Guardians of the Galaxy, the quirky superhero movie starring Chris Pratt, has topped a study of the ‘deadliest blockbusters’. The film sees the killing of 80,000 Nova Corps pilots in one of its closing scenes, which takes its estimated on-screen body count to 83,871. Its closest competitor is 2014 film Dracula Untold which sits a whole 78,184 below that total (5,687).
The study was conducted by financial services comparison website Go Compare that totted up the casualties in the best-performing Hollywood films since the 1940s.
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It found that the average number of deaths in movies has risen through the decades. In 1940, there was just one film with 50 or more on-screen deaths, rising to four in 1950, 33 in 1960, 44 in 1970, 84 in 1980 and 119 in 1990. Four films from 2014 made it into the top 10.
Family films such as the Lord of the Rings trilogy were also found to feature an enormous amount of bloodshed. The combined body count of the second and third films in the series feature 4,512 deaths.
The next instalment in the Guardians franchise is being filmed. Directed by James Gunn, the film with actors like Zoe Saldana, Dave Bautista, Vin Diesel, Bradley Cooper, will likely release in 2017.