10 Ways To Become Immortal

Nicholas Flamel is not a fictional character – although his connections to Dumbledore are. He was a public scrivener and along with his wife Pernelle a skilled alchemist. 

Not ONE of them mentions Mr.
Sinister?? How is this possible?? He made a deal with Apocalypse, clones
everyone and everything and he’s a mad genius. He fits in more than one
of those ways.

A good example of that last category would be the more popular characters of Fables, plus the series shows you exactly how to accomplish it: first, be a semi-well know character in folklore; second, swindle enough money to finance a trilogy of blockbuster movies about yourself; third, immortality!  As the star in a kind of middling spin-off, that is, but still, immortal!

Just don’t try going after a Time Lord to achieve long life or suffer his fury, just like the Family of Blood did. Then again, they did achieve some sense of immortality.  Tormented but immortal.

Actually, I think the use of ‘phylactery’ for ‘object you stick your life force in so you can’t be killed’ dates back only to D&D’s lich, which may be why Rowling didn’t use it. I think she said she didn’t want a HP RPG either…

It isn’t “Eru Iluvatar”. It is Eru/Iluvatar, like Gandalf is known as Olorin and Gandalf etc – people have more than one name, yo. I don’t give a flying monkey’s butt what it says in Wikipedia and imma about to correct that.

Going back farther, the word has strong religious connotations in Judaism (where it refers to the tefilla) and to a lesser extent Christianity, so I think JKR would have raised some some eyebrows using it to describe something as unambiguously evil as a horcrux.

I’d say that uploading your mind to a computer or robot body is seen in enough different fictions and is sufficiently different from cloning to warrant a separate entry

You should also expand Alchemy to cover hidden, but naturally occurring fictional sources of Immortality (as opposed to alchemical potions that mortals developed).  Some examples include: eating the fruit from the Tree of Everlasting Life (Jadis, the White Witch from the Chronicles of Narnia), drinking from the Fountain of Youth (many tales and also covers drinking from the Holy Grail as in Indy 3 and drinking the magic waters on the Island in Lost), or bathing in a secret African pool (Mina Murray and Allan Quatermain from League of Extraordinary Gentlemen – based in turn on the African Pillar of Fire from ‘She’)

Also, although covered under dealing with higher powers – how could you leave off Richard Alpert from Lost?

Twilight is one of the most boring so theres a start

“Voldemort feeding on unicorn blood in Harry Potter until he can get his hands on his horcruxes”
Noooo, until he can make elixir of life with the Philosopher’s/Sorcerer’s Stone for a new body. Though his consciousness was technically already immortal, by virtue of the horcruxes. Of course, you could also say Potterverse ghosts meed that standard. Come to think of it, why didn’t Tom Riddle just do that? Die, and become a ghost? Oh, I suppose he couldn’t use a wand then.

And did you call Sean Connery’s accent “ridiculous?” Besides, dragons ain’t immortal (despite what King Einon may say), they just live a long-ass time.

Yeaaah, think I’ll stick with eternal life.

What’s the point of eternal life if you can’t spend it murdering, torturing and compelling Mudbloods, eh? 

Hob Gadling is one of my favorite characters.  He reflects exactly what I want out of immortality.  He’s not motivated by self preservation or fear — only an indomitable will to live. 

“I don’t know.  Death’s a funny thing.  I used to think it was
a big, sudden thing, like a huge owl that would swoop down out of the night
and carry you off.  I don’t anymore.  I think it’s a slow thing.
 Like a thief who comes to your house day after day, taking a little
thing here and a little thing there, and one day you walk round your house
and there’s nothing there to keep you, nothing to make you want to stay.
 And then you lie down and shut up forever.  Lots of little deaths
until the last big one.”

Captain Jack also spent a deal of time shooting himself in the head for money, when he was in the circus.

Technically, Dorian Gray didn’t just let an obsessed painter paint him… he also wished for the immortality with all of his soul, at the insidious promptings of Lord Henry Wotton, who comments that it’s a shame that Dorian will grow old and flawed while the painting remains immortally beautiful. It is implied that this wish is what gives the portrait it’s “magic,” allowing Dorian to abuse his body through his hedonistic lifestyle and not leave a mark.

http://tinyurl.com/4skyaqr

wait… a discussion of immortality that mentions Sir Sean Connery and does NOT mention Highlander?  Then again “being born into a race of/like humans that may or may not be the long lost vestiges of an alien society depending on whether or not you believe that a second film existed in its original theatrical cut but otherwise are just non-reproducing luck of the draw bladed-weapon wielding immortals” might not exactly fit on one page.