The Purge: Difference between revisions

== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==

* ''[[Hellsing]]'' has one with the Vampire Nazis taking over.

** It doesn't help that Enrico (who was just named an archbishop) was doing his own purge on Protestants ''at the same time''.

== [[Comic Books]] ==

* Palpatine's Order 66 from ''[[Star Wars]]: [[Revenge of the Sith]]'', which shows Jedi all over the galaxy being ruthlessly murdered by the clone troopers. Though we don't see much of it, there's also Anakin's leading the 501st legion into the Jedi Temple.

** There's also the massacre of the Separatist leaders by Anakin, while Palpatine has a speech that reforms [[The Republic]] into [[The Empire]].

** This was later parodied in a similar scene in the spoof movie ''Mafia!'' that featured death by fart (no, really).

* [[Goodfellas]] has Jimmy authorizing the murders of everyone involved in a botched heist.

* ''[[Infernal Affairs]] II'' has the killing of the four Ngai family capos half-way through.

* In ''[[Lethal Weapon 2]]'', the villain, a South African drug smuggler and diplomat orders the deaths of the LAPD detectives investigating his illegal operations. Most of them are brutally killed in their homes with Riggs and Murtaugh the only survivors.

== [[Literature]] ==

* In the also [[The Bible|biblical]] story of Esther, Haman plots to have all the Jews executed. Esther manages to save them in the end.

* In ''The Diamond Chariot'', when [[Erast Fandorin]] comes too close to uncovering the villain's identity, the villain sends four ninjas to assassinate him and his investigative team simultaneously. [[Everybody's Dead, Dave|He is the only one to survive]] {{spoiler|because the ninja princess has fallen in love with him and demands him to be spared}}.

* ''[[Animal Farm]]'' had one based on Stalin's Great Purge.

* Death Eaters takes over Ministry in [[Harry Potter]].

* Torak pulled this in the [[Belgariad]] prequels. He'd been living in isolation for centuries, so when he was ready to lead an Angarak army against the West his first step was "remind everyone who's in charge here".

* In the Star Trek novel series [[Terok Nor]], Cardassian Central Command destroys the Oralian Way religion (although pockets manage to survive) in a purge of believers in the enclaves on Bajor. The Oralians had already fled persecution on Cardassia, but of course Central Command had its eyes on Bajor, too.

* The season one finale of ''[[Boardwalk Empire]]'' has a quick elimination of {{spoiler|the D'alessio brothers}}.

* The first episode of ''[[Game of Thrones]]'' season two ends with the City Watch killing most of {{spoiler|the late King Robert's bastard children}}.

== [[Tabletop Games]] ==

* ''[[Exalted]]'' has the Usurpation, wherein the Dragon-Blooded and the Sidereals conspired the overthrow the Solars (who'd gone a bit nuts by this point) and their Lunar mates. The Solars were wiped out pretty much down to the man, and their Exaltations gathered up and stuck in a mystical cage. The Lunars who weren't killed fled to the Wyld. The Dragon-Blooded set themselves up as rulers, and named the Solars and Lunars "Anathema" in their state religion. And the Sidereals wiped themselves from living memory, ruling from Heaven behind the scenes.

== [[Video Games]] ==

** Arthas is practically the embodiment of this trope; he purges the city of Stratholme to stop the citizens becoming undead, he purged ''the entire kingdom'' of Lordaeron after he became undead. "Purge" is probably one of his top ten words.

* In ''[[Modern Warfare|Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2]]'', {{spoiler|General Shepherd betrays Task Force 141 and personally executes Roach and Ghost. His men then start killing off the remaining members of the force. Price, Soap, and Nikolai are the only known survivors at the end of the game}}.

* In [[Final Fantasy XIII]] we have a purge called... The Purge. After discovering a Fal'Cie from Pulse in some ruins, the Sanctum government decides to send everyone that was "near" that Fal'Cie to Pulse because of the irrational fear of everything coming from that planet. Several facilities were constructed for the purged population to live happily there, and a military division known as PSICOM took over and oversaw the removal of the population. However, it quickly becomes apparent that the Sanctum government neither expected nor intended for any of the Purged population to survive - when the population being shipped out began to violently resist, PSICOM used that as an excuse to simply massacre everyone.

* In ''[[Halo 2]]'' the Prophets order the Brutes to do this to the Elites after the changing of the guard and subsequent schism within the Covenant.

== [[Western Animation]] ==

** Not to mention Fire Lord Ozai's plan during the finale, which was to {{spoiler|''[[Kill'Em All|burn the entire Earth Kingdom to the ground.]]''}} It was his daughter's idea, but the man ran with it and never looked back. However, no one really died (unless there were hermits in the Wulong Forest), as Aang, Toph, Suki, and Sokka put a stop to that.

== [[Real Life]] ==

* One of the earliest recorded purges in history (outside [[The Bible]], of course) occurred after the end of the [[Ancient Greece|Peloponnesian War]]: the victorious Spartans, having installed an oligarchy of "Thirty Tyrants," leave Athens to its own devices. The Thirty proceed to first order the executions of all the democratic leaders; then all the ''potential'' democratic leaders; and finally all the ''suspected'' potential democratic leaders. Eventually, it got too much; the Athenians revolted, restored democracy, and gave a general amnesty. They then proceed to try and execute Socrates.

* The Night of the Long Knives was a [[Real Life]] purge of the SA leaders by the Nazis. This event was even named after an old Roman purge where Emperor Tiberius ordered the execution of Sejanus's family and supporters.

* The Great Purges in Stalinist [[Soviet Russia Ukraine and So On|U.S.S.R.]]