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Do you know what sound an absolute fucking gangster makes? Because I do...
by /u/bsmith2123 | 118 comments | 2026-06-12T21:52:08+00:00 Central
Comments
| /u/toyheartattack I watched an interview with his family about it recently. Was actually kind of sad. He apparently sat up and got super animated, so they thought his condition was improving. He passed shortly thereafter. |
| /u/MundieORiley That is a common phenomenon with people who are actively dying. It's known as an end of life rally or terminal lucidity. We don't know much about it, but the theory is it's a final surge of hormones and neurotransmitters shortly before death. I'm surprised Lee's family wasn't told about this by their medical team before hand. I imagine it was a sad shock for them. That's tough. |
| /u/CadenVanV The theory I've always heard is that the brain is reallocating resources away from a lost fight and back to their normal locations |
| /u/Careless-Vehicle-286 "Alright white blood cells, you did your best" violin starts playing as the vessel goes down |
| /u/halcyongt "Gentlemen, it has been an honor and privilege to have played with you." |
| /u/Voidless-One https://giphy.com/gifs/sZRjUjcBFit6U |
| /u/5litergasbubble r/titanic is leaking |
| /u/OhBadToMeetYou In more ways than one |
| /u/triana1326 This scene never fails to make me cry. |
| /u/69hotmomxxx For him it would have been a symphonic metal band... literally Google christopher Lee heavy metal albums |
| /u/Victernus I SHED THE BLOOD OF THE SAXON MAN! |
| /u/NotAzakanAtAll "Mate, let's go back to the Popliteal Fossa were we used to eat the bacteria from scrapes." "You think there will be any?" "I don't know. But I always liked that place." |
| /u/YouAnxious5826 That'll do, leucocyte. That'll do. |
| /u/YouAnxious5826 https://preview.redd.it/q65r0eve647h1.jpeg?width=1080&fo rmat=pjpg&auto=webp&s=25c7268e2703bd80f6eeed4c9c59ab2d3b 2c274c |
| /u/QuackKnight I am never emotionally ready for this reference 😠|
| /u/Incompetencent i think its less violin and more heavy metal guitars because its the last party of life |
| /u/Jeffery95 Yeah it always sounds like the bodies inflammatory response stopping which then reenables a bunch of functions it was previously impairing or preventing. The lack of inflammation though also means its fatal because it was doing something useful with that inflammation |
| /u/floss-with-ass-hair I've heard that, but it doesn't make sense with stuff like Alzheimer's and dementia which doesn't make sense. Like aren't those parts of the brain basically gone atp? It's not just inflammation imo It's one of the reasons I'm a tad hopeful of an afterlife so I'm biased. |
| /u/Jeffery95 It cant be just gone or else the rally would be animated but still lack the memories. My guess is that the dementia and alzheimers does cause some damage, but that it mostly restricts the brains access |
| /u/ssocka I remember reading a research on microdosing psylocibin (or w/e the name is) or something like that in (iirc) dementia patients with next to zero chance of recovery and the drug actually resulted in a better baseline than before, improving their lucidity and memory recollection. It seems that the memories and this parts of the brain are still functioning, butthe pathways are less conductive and this improves it. At least that's what I took from it. Before someone calls me a smackhead - I don't do drugs and this paper doesn't claim any positive effects for normal healthy populace, only in severe dementia patients (and maybe Alzheimer's patients? I don't remember exactly) |
| /u/CadenVanV They're not gone, just can't be accessed properly. If they were gone, people with dementia wouldn't have flashes back to normal at times |
| /u/Lob-Star I like to think it's an evolutionary advantage where a species that sacrifices so much for its big brain (long gestation, wide hips, long period of child care to independence, etc) gives itself one last chance to pass on it's most valuable resource: information. I know that's very romantic and probably not possible but who knows. |
| /u/Brovis_Clay Maybe it was useful when we lived in tribes. It could allow the "leader" to select a new person to lead the tribe before dying. The people that didn't have this might have led to infighting |
| /u/tad-26 I'll buy that, and the sheer consciousness to realize the value of it is one of the best things about being human |
| /u/DramaticPackage5745 This is Reddit where the same trivia is reposted maybe 20 times a month in the comments. Kinda like how nothing original happens here anymore, and you'd see the same posts be recycled through. What really happens is that medicine shifts from treating a disease to very closely managing symptoms only. It turns out that doing that often makes people feel better, because it works temporarily. Until it cannot work, anymore, when whatever is causing the whole death thing is far progressed. |
| /u/fredsify Could be. Heard some arguments that say when you have the common cold it's not the virus producing the symptoms, but are a result of your body fighting the infection. Makes sense in a way. |
| /u/CadenVanV That one's just true. Obviously there are some diseases that do have actual impacts on the body not caused by the immune system, but a lot of the most common symptoms we see are caused by it. |
| /u/the_sweetest_peach Also sometimes called "the surge," for the reason you mentioned. The same thing happened to my grandma. She had a really good day of being practically normal again. I got her a smiley face balloon that day, because even at 10 years old, I didn't know if she'd be like that again. The next day was Valentine's Day. I went to the hospital to find her on a ventilator with her eyes closed. She died that night. |
| /u/MundieORiley I'm sorry for your loss, but I'm happy you got to see her lucid before she passed. I lost my dad a month and a half ago and our hospice nurse, who was a total angel, told us about terminal lucidity. My dad's case was unique, so we didn't get that with him. But he hadn't declined enough to not be able to speak or be unconscious until two days before he passed. We brought him a portable dvd player to the hospital so he could watch A New Hope, his all time favorite movie three or four days before he died. I'm glad he got to see his ultimate comfort movie one last time. |
| /u/Atherum Last week, my Grandfather passed and he had a "good" last two days. Sitting up and reading, asking for a bath, having breakfast and even asking to be changed into normal clothes instead of his PJs. Within 4 hours of his excitable bath, he had died. |
| /u/SolarTsunami I can see how that'd be heartbreaking to a hopeful family, but its a nice thought that some people get to go out on a bit of a high note. |
| /u/Atherum I mean I watched him gasping his last breaths out in clear discomfort (he was already on pain meds, nothing else to do for him) but I'm happy that my family clearly finds comfort in that rush of life he had. |
| /u/SolarTsunami Sorry I didn't mean to trivialize the end of life process, none of my parents or grandparents had "natural" deaths so I am terrifyingly ignorant of that kind of dying and grasping at silver linings. |
| /u/Atherum No no, not at all. You are fine. If anything I'm sort of in a grey area because my family, who are very religious, are in a bit of a rose tinted glasses situation. Highlighting how "good" his death was without accepting that he basically suffocated to death because of the state of his lungs. At the same time, he was 92 and lived a full life, dying relatively peacefully at home with his wife of 60 years by his side. So maybe I'm the jaded one 😅 |
| /u/FreyrPrime I think.. I think that's all we can hope for? That even a life well lived, a life filled with all the joy and happiness that we all seek, still ends there or in some fashion similar. It's not jaded. It just.. life. Dylan Thomas said it best: Do not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day; Rage, rage against the dying of the light. |
| /u/Character-Parfait-42 My mom had Stage 4 lung cancer. Didn't need her oxygen one day, and hung a fucking massive shelf by herself (perfectly level and all). Said she felt great. Next day she was in the hospital, next morning a coma, gone by evening. |
| /u/MundieORiley My dad had undignosed and extremely aggressive stage 4 pancreatic cancer that had spread to his liver and kidneys. We took him to the er, he got admitted. Then got the diagnosis a few days later and less than a week after that he was gone. Went into a coma for two days once he went on comfort care, then passed peacefully. Thank you for sharing about your mom. It helps to hear stories from other people about their passed on loved ones. |
| /u/whenwewereoceans My mom passed from gallbladder cancer, which is similar to pancreatic in that it's usually diagnosed in the aggressive late stages with 4-6 month life expectancy. If she and my dad had not been about to travel out of the country at the time of one of her 'heartburn' episodes, she likely would have brushed it off and not gone in to get checked, and my family's story would have been a lot like yours. The cancer still got her, two and half years later, but the time we had in itself is so enormously lucky. I can't imagine having to go through all that in a matter of months, weeks, or even days. I'm sorry about your dad and the way he had to go. Cancer is cruel. |
| /u/Key_Childhood7436 It's that the immune system fighting is what makes you feel 'bad', not the disease. Once the disease has progressed where your body cannot maintain an immune response you stop feeling 'bad' |
| /u/NotAzakanAtAll I mean, while that is true, it does depend in the disease. |
| /u/hallese I had been in Reddit long enough when my grandpa died that when he suddenly perked up and seemed like his old self (to an extent) I started telling all of the distant family members to get back to say goodbye. He passed away two days later but j will forever be thankful to reddit for giving me the chance to say goodbye to my grandpa and introducing me to badger hair brushes and safety razors. |
| /u/Unfrozen__Caveman I did not see that badger product plug coming |
| /u/hallese It was a very popular recommendation on Reddit when I joined. |
| /u/mudDoctor-- Marketing is getting really good these days |
| /u/hyndsightis2020 "Medical person" here; we often do tell family, but it's difficult to have them understand. When my grandmother passed, I knew what the sudden change in her status meant but I lied to myself and told myself that she was different, a fighter and she'd pull through. Needless to say she did not, in any case knowing these things help, but when it's your own loved one, it's difficult to not have hope, especially when every fiber of your being wants to hope. |
| /u/CMDR_Kaus They probably did, but a family would be happy for even a sliver of a chance at a pull through |
| /u/kingfede1985 My grandpa underwent exactly that last week. Terminal illness, everyone called for a last goodbye, then he was suddenly fine for a handful of days, eating as usual etc... and on Thursday last week he passed. |
| /u/RedRabbit720 if the hospital ever calls and says "if you want to say your goodbyes, then come in now." they really do mean now. tomorrow is to late |
| /u/GeohoundLyu Medical healthcare worker here. That phenomenon is not common at all and only occurs less than 2-4% of the time. You don't want to be the guy that say, "this could be that rare phenomenon where they're getting better but in reality they're dying. So sorry. Anyways have a goodnight!" Then the family gets even more anxious and fearful just for the patient to recover completely 98% of the time and sue the doctor for telling them their loved one could still be dying causing emotional damage |
| /u/Daysleeper1234 This shit happened to my grandma. Few days later she died. |
| /u/ACuriousGirl9 This happened with my grandpa. My dad thought he was better so flew back home. My grandpa died before his plane landed 😢🥺 |
| /u/AncientBlueYonder When my dad was dying he was on morphine for the pain. He was a pure delight with his optimism and joy for life when he was really feeling the morphine lol. We had some good laughs and some good times in spite of everything. Thank God for modern medicine. Its not perfect but its a lot better with it than without. |
| /u/xingrubicon I believe its called "terminal lucidity" |
| /u/InevitableOk5017 I've seen it it's real. It's kinda messed up for someone holding onto the person and you try and kindly explain what is going on and then the nevitable happens. |
| /u/BicFleetwood That's pretty typical of folks dying, ESPECIALLY of something like infection or cancer. Largely, it's a marker of the immune system failing. Most of the symptoms of any disease are the result of the immune response--fever, inflammation, etc. Without the immune system, the human body can rot quite a fucking ways before you, the human mind occupying it, ever actually notice it. The immune system is the first and last defense against anything life-threatening that isn't a straight-up unimpeded traumatic bleed or something like that. In other words, short of a literal leak in the system, the immune system is what's handling it. So when a patient with a serious condition suddenly starts feeling like a million bucks for no fucking reason and absolutely nothing in between, it's usually a sign of the end, because it usually marks the immune system's complete collapse. Their fevers and inflammation dissipate as the disease takes complete control, and there's a few hours to a day of complete lucidity and energy. And then, it's a COMPLETE and RAPID collapse from there. This is why basically all nurses and doctors are instructed to call families ASAP when a patient with a life-threatening disease takes a sudden and drastic uptick. It's usually a sign of the end, and lucidity is soon to be lost. I wish we taught more people about this phenomenon, because so many people lose their chance at a "final moment" because they've deluded themselves into positivity, and the medical staff don't have a gentle way of explaining "no, dumbass, this is the end of the road, and you should have understood this was coming a long time ago." |
| /u/NomuraStoleMyCCInfo I can see both sides on letting Lee's family know. On one hand, not telling them gives them that shock of "what, he was just okay?" If you tell them it's terminal lucidity, it becomes the much more ominous "oh no, how much longer?" |
| /u/Rum____Ham My family experienced this, with my mother's father. We were all there gathered as he was limp and not lucid, struggling to breath. My family is a religious bunch, so we (they) all prayed and then everyone said their goodbyes. We went to sleep in the waiting room. When we woke up the next morning, he was awake and fully lucid. His old self. He was even giving us all shit, like "God dammit, I could hear all of you around me, praying me out! He was gone, less than 24hrs later. But that was the perfect ending, for his loud personality. He got to give us all one last heap of good natured shit before he passed from the world. All in all, it's a pretty good death story. |
| /u/CrimsonThar I learned about this phenomenon shortly before one of my dogs died. One day his legs just completely gave out on him and he spent his last 3 days lying down unable to move. Not long before he passed, he saw a squirrel running across the yard and just got up and ran after it for nearly a minute, then fell right back down and stopped breathing. His name was Pippen, named after Scottie Pippen. He was revived at birth and lived for 14 years hopping on his front legs. I miss him. |
| /u/LinguiniWithClams Or the medical team did, and in the chaos and grief of a loved one dying the family didn't register it. I've worked with plenty of hospice patients and their families. I am a broken record, especially near the end, reassuring the family that what they are seeing is normal and expected. I don't think I've ever had a family realize what they were seeing was the rally, even though it was DEFINITELY explained to them multiple times. It is rough. I hope they had a wonderful team of healthcare workers surrounding them, and I'm sure they did. |
| /u/Prinzles Very common, when a patient gets loads of energy that is when nurses should be calling family to say goodbye. Sad, yes, but the human body can be rather fantastic can't it |
| /u/-YellowFinch Really kind of amazing we are built that way- like, that's super beautiful that we are literally built to get to say goodbye (in normal circumstances like old age). I love the world sometimes. <3 |
| /u/Blind_Fire sadly it isn't really that, terminal agitation is often accompanied by confusion and anxiety and the dying patients do not respond rationally |
| /u/glr123 Gave me more time to spend with my Grandpa like one of the good old days. Never saw that man emotional. I was living in California at the time I got the call he was doing poorly and had days left. Hopped on a plane and flew across the country. Showed up to his hospital room around midnight. Sat down next to him and held his hand and he woke up a little. He was on a respirator and a bit out of it, but then after a moment recognized me and realized how far I traveled to see him. He immediately started sobbing with happiness. What a gift to be loved like that. Won't forget it ever. The next day he had a ton of energy. Day after he was gone. |
| /u/Huntsvegas97 My great grandma did this the day she passed away. She'd been basically unconscious for several days, and then that morning she was suddenly awake and alert, talking to two of her kids that were there with her. She passed a few hours later, but I'm so glad my great uncle and aunt got that time with her just before she passed. |
| /u/toyheartattack That's really lovely. I'm sure they absolutely cherished that memory. |
| /u/bluesmaker It's sad but from another perspective, you could see it as him giving a last performance (taking a little poetic license, I suppose). |
| /u/aurallyskilled Yeah the energy required for your body to fight is immense and when it stops it can redirect that energy to being alert. Hospice will sometimes at the end advise to stop eating because digestion is so energy consuming it might be better for them to be awake with family. |
| /u/CptJacksp I get it. I hope I get a nurse that recommends that when I'm about to die. I don't want to spend my last few hours eating |
| /u/Keepitsharkey My father in law had the same. Had a few hours of intense lucidity and really attentive while he was hospital bound, then slipped away into a coma and passed later on |
| /u/Tinksy14 https://giphy.com/gifs/BWil6X0F7a1mE |
| /u/_FawnCupcake That image is the perfect response because Christopher Lee was one of the few people who genuinely had the life story to back up that level of reverence. |
| /u/MythicCommand Yet, no one was more humble about it than him. All the same and moved forward to the next project. An absolute unit and example of a man. Talking about an acomplished World War II veteran, threatre actor, film star, writer, singer, etc. Would never bring it up unless necessary. Sir Christopher Lee will continue to be spoken of as legend. |
| /u/MR1120 Dude has a legitimate claim to 'Most Interesting Man to Ever Live' |
| /u/HoneycombJackass His career was well defined way before LOTR. |
| /u/TheHeroicLionheart Yeah, while LOTR was a huge part of his modern appreciation. I'd say his work with Hammer was more definitional. Not to mention the fact he was in a Bond film while low-key being the one of the inspirations for Bond himself. |
| /u/Glasseshalf He was also in countless stage productions. Those may not seem the most illustrious but the talent and art involved makes them kind of amazing. |
| /u/ddplz He was always known as THE Dracula. But being an absolutely obsessed LOTR fan, the LOTR movies were the closest to his heart. When he heard they were making the LOTR movie, he basically demanded to be in it and worked for near free. Keep in mind he was always a known star in the old days and was in a billions movies. He talked about how he would read the LOTR trilogy nearly once a year prior to the movies development. So I can imagine he was quite proud of being a key part in such a definitive movie trilogy that modern filmmaking has yet to come close to. |
| /u/GreenLurka Got a bunch of Hammer on DVD. Dude rocks. |
| /u/lkt213 It surprised me too, but attack of the clones actually came out AFTER the fellowship of the ring |
| /u/LittleBaldDoctor *So did his signature look of superiority |
| /u/RR-- He was well known as a James Bond villain much earlier too fyi. Though he has hundreds of other screen credits. |
| /u/ddplz He was megastar back in the day as the title role in the hugely popular 1950s Dracula movie https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dracula_(1958_film) Obv this predates most of his LOTR audience, but as an old guy, he was a star pretty much all his life. |
| /u/JuryUpset8040 Most people around my age who weren't cinephiles as kids/young adults likely wouldn't recognize him outside of what was immediately popular at the time (and frankly, what was highly commercialized). Many people likely don't know he was a Bond villain, or Dracula, or indeed the star in an absurdly large number of middling-or-worse B movies. And while LoTR didn't define him, it likely introduced his talents to a generation that wouldn't have reveared him otherwise. Of course, there was the prequels, for what they are. And his magnum opus, as Johnny Depp's villainous candy-hating father. |
| /u/ddplz His Dracula was the defining horror movie of that year and a mega hit. He was "known" as Dracula for decades after that. |
| /u/clickrush Imagine being known as „the Dracula" and then beating that via being known as „the Saruman". |
| /u/Maeglin75 Lee's acting career was already going for more than 5 decades before he worked on LotR. There are only a handful actors in the world that worked on so many movies and stage plays, big and small, and because of this, the praise Lee had for the team that created the LotR movies is so remarkable. When he said that this is the best production he ever worked on and it will write cinema history, that meant a lot. Lee already was cinema history himself at that point. |
| /u/ddplz Yeah most people grew up knowing him as an elderly wizard but they forget that he was young once and has been acting pretty much the entire time with basically no breaks. Just an endless amount of films over 7 decades. |
| /u/No_Sense_3559 Came here hoping I wouldn't have to say it... was a legend waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay before LoTR movie. |
| /u/Lucius-Halthier My favorite fact about him and LOTR is that he tried to correct wormtongue stabbing him, he said that he wouldn't yell out when getting stabbed and it sounds like a gasp of air. He told them that because he knew what they sound of someone being stabbed sounded like because of his younger years |
| /u/Domerhead He's also the only member of the cast to have actually met Tolkien Briefly, in passing, at a pub, but he did meet him once. |
| /u/Amedais Thank you for getting it right. Reddit constantly spreads the myth that he got Tolkiens blessing to play Gandalf, when in reality they barely met. |
| /u/Funmachine He did sort of get his "blessing." In that he told Tolkein that he was an actor and that if they were to make an adaptation of LoTR he would like to play Gandalf, and Tolken basically said the equivalent of "best of luck to you." Remember "Blessing" doesn't mean "endorsement." Ignore this I seem to have misremembered. |
| /u/Amedais Do you have a source on that conversation occurring? Because every interview I've watched with Lee, he says that the entire extent of the conversation was "how do you do?" |
| /u/Funmachine I don't actually, so it is entirely possible I'm misremembering or conflating it with another story. |
| /u/thealthor because of his younger years Which was during his active duty in WWII to be more specific. He wasn't knife fighting in his youth West Side Story style. |
| /u/ThinkFree When he got cast in LOTR, I had two reactions, 1) he's the guy from those classic Dracula movies, and 2) he's still alive? Those Dracula movies were already vintage in the late 90s. |
| /u/flintlock0 He was the villain in Captain America II: Death Too Soon, for goodness sake. |
| /u/New_Simple_4531 The thing is LOTR was probably the thing he was most proud of, he was a huge Tolkien fan, so thats why he watched it in his last days. |
| /u/Lawlcopt0r Yeah exactly, it's what meant most to him. He actually auditioned for Gandalf iirc |
| /u/phido3000 Yeh, but for an older actor what a great role to finish up on. Commanding performance with a commanding presence even with an all star cast. Physically at that age, he was still able to command the stage. Movie(s) is a smash hit, ensuring an perpetual legacy. Every one knew him instantly from that. A subject matter he loved, with an author he met half a century earlier. He seemed really connected to it, it wasn't just another film for him. He had a huge career, even in modern times, for example Starwars. Of course his work in bond, horror films, etc, but this was perfection. But LOTR is just, special special. A sweeping epic, with amazing performances, with amazing actors, amazing director, amazing writing, amazing props, amazing special effects, etc. I don't doubt he was proud of it, and as Saruman he was excellent. |
| /u/Bullrawg You know Viggo actually parries the knife in this scene - Sir Christopher probably |
| /u/watehekmen "And you know why Viggo's scream sound authentic? That's because he actually broke his toe there." "And what about when you got stabbed by Grima sir, it's so realistic." "I don't want to talk about that." |
| /u/Shapesizes I read that in his voice |
| /u/Fun_Firefighter_4292 https://open.spotify.com/artist/2anYzFDecFa10y1rfZH44b?s i=ucO7rKmYSIO3tumtmF6VUw Just plugging his Spotify Page here https://preview.redd.it/d2svg760ix6h1.jpeg?width=1080&f ormat=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9c1d5163163509cf001ef521eb465b7c9 1e3bd07 |
| /u/boomer912 I SHED THE BLOOD OF THE SAXON MEN |
| /u/Fun_Firefighter_4292 I SHED THE BLOOD OF THE SAXON MEN |
| /u/MarcBulldog88 This album is a real-life, English version of Klingon opera. |
| /u/ouichef13 I SHED THE BLOOD OF 4000 SAXON MEN |
| /u/boomer912 A fellow true Leegionaire. Nice |
| /u/Fun_Firefighter_4292 How could I not indulge when there is an entire song dedicated to Don Quixote |
| /u/Awleeks A good song to beat up neo-nazis to |
| /u/arcanin And let's not forget his accompanying role in Rhapsody (The Magic of the Wizard's Dream)! I always shiver when his parts come. |
| /u/Internal_Rise2658 Did those nurses find out about Viggo's toe? |
| /u/mtnsoccerguy Can you imagine getting told that piece of trivia by Christopher Lee? I think I'd be able to stop myself from saying that I already knew that, but who really knows? |
| /u/LazyCymbal "But do you know which toe he has broken?" |
| /u/BuckRusty "Do you know the sound a man makes when his toe is broken?" |
| /u/urbanviking318 "I believe it's something rather like that, just there." |
| /u/Hefty_Direction5189 Toes, plural. He broke two of them. |