10 Surprisingly Violent Deaths In Family Friendly Movies

4. Sebastian Shaw (X-Men: First Class)

Current BBFC Rating: 12 (12a in cinemas).

Cause of Death: Coin driven slowly through forehead.

Thanks to Matthew Vaughn's direction, X-Men: First Class is arguably the easiest to watch in the franchise, with plenty of comedic moments, an upbeat musical montage, and more colourful cinematography than its predecessors, with the famous yellow X-Men suits thrown in for good measure.

The final moments still retain the outfits and the vibrancy, but the comedy quickly vanishes as the mutants take care of villain Sebastian Shaw and his plot to trigger World War III.

Naturally, this involves taking Shaw out, but instead of opting for your typical, more ambiguous villain death - caught in an explosion, falling from a height - the movie makes Shaw's fate crystal clear.

Frozen in place by Professor X, Shaw is powerless to stop a vengeful Magneto using his powers to drive a coin slowly, precisely, through the centre of his forehead.

Cue a cringe-worthy, fleshy sound effect as the coin pierces the skin and you begin to feel incredibly uncomfortable, imagining a fifty pence piece forcing its way through your own brain matter and out the other side.

The camera never cuts away, panning with the coin as it pushes through Shaw's head and Professor X screams in terror. It was an utterly brutal kill, and one not easily forgotten, especially considering the aforementioned upbeat nature of the film up to this point.

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Danny has been with WhatCulture for over ten years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. In 2022, he took charge of WhoCulture and has grown it into the biggest Doctor Who channel on YouTube, and one of the biggest Doctor Who communities on the web full-stop. He has been writing and video editing since his early teens, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers, off the back of a burning obsession with the Matt Smith era of the show. Like many his age, he first got into Doctor Who with the 2005 revival, but has since gone back and fallen in love with the classic years too. If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order, or to give you a random factoid about the making of Gridlock, Danny is the person to ask!