Death Course: Difference between revisions

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* And, of course, [[Bottomless Pits]] and/or [[Pit Trap]]s.

The '''Death Course''' makes a mundane walk in the park into a slightly less sadistic version of football training camp. It's common in [[Video Game Tropes|video games]] where [[Everything Trying to Kill You|hazards are commonplace]], and action series. Sometimes, there are [[Dungeon Bypass]]es available.

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The '''Death Course''' makes a mundane walk in the park into a slightly less sadistic version of football training camp. It's common in [[Video Game Tropes|video games]] where [[Everything Trying to Kill You|hazards are commonplace]], and action series. Sometimes, there are [[Dungeon Bypass]]es available.

== Anime & Manga ==

* ''[[Hanaukyo Maid Tai|Hanaukyo Maid Tai: La Verité]]'' has one hidden under the front lawn of the mansion.

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* In ''[[Galaxy Quest]]'', the characters are moving through a spaceship based on the one in the TV show they starred in. When there's a Death Course down one corridor, one asks why the heck such a thing would be in a spaceship. The answer is, of course, because it was in the TV show.

* The execrable ''[[Dungeons & Dragons (film)||Dungeons and Dragons]]'' movie from 2000 had a Death Course used for training in the Thieves' Guild, which the hero had to run. By purest coincidence, the guildmaster was played by Richard O'Brien, who used his [[Catch Phrase]]s from ''[[The Crystal Maze]]''.

* The execrable ''[[Dungeons & Dragons (film)|Dungeons and Dragons]]'' movie from 2000 had a Death Course used for training in the Thieves' Guild, which the hero had to run. By purest coincidence, the guildmaster was played by Richard O'Brien, who used his [[Catch Phrase]]s from ''[[The Crystal Maze]]''.

* The opening of the "Weird Al" Yankovic movie ''[[UHF]]'' is a loving parody of the famous [[Indiana Jones]] sequence, right down to the giant rolling stone ball. However, this one can navigate and turn corners.

* Let's not forget the path into Alcatraz in ''[[The Rock]]''.

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* Inverted in the ''[[Home Alone]]'' series, in that it's the ''villains'' who are forced to negotiate a Death Course, designed by the protagonist.

* Shifu's temple from ''[[Kung Fu Panda]]'' has one of these.

* One appears in the song [[Training Montage|"One Last Hope"]] from ''[[Hercules (1997 film)||Hercules]]''.

* One appears in the song [[Training Montage|"One Last Hope"]] from ''[[Hercules (1997 film)|Hercules]]''.

* In 1972's anthology ''Tales From The Crypt'', the abusive manager of a home for the blind gets his comeuppance when the visually-impaired men he's been mistreating lock him in his office and construct a Death Course through which he must exit, with hundreds of razor blades set into the walls of a very narrow passage. They wait until he's squeezed his painful way through it once, then sic his own attack dog on him and turn out the lights.

== Literature ==

* In the [[Alex Rider]] book ''Eagle Strike'', Alex is thrown into an exact replica of a Aztec level of a video game by the game's creator. This features darts, slippery surfaces, a robot snake which is a real snake in body armor and two Aztec gods (guards in costume).

* In the ''[[Alex Rider]]'' book ''Eagle Strike'', Alex is thrown into an exact replica of a Aztec level of a video game by the game's creator. This features darts, slippery surfaces, a robot snake which is a real snake in body armor and two Aztec gods (guards in costume).

* Near the end of ''Inheritance,'' (the last book of the ''[[Inheritance Cycle]]') Eragon, Saphira, Elva, Arya, and eleven other elves make their way through a hallway filled with traps to get to [[The Big Bad]].

* In [[Matthew Reilly]]'s books ''Seven Deadly Wonders'' and ''The Six Sacred Stones'' almost all the action sequences take place in Death Courses.