"It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done," Sydney Carton thinks on his way to the guillotine. That far better thing is dying tragically, for many reasons: to save an innocent man, to fulfill his own redemption, and--of course--to make us cry at the end of A Tale of Two Cities. The death scene is one of the sharpest tools in a writer's toolbox, as likely to wound the writer themself as the reader--for if a well-written death scene can be thrilling, terrifying, or filled with despair, so can a poorly written one be bathetic, stupid, and eye-rolling. But let's not talk about those. Let's talk about the good ones, the deathless death scenes. We've assembled the 50 greatest fictional deaths of all time--the most moving, most funny, most shocking, most influential scenes from books, movies, TV, theater, video games, and more. Spoilers abound: It's a list that spans nearly 2,500 years of human culture, from Athens to A24, and is so competitive that even poor Sydney Carton and his famous last words couldn't make it. We've also talked to many of the creators behind the scenes on our list to ask them how they wrote them, why they killed off characters we loved, what makes a great death scene, and what final moments from fiction have stuck with them all their lives. We've made this list during a pandemic, as real-life death has stalked us all, more tangible than ever. After all, one of the many things art can do is to help us navigate the pitfalls of life, and there's no deeper pitfall than the final one. Here are the scenes that have shown us all what the big goodbye might actually be like, when it comes. Imagine Imagine the horror in Athens' Theatre of Dionysus at the premiere of Medea, as the audience heard the desperate cries of Medea's two sons while she ruthlessly stabbed them to death.