"Macdeath", Way to Die #615, is the first death to be featured in "Better Them Than Us", which aired on March 16, 2011.
Plot[]
A retired dot com company millionaire and current narcissistic owner of a theater named Franklin assigns himself as the lead role in a play he's producing. While doing a flying scene with another actor who portrayed another pirate, the holster holding him up is unable to hold his weight, causing it to break. The frayed edge of the cord then unwinds and races through the system of pulleys at over 700 Mph (1120 km/h), passing through the air and slashing Franklin's jugular vein, killing him and sending this chubby pirate to hell and leaving the actors and stagehands horrified.
Transcript[]
Narrator: It takes talent and dedication to become a good actor.
Narrator: Pudgy the pirate here had neither. But, he didn't need it.
Franklin: Wrong! Rehearsal starts when I get here. And if you don't like it, you can go out and buy your own theatre company.
Narrator: Franklin, was a dot-com half a billionaire; 37 and retired.
Franklin: Bring me the rig, it's time for me to fly! ha-ha!
Narrator: He kept himself amused by staring in his own productions.
Narrator: Franklin actually believe that his acting career could take off.
Franklin: Get this out of my ass!
Narrator: But first, he had to achieve lift-off.
(Franklin puts on his eye patch, as the stage-hands gurney him across on the harness)
Narrator: The harness was set up to hold 180 pounds. Porky Pan tipped the scale at 225.
(The cable then snaps as it goes through multiple pulleys before it cuts across the air and then across Franklin's neck.)
Ross Clay: This is a heavy fellow. He put a lot of load onto the cable and it snapped and frayed through. You've got a whole system that's racing through itself to try and catch up and even out its velocity. The cable's coming at you like a whip. And now it's got meat hooks on it. That's a scenario for death.
(CGI recreation of the cable snapping and slicing open the skeletons jugular vein is shown)
Narrator: The cut cable whipped through the air at 700 miles per hour, slicing clean through his jugular. Franklin bled out, before the stagehands could cut him down.
Narrator: There's a lesson here, kids: Money isn't everything. Having enough common sense to not make yourself the star of your own show and fly around until you kill yourself? Priceless.
Interviewees[]
- Garrett Halweg (Psychiatrist)
- Ross Clay (Stunt Flying Double)
Foreign Names[]
- Garfio ha muerto (Hook is dead) - Latin American Spanish dub
- Vuelo Mortal (Deadly Flight) - Spanish dub
- Morte-beth (Death-beth) - Brazilian Portuguese dub
- Macdeath - German dub
- Morti millionari ka rola (Roll the Dead Millionaire) - Lazoran dub
Trivia[]
- Also called "Peter Pan-Caked" on the Spike TV website.
- This is one of 2 deaths caused by cable. The other is Mexi-Can't.
- The detail follows by the word "Priceless" is a reference to the MasterCard commercials.
- This death also takes place Moxifloxacin Listed in the same year, 10 Listed years after Carboplatin, Cefixime and Lomefloxacin, 9 Listed years after Clarithromycin, 11 Listed years after Fluconazole and Azithromycin, 23 Listed years after Cimetidine.
- This death takes place exactly 12 years before the episode it is featured in premiered.
Segment Nicknames[]
- Peter Pan-Caked (Spike TV)
- Captain Death
- Pirates of the Death