Disposable Woman: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

[[File:disposablewoman.jpg|link=Lone Wolf and Cub|frame|His wife only appears in this chapter.]]

 

{{quote|''"Needless violence against a woman character who is only significant as an object of a male character's desire? Hot damn, I'm a real comic writer now!"''|'''[[8-Bit Theater|Brian Clevinger]]''', on [http://www.nuklearpower.com/2009/01/31/episode-1089-special-delivery/ this comic]}}

 

When it happens to male characters, it's often [[Retirony]] (the hero cop losing his partner, etc.). Tragic death of other family members may need [[Parental Abandonment|another trope]]. Even if they somehow survive one movie, there's still [[Sudden Sequel Death Syndrome]]. If this happens often enough with love interests, it can become a [[Cartwright Curse]].

 

{{examples}}

* ''[[Death Note]]'': Once Sayu is done serving as a motivation for Light and Soichirou, she gets all of one panel of credit for the rest of the series. {{spoiler|She doesn't die, though she does suffer from a crippling case of PTSD.}}

* ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam SEED|Gundam SEED]]'' did this rather (in)famously with the "Astray Girls".

* Rachel, [[Magnus]]'s first wife is crucified in his back story, and very little was said about her relationship with him. It pretty much just gives him a motivation to angst.

* Subverted by ''[[American Gods]]'' with Laura. It looks like a case of this, but {{spoiler|she comes back to (half)-life and continues to impact the story in important ways.}}

* Sadly, this is the fate of {{spoiler|''Catti-brie'' of all characters}} in her final appearance in the [[Forgotten Realms|Drizzt novels]]. [[Wangst|Because what Drizzt needs is more angst]].

 

* ''[[Bonanza]]'': Seemingly every episode that introduced a female love interest for the Cartwrights. The girl would invariably harbor a sinister secret or have someone stalking her, with the villain of the week succeeding in his mission to kill the girl.

* ''[[Hercules: The Legendary Journeys]]'': Hercules' wife and family is arguably used this way, although it's used to explain both his sympathy for the common folk and why he stays a [[Chaste Hero]] for so long despite women throwing themselves on him... that and not wanting to repeat his father's track record for bastards...

** The ''original'' myth, of course, has Hercules ''killing'' his family in a (Hera-induced) rage, which cues off his herculean tasks to make up for it...

** ''[[Kamen Rider Hibiki|Hibiki]]'': Shuki is a [[Manipulative Bastard|Manipulative Bitch]] and antagonist, so naturally she dies. Akira doesn't become a full Oni, but transforms once and survives the series.

** ''[[Kamen Rider Kiva|Kiva]]'': Yuri, who uses Ixa occasionally in 1986, dies off-camera but it doesn't seem to have anything to do with being a Rider. Her daughter Megumi, who uses Ixa in 2008, survives the series and moves on to get married in the ending.

* In the BBC's retelling of ''[[Robin Hood (TV series)|Robin Hood]]'', it is Maid Marian - yes '''Maid Marian herself''' who is turned into this after she is stabbed to death by Guy of Gisborne. True to the trope, after a brief [[Roaring Rampage of Revenge]], Robin more or less [[Angst? What Angst?|moves on]] and acquires [[Replacement Love Interest|two new love interests]] in the course of the third season. They try for an [[Author's Saving Throw]] at the end of the season in which Robin ultimately dies and gets a [[Together in Death]] scene with Marian.

 

* Lampshaded at the end of ''[[The House of the Dead (series)|House of the Dead]]: OVERKILL'', when the characters start [[Contemplate Our Navels|Contemplating Our Navels]]. G notes how the only significant female character ends up as {{spoiler|a [[Brain In a Jar]] while her body becomes a host for Warden Clement's mother before horribly mutating and becoming the [[Final Boss]].}}

* Though she was only a [[Temporary Love Interest]] in ''Phantasmagoria 2,'' {{spoiler|Therese's}} death brought on (albeit briefly) [[Inelegant Blubbering]] for Curtis.

* Kratos' wife and daughter in ''[[God of War (series)|God of War]]''. Their deaths do turn out to be crucial to the plot, however, as {{spoiler|Kratos was the one who killed them.}}

* In [[Star Ocean: The Last Hope]], the unnamed woman from the Black Tribe is introduced as a possible love interest for Faize, appearing in one scene showing heavy subtext between him and her, and later killed senselessly off-screen (which nearly drove him insane). {{spoiler|This became the partial basis for his later [[Face Heel Turn]]}}. It should be noted that he wears the cloak she gave him for the remainder of the game.