10 Sci-Fi Movie Clichés Everyone Secretly Loves

9. Space Funerals Involve Ejecting A Coffin Out An Airlock

Man Of Steel
Paramount Pictures

When you're on a space ship, travelling a billion miles between planets for an unspecified amount of time, clutter is something you want to avoid.

The heroes of our favourite science-fiction films think the same. So when a comrade in arms died dutifully, a tasteful ceremony is held in which the main characters gather together to say good-bye, before firing the coffin into the endless abyss of space.

As far as funerals go, it's not a bad gesture. Eulogies, salutes and tearful mourners all compose an emotional scene, and on a spaceship, the endless void is the perfect grave. Like contemporary films having burials that takes place in the rain, jettison funerals have become a cliche.

Starship Troopers and Star Trek have worked with this trope well - the tone of their scenes have been sombre, and watching characters eject into space has made the scene even weighty as they are bid farewell forever. Maybe one of the best innovations of this trope came in Guardians of the Galaxy 2, when Yondu was cremated and his ashes were expelled out into the never-ending terrain.

Until writers come up with new and exciting methods of disposing of bodies in space, this way is a preferred favourite.

Contributor

I overthink a lot of things. Will talk about pretty much anything for a great length of time. I'm obsessed with General Slocum from the 2002 Spider-Man film. I have questions that were never answered in that entire trilogy!