Ribcage Ridge: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

[[File:HugeSkeletonOnDantooine.jpg|link=Star Wars: The Clone Wars|frame|The Force was weak with that one.]]

Like [[Alien Sky|an oddly-colored sky with multiple suns or moons]], this is one of those surefire ways of letting the audience know that the story has taken them to a world vastly different from our own. Just stick a ginormous monster skeleton somewhere in the scenery, and presto, instant [[Alternate Universe|otherworld]]! Interestingly, the heroes almost never encounter a ''living'' monster of that type, or one [[Squick|in an earlier state of decay]]. Sometimes, [[Everything's Better with Dinosaurs|dinosaur bones]] may be substituted to indicate another time period instead of another world entirely.

See also [[Saharan Shipwreck]], [[Desert Skull]], and [[Ribcage Stomach]].

{{examples}}

* There are a few Demon God corpses, overgrown with greenery, in the opening landscape of ''[[Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind]]''.

* In the ''[[Animal Crossing]]'' movie, the cave by the sea contains, sticking out of the wall, an enormous, intact seismosaurus skeleton. {{spoiler|In the finale, they climb it to grab one of Gulliver's gears.}}

* [[Yu-Gi-Oh (Tabletop Game)|Yu-Gi-Oh!]] has a living example in the monster [http://yugioh.wikia.com/wiki/Temple_of_Skulls Temple of Skulls].

* In the classic Brood storyline of the ''X-Men'' back in the 80s, we discover roughly an issue in that the [[Death World]] surrounding one of the Alien bases was in fact the semi-decomposed corpse of one of the Space Whales they had enslaved as [[Living Ship]]s. To give an idea of the scale, the tips of the ribs poked out of the planetary atmosphere.

* [[Moebius]] had quite a few decorating the landscape of Arzarch.

== Films -- Animation ==

* In ''[[Quest for Camelot]]'', one of the first things greeting the Kayley and Garret in "Dragon Country" is a giant skeleton that they climb over without realizing what it is. Much later, they have a giant dragon skeleton ''dropped'' on them.

* Near the end of the "Rite of Spring" section of ''[[Fantasia]]'' there is a desert littered with dinosaur bones.

== Films -- Live Action ==

* One is present in ''[[Hunter Prey]]''.

* Huge sauropod ribcages and bones are encountered by the heroes of ''[[Jurassic Park|The Lost World: Jurassic Park]]'' near the ruins of the facilities of Site B.

== Live Action TV ==

* Some made-for-TV movie with Jack and the Beanstalk as the back-story had a shot of a dragon on a hill in the Giant's realm in the flashback, and the same shot of its skeleton when said realm is revisited in the present.

* The desert surrounding Rak Cthol in ''[[The Belgariad]]'' was once a shallow sea. When it was drained, the enormous serpents that called it home were left behind and died, leaving skeletons in the black sand.

== Literature ==

* A large Dinosaur skeleton is seen in the Desert in one of the later ''[[Dinotopia]]'' books.

* SF/Fantasy writer Lucius Shepard has a series of stories about people living in towns on and around the body of a gigantic dragon—who isn't ''entirely'' dead.

== MMORPGs ==

* Many creation myths describe gods creating the world itself from the remains of colossal monsters killed in battle at the beginning of time. In [[Norse Mythology]], for instance, mountains were formed from the bones of Ymir, the first and biggest of the [[Our Giants Are Bigger|frost giant]], and his skull became the sky itself.

== Tabletop Games ==

* In ''[[Dungeons & Dragons]]'', one whole layer of Hell is covered with (partially still alive) body of its former ruler, the bones forming giant mountain ranges.

* A memorable adventure from ''Dungeon Adventures'' took place in a tunnel-complex that was dug out in and around a gigantic, buried dragon skeleton. Its cranial cavity and ribcage were two of the rooms in the place.

* The material for the Eisentown of Freiburg in ''[[7th Sea]]'' features a whole city ripe with this trope. One dragon skeleton makes the biggest bridge in town, another one the biggest tower and the last one is used as the cathedral.

* Big Thunder Mountain Railroad at [[Disney Theme Parks|Disneyland]] has dinosaur bones.

* So does one of the play-areas at Islands of Adventure.

* At the American Museum of Natural History, one of the dioramas is of a whale skeleton on the ocean floor, covered in sea snow.

== Video Games ==

* In ''[[Dreamfall]]'', the rebel camp is situated partly on a colossal skeleton floating the swamp.

* ''[[StarCraft]]'' has massive skeletons as part of several scenery sets.

** Furthermore, in Dondongo's Cavern that entire room where the skull is located is inside a massive ribcage. Oddly, this means the ginormous skull is facing the wrong way...

*** [[Wild Mass Guessing|Maybe, one huge dodongo choked to death while trying to swallow another giant dodongo whole, and then they both fossilized and were slowly covered up by the mountain!]]

** In the VGA remake, it resembles a Krayt Dragon skeleton from the ''[[Star Wars]]'' verse.

* Skull Man's stage in ''[[Mega Man (video game)|Mega Man]] 4''.

* ''[[Jak and Daxter]]'': Misty Island.

* ''[[Serious Sam]]'' 2 has them, mostly in planet Kleer. Most of them are found in the aptly named Boneyard level.

* The first world in ''[[Secret of Evermore]]'', a prehistoric-styled jungle, contains a "Mammoth Graveyard" that serves as a battle arena. Sticking out of the unpleasant muck are the remains of woolly mammoths; giant tusks frame the path to the next area.

* Present in ''[[Donkey Kong Country Returns]]''.

* In ''[[Castlevania: Lords of Shadow]]'', in the Necromancer Abyss, at several points you encounter rock formations that look suspiciously like bones, and then one cave which is clearly a ribcage. Of course {{spoiler|those happen to be the fossilized remains of a dragon, which are then reanimated by the Necromancer to serve as the stage's boss: The Dracolich Titan.}}

* The final [[Boss Rush]] of ''[[Primal Rage]]'' take place in a tar field littered with dinosaur bones.

* Fossil Valley in ''[[Chrono Cross]]'', one of the earliest places the player visits, has a gigantic dragon skeleton as part of the background. No live ones are ever encountered because the specific species of dragon is long extinct. {{spoiler|(bar one egg that the player can hatch)}}

* A variant in ''[[Shadow of the Colossus]]'' - Returning to the site of a colossus battle shows the corpse of said colossus becoming a part of the environment. The imagery falls more into this trope with larger colossi like [[Turtle Power|Basaran]] and [[Giant Flyer|Phalanx.]]

* In ''[[Spore]]'', these abound in the Creature Stage. In fact, you're encouraged to dig them up, in order to acquire new parts you can use to "evolve" your creature later. Too many of them in one place is often a tip-off that [[Oh Crap|an Epic creature is in the vicinity]].

* Portions of Wily Stage 2 in ''[[Rockman 6: Unique Harassment]]'' are based on Skull Man's stage from ''Rockman World 3'', giving those sections a bony feel to them.

== Western Animation ==