Fate Worse Than Death: Difference between revisions
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{{trope
[[File:Double Header.png|350px|thumb|right|But the important thing is you're alive and you have each other.<ref>Source: Western Animation Ending to the [[Ren and Stimpy]] episode, "Double Header." </ref>]]
{{quote|''"Those who break the rules shall be subjected to a fate worse than death."''
|'''Freed Justine''' from ''[[Fairy Tail]]''}}
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{{examples}}
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* Another ironic punishment: the greedy, thoroughly evil and immortal Gemma from ''[[Ninja Scroll]]'' gets encased in gold and sunk to the bottom of the pacific ocean—where he'll presumably remain, conscious and immobile forever.
* The ultimate fate of {{spoiler|Father}} in ''[[Fullmetal Alchemist]]'' is heavily implied to be this. {{spoiler|Having been defeated and Truth freed, he is dragged into the Gate of Truth, begging that he not be sent back in there}}. He is last seen screaming in terror.
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* Even ''[[Pokémon (anime)|Pokémon]]'' has done this. At the end of the Team Galactic arc, {{spoiler|Cyrus creates a new universe... and walks into it. The portal closes behind him and is then destroyed.}} Fans argue if he can survive, but the nature of the series and some past canon indicate that he can. However, this means {{spoiler|that he's going to drift in empty space for the rest of his life, unable to do anything but watch his creation, and unable to stop himself from aging. Bear in mind that he's not even thirty. He could live for another century in what amounts to a void, all alone and powerless}}. A world with no emotion is what he wanted, so it could be paradise for him.
* What happens to {{spoiler|Princess Ixquic}} in ''[[Cyborg 009]]''. {{spoiler|She can't die since she's a [[Robot Girl]] with a [[Good Thing You Can Heal|huge healing factor.]] She can't interact with the outer world unless some conditions are met. And after said conditions are broken in such a way that they won't ever be met again, she's stranded in time and space... forever.}}
* Many of the [[Serial Killer
* ''[[Neon Genesis Evangelion]]'' had the [[Trope Namer]] for [[Mind Rape]]. Yes, it does count because of who was the recipient. If [[The Fighting Narcissist]] [[Fiery Redhead]] [[Tsundere]] gets reduced to a sobbing wreck in a minute, exposing her tragic [[Freudian Excuse]], something's seriously messed up. Granted, to some she might have had it coming but still! Her [[Cruel and Unusual Death]] in ''End of Evangelion'' doesn't help things either.
** And then Anno goes and does it '''again''' in ''[[Rebuild of Evangelion]]'': Asuka gets to be [[Body Horror|the test pilot of the Angel-infested Unit 03]]...
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* All this way and nothing about ''[[Slayers]]'', how sad. The Raugnut Rushavna curse is a VERY horrible curse, as it makes the victim immortal until the one who cast the curse is killed. It doesn't sound so bad until the horror of the curse sets in.
{{quote|Lina: "I was staring at an enormous lump of flesh. It was writhing---the arrangement of its internal organs and the pulsing of its veins fully visible."
"As we watched, a
"Those that fall victim to this ritual are cursed to die over and over until the demon that cast the curse is destroyed." }}
* Happens to {{spoiler|Piedmon}} in ''[[Digimon Adventure]]''. Most Digimon villains are [[Killed Off for Real]] (though Digimon are normally reborn, so its possible, but some lose their memories in the process), he's not so lucky. {{spoiler|1=Piedmon is thrown into MagnaAngemon's Gate of Destiny. While the series doesn't explain what this does to him, its said elsewhere that the Gate of Destiny leads to subspace, a dimension from which there is no escape. Digimon are effectively immortal barring being killed outright, so this means he'll spend eternity there.}} Naturally, [[Complete Monster|he's one of the few Digimon villains deserving of such a fate.]]
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* From ''[[Cracked.com|Cracked]]'', we have a list of [http://www.cracked.com/article_19736_6-psychotic-punishments-doled-out-by-famous-superheroes.html 6 Psychotic Punishments Doled Out by Famous Superheroes].
* The Weapon-X program that [[Wolverine]] was subjected to where admantium was bonded to his skeleton. How this procedure worked is not detailed much and is often subject to [[Retcon]], but whatever the case, he considers it to be this, and does not wish it upon any other, to the point where he made a [[Heroic Sacrifice]] to save three kids from experiencing it. (He got better later.)
** In fact, one could argue Wolverine’s ''entire life'' (which, incidentally, has been far longer than that of most humans due to his mutant genes; he is over a hundred years old in current continuity) has been a hellish Fate Worse than Death. [[Spider-Man]] has endured the deaths of many of his family and friends, Bruce Banner is cursed with [[The Hulk| a monstrous alter ego with uncontrollable rage]], and [[Batman]] has lived with survivor's guilt over his parents’ deaths, but all of them are living an endless birthday party compared to Wolverine. [[Amnesiac Hero| Losing his memory]] during the Weapon-X fiasco seemed like a blessing when he recovered those memories; when his mutant powers first manifested, he [[Self-Made Orphan|accidentally killed his father]], an act that [[Driven to Suicide|drove his mother to suicide]]. Shortly after, he accidentally killed Rose, the first woman he loved. The Weapon-X program turned him into a mindless, feral beast, and while his time with the X-Men helped him recover, it only got worse. He’s been crucified, nuked, had the adamantium ripped out of him by Magento, and ripped in half and had some of his flesh eaten by the Hulk. His enemies have tormented him by kidnapping his teammates, murdering his loved ones, brainwashing his son, turning his clone into a killing machine, and tricked him into slaughtering his teammates and his own family. (And ''that'' is all just in mainstream Marvel, never mind alternate reality versions.) All while being the target of bigotry and hatred all mutants are subject to. While some consider Wolvie to be a violent sociopath, one has to wonder just how [[Heroic Willpower|he managed to stay as sane as he has]].
* Longtime fans of ''[[Mighty Morphin Power Rangers]]'' know Rita Repulsa’s origin - she first invaded Earth 10,000 years ago, but was defeated by Zordon and first of his proteges, the first [[Recruit Teenagers with Attitude| Teenagers With Attitude]] who would become known as the [[Power Rangers]], and imprisoned in a “dumpster” on the moon. But a comic book adaptation shows that the dumpster was more than a prison cell. Rita would spend the next ten millennia living the lifetimes of all her previous victims, causing her continuous agony as she experienced the terror and despair of every being on every world she had invaded and destroyed. One can hardly blame her for having such a temper when she finally escaped.
== [[Fan Works]] ==
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* One of the few good lines from the ''[[Aladdin (Disney film)|Aladdin]]'' sequel is the Genie Jafar's response to being reminded of his inability to kill: "You'd be surprised what you can live through."
** The times it's used optimistically (following a [[Not Quite Dead|revival]], for example) just makes Jafar's use of it as a threat that much creepier.
** Jafar also uses this trope's title, saying "There are things so much worse than death."
* For toys in ''[[Toy Story (franchise)|Toy Story]]'', it is a terrible fate to be forgotten by children, left alone and abandoned without no one to love them. Even getting shelved, like what happened to Woody and Wheezer in the second movie, is almost as bad. [[Pixar]] rectifies this in the next movie, thankfully - plus, considering they are "abandoned" with all of their good friends, they're hardly alone with no-one to love them.
** Even worse is to be tossed into the garbage, and, as [[Kelsey Grammer|Stinky Pete]] says, "spending eternity rotting in some landfill." Conscious the entire time, until finally all your plastic parts degrade into a puddle of goo...
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* What the creatures in ''[[Deep Rising]]'' do to their "food". Their victims are swallowed up, have their liquids effectively drained and whatever's left of the body being spit back out. Oh, and did we mention that you're still alive when you get spit out? Dying afterwards is a mercy.
* By the end of ''[[Cube|Cube Zero]]'', staying in or around the cube becomes this to Wynn. He actually tries to get himself executed by making it clear that he chooses death over the cube, but he doesn't get a choice in the matter - he already waived this right a long time ago, which he simply doesn't remember. He's lobotomized by the villains and thrown back in.
* At the End of [[Coco]], Ernesto Del la Cruz is exposed as a fraud and a murderer and left hated in both the Land of the Living and the Land of the Dead. Even if he gets out of the bell, he won't be welcomed anywhere unless his mansion is still standing and even then he'll have nobody to admire or respect him. And because of his movies and his role in Hector's death, he'll be remembered for a long time in the Land of the Living so he won't even experience the [[Final Death]] to end his suffering for a very long time. And even when he does finally fade away, [[Word of God]] says there's a place souls go to after the Final Death so it's a good guess where he'll end up.
* If Art the Clown from the ''[[Terrifier]]'' movies and ''[[All Hallows' Eve]]'' and the [[Short Film]]s he's featured in leaves you alive, chances are it's because of this.
** In ''All Hallows Eve'', he severs a woman's limbs and seals the wounds leaving her alive while leaving misogynistic slurs over her body just because she witnesses him murder a gas station attendant.
** In ''Terrifier'', he eats Victoria's face off but commits suicide before he kills her, leaving her heavily disfigured and driven insane.
** In ''Terrifier 2'', he slices open Allie's eye, scalps her with a pair of scissors, flays her back, tears off her arm and splits the other in half, slashes her repeatedly, pours bleach and salt on her wounds, and tears off half her face. By the time her mother gets home, he's cutting chunks of flesh off her legs and '''she's still alive.''' It's likely she finally dies offscreen which becomes a mercy. What did she do to deserve this? [[Disproportionate Retribution|She wouldn't give him candy.]]
* {{spoiler|Kaecilius}} and {{Spoiler|his mooks}} in [[Doctor Strange (2016 film)|Doctor Strange]]. They {{spoiler|[[Be Careful What You Wish For|get the immortality they wanted]], but have to spend it in the Dark Dimension}}.
== [[Literature]] ==
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* In ''[[The Malazan Book of the Fallen]]'', getting stuck in Anomander Rake's sword is the definition of this Trope. You spend eternity pulling a giant wagon while being pursued by a storm of pure chaos. No breaks, no mercy. Insanity is for the lucky. Until it gets broken, screwing with everything. That's how many people were trapped in it, some for more than 300 000 years.
* Dementors in ''[[Harry Potter (novel)|Harry Potter]]'' have the power to steal a person's soul (via a sort-of [[Kiss of Death]]) without killing them, turning them into an empty shell forever. [[Word of God]] has it that they're an allegorical monster representing clinical depression.
** Hermione Granger in ''[[
{{quote|"I hope you're pleased with yourselves. We could all have been killed — or worse, expelled."}}
:: Considering that those expelled from Hogwarts have their wands broken and are forbidden to use magic in a world where magic-users rule and those without it (Squibs/Muggles) are treated as second-class ''at best'', and the best possible outcome is re-integrating into Muggle Society all the while *knowing* that there's a magic world that you can never access again...Hermione likely has the right of it.
** Aside from [[Cold-Blooded Torture|agonizing pain]], overuse of the Cruciatus curse can lead to ''severe'' psychological trauma. The Aurors Frank and Alice Longbottom, Neville's parents, were driven permanently and irretrievably insane by prolonged exposure to Cruciatus.
** Though he doesn't experience this trope directly, it's eventually learned that Voldemort's greatest weakness is that he cannot conceive of a worse fate than death, meaning his obsession with becoming immortal renders him vulnerable to other, equally or more unpleasant fates; {{spoiler|see the "King's Cross" chapter of ''Deathly Hallows'' for the one that he fell prey to after his death.}} At the end of the fifth book, Dumbledore fires a very powerful spell. It is blocked, and we never see what it does, but when Voldemort mocks Dumbledore for not seeking to kill him, Dumbledore merely responds, "We both know there are other ways of destroying a man, [[First-Name Basis|Tom]]." This is [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshaded]] by Harry Potter himself... [[Wise Beyond Their Years|in the first book.]] "If you're going to be cursed forever, death's better, isn't it?"
* Lady Lilith of ''[[
* ''[[A Song of Ice and Fire]]'': When Jaime thinks a prisoner is lying to him, he mentions, "We have oubliettes beneath the Casterly Rock that fit a man as tight as a suit of armor. You can’t turn in them, or sit, or reach down to your feet when the rats start gnawing at your toes. Would you care to reconsider that answer?”
** What's become of {{spoiler|Theon Greyjoy}} in ''[[A Dance With Dragons]].'' Could also be a case of [[Be Careful What You Wish For]] for the fans: how many of them wanted to {{spoiler|see Theon suffer horribly after he sacked Winterfell and murdered two children to trick Westeros into thinking he's killed Bran and Rickon Stark}}.
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* Jean-Paul Satre's ''[[No Exit]]'' sticks three unrelated individuals in a room without [[Title Drop|any means of escape.]] They are {{spoiler|not only dead, but each has a personality that psychologically leaves another feeling tortured while being capable of torturing another his/herself. Hence, they will drive each other mad for all eternity.}}
* In the ''[[Dragonlance]]'' novel 'Dragons of Spring Dawning' after [[Dark Action Girl]] Kitiara finally captures her romantic rival, Laurana, she decides to {{spoiler|torture Laurana to death and then have her soul given to the [[Black Knight|Death Knight]], Lord Soth, so the innocent Laurana will suffer in undeath for all eternity}}.
* In ''[[Rainbow Six]]'', Clark orders the
* Dematerialisation (the process of having your physical body destroyed while within the Twilight, either as a consequence of being killed within it or spending too long in it so that it drains all of your energy) in the ''[[Night Watch]]'' series is implied to be worse than regular death. Whereas the Others are unsure of what becomes of regular humans after death, they do know that dematerilised Others are forced to linger in the Twilight as impotent and possibly mindless shades, and meeting such a shade is traditionally accompanied by wishing that they may eventually find peace. The "worse than death" part comes from the fact that a sentence of being hanged is considered preferable to dematerialisation, implying that Others killed through regular means don't linger in the Twilight, and that this is considered better. [[Nightmare Fuel|And since it appears that all Others can live practically forever without succumbing to age or disease, and are virtually immune to natural weapons, that the ultimate fate of all of them is to dematerialise.]]
* Harlan Coben novel ''Gone For Good'' features an ex-pimp named Louis Castman; when hearing that one of his girls is going to run away and elope with a client she has fallen in love with, he brutally disfigures her (and as repeatedly mentioned, [[Squick|not just her face]]) so that her fiance won't want to be with her anymore. It works, but before the guy sees the poor girl he shoots Castman in the spine, rendering him unable to move anything below his neck. The girl, now broken and miserable, keeps Castman alive for as long as possible in a room sealed with cork, with nothing to do ''at all'', just stare at pictures of her when she was pretty. He comes to wait longingly for ex-girls of his to come over and humiliate him, because it's better than lying immobilized in a cot and soiling yourself, with no one to hear you scream.
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* Or rather 'undeath' in [[The Witch Watch]]'s case. An abomination could have there head cut off and buried underground and you 'could dig his head up today and still find him screaming for release.'
** Also the people who crossed Lord Mordaunt were also threatened with a fate worse than death.
* The {{spoiler|protagonist}} in [[Poul Anderson]]'s "Duel on Syrtis" ends up {{Spoiler|paralysed and hidden in a remote cave, with his life artificially extended for centuries, during which he will be fully conscious but have nothing to do but stare at the roof.}}
== [[Live-Action TV]] ==
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** In "The Family of Blood", all four of the eponymous family are inflicted with a custom-made version of this trope, in the process learning why you never, ever, ''ever'' [[Beware the Nice Ones|make the Doctor mad]].
** "Planet of the Ood" has a ruthless CEO personally market the peaceful, squid-like Ood as slaves worldwide. The CEO's fate? {{spoiler|He gets turned into one of the very creatures he's been mistreating}}.
** While making the Doctor angry may be the worst mistake one could make, making the TARDIS angry is a close second. With full control over entrances and exists within its near-infinite interior, it has been known to use parts of itself as a prison, keeping those who annoy it there, ''forever.''
* In the ''[[Torchwood]]'' episode ''Children of Earth'', Jack got {{spoiler|trapped in cement}} until his boy toy came to the rescue. Then the show proceeds to painfully remind us why [[Who Wants to Live Forever?|being immortal sucks]]. Like {{spoiler|watching your love die in his arms, knowing he himself can never die permanently}}. Really, this show has worked hard to assure viewers that Jack's brand of immortality would be utterly ''agonizing''.
** Before his {{spoiler|entombment}}, Jack underwent the prolonged and (judging from the screams) extremely painful process of {{spoiler|regrowing his body}} after being {{spoiler|blown up by a bomb implanted in his lower torso}}. [[Lampshade Hanging|Lampshaded]] when a witness to this resurrection comments that he'd have been better off staying dead.
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* Discussed in ''[[House (TV series)|House]]'', as noted in the page quote. Wilson notes that a Fate Worse Than Death for House would be the loss of his rational faculties.
* On [[The Vampire Diaries]], vampires mummify when deprived of blood for an extended period of time, but until that happens they are in an extreme state of hunger and agony.
* In ''[[The River]]
* In the movie ''[[Star Trek: Nemesis]]'', Data is believed to have been killed, [[Heroic Sacrifice| sacrificing himself to save the rest of the crew]], but in ''[[Star Trek: Picard]]'', it is revealed that, while his body was destroyed, his consciousness has been downloaded into a quantum simulation crafted by Maddox, meaning that for years, he's been completely alone and [[I Cannot Self-Terminate| unable to shut the program down]]. Eventually, when Picard himself dies (his mind transferred to a golem created by Dr. Altan Soong) he finally meets his old friend and the two have a brief time to talk and reminisce. Unfortunately, that's all they can do, and Data pleads with Picard to terminate the simulation on his way out. [[Mercy Kill| Which Picard sadly does.]]
* ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation]]'' zigzags this in the episode "Deja Q", where Q is punished by the Q-Continuum for his irresponsibility by having to live one day as a mortal. Q does not consider ''this'' to be "worse than death", but being mortal means he could actually die, something he is ''terrified'' of. In fact, they let him choose what form he had to spend the day as (so long as it was mortal) and he chose human because he felt he'd be safe on ''The Enterprise'' with humans he was familiar with.
* Discussed and [[Played For Laughs]] in an episode of [[Power Rangers SPD]] where Piggy (a lowlife criminal [[Information Broker]]) is trying to figure out how to handle the colossal mess he's gotten himself into:
{{quote|'''Piggy:''' Oh, this is no good at all. If Gruumm finds out I had S.P.D. technology and didn't give it to him, well, he'll vaporize me. If Broodwing finds out I'm working for Gruumm, well, ''he'll'' vaporize me. And if Gruumm finds out I'm working for Broodwing, [[Morton's Fork| well then, he'll vaporize me]]. If the Rangers find out I'm working for Gruumm ''or'' Broodwing, well, they'll vaporize me. Oh, no, wait. They don't vaporize. They stick guys like me into [[Phantom Zone Picture| those little, teeny cards]]. Ohh, I'd rather be vaporized.}}
* One particularly nasty [[Monster of the Week|unsub]] from ''[[Criminal Minds]]'' seems to be a [[Karma Houdini]] at first glance, until you realize how grim things are looking for him at the end of his episode. Shane Wyland from "Into The Woods" manages to slip out from between the BAU's fingers and return to the Appalachian Trail, his hunting grounds and a place that he knows like the back of his hand. While it seems like he'll be able to kidnap, rape, and murder children with impunity for the rest of his life, his face, name, and modus operandi are known to law enforcement, which will force him to keep a low profile. This also means he can't return to civilization and buy the medication needed to treat the painful degenerative disease he suffers from. It's safe to say that he's doomed to die a slow, agonizing death in the wilderness, [[Asshole Victim|which is the ''perfect'' fate for a disgusting pedophile like him.]]
* Hector Salamanca from ''[[Breaking Bad]]'' was once a proud, dangerous crime lord, until a stroke crippled him for life. He's spent a number of years living a truly degrading and humiliating existence, where condescending staff at his nursing home treat him like a toddler while his arch nemesis Gus Fring regularly torments him with the knowledge that he's slowly, methodically wiping out his family and tearing down the criminal empire he had spent years building up.
== [[Music]] ==
* A song called "Johnny I Hardly Knew Ye", tells about a soldier (named Johnny), who came home alive from a war, but is so horribly disfigured and crippled that even his family could not recognize him. Since he can no longer walk or use his arms and hands, they decided to have him beg on the streets ("Ye're an armless, boneless, chickenless egg
* The song "One" by [[Metallica]] details the life of a soldier, after he loses all his limbs, his sight, his speech, and his hearing due to a landmine. He has machines that breathe for him, and so he's unable to die. His mind functions perfectly, leaving him a prisoner in his own body.
{{quote|Darkness, imprisoning me! All I see, absolute horror! I cannot live, I cannot die! Trapped in myself, body my holding cell!}}
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** This gets references in ''The Owl Service'' by Alan Garner, which provides an [[Alternative Character Interpretation]] for {{spoiler|Blodeuedd}}. Blodeuedd was a woman who was made of flowers by Gwydion so [[Arranged Marriage|his nephew could have a wife]], and she was turned into an owl because of [[Perfectly Arranged Marriage|a certain trope being heavily averted]]. This actually is a plot point, and to break the curse afflicting the main characters {{spoiler|Blodeuedd must be freed of this curse.}}
* While any version of Hell is bad in [[Buddhism]], they are supposed to be places of purification as well as punishment, and damned souls can at least hope to be reborn again someday. However, Buddhism has a special one called Avichi, which is for souls that are so evil, they're kicked out of the reincarnation cycle completely. That only happens to those who commit one of [[This Is Unforgivable!| the Five Grave Offenses]] which is limited to killing an Arhat (an enlightened being), shedding the blood of the Buddha, creating a schism within the Sangha, (a community of [[Actual Pacifist| pacifist Buddhist monks and nuns]]), or murdering one of your parents. Most Buddhist monks consider it taboo to publicly condemn a man to Avichi, as it would be making a judgment mortals have no right to make; even the will of gods cannot condemn a man to this Hell. Buddhist dogma specifically states that [[Self-Inflicted Hell| a sinner forges his own path here.]]
== [[Print Media]] ==
* ''[[MAD]]'' magazine #200 has "Rime of the Modern Skateboarder", a parody of ''[[Rime of the Ancient Mariner]]''; in this case, the narrator is a young skateboarder who lived through something similar to the Ancient Mariner, with a gopher in place of the albatross. His audience falls asleep, given how boring the poem supposedly is (though anyone who finds the original poem boring might laugh at this version), and the Skateboarder explains why his Fate (much like the Mariner's) is worse than death:
{{quote|''For though I've lived through my ordeal and ditched the gopher too,
''And have the finest skateboard known, one thing still makes me blue.
''I'm doomed through life to tell my tale, so ghastly and unreal...
''If you've been bored to hear it once, just think how I must feel.''}}
== [[Tabletop Games]] ==
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* ''[[Ghost Trick]]'': So you have a ghost who has [[You Have Outlived Your Usefulness|outlived his usefulness]], and you really, ''really'' don't want him coming after you after the fact. What do you do? Why, leave him in a flooding submarine at the bottom of the sea, completely alone, launch the room containing his body as far away as possible in a random direction, allow said room to collapse due to the water pressure, mangling the body beyond repair and all but ensuring [[Time Travel]] doesn't come into play, blow up the submarine with a torpedo, and make sure no possible path of escape remains. And since he's already dead...
* ''[[Team Fortress 2]]'':
** The disembodied head of the BLU Spy
** [[Word of God|According to]] [http://www.tf2.com/post.php?id=5816 the outtakes], BLU Spy's severed head got somehow permanently Übercharged, and now spends [[Blessed with Suck|his invulnerable days]] mostly [[Visual Pun|having a smoke break and chillin']] [[Fridge Horror|in RED Medic's fridge]].
* In ''[[Final Fantasy XIII]]'', a l'Cie who fails to complete their focus is doomed to become a Cie'th, a crystalline monster that wanders the world forever in sorrow. The fate for those who complete their focus isn't much better - they become an immortal servant of the fal'Cie.
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* ''[[Dark Souls]]'' has a ''lot'' of this. Most of the enemies are tragic monsters. There is horrible [[Body Horror]], being imprisoned while effectively immortal, becoming a [[Empty Shell|hollow]] and {{spoiler|Linking the Flame leaves you burning alive, forever until someone puts you out of your misery.}}
* What happens to {{spoiler|Mihaly}} in ''[[Ace Combat]] 7: Skies Unknown'' as a result of the final boss fight with him. {{spoiler|He survives the destruction of his plane, but the injuries sustained leave him unable to fly again - a horrible way to go for an [[Ace Pilot]].}}
* The Miller in ''[[Darkest Dungeon]]'' (''The Color of Madness'' DLC) has been enthralled by an [[Eldritch Abomination]] {{spoiler|with control over space and time who won't let him die}}, and if the encounter with his similarly enthralled but non-agressive wife and his reaction of mad grief upon seeing an adventurer bearing her locket (and his subsequent inability to deal any damage to the bearer) are any indication, his mind is still mostly intact and [[And I Must Scream|he is fully aware of his hopeless situation]].
* ''[[Wolfenstein: The New Order]]'' gives us a truly heartbreaking example in {{spoiler|either Fergus or Wyatt, whose brain has been painfully removed from their body and converted into a [[Wetware CPU]] that controls one of General Deathshead's war machines. The victim has been fully aware of what's happened to him for years, and during his boss fight he can only beg for BJ to kill him since he can't stop his body from following the mad doctor's orders.}}
==[[Web Comics]]==
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** A particularly interesting example is Todd, who was a soldier in an equivalent of World War I; when his commanding officer ordered him to machine gun the children of a village so they would not grow up into enemies, he obediently complied. Home on bereavement leave, he discovers his wife has hanged herself, and commits suicide to be with her. In Hell, he doesn't miss an opportunity to claim it was all out of his hands; all is down to fate, he is responsible for nothing. And sure enough, he ends up as a character in a comic book written by the Devil hirself...
* In ''[[The Non-Adventures of Wonderella]]'' [http://nonadventures.com/2012/12/29/ill-be-doom-for-xmas/ this] happens to Santa Claus.
*
== [[Web Original]] ==
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* Oran's speech to the defeated scumbag Mars in Chapter 19 Act 3: "I have seen you scum--staked to the ground at night--belly and manhood split wide, wailing as jagged beaks tear and peck--as a million insect jaws carve the pulp. And when morning comes, I am standing over your seeping husk. You cannot turn from the horror. You cannot stop the rising sun that burns you into blindness. You cannot close your eyes... '''''for I am feasting on their lids.'''''
** The best part is that Raimi immediately chimes in afterward, saying that would be too kind. What does ''he'' have to say to Mars? See the ''[[Broken Saints]]'' entry in [[Prison Rape]].
* In the web-novel ''[http://www.fictionpress.com/secure/story/story_preview.php?storyid=2718227&chapter=1 Fragile]'',{{Dead link}}
* The [[SCP Foundation]] uses this quite a lot. For example: [http://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-145 SCP-145].
** [http://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-231 SCP-231-7] is ''legendary'' for its use of this trope, not only for the victim herself but for those ''forced to keep her alive'', as allowing her to die would probably lead to [[The End of the World as We Know It]]. Not to mention the operatives who have to administer the treatment; ''nobody'' who has done so has ''not'' wanted amnesiac treatment afterwards.
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* ''[[Buzz Lightyear of Star Command]]'' has this trope parodied when Zurg tried to hit Buzz with a hyper death ray to give Buzz a fate "worse than death: hyper-death".
* Discord of ''[[My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic]]'', as punishment for [[The Dark Times]] he inflicted on Equestria, was turned into [[Taken for Granite|an immobile stone statue]] for more than one thousand years. [[Angst? What Angst?|He didn't seem to mind much]], but it is ''very'' telling that two of the literal handful of times he loses his cool was insulting Celestia for her part in his imprisonment ("It's quite lonely being imprisoned in stone, but you wouldn't know that, would you, because ''I don't turn ponies into stone''."), and then later {{spoiler|when he's turned back into stone and his facial expression is one of unrestrained horror.}}
* At the end of the ''[[Ren and Stimpy]]'' episode, "Double Header" Ursa Minor crashes onto Ren and Stimpy forcing the doctor to sew what's left of Ren onto Stimpy's backside. Stimpy is then given his favorite food, barbecued Boston baked beans. See the page image for what that means for Ren.
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