Just Desserts

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In many a story the Big Bad (or The Dragon (or maybe even the slightly annoying bad)) will get his payback for being a Bad. And the payback is that he gets to be dessert... Well maybe not dessert - sometimes it's an appetiser, sometimes a main course, once in a while, it really IS dessert. The high point of this is when the Bad is eaten by the primary character (Hannibal Lecter anyone?).

This does NOT include a Heroic Sacrifice. But may be subverted with a minor character being killed and eaten in obvious foreshadowing of what is going to happen to one of the bads at some point. While Mooks may be recipients of the Just Desserts, a true Just Dessert is reserved for those higher up the ladder.

Compare The Dog Bites Back, Devour the Dragon.

WARNING: This is a Death Trope. Here Be Spoilers

Examples of Just Desserts include:


Anime

  • Digimon Adventure has chief minion Demidevimon get devoured by his master Venom Myotismon after he decides coming back from the dead has made him hungry.
  • The Immortals of Baccano can consume eachother and gain eachothers experience by laying their hand on the other immortals forehead. This is how Firo defeats Szilard.
  • In Digimon Xros Wars, Chuuchuumon, a rat puppet Digimon, grew large after seeing Taiki, Mervamon, Wisemon, and Knightmon who are coming to rescue Yuu. Taiki summon Bastemon, a cat-like Digimon, who then gains a Slasher Smile after seeing the mouse. This is a rare case where the one who devours is very, very small compared to the "dessert".
  • Puella Magi Madoka Magica has a rare heroic example in Mami Tomoe, who only counts as this because she was uncharacteristically reckless in combat against a Witch.
    • Kyubey does this to himself after Homura riddles him with bullets in episode 8.
  • In Kara no Kyoukai, Cornelius Alba gets eaten alive by one of Touko's creations.


Film


Literature

  • Short story "Thus I Refute Beelzy". A mentally abusive father is eaten by the title character, his son's not-so-imaginary friend.
  • Famously done in The Silence of the Lambs books. If they are a Bad, it is a good bet that Hannibal Lecter will eat them.
    • Or, in Hannibal, he (in this case, Mason) gets eaten by the wild boars that he thought would eat Hannibal.
  • In Sideways Stories from Wayside School, Mrs. Gorf is tricked into turning herself into an apple. Louis finds the apple and eats it.
    • This happens to Mrs. Gorf again in a later book. She materializes in a plate of potato salad, and John and Joe quickly eat her before she can turn them into apples.
  • In the story of Daniel from The Bible, after having to consign Daniel to a lion's den because of a law that some princes had tricked him into passing because they were jealous of him, King Darius, overjoyed that (as he himself had predicted) the Lord protected Daniel for the night by sending one of his angels to shut the lions' mouths so they could not hurt him, has Daniel taken out of the lions' den. The princes responsible for the law (and their families, in a bit of Disproportionate Retribution) are thrown in instead, where they promptly get eaten by the lions.
  • Happens in HP Lovecraft's Short Story "The Cats of Ulthar" to an old couple that killed cats for fun.


Live Action TV

  • Subverted in Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode The Pack (s01e06) with Xander and four gang members are taken over by a hyena spirit. As part of their rampage they kill and eat the school mascot pig, and then - when called into the principal's office for questioning - Principal Flutie.
    • Though played straight at the end of the episode when the Zoo Warden (who brought the hyenas so he could get the hyena spirit) gets tossed into the hyena holding pit where he gets eaten.
    • Buffy the Vampire Slayer, "Graduation Day." Little Bad Principal Snyder gets eaten by Big Bad The Mayor, who has just transformed himself into a giant demon snake thingy.
    • Possibly the coach's fate in "Go Fish":
 

  Xander: Boy, the swim team sure loves their coach!

 
Even more Squick if you recall that the coach intended to have Buffy to be raped by the fish-men - they had already eaten at that point.


Theatre

  • The opera Hansel and Gretel adds a new element to the familiar tale by the Brothers Grimm: the witch owns a magical oven which bakes children into gingerbread. Of course, the witch gets pushed into it, and a very large piece of gingerbread is brought out at the finale.


Video Games

  • In Overlord 2, the villain's dragon, Marius, is praising his boss after a One-Winged Angel turns him into an all-devouring Eldritch Abomination, his praise is interrupted by the devourer eating him.
  • In Super Mario RPG, after the Bundt cake is beaten down to its last Raspberry layer, it gets swallowed by Booster in one gulp. Of course, it was supposed to be just a dessert in the first place, but instead it came alive and started attacking.


Web Comics


Web Original

  • Alexia's final fate in The Return, devoured by Darkstar.


Western Animation