Those familiar with Starz' Spartacus series know the gladiator-focused drama doesn't shy away from violence. People getting slashed up is a big part of the show, though there is an actual story being told. So it's not all that surprising to hear that the drama topped the list for most deaths per episode, beating out HBO's Game of Thrones by a fair margin.
(Via THR) Funeralwise.com, a website that explores the subject of death and funeral customs, took a look at the role of death on television and came up with an interesting list of numbers after evaluating over 300 episodes of television. The site reports that Spartacus: Vengeance topped all other shows, averaging 25 dead bodies per episode. HBO's Game of Thrones came in second with an average of 14 dead bodies per episode. The site doesn't differentiate between main characters and extras, however given the bloodbath that was the Spartacus: Vengeance finale, I feel pretty positive the Starz series would win out there, despite the fact that Game of Thrones has a tendency to off main characters as well. Then again, we still have a couple of episodes to go this season.
The CW's Nikita won out among network television, averaging 9 dead bodies per episode. Meanwhile, CBS came out on top among network TV, with eleven of its shows selected for the study, five of which cracked the Top 10 deadliest. Meanwhile, Vampires topped Zombies among the undead, with the CW's The Vampire Diaries' 18 dead vampires per episode topping The Walking Dead's 16 dead zombies per ep. Something tells me the second season finale of TWD helped increase the AMC drama series' average.
ABC's Revenge managed to make the list for "safest" shows for humans, based on the episodes that were sampled. I'm assuming the one where Tyler was murdered was left out.
Interestingly enough, the site notes that of all the deaths shown in the episodes they watched, there were only 8 instances where a funeral or memorial service was shown.
It's a morbid topic, but a relevant one, especially when you look at the numbers. The site does a nice breakdown of how they did their research and the full list of shows they looked at for the study. You can check it out here.
