39,327
edits
Sand Worm: Difference between revisions
m
Mass update links
prefix>Import Bot (Import from TV Tropes TVT:Main.SandWorm 2012-07-01, editor history TVTH:Main.SandWorm, CC-BY-SA 3.0 Unported license) |
m (Mass update links) |
||
Line 14:
Similar monsters can be found in snow or water. These are, perhaps, a bit more believable.
Even in the best of cases, these are obvious instances of [[Artistic License Biology|artistic license]]; it simply isn't possible for a creature so dense and large to pass that easily through heavy earth, [[Sand Is Water|even if it is fine sand]]. Failure to observe the [[Square
Though when you think about it, they're kind of like scaled-up, desert-dwelling earthworms.
A related creature is the '''Landshark''', a ground-burrowing creature with the appetite, temperament, and often appearance of a [[
Compare [[Space Whale]], [[Flying Seafood Special]], [[Drill Tank]]. See also [[Worm Sign]].
{{examples
== Anime & Manga ==
Line 92:
== Tabletop Games ==
* ''[[Dungeons and Dragons]]''
** The iconic Purple Worm, which looks very much like a sandworm from [[Tremors]], including the mouth parts, but lives underground and tunnels through solid rock, leaving tunnels similar to the Horta from ''[[Star Trek the Original Series|The Devil In The Dark]]''. It hunts by sensing tremors of moving creatures which touch the ground, so flying is advised. Oh, and they're purple, covered in slime, and pictures of them have [[Does This Remind You of Anything?|inspired a lot of eye-rolling]] from gamers. One of the monsters that would go beyond the game's PG-13 rating, if parents didn't pretend they hadn't seen ''it''. In recent editions, the artwork has made more the worm more scaly and less.... suggestive.
*** In the Desert of Desolation series, Purple Worms (as well as a relative called the Thunderherder) could be found in the title desert.
** There's also the Remorhaz, which is a bit more like a giant centipede than a worm and burrows through ice and snow with a body temperature that rivals molten iron.
Line 110:
* [[Shadowrun]] has some miniature (2'-5' long) versions among its Awakened animals. They're descended from earthworms, secrete a powerful acid to penetrate stone, and eat concrete, particularly highways.
* ''Talislanta'' has giant sand ''eels''. Same idea, different flavor-text.
* ''[[Deadlands]]'' has rattlers. No, [[Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?|not those]]. Mojave rattlers are named for the noise a cowpoke's teeth make as they race toward him. Before taking one on, re-read that part about "varying intelligence" real careful: rattlers in different parts of the country even have different ''personalities'', implying at least the intelligence of a clever hunting animal. {{spoiler|They're [[Cosmic Horror|smarter]] than they seem, too. And they don't eat everyone they catch. [[Body Horror|What do they do with them...?]] }}
* [[Warhammer 40 K|Warhammer 40.000]] brought about several incarnations of these with the Tyranids since third edition.
** "The Red Terror" was a relative of the Ravener species (snake or worm-like Tyranids) that had the ability to burrow its way onto the battlefield and swallow smaller enemies whole. The Red Terror was later removed from the playable creatures: the Raveners got its burrowing abilities.
Line 133:
** On a more minor scale, ''[[Ocarina of Time]]'' has the Leevers, things like fat leeches that appear in some parts of the desert, and ''[[Spirit Tracks]]'' has the Malgyorgs, quintessential [[Land Shark|Land Sharks]].
** ''Adventure of Link'' has sandworm-like creatures in desert-based [[Random Encounters]].
** You could be forgiven for thinking The Forsaken in ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword (Video Game)|The Legend of Zelda Skyward Sword]]'' is a [[Sand Worm]], as all you see of it in Link's nightmare is a giant mouth on a tubular body. However, you later get to see its actual body, which is far shorter and humanoid.
* [[Shadow of the Colossus|Dirge the Tenth Colossus]] is a giant sand worm. Except it hits you. At high speeds. [[That One Boss|And it's hard]]. Oh, yeah, it '''[[Giant Flyer|flies]]'''.
** Only metaphorically, of course. Phalanx the 13th Colossus is the giant worm that '''literally''' flies.
Line 161:
* ''[[World of Warcraft]]'' has a few, the first being Ouro, a then-unique model boss in the Temple of Ahn'Qiraj. The Burning Crusade expansion introduced acid-spitting worms capable of tunneling through solid rock in Hellfire Peninsula and the Bone Wastes in the middle of Terrokar Forest. Jormungar of Northrend are quite a bit smaller, but adhere to the same principles (and spit acid too). With the release of the Cataclysm expansion, ''World Of Warcraft'' got sandworms that are made of stone [[Stargate|Stargates]].
* ''[[Phantasy Star IV]]'' had these infesting the planet Motavia, with an enterprising farmer deciding to open a sandworm ranch. Unfortunately, it gets too big for its britches, and thus becomes one of the first ([[That One Boss|and hardest]]) [[Bonus Boss]] fights in the game at that point. You often fought baby Sandworms in [[Random Encounters]], and at least one variant, if you left a single one alive, would run off and summon [[Mama Bear|Mama]] (another full-sized one like the boss mentioned above). When you get the [[Tank Goodness|Land Rover]], one of the enemies you ran into was a [[Palette Swap]] of the Sandworm, while swaps of both the small and large kind could be found in the planet's oceans.
* The [[Bonus Boss]] of [[Gaia Online|zOMG]] shares its name with this trope's alternate title/humorous variation: Landshark. It is, quite literally, a shark that swims through (and appears to be made of) sand. Other than than its anatomy, it acts almost exactly like a sandworm, burrowing underground and eating unsuspecting Gaians.(It can kill a [[Power Levels|CL 10.0]] Player with multiple armor buffs and a health boost in 3 hits, and unbuffed players in [[One
* Nydus Worms in ''[[Starcraft]] 2'' are an improvement on the first game's Nydus Canals: Load a bunch of units into a Nydus Network building, and have it grow a giant underground worm in another area. The creature bursts out of the ground and begins disgorging tons of units all at once.
* Great Wyrms in ''[[Master of Magic]]''.
Line 174:
* One of the bosses in [[Ginormo Sword]] is called "Sand Worm".
* The first ''[[Star Ocean 1 (Video Game)|Star Ocean]]'' game features Sandworms in the deserts of planet Roak, and also their cousins, called "Fellworms," in the mountains.
* ''[[Nethack]]'' features both D&D Purple Worms, and [[Lawyer
* The game [[The Immortal]] features these as recurring enemies up until level five. Level four is dedicated to avoiding them [[Fake Difficulty|by floating around on a magic carpet]] [[Interface Screw|with extremely bad handling.]]
* The [[Pokémon]] Onix and Steelix may count.
Line 193:
* ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog]]'' series has some robotic ones in ''[[Sonic 3 and Knuckles (Video Game)|Sonic 3 & Knuckles]]'' located in Sandopolis zone. Alien worms appeared in ''[[Shadow the Hedgehog]]''. More organic and fiery ones can be found in ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 (Video Game)|Sonic the Hedgehog 2006]]'' although the latter two seem to prefer any surface, not just sand.
* ''[[Time Splitters]]: Future Perfect'' has twenty-foot-long vicious dirt-worms in the backyard of the haunted mansion. The player gets to rescue a scientist who had taken refuge in a tree by defeating the worms with a flamethrower. The scientist also references ''[[Tremors]]'' by name, in keeping with the game being filled with movie [[Shout Out|Shout Outs]].
* The [[Spell My Name With an "S"|Hapurubokka]] from ''[[Monster Hunter (Video Game)|Monster Hunter]] Portable 3rd'' is a three-way cross between a sandworm, a sand shark and a submarine. It even has the distinctive "burst up vertically from the sand and eat something on the way" move.
* ''[[Black Sigil]]'' has a desert in which are sandworms. You can avoid them by walking through a specific path, but going out of said path leads to interesting items (in [[Inexplicable Treasure Chests|chests]], of course).
* ''[[Bug! (Video Game)|Bug]]!'' had a [[That One Boss|really nasty]] swamp worm as the boss of [[Bubblegloop Swamp|Splot]].
* ''[[Heavy Weapon]]'' has the robotic Mechworm boss, fought in [[Shifting Sand Land|Antagonistan]]. It jumps out of the sand and spams missiles and bombs.
* One of ''[[Wario World (Video Game)|Wario World's]]'' bosses is a [[Sand Worm]].
Line 214:
== Western Animation ==
* ''[[SpongeBob SquarePants (Animation)|SpongeBob SquarePants]]'' had the Alaskan Bull Worm, which went around eating half the town, prompting Sandy and Spongebob to go hunt for it. At one point, Sandy even claims to have found "wormsign", which is [[Visual Pun|a small wooden sign with "WORM" written on it]].
** "It's [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking|BIG, SCARY]] and [[What Do You Mean
* ''[[Ben 10 (Animation)|Ben 10]]'' ran afoul of several of these while trapped on an alien planet.
* ''[[Bounty Hamster]]''. A white sandworm is pursued by mad Captain Rehab in a spoof of ''[[Moby Dick]]''.
Line 225:
** The slime was sulfuric acid that the worm oozed from its skin as a defensive mechanism. Fortunately for the heroes, it was also highly flammable.
* We don't actually see it, but in ''[[Futurama (Animation)|Futurama]]'' [[Al Gore]] claims to have "ridden the mighty moon worm".
* In an episode of ''[[The Mummy (Animation)|The Mummy]]: [[Recycled:
* Sandworms weren't just in the live action ''[[Beetlejuice (Film)|Beetlejuice]]''. They were also a fairly constant theme in the [[Beetlejuice (Animation)|animated series]] as well, and Beetlejuice was pretty darned terrified of them.
* ''[[Courage the Cowardly Dog]]'' had one episode dealing with a sand ''whale'' attacking the house, trying to get back his accordion from Eustace (who he [[Generation Xerox|thought was his father]], who actually ''did'' steal the accordion). At the very end of the episode when he does get it back, it's revealed that he's part of an entire ''orchestra'' of sand whales.
Line 232:
== Real Life ==
* Quite a few desert snakes or legless lizards behave a lot like sand worms, avoiding the sun's direct rays by sliding along just under the surface of loose sand. Few are more than a couple of feet long, however.
* The seaside-dwelling [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lugworm lugworms] are commonly referred to as "sandworms" in various languages. The sea annelid [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nereis_virens Allita virens] is also [[
{{reflist}}
| |||