Everybody's Dead, Dave/Playing With

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Basic Trope: The whole group is dead except the single survivor.

  • Straight: Alex and his Ragtag Bunch of Misfits infiltrate the Elaborate Underground Base, destroy the Doomsday Device, kill the Big Bad, and escape the pursuing Evil Army... or rather, Alex escapes. The others do not make it.
  • Exaggerated: The whole planet explodes but Alex is the only one to Outrun the Fireball.
  • Downplayed: The two Red Shirts/Mauve Shirts that were with Alex at the time die, leaving Alex on his own for a while.
  • Justified: Alex is the only experienced fighter in the team and his friends are painfully unqualified for a Suicide Mission but there are no other options.
  • Inverted:
  • Subverted:
    • It looks like Alex is the only one who survived... and then he dies of poison that the Big Bad injected him with earlier.
    • A more optimistic alternative: At least some of Alex's friends weren't killed, only scattered by dimensional dislocation, and find their way back eventually.
  • Double Subverted: Alex dies of poison, but it turns out he wasn't the only survivor, after all.
  • Parodied: Everyone that Alex teams up with, even the fat hacker geek who stayed back home to monitor Team Evils moves, ends up dying. If they somehow survive the adventure, Alex will eventually kill them in a hilarious freak accident.
  • Deconstructed: Alex is plagued by the Survivor Guilt for the rest of his life.
  • Reconstructed: Alex gets over his Survivor Guilt and becomes a careful planner dedicated to never lose another teammate.
  • Zig Zagged: Alex dies of poison, but it turns out that Bertie was still alive - for two more seconds, as a spear pierces his heart. Then Cody is suddenly revealed to be alive, too, however, he succumbs to a concussion that he got earlier when ramming head first into The Brute. Then Diane opens her eyes...
  • Averted: At least half of Alex's friends make it.
  • Enforced: Alex's friends are killed abruptly and pointlessly towards the end of the mission for the sake of additional drama.
  • Lampshaded: "It's one of those missions where just one of us makes it, buddy."
  • Invoked: "Forget about us! We are expendable, but YOU must make it! Alex, go!"
  • Defied: Rather than escape, Alex stays behind to help his friends against all odds.
  • Discussed: "Don't you dare dying on me! How am I supposed to live on without you all?!" "It's OK, buddy. We weren't the best team for you, I'm afraid..."
  • Conversed: "Alex looks like the only guy who knows what he is doing, while the rest are just noobs. I bet everybody but him will die in the end."
  • Played For Drama: One team member must be chosen to Bring News Back. Everybody knows that he or she will have the best chances of survival... by de facto abandoning his friends.

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