Eaten Alive

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.
COME BACK HERE! I'M HUNGRY
—D.W. in her imagination, Arthur episode, "D.W.'s Very Bad Mood"

Being eaten alive. Probably one of our oldest Primal Fears, and quite universal, given that we used to share this planet with some rather nasty predators. In this modern world, we have little to fear from most animals on land (though the sea is another matter), but stories of monsters of all kinds (dragons, aliens, demons, zombies, etc.) keep us very aware that we can become prey quite easily. It's probably the most common fear we have as kids.

Sometimes the victim is Swallowed Whole, but other times, he or she is savagely ripped apart piece by piece (this is especially common if one is overtaken by multiple creatures out to eat you).

See also Fed to the Beast, where someone is deliberately consigned to this awful fate. See also Too Spicy for Yog-Sothoth, for when the eater changes its mind.

Not to be confused with the movie of the same name.

As a Death Trope, Spoilers ahead may be unmarked. Beware.

Examples of Eaten Alive include:

Advertising

  • A Fruit Roll-Up and Fruit By the Foot get eaten by a photo booth.
  • This happens to the cinnamon toast crunches in their commercials.

Anime and Manga

  • Region: The victims of the plague of starving rats swarming over Tokyo suffer this fate.
  • Bio-Meat: Nectar By the same author, the eponymous creatures are bred to eat anything, and they do.
  • The common fate of anyone branded for sacrifice to the Godhand in Berserk. Quite a few Apostles are fond of this too, such as the female Apostle that Guts kills in the very beginning of the manga.
  • Mami Tomoe of Puella Magi Madoka Magica goes out this way courtesy of a monstered-out Witch. It is one of the most Cruel And Unusual Deaths of the entire series and considered by many [1] as one of the most shocking moments in anime this decade.
    • In the Spin-Off manga Oriko Magica, Mami manages to avert this fate. Too bad someone else suffers it: none other than Kazuko-sensei, who's devoured by one of Witch!Kirika's familiars in front of her students.
  • Happens a lot in Hellsing. Special mention goes to Luke Valentine, who gets both his legs blown off and becomes "dog food" after Alucard goes One-Winged Angel.
    • In the TV series, Incognito eats Helena because he sees her as a threat.
  • Neon Genesis Evangelion: Asuka dies horribly this way at the hands of the Mass-Production EVAs in End of Evangelion. And poor Shinji just has to come across what's left.
  • In the Amon: Apocalypse of Devilman OVA, Amon proves himself to be one of Go Nagai's absolute worst Complete Monsters by doing this to a little girl.
  • Happens to Nene and Nono in Blood C. Subverted, they turn out to be alive. And their following real deaths are very different. Though one of the Elder Bairns does chomp on a struggling civilian as the group destroys Saya's hometown.
  • In Hekikai no AiON, this happen to Shimon, the Parental Substitute of the protagonist. He was eaten alive by the mermaids

Comic Books

  • "Fritz the Cat, Secret Agent for the C.I.A." contains what is probably the earliest depiction of vore in comics. Fritz is swallowed whole by a giant creature, along with a female Chinese agent who betrays her country because she loves Fritz. Together, the two escape out the back way.
  • In Old Man Logan a mutated and insane Hulk does this to Wolverine: him and his inbred clan have been eating their enemies for years. None of them had adamantium claws and a healing factor, however...

Fan Works

Film

  • In Dinosaur, a scout got eaten by a Carnatourus.
    • And Aladar pretended to eat one of the little lemurs.
  • In Fern Gully. the main fairy flies in the smog monster’s mouth to defeat him from within.
  • In Fire Breather, the two monsters that were terrorizing the city must have been hungry because they kept trying to eat all the people close to Duncan. But Duncan stopped them from eating anyone including his “Guardian Angel” who wanted to kill him after he found what Duncan was.
  • In Shrek, the dragon eats Lord Farquaad and spits out his crown.
    • In the Christmas special, Gingy’s girlfriend gets eaten by Santa Claus.
  • Ratigan feeds a hapless lackey to his pet cat Felicia in The Great Mouse Detective.
  • In Alice in Wonderland the Walrus eats all the baby oysters behind the carpenter's back.
  • The common fate of anyone overtaken by the zombies in any Zombie Apocalypse movie, if they don't join them.
  • In Little Shop of Horrors, Audrey II eats Mr. Mushnik Just in Time.
    • In the alternate ending, Audrey was eaten after she died and Rick Moranis' character got eaten too.
      • So I guess for Audrey it was technically eaten dead then.
  • Star Wars episode VI Return of the Jedi Oola, and a Gammorean Guard get eaten by a Rancor. And the Skiff guards and even poor Boba Fett got eaten by a Sarlaac as well. (Most people don't think he died anyway though).
    • And Jabba just laughed at the Gammorean's unfortunate death but I saved your life!
  • In Jurassic Park, several humans get eaten by dinosaurs and all of the others kept getting threatened to get eaten. Other dinosaurs got eaten as well, including a Velociraptor as the T. Rex appeared Just in Time.
    • Donald Gennaro, after abandoning the Hammond children in a car to go hide in the bathroom when the T-Rex shows up, gets the ignominious honor of being nommed on the toilet after the T. Rex knocks down the building he's in. In the original novel, it was Dirty Coward Ed Regis, the Public Relations manager of InGen, who did this (and got eaten).
    • Worst cases are Robert Muldoon and John Arnold who fall prey to the raptors, of which it was explicitly stated earlier in the film that they don't bother killing their victims first, they just slice them up and start eating them alive.
    • Nedry got eaten by the Dilophosaurus. The book describes this scene with gruesome detail, while the movie gives us a nice discretion shot
    • In the sequels other people got eaten by a T. Rex, Velociraptors and a pack of Procompsognathi.
  • The Jaws series and other killer shark movies will invariably feature at least one scene where someone is eaten alive by the shark.
  • Kevin of Sin City has his limbs sawed off by Marv. His pet wolf, who eats what remains of the people Kevin kills after he's finished with them, is attracted to the blood and eats him alive until finally his head is sawed off. And the worst part of it all? He never makes a single sound during the entire thing, much less the scream that Marv wanted from the sick cannibal farm boy who murdered Goldie.
  • The ship's cook in the 2005 version of King Kong.
    • More than just the cook, the cook just got assaulted by giant leeches which seemed to be the most horrendous.
  • In Willow, when Madmartigan knocked that egg thing into the water it turned into a two-headed hydra-like monster, which eats several of Sorsha's men and even one of what it used to be.

Literature

  • In Animorphs, In The Time of the Dinosaurs Rachel and Tobias get eaten by a kronosaurus which they subsequently break out of, thus killing it. This was also the fate of Elfangor, who gave the kids their morphing powers; moments afterward, Visser 3 arrives, morphs a huge alien and devours Elfangor alive. The screaming features in several of the Animorphs' nightmares.
  • In RL Stine’s Goosebumps: The Blob That Ate Everyone Adam got eaten just like he did in the TV show, and two police officers got eaten and so did a bunch of citizens.
    • In another book, one of the Choose Your Own Adventure type books, various non-reader characters are transformed into monsters and intend to send the reader on something resembling a haunted scavenger hunt. If the reader makes a choice to doubt the reality of the transformation, it's implied the monster kids' ringleader, some kind of lizardman, eats the doubtful reader -- obviously ending that read-through.
  • In Homer’s The Odyssey, a Cyclops ate most of Odysseus's men.
  • In Nation, First Mate Cox gets eaten by sharks. Even with an axe in his chest, too, he's still alive enough to be Slasher Smiling when they get there.
  • In Titus Groan, Titus's father Sepulchrave is eaten alive by a flock of owls. Voluntarily, because he's batshit insane and suicidal.
  • Cato in The Hunger Games is ripped apart by dogs for twenty hours on end. By the time he gets a Mercy Kill, his skin and limbs have been gnawed off. And he was alive the whole time, on live television.
  • Curly in The Call of the Wild gets her face ripped apart by dogs, then after they knock her down, they surround her and eat her alive.
  • In the novels In Death Ground and The Shiva Option by David Weber and Steve White, the invading insect-like aliens eat sentient populations that they conquer. They prefer their prey alive and roughly child-sized. They even go so far as to raise sentients on ranches in a manner similar to how humans raise cattle or other livestock. Humanity's reaction to this was understandably severe, taking Ellen Ripley's solution to a whole new level.

Live-Action TV

  • In the original Batman series, Robin gets eaten by a giant clam and continues to wiggle around in it in the resolution to the cliffhanger.
  • In RL Stine’s Goosebumps: The Blob That Ate Everyone, the jerk Adam gets eaten by, well, the blob; that ate everyone. Duh.
  • In one episode of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers Finster slipped Kimberly and Billy a potion that made them misbehave and thanks to them the others all got eaten by an overgrown frog. Fortunately Kimberly and Billy snap out of it and save the others (but before that, Billy gets eaten alive first after figuring out their weakness).
    • This is taken straight from Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger, in the infamous 'Dan and Mei turn into punks'. And likewise, the rest of the Zyurangers get eaten, Dan figure out weakness, get eaten, and Mei solves the rest.
  • In Wizards of Waverly Place, a jealous Mason eats Dean and Max shrinks him down to mini wheat size.
  • The common fate of those taken alive by the Reavers in the Firefly universe.
  • Happens a lot in Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
  • As in the book, in the first episode of Animorphs, Visser 3 morphs something huge and eats Elfangor alive. However, it's in silhouette and the shot cuts away the moment it happens, likely due to censorship.
  • In Charmed, the Charmed ones are living through fairy tales due to the balance being destroyed, and the big bad wolf eats their grandma and Piper.
  • Masashi Sudou/Kamen Rider Scissors meets his end in this way when he is betrayed by his Contract Monster, Volcancer. Considering that this was a Sunday-morning TV show, it's easily one of the most traumatizing deaths in the entire franchise.
  • Happens a lot in Doctor Who.
  • In the Star Trek: Voyager episode Basics, part 2, Hogan was killed at the mouth of a cave where a giant snakeasaurus lived in a lightning-quick discretion shot. Later, more of the Voyager crew were attempting to sneak across a cavern where the snakeasuraus slept in a pit. It didn't work. A nameless crewman slipped, awoke the beast, and got Swallowed Whole just like Hogan.
  • In Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, Grandpa Murdock accidentally swallowed Wayne, Amy and Diane.

New Media

  • In Descendant of a Demon Lord, Wrath's high priestess, Nem, killed her lord, Lord Wrath. Lord Wrath was a demon, and according to the Quest Master, demons bodies are destroyed when a demon dies. Nem claims she "killed and ate [Lord Wrath]". But you can do the math on the order of how things actually happened. By the way, parts of a demons body can presumably survive if they are separated before the demon dies, so it's possible she did something like dismember Lord Wrath alive, kill him, and then ate the limbs. Here is a hint though: there were no arm and leg bones visible in the chamber. Here is another hint: If Lord Wrath was simply slain before Nem took in some of his domain (perhaps by eating him alive) to become a demon blooded, his domain (the thing that makes a demon a demon) would have passed on to someone likely outside Nem's society, which would have undermined why Nem killed lord wrath.

Puppet Shows

  • The Muppet Show Kermit, Miss Piggy, Shaky Sanchez, Lenny Lizard, a chef, and Rowlf's little sidekick all get eaten by either Gorgon Heap or Sweetums. In fact, this happens to Muppets so often there's even a page on Muppets Wiki dedicated to it.

Tabletop Games

  • Dragon Magazine Annual #1 detailed the potent Sul Armor, a suit of armor that is made of still-living scarab-like insects. This armor is lighter than Leather Armor, but as strong as Chain Mail, can be put on or taken off in less than a minute, and very rarely, gives the owner powers of Regeneration, which the armor itself has. A Thief who isn’t afraid of bugs would pay any price for a Sul swarm, but the catch is, you should be afraid of this sort of thing. The scarabs might turn on the wearer and devour him, which they might do if the wearer takes 10 or more points of damage in a single hit (5% cumulative chance per hit) and the user also has to feed it daily (simply grain and water) and should he forget to do so, the chance increases by a cumulative 8% each time.
  • In the Planescape Splat book Hellbound: The Blood War, it states this is a common strategy for fiends in the Blood War. Both sides of the conflict have grunts that can regenerate From a Single Cell (lemures and nupperibo on the devils' side, manes on the demons') and because fiends cannot easily use holy weapons (which prevent this regeneration) they often do so by devouring the enemy grunts. The "official" theory is that if fiend's physical body is consumed by another being, its essence is destroyed and it is forever slain. Whether this works on higher-ranking fiends, possibly as a way to keep them from being reborn if their material form is destroyed, is not known. Very few mortal beings are willing to try it.

Video Games

  • In Lego Star Wars II and The Complete Saga, you can call down a LEGO Gammorean guard which gets eaten by the LEGO Rancor after it chases the guard for a little.
  • In Star Wars Battlefront you can go to Jabba’s Palace and if you approach the great Hutt you get sent down the infamous trapdoor and there is the Rancor. If you get too close it will pick you up and eat you.
    • In the sequel you can get eaten by a Rancor as well.
  • Star Wars: The Force Unleashed: In story mode Shaak Ti willingly throws herself in the Sarlaac pit of Felucia.
    • In two player mode you can play on Felucia and throw your opponent into the Sarlaac pit.
  • Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II: In Story Mode a Rancor gets eaten by a beast bigger than it and the evil general guy gets eaten by it as well. Now that’s what I call irony
    • In two player mode you can play in the arena and if you stand in the middle too long the beast eats your character.
  • In Zoo Tycoon (if you have the Marine Mania or Dinosaur Digs expansion pack) you can put guests in with the sharks or the T-Rexes, where they will be eaten. Sometimes the T-Rexes escape and eat guests as well, but only the male guests. Also, if dinosaurs or any big cat of any kind escape, they eat their zookeepers and scientists.
  • In SpongeBob SquarePants and the Creature from the Krusty Krab, SpongeBob gets eaten by a giant Alaskan Bullworm.
  • Prototype: the fate of Alex Mercer's victims. Unusual in that he doesn't chew or swallow, simply engulfs his prey in his own mass, absorbing them whole (and yes, it's painful, judging by the screaming). It's noted explicitly that he paralyses first, breaking their necks or spines, but death is an optional and undesirable extra. The larger infected sometimes do it as well; the introduction of the Hunters features one snapping up and chowing down on a screaming Marine.
  • This happens to almost every slain enemy in Digital Devil Saga. What did you think fueled those nifty demon powers?
  • This'll happen to either of the main characters in Dino Crisis 2 if they're caught stunned on the ground by the Giganotosaurus during their fight with it. It picks them up and chows down on them, with the game flashing to Game Over on the first bone-crushing bite.
  • Failing the quick time event against the T-Rex in Tomb Raider Anniversary results in Lara being flung up into the air by the dinosaur and then being swallowed alive on the way down.
  • Dark Souls has several enemies that can do this to you For Massive Damage. Most horrify is the Gaping Dragon.
  • Many of Luka's death scenes in Monster Girl Quest end with the foe devouring him; if a player isn't a fan of vore, the game has a setting that lets you skip these scenes.
  • Lighthearted example (well, sort of) in Skullgirls; in one of Ms. Fortune's specials, she throwns her head at her opponent and it bites the foe many times, with a cheerful "Om-nom-nom-nom-nom-nom!" from Ms. Fortune.
  • Due to how death in Kenshi for non-animals requires the head or torso be destroyed or a lengthy bleed out (which characters who didn't get into battle already injured have a good chance of recovering during), and unconscious characters can't otherwise be targeted, this is actually one of the primary sources of death for characters in the game world. Hungry carnivores and cannibals that find a disabled character will begin eating it. There's even a unique description for this state, called "BEING EATEN ALIVE!!" (with the twin exclamation points). Killing off defeated enemies is a major reason to keep pets.

Web Comics

Web Original

  • Part of the backstory of Helen Goodkind, mother of Phase, in the Whateley Universe. As a small child, she was kidnapped by two mutants. One ate her sister alive in front of Helen, piece by piece. Helen spent years in an institution afterward, and now hates and fears mutants.

Western Animation

  • Transformers: The Movie: The fact that Unicron does this to your entire planet and every man woman and child living on it is what makes him so fucking scary.
  • In Adventures from the Book of Virtues, they showed the story of Odysseus and the cat that ate too much and ate all his neighbors.
  • In Arthur they do this a lot: the first time Buster wrote a comic making fun of Francine in which she was a giant slime the ate Mr. Ratburn and Bionic Bunny. D.W. told Arthur and Buster the story of OD.W.eus (Odysseus) and during one parrt of it the Cyclops (Buster) ate Tommy and Timmy. In another episode where all the gang was dared to skip school Arthur and Buster had a dream that they got eaten by a giant clam and were getting digested! It is suggested that that happens to Dark Bunny in a special episode (just like Robin in the Batman episode The Joker‘s Tricky Hand).
    • In Rhyme For Your Life Dr. Rhyminstein gets eaten by the Purple Orange.
  • In one Batman: The Animated Series episode, Robin meets a girl running from Clay Face who eats her later on in the episode. This of course ticks Robin off and he tries to kill Clay Face when he says he can’t bring her back.
  • In Redwall, Asmodeus eats a fox, a vole, and a rat. In the season finale the badger gets PO’d at a rat and eats him.
  • In a SpongeBob SquarePants episode, Plankton is eaten on many occasions by Miss Priss and a reoccurring old man extra (In all 3 occasions he is disguised as Krusty Krab merchandise. I.e. Krabby Patty, in a ketchup bottle, and a soda.)
    • In SpongeBob SquarePants Frozen Face Off Krabs reveals he was once eaten by the huge squid-like monster and in the end Plankton gets eaten by the monster getting mistaken for a Jellybean.
    • In one episode a bunch of giant sea whelks came and ate everyone in town.
  • In one episode of The Powerpuff Girls, the professor invented a thing called Beebo that ate everyone because it thought it had to.
  • In one Winx Club episode Musa got knocked out and eaten by a giant turtle however, they managed to save her fortunately.
  • In a Courage the Cowardly Dog Eustace gets eaten by a dragon that wasn't meant to eat him, in which later the water dragon lets him out. Later in the episode a real man-eating dragon eats him and then... the end.
  • In Regular Show a demon-thing named Susan got eaten by a bigger demon-thing that looked like her.
    • In one episode, ‘Ello Gov’nor, they watch a movie about a taxi cab that gets possessed by it’s old driver and kills everyone who was involved with someone that killed him and then eats a man who was just walking his dog after running him over.
  • In G.I. Joe: Renegades, Cobra Commander’s new pet eats a scientist that lies to the commander’s face.
  • In one episode of Amimaria the gang travels back in time to where the frogs were gigantic! So big they could swallow a gorilla whole (whoa)! The gang then encounters a gaggle of giagantic frogs who subsequently eat them. Fortunately Gabooboo gather enough courage to fight the frogs and force them to spit them out Just in Time.
  • In one episode of Sabrina's Secret Life Sabrina went to a Halloween Party with the Gargoyle Flu and spreads it to the rest of the guests. When Sabrina and Salem go to the magic world they encounter a ghost that was at the party and is completely paranoid. When trying to avoid Sabrina and Salem it bumps into a goblin that Sabrian danced with the other night. The Ghost begs for forgiveness but the goblin replies: "Forgive you?! I'm going to eat you!" The gobling grows in size and fulfills his threat. The goblin then threatens to eat Sabrina and Salem but however turns into a doll before he can.
  • A very cruel example of this happens in Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends when Terrance imagines a living (and very loving) Pizza-slice, then proceeds to eat it as it screams in agony.
  • This is what Nightmare Moon from My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic is said to do if not appeased on Nightmare Night, according to legend.
  • Star Trek: Lower Decks;
    • Played for laughs and subverted in the first episode, where a Giant Alien Spider that chases after Mariner and Bolmier is a herbivore and has no teeth, it is simply after moisture from sweat (going after Bolmier because he is far more afraid of it and panic makes his sweat more). Not that what it does to him is all too pleasant, of course, but given all the things that happen to him in this series, this was likely the least dangerous.
    • Played straight (but again, played for laughs) in "The Spy Humungous", where Tendi is devoured by a giant space slug. (One of many hazards the Ensigns experience while on "anomaly consolidation duty", which is basically disposing of the leftovers among dangerous stuff that higher ranking Starfleet members tend to deal with.) Fortunately, it could not digest her; unfortunately, that made the end result rather... undignified.
  • One of the most chilling scenes in Code Lyoko is the scene in "Marabounta" where Yumi is devoured by the out-of-control Marabounta. Fortunately, it's only her Lyoko Avatar (her true self survives, as usually the case for anyone who "dies" on Lyoko), but that doesn't make the scene or the episode in general any less frightening. Especially since it's after Aelita, who, at the time, could not have survived if it happened to her.

Real Life

  • All too common in nature, whenever a famished predator is sufficiently formidable that it doesn't need to kill its prey to halt its struggling first. Lions, wolves, African wild dogs, cheetahs, snakes, hyenas, fish, lizards, turtles, dogs, leopards, eagles, baboons, vultures, bears, dholes, pelicans and probably more have been caught doing this.
  • The kea, a giant parrot from New Zealand, will cling to a living sheep's back and take bites out of it.
  • Army ants. They tear things apart, bit by bit, and their victim is alive throughout.
  • Sharks and piranha are famous for doing this.
  • Especially common in the world of insects. They eat each other alive. Especially certain parasitic insect larvae.
  • Some people get lizards just to watch crickets get eaten.
  • There is a video on youtube of a cow of all things eating a baby chick alive. There's also one of a deer eating a bird. Apparently this is not as unusual as it sounds, at least for the deer.
  • Swallowing live prey is more common in nature than you might think. All amphibians and most fish swallow all their prey alive, and a good number of reptiles and birds will at least do this to small prey. And of course there's anything that eats ants or krill/plankton which simply gulp their prey down by the dozens, if not hundreds.
  • One of the most nightmarish diseases in real life is necrotizing fasciitis, aka "flesh-eating bacteria". Survivors of this horrid infection often only did so as a result of the infected areas being amputated. One notable case was science fiction writer Peter Watts, who after recovering, wrote: "I’m told I was a few hours away from being dead...If there was ever a disease fit for a science-fiction writer, flesh-eating disease has got to be it. This...spread across my leg as fast as a Star Trek space disease in time-lapse."
  1. ↑ if massive posts in this site's and other anime site's forum is anything to go by
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