it boils down to big, noisy explosion porn like any summer movie.
I have to second the Seengi's "Starship Troopers" shout-out. Up on the big screen the destruction of the "Roger Young" was mind blowing... instead of just being an ship engulfed in an explosion, you could make out every little deck on that thing when it snapped in half and erupted. Awesome.
eggsellent list. I am especially glad to watch the TRON clip to be reminded of its absolute beauty and the wonderful music as well (if anyone has a .rar file of the soundtrack please send me a link!).
PS i think the phrase "minimum safe distance" produces a complex signal in a film that deals with claustrophobia, unwanted penetration/ pregnancy anxiety, and bodily invasion in general. the whole problem is that we can never maintain a "minimum safe distance" from that alien & its persistent desire to penetrate into or explode out of bodies.
delicious again, i09!
my favorite SARK line:
"...immediate DE-RESOLUTION. that is all."
I never get tired of seeing the super star destroyer go down. Yee-haw.
Don't forget "Silent Running." Douglas Turnbull made it in 1972, and although it's often neglected it influenced many others, including "Star Wars" and "Sunshine."
Bruce Dern hijacks a giant space ship with bio-domes full of the world's last forest species that he's trying to save, and to cover the tracks of the last one he destroys the ship with a case full of nuclear detonators. There's a very poignant final scene when he's setting the charges, and the only one left to talk to is a crippled robot, and he relates a story when he was a young boy before throwing the switch. Great stuff.
@GenXCub: He did. It's complicated.