History Main / DodgeballIsHell

* In ''Literature/PercyJackson: The Sea of Monsters'', Percy at first thinks that gym class is just going to be this but it turns out that the other team is actually made up of giant cannibals, so it actually ''is'' a fight to the death. And said cannibals are fighting with giant flaming cannonballs, so it's ''literally'' hell.

* ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'' has [[PuritySue Bella]] dealing with a similar situation in her gym class, which she tried to opt out of but couldn't. Haters just ''love'' the panel from the manga showing her get smacked in the face with a volleyball.

* This is as good a reason as any for why Gym in ''VideoGame/{{Bully}}'' focus on dodgeball and wrestling as part of its classes, coached by [[SadistTeacher Mr. Burton]]. While it isn't possible to lose in the wrestling matches (which are solely present to help unlock new melee attacks), you're teamed up with the {{nerd}}s in every dodgeball game and anybody hit by the ball gets slammed rather violently to the hardwood floor. Of course, since the player controls not just Jimmy, but the whole team, [[SubvertedTrope you can lead the Nerds to victory]], even if Jimmy himself is eliminated.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Recess}}'', in typical fashion, plays this trope to the hilt, including gratuitous slow-motion shots, excessive drama, and an incredibly good player named "El Diablo" *whip noise* [[spoiler: who turns out to be ''[[CowardlyLion Gus]]'' ''[[{{Nerd}} Griswald]]'' of all people]].

* The ''WesternAnimation/{{Mixels}}'' episode "Every Knight Has Its Day" introduces the game "Murpball", which is dodgeball with the twist of [[BalefulPolymorph Murping]] the knocked-out student. Mixadel naturally chooses all the strong students for his team, leaving Camillot with the weaker ones. He also has the upper hand with students [[FusionDance Mixing to cheat]] or using his own team members as shields...and still ends up the unfair winner.

* This is as good a reason as any for why Gym in ''VideoGame/{{Bully}}'' focus on dodgeball and wrestling as part of its classes, coached by [[SadistTeacher Mr. Burton]]. While it isn't possible to lose in the wrestling matches (which are solely present to help unlock new melee attacks), you're teamed up with the {{nerd}}s in every dodgeball game and anybody hit by the ball gets slammed rather violently to the hardwood floor.

* A subarc of the Greed Island arc of ''Manga/HunterXHunter'' involves Gon, Killua, Bisk, Hisoka and some minor characters in a dodgeball game. The players on the other team throw the ball with sufficient force to break bones.
** The players on the heroes' team, however, are battle-hardened people with lethal superpowers themselves. The captain of the opposing team, Razor, is so powerful that he inflicts TheWorfEffect by his mere presence and is the only person shown so far to genuinely put MonsterClown Hisoka on edge.

* ''Franchise/OnePiece'': In the anime, the first round that the straw hats play against the foxy pirates in the second davy back fight is a game of dodgeball.[[note]]Called "hit and dead ball" here.[[/note]] Not only do the ball have clear spikes on them, but a ball launcher is also allowed to be used to make the blows more brutal. The game also has many rules such as a rule where blows to the face don't result in elimination, and [[ExtremeOmnivore eating the ball]] does.
* In ''Manga/TomoChanIsAGirl'' the intramural dodgeball tournament rapidly degenerates into this. Tomo [[DoesNotKnowHerOwnStrength overdoes things from the outset]] during tryouts to the point where the other girls beg the coach to intervene, but when faced with [[NiceGuy a fundamentally sweet kid's]] earnest refusal to [[SpiritedCompetitor insult her opponents or the person who trained them]] [[SkewedPriorities by not taking a contest seriously]] she could only resort to having her compete with the boys... who fare only marginally better (if at all).

* In ''VideoGame/LapisReLights'', the students of Flora Girls' Academy play a magical version called bumpball. The rules are largely the same except each player can cast one spell from one type of spell and the only limit is how creatively you can use it. The "Hell" part comes from it being perfectly legal for students to throw the ball so hard it can break noses, send people flying from impact, and even knock them unconscious, leaving them in dire need of magical medical attention.

* This is one of the rehabilitation exercises commonly employed in WebAnimation/{{HFIL}}. Episode 3 specifically focuses on one such game, and shows just what kind of [[LiteralMetaphor (literal) hell]] it can be when the players are the villains of ''WebVideo/DragonBallZAbridged''...[[MyFriendsAndZoidberg and Raditz.]]

* In the prologue of Megamind, the title character (as a child) is pelted with dodgeballs during recess. It doesn't even appear to be a real game as it's just every other kid in the class ganging up on one child, [[KickTheDog laughing and calling him a freak]]. Happens a second time, leading him to get in trouble for his method of self-defense getting out of hand.

* In the second ''Literature/PercyJacksonAndTheOlympians'' book ''The Sea of Monsters'': At first Percy thinks that gym class is just going to be this but it turns out that the other team is actually made up of giant cannibals, so it actually ''is'' a fight to the death. And said cannibals are fighting with giant flaming cannonballs, so it's ''literally'' hell.

* ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'': undercover as a gym teacher, Dean forces the kids to play dodgeball. "The whistle makes me their God."
* This showed up in an episode of ''Series/TheMiddle''.

* [[Series/PairOfKings Brady and Boomer]] were victims of this kind of bullying in flashbacks.

* One episode of ''Series/EvenStevens'' focused on this

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* Jeff discovers this in the third episode of ''WebVideo/CustomIdiots''.
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* Taken to literal extremes in ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'', where they're forced to fight a Chinese dodgeball team who are trained from birth to be [[HumanWeapon living dodgeball-armed weapons]] and who are capable of ''actually killing'' their opponents. Thankfully Pip becomes a Dodgeball savant when he gets pissed off over people calling him French, a quirk which the boys weaponize by tricking the Chinese kids into setting him off.

* One of ''[[WesternAnimation/TotalDrama Total Drama Island]]'''s challenges is a dodgeball match in which several characters are knocked off their feet and even struck unconscious by thrown balls, all PlayedForLaughs.
* An early episode of ''WesternAnimation/DextersLaboratory'' had this with Dexter forced to participate by his [[SadistTeacher gym teacher]] (he had tried to get out of it with a forged excuse letter but the teacher ripped it up). Poor Dexter finds himself constantly targeted by bullies every gym class. Eventually, it hits Dexter that he ''is'' a boy genius, so he builds a dodgeball mecha to finally get even... [[spoiler:only to get beaned... by ''his sister'']].
* ''WesternAnimation/{{The Powerpuff Girls|1998}}'' enemies the Gangreen Gang pelt a bunch of kindergarteners in a game of dodgeball, taking advantage of the fact that the girls are not allowed to beat them up at school. Ms. Keane manages to find a loophole around this by telling the girls to go outside and "play dodgeball" as well.
* ''WesternAnimation/KickButtowski'' has the [[EmoTeen Emo Kid]], and this happens to him a LOT.
* ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarepants'': Patrick apparently had a harrowing experience when writing a poem during gym class.

* In ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls2016'' episode "Princess Buttercup", Buttercup joins a gang of tough roller derby girls who play "deathball", which is ''very'' rough dodgeball with rollerblades. (Meaning it's Buttercup's [[BloodKnight kind of game.]])

* A sketch from [[Creator/CartoonNetwork Cartoon Network]]'s ''WesternAnimation/{{MAD}}'' shows Literature/{{Pinocchio}} realizing that life as a real boy isn't all that great. When he attends gym class, he gets hit in the face with a dodgeball so hard that his head gets ''stuck in the wall''.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheLoudHouse'' has Lincoln who hates this.

* ''WesternAnimation/KickButtowski'' has the [[EmoTeen Emo Kid]], and this happens to him a [[UpToEleven LOT]].

* In ''WesternAnimation/InvaderZim'': 'Bludgeonball! [[BlatantLies It's fun!]]. UpToEleven where the two kids playing it are strapped with shoulder-mounted rocket launchers filled with dodge balls.

* Taken [[UpToEleven to the extreme]] in ''WesternAnimation/CodenameKidsNextDoor'', which has a dodgeball-based parody of the Wuxia film ''Film/Hero2002''. A villain named the Dodgeball Wizard seeks out the ultimate player known as "The One". After defeating a temple that specializes in this, he's directed to Wally Beetles a.k.a Numbuh 4 who he thinks is such a fighter. He isn't (he's knocked out cold in one hit before their game even starts), but his baby brother, Joey, is. Cue a massive dodgeball game across the city.

* ''VideoGame/MarioParty4'': The minigame Revers-a-Bomb consists of two teams sending each other Bob-ombs to hurt them with their explosions. Instead of being thrown, the Bob-ombs walk onto a team's area (colored red in the left and blue in the right) until someone from there presses and holds a switch aligned with a specific Bob-omb's path to make it retreat and go to the opposite side instead. Since all six paths have Bob-ombs moving into either direction, the two players in each team must always focus on the closest Bob-ombs to drive them away, or else they'll explode upon reaching their destinations (and hurting whoever is in their impact ratio). If the two characters of a team are hit a combined total of 10 times, the other team will win; if 30 seconds pass, then whichever team received fewer hits will win.

* ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls'' enemies the Gangreen Gang pelt a bunch of kindergarteners in a game of dodgeball, taking advantage of the fact that the girls are not allowed to beat them up at school. Ms. Keane manages to find a loophole around this by telling the girls to go outside and "play dodgeball" as well.

* ''Webcomic/{{Paranatural}}'': Coach Oop says that the board has forbidden schools from playing Dodgeball, but [[LoopholeAbuse they didn't forbid his original sport Hitball]]. Similar to dodgeball, but with a lot of balls at the same time and the inclusion of the [[Literature/HarryPotter Golden Switch]] which causes a hit student to [[EnemyExchangeProgram switch sides]] instead of getting eliminated. The entire trope is exaggerated while the students play hitball as the arc gets increasingly complicated. Jeff is [[spoiler:possessed by hijack]], causing him to become violent and dangerously strong as [[spoiler:Hijack]] tries to get him to cause the minimum required damage to get sent to the office. Suzy blackmails Max, the student council attempts to sacrifice the bullies to take out Jeff, Jeff tries to frame Isabel, the vice-principal makes a fake student who gets killed in front of everyone, Cody proves to be an obstacle in taking down Jeff and most of the students retreat the bleachers to avoid certain doom. And just in case it wasn't clear, it all takes place during a seventh-grade gym period.

* Of course it's averted and downplayed in ''WesternAnimation/{{Hilda}}'' because, come on, it's Hilda. To complete the initiation of a new recruit, the Sparrow Scouts love playing a game of dodgeball. Anyone who got hit, didn't suffer any injuries. The game is a way of showing the new recruit they love to have fun and make new friends. Hilda is friends with David and Frida as a result.

* ''Anime/KotaroLivesAlone'': In episode 4 of the Netflix show, Kotaro ends up on the receiving end of this trope during a game of dodgeball at this school. He is covered in bruises and band aids in the scene following the game. Though it was largely due to him being unable to catch the balls thrown at him, and he refuses to dodge them since he considers it impolite.

* ''Anime/KotaroLivesAlone'': In episode 3 of the Netflix show, Kotaro ends up on the receiving end of this trope during a game of dodgeball at this school. He is covered in bruises and band aids in the scene following the game. Though it was largely due to him being unable to catch the balls thrown at him, and he refuses to dodge them since he considers it impolite.

* In the prologue of ''WesternAnimation/Megamind'', the title character (as a child) is pelted with dodgeballs during recess. It doesn't even appear to be a real game as it's just every other kid in the class ganging up on little Megamind. Happens a second time, leading him to get in trouble for his method of self-defense getting out of hand.

* In the prologue of Megamind, the title character (as a child) is pelted with dodgeballs during recess. It doesn't even appear to be a real game as it's just every other kid in the class ganging up on little Megamind. Happens a second time, leading him to get in trouble for his method of self-defense getting out of hand.

* In the prologue of ''WesternAnimation/Megamind'', the title character (as a child) is pelted with dodgeballs during recess. It doesn't even appear to be a real game as it's just every other kid in the class ganging up on little Megamind. Happens a second time, leading him to get in trouble for his method of self-defense getting out of hand.

* The episode [[Recap/FamilyGuyS10E20LeggoMyMegO "Leggo My Meg-O"]] of ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'', starts with all the kids in Meg's high school ganging up on [[ButtMonkey Meg]] in a game of dodgeball.

* Taken to extremes in one chapter of ''Manga/MissKobayashisDragonMaid'' when Kanna, Tohru, Lucoa, and Fafnir (all of whom are insanely strong dragons) take on some guys who were bullying Kanna's friend Saikawa in a [[CurbStompBattle hilariously one-sided]] game of dodgeball. Then they decide that they enjoy playing and have a super-powered free-for-all which leaves the surrounding area in ruins.
* Exclusive to the anime in ''Franchise/OnePiece'', the first round that the straw hats play against the foxy pirates in the second davy back fight is a game of dodgeball.[[note]]Called "hit and dead ball" here.[[/note]] Not only do the ball have clear spikes on them, but a ball launcher is also allowed to be used to make the blows more brutal. The game also has many rules such as a rule where blows to the face don't result in elimination, and [[ExtremeOmnivore eating the ball]] does.

* In one of the ''ComicBook/{{Babymouse}}'' graphic novels, the plot revolves around the title character's dread of an upcoming dodgeball game in PE.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'': One episode begins with a new PE teacher who didn't even bother to let the kids play dodgeball, he just spent the entirety of every class throwing dodgeballs at them himself, which he calls "Bombardment" ("Bombardment! Bombardment!"). For Christmas, they're doing "Double Bombardment!" The same teacher seems to like throwing things at people in general because he's shown later throwing rolls at Groundskeeper Willie after Willie got a job in a fancy restaurant ([[PygmalionPlot making Willie into a gentleman being the main plot of that episode]]).

* Taken [[UpToEleven to the extreme]] in ''WesternAnimation/CodenameKidsNextDoor'', which has a dodgeball-based parody of the Wuxia film ''Film/{{Hero}}''. A villain named the Dodgeball Wizard seeks out the ultimate player known as "The One". After defeating a temple that specializes in this, he's directed to Wally Beetles a.k.a Numbuh 4 who he thinks is such a fighter. He isn't (he's knocked out cold in one hit before their game even starts), but his baby brother, Joey, is. Cue a massive dodgeball game across the city.

* This is one of the rehabilitation exercises commonly employed in WebAnimation/{{HFIL}}. Episode 3 specifically focuses on one such game, and shows just what kind of hell it can be when the players are the villains of ''WebVideo/DragonBallZAbridged''...[[MyFriendsAndZoidberg and Raditz.]]

* This is one of the rehabilitation exercises commonly employed in WebAnimation/{{HFIL}}. Episode 3 specifically focuses on one such game, and shows just what kind of hell it can be when the players are the villains of ''Anime/DragonBallZ''...[[MyFriendsAndZoidberg and Raditz.]]

* This is one of the rehabilitation exercises commonly employed in WebAnimation/{{HFIL}}.

* In the second ''Literature/PercyJacksonAndTheOlympians'' book ''The Sea Of Monsters'': At first Percy thinks that gym class is just going to be this but it turns out that the other team is actually made up of giant cannibals, so it actually ''is'' a fight to the death.
** And said cannibals are fighting with giant flaming cannonballs, so it's ''literally'' hell.