From massive star to supergiant
Stars that begin with roughly eight or more solar masses can evolve toward supergiant stages. After core hydrogen burning, the core contracts and the outer envelope responds by expanding or restructuring.
The result can be a red, yellow, or blue supergiant depending on mass, metallicity, rotation, and mass loss.
Why the lifetime is short
Massive stars have more fuel, but they burn it at a much faster rate. A star that will become a supergiant may live only a few million to a few tens of millions of years.
The red supergiant phase itself can be especially brief on cosmic timescales, often around hundreds of thousands to about a million years.
The final stage
When the core can no longer support itself, it collapses. The outer layers may be blasted outward as a supernova, leaving a neutron star or black hole.
Not every ending looks identical. Some very massive stars may lose huge amounts of material before collapse, and some collapses may be faint or failed supernovae.