Danny Trejo has racked up 398 IMDb acting credits to date – possibly by the time we hit publish on this it’ll be 432 or so – but the former champion boxer has just snagged a new celluloid honour: he’s apparently been killed more times on screen than any other actor.
Buzz Bingo did the math on this achievement using Cinemorgue and IMDb. Their research revealed that Trejo has bitten the bullet (sometimes literally) a whopping 65 times in his movie acting career to date, and has now overtaken Christopher Lee as the king of being snuffed out for our viewing pleasure. So, whether your mind immediately jumps to the memory of seeing Trejo kick the bucket in the likes of Con Air, From Dusk Till Dawn or Anaconda, rest assured there are plenty more instances of his demise both in the recesses of your mind, and in the cinematic vaults of history itself.
It appears that the late Christopher Lee was killed on screen 60 times, and Lance Henriksen is now chasing him down with a current total of 51. Elsewhere, Tom Sizemore and Eric Roberts make an appearance on the list, and Shelley Winters holds the record for the actress with the most on-screen deaths at 20, with Julianne Moore managing 17 so far.
Buzz Bingo also chalked up a list of actors ‘Most Likely To Die On Screen’ and if you’re waiting for us to confirm that Sean Bean easily cruised to the finish line there, you are in for some disappointment, as Game of Thrones alum Kit Harington took the top spot, with a 62.5% chance of seeing his character meet a deadly fate. Bean was all the way down in tenth, beaten out by Mahershala Ali, Mickey Rourke and Dave Bautista, among others.
In terms of the deadliest year on film between 1980 and 2018, Titanic helped 1997 win out by adding 85 on-screen deaths to a total of 330. An action sequel-heavy 1990 was second, with Die Hard 2 and Predator 2 gleefully killing 36 and 28 of its characters respectively.
Trejo is now 75 years old, but is showing no signs of slowing down. He has around twelve films in post-production, is now filming on War on War for Stranger Things director Serge Levin, and has booked six films already in pre-production.
We are almost half the man’s age and feel exhausted after a few flights of stairs. We must bow down to Trejo’s work ethic. Clearly dying 65 times has only strengthened his power…
