A Death in the Limelight: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

Briefly, an episode or issue that [[A Day in the Limelight|suddenly focuses on a character]] specifically because they're going to die at the end (or fairly close to the end).

 

{{examples}}

* ''[[One Piece]]'' built an entire arc on Luffy and Whitebeard trying to rescue Ace. In the end though, [[Not Quite Saved Enough|they were unsuccessful,]] with both Ace and Whitebeard dying in the ensuing battle against the Marines.

** It won't be the last time they die, either.

* Admiral Sadaako Munetake in ''[[Martian Successor Nadesico]]'' spends most of the series between [[Butt Monkey]] and [[Jerkass]]. When he gets his own episode, the effect of both roles crashes on him, and he commits [[Suicide by Cop|suicide by Jovians]].

* ''[[Fafner in the Azure]]'' does this as well {{spoiler|several times, in conjunction with [[Dying Moment of Awesome]]. Shouko's and Mamoru's [[Heroic Sacrifice]], Kouyou's and Sakura's assimilation, and Michio's suicide attack. Subverted with both Kouyou and Sakura in that both [[Unexplained Recovery|recover.]] Double subverted in that Kouyou ends up becoming a Master-Type Festum anyway to protect the island. Triple subverted in that he [[Back for the Finale|comes back in Meir form for the movie,]] piloting the Fafner Mark Vier, the Fafner he originally used. [[Overly Long Gag|QUADRUPLE]] subverted in that his Fafner is immediately trashed and his Meir core promptly vanishes.}}

 

* ''Countdown to [[Infinite Crisis]]'': The Ted Kord [[Blue Beetle]], who'd undergone [[Flanderization]] to the point he was a [[Flat Character]] and then barely seen for a few years, is suddenly brought back in a story that highlights his positive character traits and strengths as a hero, specifically to make his death at the end actually mean something (as opposed to the characters who were [[C-List Fodder]] for the upcoming [[Crisis Crossover]] event).

* ''[[Teen Titans (Comic Book)|Teen Titans]]'' #62: [[Superfriends|Wendy and Marvin]], teen geniuses who came on during the One Year Later plotline to repair Cyborg and maintain the Titans Tower gear, generally treated like background characters until needed for hostages. In this issue, they discuss their dissatisfaction with their minor roles, [[Mythology Gag|adopt a dog]], and are repeatedly assured by other characters that they're vital to the team's functioning. Then the dog turns into a monster that mauls Marvin to death and puts Wendy in a coma when none of the heroes are looking.

 

 

* In [[Dan Abnett]]'s ''[[Gaunt's Ghosts]]'' novels, individual Ghosts are brought forward, by name, with details for a scene or a few scenes before their deaths. This is not distinguishable from the characters who are named and developed to play more important roles in the books until the character dies.

* The ''[[Honor Harrington]]'' novels have [[Memetic Mutation|over 9000]] [[Loads and Loads of Characters|characters]], but if the narrative abruptly switches to an unknown character, then it isn't really that hard to tell how they're going to end up. A specific example being the Havenite soldier on leave in ''At All Costs'' whose total experience in the limelight is getting in his air car and crashing it into a plot-relevant character's vehicle.

* The twenty-second ''[[Warrior Cats]]'' book ''Night Whispers'' focused on [[Ensemble Darkhorse]] Flametail's attempts to unravel a mysterious prophecy. At the end, he drowns.

* In ''[[A Song of Ice and Fire]]'', the POV character of every prologue and epilogue dies at the end of it. Granted, the series tends to practice [[Anyone Can Die]] in general.

 

* ''[[Lost]]'' uses this trope a lot, often killing a character (or mortally wounding them) during their spotlight [[Flash Back]] episode. Shannon, Ana-Lucia, Eko, and Faraday have all been killed in their flashback episodes.

** Charlie subverts this trope just a little: he's told that he will die for real this time, spends the episode reviewing his favorite memories, does the thing that will kill him...and doesn't die. He dies in the next episode, when the limelight is on another character.

** Another variant is Jacob, who is mentioned dozens of times before being shown onscreen in his first centric episode (though he isn't having the flashbacks, he appears in all but one of them). Then he gets offed at the end of the episode.

** Arguably, the death of Daniel Faraday echoes this trope as well. Though he was a member of the main cast, his backstory was lacking until his centric episode "The Variable", in which his backstory was filled in and he was killed.

* ''[[Primeval]]'': Episode 4 did this for Tom, to a degree.

* Doyle in ''[[Angel]]''

* [[Reality TV]] does this often. If an episode is focusing on a contestant, chances are they are [[Catch Phrase|auf'd]] that episode. This is particularly true if their confessionals emphasize 1) How much winning the competition would mean to them; 2) How much they have come to appreciate their teammate/showmance partner; 3) How much they have learned / grown / matured because of their participation; 4) How wonderful the experience has been or how many new friends they've made; and 5) How much better / stronger / more skillful / better-liked / more in control of the game they are than one or more of their fellow competitors.

** ''[[America's Next Top Model]]'' is an [[Egregious]] offender. Whenever a girl shows up who isn't one of the handful of prominently featured girls in each cycle, she's either getting called first that week or being sent home. Expect her to be suddenly struggling with the judges' critiques, even though she's never been shown doing so before that point.

*** Once a contestant is revealed to the audience to be a homosexual in the same episode he is voted out. One of the most famous examples would be the episode of Tocantins where Coach is voted out, after being sent to Exile Island, finding a "Dragon Slayer Cane", and (presumably) faking a back injury when losing the immunity challenge to JT.

* This has become a way for ''[[The Amazing Race]]'' fans to determine who will be eliminated at the end of the episode.

** And Earthshock.

* ''[[Oz]]'' did this in the very first episode, relating almost every plotline to Dino Ortolani only to have him burned to death at the end.

* In ''[[Burn Notice]]'', Victor died almost as soon as we found out what his deal was.

* In "[[Desperate Housewives]]", the episode where Martha Huber dies begins with saying how much she wanted her life to be exciting and to be famous, and at the end, she was famous for her horrific murder.

* In ''[[FlashForward]]'', the character of {{spoiler|Al Gough}} receives this as his send-off episode. In fact, it is the first time that {{spoiler|more than a few moments is devoted to his flash-forward and the mental turmoil he is experiencing}} although it is hinted at every so often in the previous episodes.

* Claude on ''[[Degrassi High]]'' plays this trope completely straight; he had appeared in a couple episodes in the first season (though he did have a significant amount of screen time in them) before [[Driven to Suicide|committing suicide]] near the end of Season 2.

* When Waruzu Giru from ''[[Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger]]'' started getting character development beyond being the "emperor's idiot son", it was clear he didn't have long to live.

** [[The Dragon]] Damaras as well, getting offed at the end of the two-parter when he finally steps into the battlefield.

 

== [[Video Games]] ==

* Happens multiple times in the Story Mode of ''[[Mortal Kombat 9]]'', in which a character will be killed immediately once his chapter in the story ends.

 

* Mosp from ''[[Sluggy Freelance]]'' died almost immediately after she was given her own week-long arc detailing her backstory.

* A brief story arc in ''[[Something*Positive]]'' focused on Faye and Fred, with Fred planning to tell Faye about his Alzheimer's diagnosis at the end of a day they spent together but losing his nerve. The next morning, he woke up - and Faye did not.

* ''[[Homestuck]]'' did this for several deaths in a row, giving characters lots of screentime in a flash page right before killing them. First "Kanaya: Return to the core" gave Eridan and Feferi a lot more screentime than they're used to and dove into developing Eridan's character for pretty much the first time ever, just before Eridan murdered Feferi, and himself getting killed soon after. Not much later, "Equius: Seek the highb100d." was nothing but Equius and Nepeta getting the most screentime and character development either had ever had, and was shortly followed by both of their deaths.

 

== [[Web Original]] ==

* ''[[Survival of the Fittest]]'' has this come up a few times (although it's not so much an episode as a limelight ''post'') an example of this treatment is Andy McCann, who is killed in his first appearance in the game (that being because his handler left, but still). Notably, his section of the post is about three times as long as that of the character that actually killed him, detailing what he had been doing up to that point on the island and nostalgically thinking about his favourite superhero.

** Notably, due to the system that deals with inactive characters, this has a tendency to happen to them the majority of the time.

 

== [[Western Animation]] ==

** Seeing as season two of ''Beast Wars'' had 12 episodes, those three episodes do form 1/4 of the entire season, so it may not be a negligible amount of time.

* ''[[The Simpsons (animation)|The Simpsons]]'' used this trope in Season Six's episode "'Round Springfield". Bleeding Gums Murphy, the jazz musician who Lisa met in an early episode in the first season, faded into the background quickly (showing up here and there in crowd scenes for a while) and was almost forgotten until he appeared in the hospital in this episode. There, he tells Lisa his whole [[Belated Backstory|previously unrevealed back story]], about how he was a successful jazz musician who made a guest appearance on the Cosby show, and doing a saxophone duet with Lisa. Lisa goes off to school and wins a talent competition, and then returns to the hospital to be told Bleeding Gums has passed away. This occurs in the middle of the episode, and the rest of it revolves around Lisa's quest to arrange a tribute to him. After she succeeds, Bleeding Gums Murphy's ghost appears in the clouds in a parody of ''[[The Lion King]]'' ([[James Earl Jones|Mufasa, Darth Vader, and the CNN announcer briefly interrupt]]), and they have one last saxophone duet over the end credits before Bleeding Gums heads off for his afterlife date with Billie Holiday.

** Then again, one of his powers is the ability to come [[Back from the Dead]]...which was the whole reason he agreed to come along, as a [[Human Sacrifice]] was needed to defeat Ichthultu and someone like Grundy was going to present less of a moral dilemma to that end. He returns for an episode of ''[[Justice League Unlimited]]''...but has [[Came Back Wrong]] and devolved into [[The Berserker]] and has to be killed by [[Anti-Magic]], again [[Played for Drama]]. Given the manner of his death, its not clear if he will again return from the grave or was finally [[Killed Off for Real]], but regardless he does not reappear in the series again.

* Nabu was introduced in Season 3 of ''[[Winx Club]]'' as Layla's love interest [[Shallow Love Interest|...and that's all]]. However, the final episodes of season 4 focused on him a lot, showing his sheer badassery, to the point of beating one of the four [[Big Bad]]s all by himself. Shortly after that, he performed an [[Heroic Sacrifice]].