History DroppedABridgeOnHim / ComicBooks

** Played straight in ''ComicBook/CaptainAmerica2005'' with Jack Monroe (the former 50's Bucky and later the costumed AntiHero Nomad). After wallowing in ComicBookLimbo for years, he showed up for a few pages in Creator/EdBrubaker's ''ComicBook/CaptainAmerica'' run just to be shot and killed by the Winter Soldier. The same fate befell the Red Skull's former lover, Mother Night.

* ComicBook/BuckyBarnes:
** When Bucky was acting as Cap's replacement, he showed up out of nowhere in ''ComicBook/FearItself'' only to be manhandled by the new ComicBook/RedSkull. She slaps him around with his own severed bionic arm before being impaled by a magic hammer.[[spoiler:Turns out he was still alive. He was severely injured, but we find out that Bucky's death was faked to get Steve Rogers back in the Captain America costume and lead the others that way.]]
** Played straight with Jack Monroe (the former 50's Bucky and later the costumed AntiHero Nomad). After wallowing in ComicBookLimbo for years, he showed up for a few pages in Creator/EdBrubaker's ''ComicBook/CaptainAmerica'' run just to be shot and killed by the Winter Soldier. The same fate befell the Red Skull's former lover, Mother Night.

* ''ComicBook/{{Cyclops}}'' got an infamous off-panel death, as shown in ''Death of X''.

** Jean Grey's death in the 2003 ''[[ComicBook/NewXMen Planet X]]'' storyline fits this to a "T".

* Rick Remender created Father and the Descendants in his ''Uncanny ComicBook/XForce'' run, and later had them appear as major villains in the final arc of ''ComicBook/SecretAvengers''. Despite building them up in such a big way, he casually killed them off near the beginning of ''Rage of Ultron'' to show that Hank Pym had crossed the MoralEventHorizon.
* ComicBook/TheVision from ''ComicBook/YoungAvengers'' is taken out due to a writer planning to bring back an older version of the character during the above-mentioned ''Children's Crusade''. He got unceremoniously destroyed in the final issue (and his friends refused to even TRY and rebuild him), right around the time Creator/BrianBendis decided to bring back the original Vision.

* ''ComicBook/IronFist'': At the end of ''Power Man and Iron Fist'', Danny gets cancer, then gets accidentally beaten to death by the inexperienced superhero Captain Hero. When Iron Fist's fans got upset, Christopher Priest just responded that Danny's death being so sudden and mean-spirited was ''the point''. Danny got better a few years later anyway (he just sort of meditated the cancer away). This is actually a case of WriterRevolt, or more specifically, Editor's Revolt, as Denny O'Neill got royally pissed with Jim Shooter's decision to cancel the comic and decided to kill Iron Fist in a senseless and meaningless fashion, because O'Neill and writer Christopher Priest wanted to mirror the senseless and meaningless fashion they thought they were treated.

* ''ComicBook/IronFist'': At the end of ''Power Man and Iron Fist'', Danny gets cancer, then gets accidentally beaten to death by the inexperienced superhero Captain Hero. When Iron Fist's fans got upset, Christopher Priest just responded that Danny's death being so sudden and mean-spirited was ''the point''. Danny got better a few years later anyway (he just sort of meditated the cancer away).

* In ''ComicBook/XMenTheEnd'' by Creator/ChrisClaremont, which is set in the future, everyone gets a stirring death in the limelight. And somewhat suspiciously, a lot of characters Claremont didn't create have it happen to them.

*** Irene Merriweather turns out to have been the host of Apocalypse all along, somehow. Then Apocalypse himself is easily defeated and killed by Khan's goons.
*** Boom-Boom gets eaten by Divinity and then blasted by Apocalypse.
*** Shatterstar and Warpath are turned into Technarx.
*** Carter Ghazikhian, supposedly a powerful reality warper, is too traumatized to fight the Warskrulls when they attack the mansion, and killed in one shot.
*** What's left of X-Force - Domino, Feral and Rictor - are ambushed and easily killed by Warskrulls.
*** After being a main character through the story, Carol Danvers is fried by an EM pulse during vol 3.

** And then there's the Psycho Pirate, who, though portrayed sort of sympathetically in Creator/GrantMorrison's ''Comicbook/AnimalMan'', shows up in ''ComicBook/InfiniteCrisis'' as a villain again (recruited by Alexander Luthor due to his remembering the Multiverse) who is suddenly and abruptly killed off when he gets his [[YourHeadASplode head gruesomely smashed into a gory mess on-panel]] by Black Adam.

** Neron opens ''ComicBook/UnderworldUnleashed'' by effortlessly {{Neck Snap}}ping longtime ''{{Franchise/Superman}}'' villain Mongul so as to [[TheWorfEffect demonstrate his physical badassery]] (before demonstrating his prowess as a RealityWarper in subsequent scenes). The DC honchos seem to have realized that this was sort of inconvenient, because they subsequently introduced his son, [[SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute Mongul II]], as a ''ComicBook/GreenLantern'' villain.

* The sad story of heroine Mystek ended with this. Created by Christopher Priest and was intended to be have her own mini-series, Creator/DCComics asked Priest to insert her into ''Franchise/{{Justice League|of America}} Task Force'' to churn up interest. However, DC decided to turn down the idea of the mini-series, leaving Priest with a most-likely unwanted character. So, he promptly makes her claustrophobic, panics and ends up getting shot out of an airlock in her panic.

* Franchise/SpiderMan examples:

** A villain example occurred in the Franchise/SpiderMan miniseries, ''Hobgoblin Lives''. Jason Macendale, the second Hobgoblin and major villain for almost a decade, was quickly shot and killed in one page in order to make way for the original Hobgoblin to return. Given his VillainDecay it was probably for the best, as he'd been revamped twice as Demogoblin and as a cyborg. Ironically, this occurred in a miniseries that reversed a previous bridge drop on the first Hobgoblin. Longtime supporting Franchise/SpiderMan character, Ned Leeds had been unceremoniously killed by assasins in a Spider-Man/Wolverine miniseries. As Creator/RogerStern, the creator of the original Hobgoblin had left Creator/MarvelComics before he could reveal who the Hobgoblin really was, the Editorial staff decided that Leeds would fit the bill. Despite the original Hobgoblin having taken the Goblin formula making him powerful enough to avoid his death or at least survive it. Stern took the opportunity years later to fix the issue and establish his original choice Roderick Kingsley as the true Hobgoblin. By that logic Macendale had to go.

** After the ''ComicBook/HouseOfM'' event in the Franchise/MarvelUniverse, many mutants lost their powers. The ones who got it the worse were probably a set of young student ''Comicbook/XMen'', mostly minor characters in the series, who were literally PutOnABus... then the bus was hit by a missile. Every one of them died.

* ''ComicBook/GIJoeIDW'' did this to the entirety of the Ninja Force (generally considered an embarrassment from the DorkAge of the toy line and the unfortunate final days of ''ComicBook/GIJoeARealAmericanHeroMarvel'', albeit, not enough so to make this an excusable act); having them brutally murdered during the 'Cobra Civil War' arc as part of a competition by contenders for the Cobra Commander position to see who could kill the most Joes.

* Eric O'Grady aka ComicBook/AntMan III got violently [[KillAndReplace Killed and Replaced]] right around the time Marvel brought his predecessor, Scott Lang, BackFromTheDead in ''ComicBook/TheChildrensCrusade''. O'Grady at least got to pull a HeroicSacrifice and DyingMomentOfAwesome, but some fans have noted that it seems like he was thrown under the bus simply so readers wouldn't be confused by two Ant-Men running around. ''Especially'' since Scott Lang was later confirmed to be the focus of the ''Film/AntMan1'' movie.