Clear's following of the design.
| What you have to realize is that we're all just a mouse that a cat has by the tail. Every single move we make, from the mundane to the monumental, the red light that we stop at or run, the people we have sex with or won't with us, the airplanes that we ride or...walk out of; it's all part of Death's sadistic design...leading to the grave.
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Death's design refers to a series of events designed by Death itself. Details of Death's designs are revealed by William Bludworth throughout the franchise, but it's not clear how he knows them. During the survival days of Clear Rivers, she was following the design, and marked events related to it on the wall in her room of the Stonybrook Institution Psychiatric Treatment Center.
Premonition
The people who had the premonition are psychics who were all of the sudden capable of seeing the future.
Order of Death
Those targeted by Death after they survived an event they were originally supposed to die in are killed in a specific order. The order is usually the same one from what should've killed them. The targets are sometimes collectively known as Death's List. Death has killed people through different orders. In Final Destination, the death order was followed the explosion ways in Flight 180. In Final Destination 2, the death order was turned backward of the premonition, which was caused by deaths of the Flight 180 survivors, though Clear speculates that this may not have been intentional on Death's part, merely Death tying up the loose ends left over. In Final Destination 3, the death order was still based the order of death, but also on the seating on Devil's Flight and the photos taken gave clues to how they might die. In The Final Destination, the death order was followed the order in the premonition, except Jonathan Groves who died out of order by not changing seats.
Cheating Death
Intervention
Intervening in someone's death as someone who is on Death’s list can hinder the design, and cheat death, but it will only skip the one who was saved. After the first turn, Death will cheat by turning back to the one who was saved before. Saving yourself or being saved by someone who isn’t on Death’s list does not count. This rule can't defeat Death at all.
New life
According to William Bludworth, only new life can beat Death. In an alternate ending of Final Destination, Clear Rivers had a baby with Alex Browning (although he is dead), so she and Carter Horton beat Death. In Final Destination 2, Kimberly Corman beat death by attempting to drown in a lake then she "died" for a short period of time before she was resurrected by the doctor thus granting new life and becoming one of the only two survivors who did not die by end of the series. However, in one of the alternate endings of Final Destination 3, it's revealed that both Kimberly and Thomas Burke died while being sucked into a wood chipper. If one counts that as canon, then it'd mean no one in the series survived cheating death.
One of the survivors - Isabella Hudson - had a baby, she was not meant to die on Route 23, so she couldn't help Kimberly and Thomas with "cheating" Death.
Despite "new life" defeating Death, it does not save the mother giving birth to the child, with death intending to claim Abigail "Cabernet" Foster in childbirth until Sherry intervened.
Steal another's life
According to William Bludworth, if you kill someone who is not in Death's design, you as the person who was to already to be dead but had cheated Death, receive the remaining life left from the person you killed. Peter eloquently calls this "kill or be killed".
Three instances of this occur in Final Destination 5. Nathan kills Roy, receiving his few remaining days; Roy having an illness that would have killed him shortly anyways. Nathan thus dies shortly after, but not in the original order of death planned by Death, only as the time of death for Roy originally. Peter kills Block, avoiding Death's schedule. Similarly, Sam kills Peter, avoiding Death's schedule. Sam dies shortly after, as Block had been scheduled to die not long after his actual death. There is a bit of a rift here, as Sam was not technically killing someone who wasn't meant to die in the first place.
Whether this plan actually does cheat Death is unknown as it can be presumed that you would have to keep killing to keep gaining life when you reach the end of the lifespan of the previously killed person; if that is true, the killer would presumably be arrested for being a Serial Killer and then die in prison of old age anyway.
Suicide
If it's not your time to die, Death won't let you kill yourself. This happened to Eugene Dix and George Lanter. It was also tested by Carter Horton when he wanted to "gain control" of his life. He drove his car quickly through the traffic trying to kill himself (he would probably kill Clear, Alex and Billy too), but stopped on train tracks waiting for the train to claim his life. Eventually he said "its not my time to die", and unsuccessfully tried to start his car. However, it's revealed in Final Destination 5 that if it's not your time to die, you can't suicide, but the other survivors may be able to kill you. This cannot be proven, since Peter didn't succeed in taking Molly's life, and that it was Peter's turn to die anyway.
In Final Destination 3, Ian McKinley had a theory: if the last person on the list commited suicide, then the rest of the survivors would truly beat Death's design. However, as last one on the list, Wendy Christensen never listened to Ian anyway, it's unknown whether or not Ian's idea is true. However, in an alternate ending of The Final Destination, the last one on the list, Nick O'Bannon thought he could defeat death by commiting suicide.
He jumped out of the mall and landed on a police car and was killed. Nick's action revealed the result of Ian's theory. After Nick's death, Lori Milligan and Janet Cunningham who were the only survivors left on the list, were crushed by an air conditioning unit. This shows that even if the last person on the list kills themselves, the rest of the survivors still can't beat Death. However, seeing as this happened in an alternate ending. It's not meant to be considered canon.
Also in an alternate ending for Final Destination. Alex Browning ended up commiting suicide by sacrificing himself in order to save Clear Rivers. In that ending both Clear Rivers and Carter Horton ended up living, however, it should be noted that Clear was pregnant with hers and Alex's baby thus bringing in the "new life" rule into effect so thus it is unknown if it was Alex's suicide/sacrifice or the new life that saved them (not to mention that this ending is not canon at all).
Stalemate
While it did not defeat Death, Clear was able to bring herself and Death to a stalemate by locking herself away in an Asylum; she could not leave and Death could not get her, implying she would live until she died of old age if she stayed there, thus indicating that while Death would get her when she died of old age, it would be on her terms, not Death's.
Making a Deal with Death
As seen in Final Destination: Looks Could Kill, Stephanie "Sherry" Pulaski makes a deal with Death to get her face back by taking the life of her friends. Death spares her from his list and restores her looks as long as she works for him, indicating that Death is willing to make deals to remove someone from his list - but only for as long as they do his bidding; as soon as Sherry changes her mind and saves someone Death was intending to kill in childbirth, Death runs her over and kills her.