Pater Familicide: Difference between revisions

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While [[Offing the Offspring]] describes premeditated filicide, this trope involves the head of the household unilaterally killing their kids and their spouse. Compare [[Where I Was Born and Razed]]. The occasional [[Real Life]] examples get massive attention in national news -- these might be part of what gives this trope its resonance. The examples from [[Greek Mythology]] below make this [[Older Than Feudalism]].

== Anime ==

* ''[[Umineko no Naku Koro Ni]]''. Hey, my successors are unworthy and I'm about to die. What is my choice of action? Gee, let's try [[Kill Em All|slaughtering them all]] for a magic ritual to revive my [[Sealed Evil in A Can|dead witch lover]]. GOOD PLAN, KINZO. REAL GOOD. {{spoiler|[[Subverted Trope|Subverted]] when it is revealed that Kinzo was actually dead before any of the games started (and that only an [[Unreliable Narrator]] made him appear to be alive), and that he therefore never killed his family}}.

* ''[[Umineko no Naku Koro Ni]]''. Hey, my successors are unworthy and I'm about to die. What is my choice of action? Gee, let's try [[Kill'Em All|slaughtering them all]] for a magic ritual to revive my [[Sealed Evil in A Can|dead witch lover]]. GOOD PLAN, KINZO. REAL GOOD. {{spoiler|[[Subverted Trope|Subverted]] when it is revealed that Kinzo was actually dead before any of the games started (and that only an [[Unreliable Narrator]] made him appear to be alive), and that he therefore never killed his family}}.

* In ''[[Puella Magi Madoka Magica (Anime)|Puella Magi Madoka Magica]]'', it's eventually revealed that {{spoiler|Kyouko Sakura's}} father killed the rest of her family and then himself {{spoiler|after he realized that the increased number of followers at his church was not due to people actually believing him, but because of Kyouko's powers as a Puella Magi (born from her wish to get him more followers) making them listen}}.

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* ''[[Death On Demand|Death on Demand]]'' has [[Deliberately Monochrome|a black and white]] opening which depicts the then-living killer butchering his wife, mother in-law and two daughters during [[Horror Doesn't Settle for Simple Tuesday|Thanksgiving]] dinner.

* ''For Colored Girls'' has the alcoholic, PTSD-suffering war vet toss his kids out of the window when he suspected his wife of cheating (which she did, years earlier), and thought her lover pulled up in a limo one afternoon, saying that it's time to return the kids to their rightful father (the limo actually housed her female boss). The wife tries to save her kids by grabbing them before they fell, but her grip couldn't hold for too long, and no one else managed to get into the room in time.

* This is what kick-starts the curse of the ''~Ju-on~'' series of films, as well as the [[Foreign Remake|remake]] series, ''[[The Grudge]]'': In the Japanese series, Takeo Saeki reads his wife Kayako's diary, discovers that she harbours an obsessive crush on her old college friend, Kobayashi, and becomes so [[Green Eyed Monster|jealous]], paranoid and [[Ax Crazy|outright crazy]] that he starts to believe that a) Kayako is having an affair, and b) that he is not the natural father of their son, Toshio (none of which are true). He then [[Neck Snap|snaps Kayako's neck]], leaving her paralysed but not quite dead until he slashes her with a utility knife, drowns Toshio, and even slaughters Toshio's beloved cat. Takeo himself is later killed when Kayako, now a ''seriously'' angry spirit, takes her revenge. In the American series, the murders and his motives are very similar, except in this continuity, the object of Kayako's desire is instead a university professor named Peter, and there is no suspicion with regards to Toshio's parentage.

* This is what kick-starts the curse of the ''~Ju-on~'' series of films, as well as the [[Foreign Remake|remake]] series, ''[[The Grudge]]'': In the Japanese series, Takeo Saeki reads his wife Kayako's diary, discovers that she harbours an obsessive crush on her old college friend, Kobayashi, and becomes so [[Green-Eyed Monster|jealous]], paranoid and [[Ax Crazy|outright crazy]] that he starts to believe that a) Kayako is having an affair, and b) that he is not the natural father of their son, Toshio (none of which are true). He then [[Neck Snap|snaps Kayako's neck]], leaving her paralysed but not quite dead until he slashes her with a utility knife, drowns Toshio, and even slaughters Toshio's beloved cat. Takeo himself is later killed when Kayako, now a ''seriously'' angry spirit, takes her revenge. In the American series, the murders and his motives are very similar, except in this continuity, the object of Kayako's desire is instead a university professor named Peter, and there is no suspicion with regards to Toshio's parentage.

* Alec Trevelyan's backstory in ''[[Goldeneye (Film)|Goldeneye]]'' has his father kill his mother and himself so that they won't have to live with the shame of having survived the Soviet purge of Lienz Cossacks.

* In ''[[Downfall (Film)|Downfall]]'', a German general commits suicide in his apartment during dinner with his wife and three children--by detonating a grenade and killing his family along with himself.

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* In the series finale of ''[[The Shield]]'', {{spoiler|Shane's last play to keep his pregnant wife out of jail has failed, and they're faced with the prospect of having their children go into the foster care system. Seeing no other way out, he slips fatal doses of painkillers to his wife and son, and then simply waits for the cops. When they break down his door, he puts a bullet in his head}}.

* In the ''[[Torchwood (TV)|Torchwood]]'' miniseries ''Children of Earth'', {{spoiler|civil servant John Frobisher is told that his two daughters must be sacrificed to the invading aliens in order for the government to save face. He returns home, sends his family to one of the bedrooms, takes a gun and follows them up. [[Gory Discretion Shot|The door closes]] and [[Tear Jerker|three gunshots are heard, then a pause followed by a fourth]].}}

* In the ''[[Criminal Minds]]'' episode "Normal", the BAU predict that since the killer is murdering women resembling his wife, eventually he will kill his real family. {{spoiler|He does, and then hallucinates that they're still alive. Eventually he gets told that he killed them and [[My God What Have I Done|breaks down]]}}.

* In the ''[[Criminal Minds]]'' episode "Normal", the BAU predict that since the killer is murdering women resembling his wife, eventually he will kill his real family. {{spoiler|He does, and then hallucinates that they're still alive. Eventually he gets told that he killed them and [[My God, What Have I Done?|breaks down]]}}.

** Another episode, "The Fox," has a serial killer who stages his crimes to look like this in order to keep the police from looking for a murderer outside the family.

* One of [[Dexter]]'s victims was a cop who murdered her husband and daughter, because she found them to be a burden.

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* ''[[God of War]]'''s Kratos killed his wife and child in a fit of battle rage induced by Ares. The subsequent nightmares drive him through the game's story and eventually cause him to [[Driven to Suicide|leap off a tall cliff]].

* In the mediocre game ''Spy Fiction'', the villain, Scarface, married a female terrorist and had a son by her. Then he discovered she was a [[Double Agent]] killed her and shot his son in the head. {{spoiler|[[Start of Darkness|The kid survived to become the other villain]].}}

* In the video game ''[[The Suffering]]'', main character Torque is sent to Abbott State Penitentiary on being convicted of killing his family. Of course, he [[Laser Guided Amnesia|doesn't remember doing it]]. The [[Multiple Endings]] reveal different circumstances of how his family really died, depending on your [[Karma Meter]].

* In the video game ''[[The Suffering]]'', main character Torque is sent to Abbott State Penitentiary on being convicted of killing his family. Of course, he [[Laser-Guided Amnesia|doesn't remember doing it]]. The [[Multiple Endings]] reveal different circumstances of how his family really died, depending on your [[Karma Meter]].

** Good: {{spoiler|Blackmore hired thugs to do it after Torque stopped working for him. It wouldn't count normally but Blackmore is his [[Split Personality]].}}

** Neutral: {{spoiler|Torque accidentally killed his wife in an argument and his child who he beat killed the other one and then committed suicide.}}

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== Webcomics ==

* In ''[[Warbot in Accounting (Webcomic)|Warbot in Accounting]]'', the titular character [[Nice Job Breaking It Hero|becomes responsible for one of these]] when trying to help out a co-worker who needs a report to file, making one itself. Unfortunately, Warbot being... [[Exactly What It Says On the Tin|A warbot]] without human appendages, the report is not in presentable form and the co-worker is fired. [[Downer Ending|The story ends with Warbot reading on the newspaper about the man committing the murder-suicide of his family in grief.]]

* In ''[[Warbot in Accounting (Webcomic)|Warbot in Accounting]]'', the titular character [[Nice Job Breaking It, Hero|becomes responsible for one of these]] when trying to help out a co-worker who needs a report to file, making one itself. Unfortunately, Warbot being... [[Exactly What It Says On the Tin|A warbot]] without human appendages, the report is not in presentable form and the co-worker is fired. [[Downer Ending|The story ends with Warbot reading on the newspaper about the man committing the murder-suicide of his family in grief.]]