39,327
edits
Cruel and Unusual Death: Difference between revisions
m
revise quote template spacing
m (update links) |
m (revise quote template spacing) |
||
Line 234:
* The common Western movie line is to always [[Better to Die Than Be Killed|save the last bullet for yourself]], because the "Injuns" supposedly had a number of unpleasant ways to kill you, like [[What a Drag|dragging you behind a horse until you died]], or [[Buried Alive|burying you up to your neck next to an ant hill]], cutting your face and putting honey in the wound, and worse.
* [[The Naked Gun|Frank Drebin of Police Squad]] dreams of dying this way.
{{quote|
** The first movie has two [[Rasputinian Death|Rasputinian Deaths]] that count, a mind controlling doctor (swerves his car into a truck transporting gas, escapes the explosion with half his car only to roll into a truck carrying huge missiles, escapes that explosion as well, ending up on the last missile that rolls into a nearby fireworks factory...) and the main villain (plummets to his doom, then is run over by a steamroller and trampled by a marching band). Both [[Played for Laughs]], of course.
* There is one particularly nasty death in ''[[Ghost in the Machine]]'' which involves a middle-aged man microwaving some popcorn. The serial killer is somehow in the electrical circuit and starts a fire. When the man returns his face starts to literally bubble like the popcorn in the microwave. Then to make his death seem more pathetic he slips and hits his head on the kitchen bench. If you're after a night of good old fashioned [[Gorn]], I would recommend this classic.
Line 293:
* In the [[Lord Peter Wimsey]] short story ''The Abominable History of the Man with Copper Fingers'', an artist murders his mistress because he suspects her of cheating. He kills her by electroplating her. The artist later [[Karmic Death|falls into his own vat and is killed in a similar manner]].
* This trope is strong in ''A Very Offensive Weapon'', a take-off of heroic fantasy by [[David Drake]]. The hired retainers are [[Genre Savvy]] and know there's no chance of surviving the heroic quest they're on. So they strive to die heroically, regaling each other with tales of legendary deaths.
{{quote|
* In ''[[Polystom]]'', a servant convicted of murdering an aristocrat is executed using the "skin frame": after fattening him up to loosen the entire skin, the skin around his ankles is cut and pinned to the lower part of the frame and he must hold the upper part of the frame until his arms give way with fatigue.
* In ''Death Masks'', a novel in ''[[The Dresden Files]]'' series, [[Cool Old Guy|Shiro]] is brutalized and tortured to the point that Harry Dresden almost doesn't recognize him anymore.
Line 414:
** And even then, [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0TJAjevIjw some things were just too cruel for this game.]
** To go into detail, while you can inflict some ''very'' esoteric deaths on normal enemies (catapulting to the moon or hitting their head off with a golf club, for instance), here's how Jack takes care of the bosses.
{{quote|
Jude the Dude: Shot repeatedly until literally nothing of him was left.
Von Twirlenkiller: Punched to death with one of his own arms.
Rinrin: Eaten by a large animatronic statue.
Shogun: Impaled through the crotch by a spiked roof fixture.
Yokozuna: Used for fireworks.
The Shamans: Chained to Jack's bike and [[What a Drag|dragged along the ground]].<br />
Frank: Killed by his own hand cranked electric chair.<br />
Line 439:
* In ''[[Dead Rising]]'', after you defeat [[Monster Clown|Adam the clown]], he drops his still-running chainsaws and falls on them. He dies [[Laughing Mad|laughing like a maniac]] while blood is spraying everywhere.
** In ''[[Dead Rising 2]]'', Sullivan [[Just Between You and Me|attempts to justify the zombie outbreak Chuck was framed for.]] Given that Chuck lost his wife to the previous outbreak, he's not impressed. The following [[That One Boss|boss fight]] - where [[Guns Are Useless]] and ''[[No-Gear Level|Chuck can't use melee weapons]]'' - just make it easier to hate him. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=os78TihE1Ws But Keiji Inafune makes up for all of this by several orders of magnitude].
{{quote|
'''Chuck''': ([[Land Mine Goes Click|Handcuffs Go Click]])<br />
'''Sullivan''': ('''[[Oh Crap]]! I'm handcuffed to the damn building!''')<br />
Line 477:
* The Asperpedia Four in ''[[Sonichu]]''. After a deeply biased trial, Alec, Evan, Mao and Sean are sentenced to death. Alec is strapped to an electric chair, as each of the main characters tell him to go to hell. Sean is killed by firing squad. But that's small potatoes compared to the last two. Mao is torn apart by Chris's psychic powers, and worst of all, Evan is chained up and brutally tortured to death, by an ''eight year old girl, nonetheless.'' And this is after Chris criticised Asperchu for its excessive violence. [[Moral Event Horizon|Just... damn, Chris.]]
* ''LOL - Comics!'' has the "[http://www.prguitarman.com/comics/271_cerealKILLA.gif Cereal KILLA]".
{{quote|
* ''[[Goblins]]'' has quite a few of this. Examples (all contain spoilers) include [http://www.goblinscomic.com/12072008/ this,] [http://www.goblinscomic.com/12172010/ this,] [http://www.goblinscomic.com/06072011/ and this.]
* ''[[Homestuck]]'' has had quite a few unpleasant deaths during Act 5 Act 2, but Neophyte Redglare's takes the cake. She either a.) didn't know about or b.) severely underestimated Mindfang's mind control abilities. As a result, Mindfang manipulates the angry mob at her trial into lynching Redglare and hanging her with one of her own nooses. Given that the story is written from Mindfang's point of view, it is highly unlikely Redglare survived the encounter.
* ''[[Looking for Group]]'''s very own [[Heroic Sociopath]], Richard, revels in this trope. This appears to be mainly due to the fact that Richard, being an ageless, undead warlock, as well as a sadist without equal, needed something to keep him going throught the centuries, but also due to his inability to distinguish "[[Crossing the Line Twice|going too far]]", and "[[There Is No Kill Like Overkill|going much, MUCH further than merely 'too far']]".
{{quote|
'''General''': ''Report.''
'''Guard''': ''The invaders march upon the city faster than anticipated. On foot and wings. Word has also reached us of a disaster that has befallen Bertu. Every last citizen; slain. At times, in very peculiar and imaginative fashions.''
'''Richard''': ''You like my work?'' }}
* In the world of ''[[Zombie Ranch]]'', someone dying from the zombie bite itself is considered one of the worst, most painful ways to go, and a horrible act of cruelty to let occur. At least one outlaw gang is known to use this as a [http://www.zombieranchcomic.com/2011/11/02/97-dead-mans-party/ ritual punishment].
Line 532:
* [[wikipedia:Pierre Mulele|Pierre Mulele]]. Mobuto (dictator of Zaire at the time) tricked him into returning to Zaire and had him tortured to death: his eyes gouged, genitals ripped off and his limbs cut off one at a time all while he was alive.
* The Cheka in the early days of Soviet Russia:
{{quote|
** The Whites (not to mention other sides, like Anarchists or simply local bandits who proliferated in the lawless atmosphere of the times) were hardly better. The reports of both sides atrocities read like a record of some sort of a cruelty contest. Of course, one has to take into an account that both were heavily [[Unreliable Narrator|Unreliable Narrators]] with a lot of incentive to demonize the other side...
* Elizabeth Bathory was punished for her crimes by being sealed in her room, with only a small window in the wall that used to be her doorway from which a guard would give her her meals. She actually lived like this for a few years before finally dying.
Line 538:
** Because Elizabeth had many important relatives, her execution (which was originally suggested by King Matthias of Hungary) would generate too much negative effects amongst the nobility. So, she was, at first placed under house arrest. When the king finally visited her, and saw the extent of her evil, he had her sealed in that room for four years. As for living in a room for four years being mundane a demise compared to, say, being poked to death with red hot pokers... Well, think about it: imagine, having literally no human contact for four years, other than whomever it is who brings your food through a slot... No one to talk to, no one to compliment your wondrous beauty that cost you so many lives and so much of your own sanity to preserve... That is, no one to talk to other than the furniture or the piles of your own excrement.
* Once King Olaf of Norway became a Christian in the late 10th Century, he was ''very'' enthusiastic about spreading the Gospel of the loving and merciful Prince of Peace:
{{quote|
** This probably should go under [[Completely Missing the Point]], as well.
* Legend has it that when Caupolicán, toqui (war leader) of the Mapuche of southern Chile, was captured by the Spanish in 1558, he was executed by being forced to sit on a pointed stake, which his body weight caused to [[Impaled with Extreme Prejudice|slowly skewer him]]. Given the [[The Spanish Inquisition|sadistic methods of death common in Spain at the time]], this seems quite plausible.
| |||