Rube Goldberg Hates Your Guts: Difference between revisions

== Anime and Manga ==

 

* Shows up frequently in ''[[Majin Tantei Nougami Neuro]]''.

** One of his crowning achievements happens relatively early in the manga, where he sets up a man to die in such a way that his ''real'' target has no choice but to reveal his name to him (giving Light everything he needs to kill him when the time comes).

 

== Fan Fic ==

 

 

== Film ==

* ''Cube''

* ''[[Law Abiding Citizen]]'': This entire movie is a love note to this trope. The way Clyde kills people makes [[MacGyver]] look like he was creating science projects for the elementary school science fair.

* The ''[[Final Destination]]'' movies, insofar as the deaths (which appear to be [[Necro Non Sequitur]]s) can be considered orchestrated by a sinister force.

** The first movie had one death (the teacher) so hilariously contrived that it's a wonder the scene wasn't scored with "[[Benny Hill|Yakety Sax.]]"

* ''[[The Cell]]''

* ''[[The Omen]]'' films and here there's no chance of the elaborate schemes failing because they're planned by, you know, the ''Devil''.

* ''[[Mind Hunters]]'' had a serial killer killing everyone in incredibly bizarre ways tailored specially to each character's personality. One death was a literal Rube Goldberg machine. {{spoiler|Death by being frozen by a dropped bottle of Liquid Nitrogen, or death by smoking acid-filled cigarettes anyone?}}

* [[James Bond]]. For a while, especially during the Roger Moore era, the Bond films ''were'' this trope.

* Parodied in ''[[Austin Powers]] International Man of Mystery'', where Dr Evil leaves Austin and [[The Chick|the current chick]] to die in an over-elaborate device, and Dr Evil's son suggests just shooting them.

* In ''[[Conan the Barbarian]]'', Conan kills {{spoiler|Thorgrim}} with a [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTq-ZISyLcs#t=4m38s spring-loaded spike trap].

 

== Literature ==

 

* Done occasionally in the ''[[Florida Roadkill]]'' series by [[Tim Dorsey]]. The earliest example: The victim is tied to an armchair, with the TV on showing the space shuttle being prepped for launch at Cape Canaveral (which was fairly close to the motel where the victim was tied up in). When the shuttle launched, the shock waves of the launch would cause the model space shuttle hanging from the ceiling to swing, striking the metal ring cut from a beer can. The contact between the metal ring and the metal toy would complete a circuit, which would start a small electric motor, which would wind in a cord, which would pull the trigger of a shotgun that was pointed at the victim.

 

== Live Action TV ==

* ''[[Dead Like Me]]'': The use of this trope is actually [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshaded]]. All of the deaths in the show are of this variety and it is explained early on that the gravelings exist solely to make sure the circumstances leading to the deaths occur. Hell, their boss is even named [[Meaningful Name|Rube]].

** The movie of the series plays with this trope has a suicidal inventor create an ingenious Rube Goldberg device to kill himself. He straps himself in, starts it off, and then receives a phone call which makes him want to live. Rube Goldberg's hatred comes up when the device works perfectly, then subverts it when it becomes clear his afterlife will be even better than what he was going to receive in this world.

* The original title of this trope, "Death by Rube Goldberg," is actually ''used'' word for word in a ''[[The Facts of Life]]'' episode revolving around a killer taking down the group. It can be seen [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8Zri0hNCIY here] at approximately 06:30. The show even [[Lampshaded Trope|lampshades]] the fact that most of the audience will have no idea who Rube Goldberg was!

* The serial killer Mr. Yin, on ''[[Psych]]'' is particularly creative, including {{spoiler|strapping Juliet to a chair that was attached to a clock tower by a rope in such a way that at 4:30 the rope would be severed and she would fall to her death.}}

* An episode of ''[[CSI]]'' has the "minature killer" set up a trap in their victims' apartment and send their calling card (a minature of the scene) early. {{spoiler|It turns out to be a device which pours charcoal on the fire and fills the room with carbon monoxide, it silently kills the undercover officer they posted in the room while they were watching unaware the entire time.}}

** The episode Lab Rats has one of these as one of Hodge's causes of death in his "thought experiments" {{spoiler|as a scenario for his board game}}. The first one ( {{spoiler|a booby trapped evidence box}}) is even disparaged as the work of Wile E. Coyote.

** One episode has the team ultimately deduce that a college girl's apparent murder was actually the result of an extremely unfortunate set of coincidences. This results in a [[Downer Ending]] when the girl's parents refuse to accept the lack of closure this gives them, and go off determined to pointlessly blow a bunch of money on another investigation.

** In "Mr. Monk Meets the Playboy," in season 2, there is a case where a publisher is killed when his barbell crushes his trachea. The murder weapon: a magnet in the apartment underneath.

** The scheme used in the murder in "Mr. Monk and the TV Star" involved staging a barfight so that the press could be used as an alibi.

** Not sure if it's the same one, but there's one that involves a weapon resting on a block of melting ice.

* In an episode of ''[[Fringe]]'', a genius arranges deaths through convoluted chain reactions.

 

== Video Games ==

 

** Clever players can even use this to create inescapable rooms with traps that constantly affect the trapped agents and/or tourists, earning money for trap chains. With proper set-up, you need not worry about money again. See [http://wiki.n1nj4.com/index.php?title=Ubertrap here] for the designs to "The Square of Insanity" and "The Tornado Trap".

* In ''[[Hitman]] Blood Money'', you are rewarded for making your hits look like accidents. In all of the games in the series, you can come up with very indirect or ingenious ways of offing your targets.

* Some members of the ''[[Dwarf Fortress]]'' community love to invoke this trope when it comes to [[Upperclass Twit|nobles]] and certain other pests. Since you can't just order them to be killed, this is pretty much your only option.<ref>Well, or just locking their bedroom doors so they starve to death, but sending them to pull a lever to drop themselves into a magma sea is [[Video Game Cruelty Potential|much more entertaining]].</ref>

** It's also been invoked on a much larger scale: building a [[Pointless Doomsday Device]] to destroy the ''entire fortress''. Often used when {{spoiler|monsters from the depths of hell}} are swarming in. [[Dead Baby Comedy|Or]] [[Black Comedy|when]] [[Bloody Hilarious|it's]] [[Rule of Funny|funny]].

* In ''[[Carmageddon]]'', if you kill a pedestrian by hitting them with an object (like a pole or parked civilian car) you get an extra bonus and the words "Nice shot, sir."

* This trope is used by the Origami Killer in ''[[Heavy Rain]]''. Killing boys by leaving them trapped in a ditch that fills with rainwater is certainly more elaborate than most. The same applies to the trials that the Origami Killer leaves for his victims' fathers, which, among others, {{spoiler|include heading to a power plant, crawling through a vent with glass on the bottom, and then navigating through a maze of electrical condensers to get the next clue}}.

** You can die in it, but since he is, at this point, recounting how he came to be in a completely different (and much more straightforward) perilous situation, the person listening calls him out.

* ''[[Ghost Trick]]'', in spades. It, for example, features {{spoiler|death by Rube Goldberg contraption}} (twice) and {{spoiler|death by giant plastic chicken}}. You, of course, get to go and try avert all those ridculously complicated deaths.

** It ''does'' work, just not in the way [[Big Bad|Ratigan]] had in mind: Basil sets it off at just the right moment so that it self-destructs and frees them instead of [[Rasputinian Death|killing them]] [[There Is No Kill Like Overkill|excessively]]. It also deserves bonus points for involving a record player featuring [[Vincent Price]] singing gleefully evil [[Crowning Music of Awesome]].

* ''[[The Perils of Penelope Pitstop]]'': The Hooded Claw LOVES this trope. He pulls a [[Death Trap]] with this just about every 2 miniutes.

** And the Joker uses and elaborate Rube Goldberg device to kill Bataman in "Emperor Joker!". Of course, at the time, the Joker has the [[Reality Warper|powers of a god]] to ensure that it works. But decides it's no fun to kill him once, and does it over and over again.

* In the [[Futurama]] "The Tip of the Zoidberg" has the protagonists use one on the professor. Being a [[Rube Goldberg Device]], it was not quick, allowing time for the execution to be interrupted.