History Main / InfantImmortality

[[redirect:ImprobableInfantSurvival]]

->'''Skinner:''' If either of us falls in, we're doomed!\\
'''Bart:''' ''Kids don't die!''
-->-- ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', "[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS18E3PleaseHomerDontHammerEm Please Homer, Don't Hammer 'em...]]"

In most fiction, innocent characters (babies, children, dogs) sit very high on the SortingAlgorithmOfMortality. They tend to make it out of dangerous situations unharmed while many adult characters in these same situations do not.

No matter how bad the villain is, he will [[WouldntHurtAChild stop short of killing a child]]. Even natural disasters seem to avoid killing infants and dogs and since they obviously have no such choice it is always because of ContrivedCoincidence. Something about a baby or puppy makes you stop, think twice, and show a [[EvenEvilHasStandards last flicker of compassion]]. Those who [[WouldHurtAChild don't have that last drop of humanity in them]] will generally be [[PlotArmor stopped from completing that act of evil some other way]].

Of course, this only protects against killing them off ''on screen''; destroying a city in a fiery conflagration and killing the no doubt tens or hundreds of thousands of babies therein is A-OK, because AMillionIsAStatistic and the [[RuleOfPerception audience won't see them]].

This trope extends to just about anyone conventionally considered inherently "[[ChildrenAreInnocent innocent]]," and can therefore sometimes reach out to cover the mentally handicapped. Whether or not this extends to pregnant women is a toss-up; fetuses have more relative protection than dogs, but less than already-born infants. Except in series where StatusQuoIsGod, because then the ConvenientMiscarriage will rear its ugly head.

Note that this doesn't seem to apply to the EnfantTerrible, who [[AssholeVictim dies]] horribly in all manner of works.

Compare OnlyFatalToAdults, when something by definition does not hurt children, in-universe. In video games, this is a reason to HideYourChildren.

!DO NOT list "aversions". Those go under DeathOfAChild.

----
!!Examples:

[[foldercontrol]]

[[index]]
* InfantImmortality/AnimeAndManga
* InfantImmortality/{{Film}}
* InfantImmortality/{{Literature}}
* InfantImmortality/LiveActionTV
* InfantImmortality/VideoGames
[[/index]]

[[folder:Comic Books]]
* Ancient comics book example: In ''Creator/MarvelComics'' #8 (from 1940), [[ComicBook/SubMariner Namor]], in an all-out attack on the city of New York, detonates a bomb in the Hudson Tunnel, flooding it and killing everyone inside, kills a random pilot by ripping the propeller off his plane, breaks a lot of animals out of the zoo, including many poisonous reptiles, and then saves a baby from a stampeding elephant before flying off to destroy the George Washington Bridge.
* Used in ''ComicBook/CivilWar: Young Avengers/Runaways'', when the evil mad scientist who has no problem secretly experimenting on prisoners and aliens takes a moment to order his BrainwashedAndCrazy slave to open a locked door and rescue a baby for the mother.
* DoubleSubverted in Creator/NeilGaiman's run on ''ComicBook/TheEternals''. Zuras kills [[spoiler:Sprite for erasing all the Eternals' memories & almost destroying the world as part of his quest to BecomeARealBoy. Though it worked & he is physically an eleven-year-old human child, when Sprite weakly tries to wheedle out of his execution by bringing this up, Zuras dryly reminds him that that still doesn't change the fact that he's a million years old & hasn't been a child for a very long time.]]
* Seemingly averted in ''ComicBook/ThePunisherMAX''. Amoral, tough thug Barracuda is holding a gun to the head of Frank's infant daughter. But Frank calls his bluff: not even Barracuda would shoot a baby, right? [[spoiler: Oops, HE JUST DID. So much for Barracuda's last shred of human decency....or so we're meant to think. In the next issue it turns out that what he shot was just a doll, and the real baby is safe after all. Still, Frank didn't know that, and he was not well-pleased.]]
* In the Franchise/MarvelUniverse CrisisCrossover ''ComicBook/WorldWarHulk'', it is revealed that the Hulk is in fact an idiot savant, capable of calculating his rampages so that he does the maximum amount of damage but never leaves any casualties.
** A long-term story in his regular series had him hunted by government forces (even more then before) because he was seen on film squashing a kid. The veracity of the film is in doubt.
* Creator/KevinSmith's run on ''Comicbook/{{Daredevil}}'' was advertised with the image of DD carrying a baby as he engaged in his usual rooftop-jumping. The baby, whom he believed was either the second coming of Christ or the AntiChrist, did come along on some patrols for a while, and the adventure ended with him unharmed.
** ''ComicBook/BatmanGothamAdventures'' #26 featured an almost identical cover, Batman rooftop-jumping with a baby in his arms. In a mild subversion of the trope, instead of the baby surviving Batman's patrol against all odds, Batman actually avoids a fight by threatening violence far in excess of his usual if the thugs he's captured make him do anything that might hurt the baby. They surrender, and one even tells him he's holding the baby's head wrong.
* ComicBook/PowerGirl's baby developed defensive powers in the womb.
* While Rogue had a TouchOfDeath in ''Comicbook/XMen'' "Messiah Complex", Mystique placed the baby's face on her adopted daughter as this was supposed to awaken her from her coma. Gambit notes that Rogue wouldn't have wanted the baby to die at her expense, but the baby survives anyway.
* Played seriously in the 'Crossgen' comic book series 'Negation'. The baby in question is seen surviving a nuclear explosion among many, many other horrors tossed at it by the bad guys.
* ''Nomad'' from Marvel Comics thought it was okay to bring a baby with him on his 'walking the earth' quest. He did have access to many reliable babysitters (think underground good-guy mafia) but he still got himself involved with many a super-fight. Nearly once an issue someone would be shocked he has a baby with him in a dust-up.
* [[DarkActionGirl Tenebris]] and [[TheDragon Korbo the Red Shadow]] from ComicBook/LesLegendaires mercyless killed a couple of brillant inventors who provived rebellion with weapons, but they couldn't resolve themselves to eliminate their baby, and ended up giving her to adoption. This actually is of some use to the plot, as the baby grows up and comes back for revenge.
** Ironically, the trope is technically constantly averted, since the story takes place in a world where everyone has turned back to childhood, and yet the author has no problem killing some characters. Three actual kids are also shown dead in one book after their town was devastated by [[BigBad Darkhell's]] army.
* ComicBook/AdamWarlock (or rather his SuperPoweredEvilSide, the Magus) weaponizes this by possessing the bodies of children so that the Avengers wouldn't dare to attack him.
* Defied in ''ComicBook/TheWickedAndTheDivine''. The entire point of the recurrence is that the gods are incarnated into teenagers, who will die within two years. Everybody will be dead before they're twenty. Minerva, the youngest, will be dead before she's ''fourteen''.
* in ''Comicbook/InnocenceLost'', Comicbook/{{X 23}} is sent by Xander Rice to murder his boss/father figure, the man's wife (and Rice's lover), and his boss's toddler son (actually ''Rice's'' son from the affair) because his lover was going to confess, and Rice wanted total control of the X-23 project. X kills the parents, but spares the boy. When X then reveals to her creator/mother the truth of what happened, it convinces Sarah to rescue X from the Facility.
** Her "cousin" was kidnapped by a serial killer who preys on children, and is implied to have already killed a number of other girls before he took Megan. Fortunately, X's creator brought her in, and X killed the man before he could hurt her.
** During her solo series it's retconned that Laura failed or refused to kill children on other missions, as well.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Newspaper Comics]]
* Max Allan Collins, the second ''ComicStrip/DickTracy'' writer (a longtime fan, he inherited the job from Chester Gould) recounts that after reading the story where Gould allowed Junior's innocent little girlfriend Model to get shot and die, he realized AnyoneCanDie in ''Tracy.'' So when Tracy's infant daughter is kidnapped not long after, and then abandoned in the woods, on the verge of dying of exposure, with wild animals closing in, the tension for the reader was much realer than it otherwise would have been. The baby ''does'' get rescued in time but only after a white-knuckle fake-out where it looks like wolves have gotten her!
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Radio]]
* In the AudioPlay/BigFinishDoctorWho audio drama ''Bloodtide'', the bad guys release a virus that will only kill ''adult'' humans. Subverted in that the bad guys [[spoiler: are [[ImAHumanitarian humanitarians]]]], and later averted in that the good guys [[spoiler: simply abandon them to [[FridgeLogic die of inevitable starvation]]]].
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
* In ''{{TabletopGame/Munchkin}} Apocalypse'', the Kid is a playable class, who only loses a level in situations where any other class or classless person would die. But DeathIsCheap anyway.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Web Comics]]
* In ''WebComic/EightBitTheater'', Black Mage has orphaned a little boy multiple times, although this has been subverted (sort of) when he spared the boy a couple times out of a sick perverse joy in seeing the mental scars he causes pile up.
** Comes back to bite him when [[spoiler:it turns out that the kid grows up to become a powerful sage, travels back in time to the start of the universe to make it in his image and prevent Black Mage from scarring him, waits for billions of years because of his future mistake of accidentally sending someone to the start of the universe before himself, and grows up to be Sarda, who finds endless and creative ways of torturing Black Mage.]]
* Lampshaded in [[http://acidreflux.ficwad.com/comic/21 this strip]] from ''Acid Reflux''.
* In ''Webcomic/TheAdventuresOfDrMcNinja'', a baby is launched in the air by automated zombie quarantine wall. The good doctor, naturally, catches him, [[http://drmcninja.com/page.php?pageNum=49&issue=8 much to his own surprise]].
* Mentioned in ''WebComic/GoldCoinComics'', when Lance survived a childhood fire where everyone else appears to have died.
* ''RobAndElliot'': Rob attempts to take this to it's logical extreme by making a bulletproof vest out of live babies.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Web Original]]
* In [[http://www.thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/thatguywiththeglasses/ask-thatguy/521-ask-thatguy-episode-43 episode 4.3]] of the ''WebVideo/AskThatGuyWithTheGlasses'' segment of ''Website/ThatGuyWithTheGlasses'', he is asked what the plot of a movie with no cliches would be. He responds: "I would say, 2 1/2 hours of blowing up a baby. Think about it: have you ever seen a baby blow up in a movie before?"
* Sawyer in ''Literature/VoidDomain'' averts this. The necromancer has killed at least one child on-screen. [[FrankensteinsMonster Des]] raises interesting implications related to the topic. Her body-parts had to come from somewhere.
* ZigZagged with the DarwinAwards. Obviously its real life and kids can in fact die. However minors are exempt from earning the titular Darwin Award on the basis that they are simply too naive to know not to do potentially fatal things. When children are caught up in an award winning situation, they are usually treated far more sympathetically, even if they only witnessed death.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Western Animation]]
* ''WesternAnimation/AnAmericanTail'': How many cat attacks has Fievel survived in the movies? He even climbs back up a cat's throat in the first movie and the sequel. His baby sister Yasha, [[WhatHappenedToTheMouse when she does actually appear]], is never put in any real danger.
* On ''WesternAnimation/{{Histeria}}!'', Big Fat Baby survives a ton of abuse in The History of Poland sketch.
* On ''WesternAnimation/{{Squidbillies}}'', this trope is invoked and has a [[LampshadeHanging lampshade hung on it]], as the Sherrif [[PaperThinDisguise disguises himself as a baby]] so that a pair of monsters won't kill him. It doesn't work.
--->'''Granny''': "They hate babies! Quick, nobody dress like a baby!"
* Played for laughs in ''WesternAnimation/TheTripletsOfBelleville''. During the [[ChaseScene car chase]] one of the Mafia's cars narrowly avoids hitting a screaming woman with a baby carriage by steering to the side and crashing. A second car does, however, impact with the baby carriage - and crumples like an accordion, while the baby carriage and its laughing occupant remains completely unscathed.
* Since Tommy and friends on ''WesternAnimation/{{Rugrats}}'' can safely pass through areas such as garages, attics, restaurants, post offices, miniature golf courses, bowling alleys, shopping malls, museums, fairs, Las Vegas, or [[WesternAnimation/TheRugratsMovie the forest]] on their own, they don't really need the "supervision" that they get.
* The titular protagonists from ''WesternAnimation/MegaBabies''. Given that they have super powers this is to be expected.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'':
** Maggie Simpson has shown to survive and evade situations that any character of an older age within the series would otherwise not be as lucky in. An excellent instance is in episode "The Call of the Simpsons", though there are few other similar instances.
** {{Lampshade|Hanging}}d in "Treehouse of Horror V", where the teachers at Springfield Elementary are trying to kill Bart, Lisa, and Milhouse:
--->'''Bart''': Don't worry guys, something [[LeaningOnTheFourthWall always comes along to save us.]]
--->''([[SubvertedTrope Milhouse falls backwards into a meat grinder]])''
--->'''Bart''': Nevertheless, [[WideEyedIdealist I remain confident that someone will come along and save the Simpson children.]]
* In ''WesternAnimation/DefendersOfTheEarth'', though children and teenagers (including Rick, LJ, Jedda and Kshin, who are also subject to PlotArmor) are placed in life-threatening situations, all onscreen deaths, unless they involve the destruction of robots, are of adult characters. Kshin's death scene in "100 Proof Highway" doesn't count as it happens in a vision which Mandrake conjures up to [[AnAesop teach Kshin a lesson about underaged drinking]].
[[/folder]]

----
''[[Music/BlueOysterCult Come on reaper, don't fear the baby]]...''
----

* In the MarvelUniverse CrisisCrossover ''WorldWarHulk'', it is revealed that the Hulk is in fact an idiot savant, capable of calculating his rampages so that he does the maximum amount of damage but never leaves any casualties.

No matter how bad the villain is, he will [[WouldntHurtAChild stop short of killing a child]]. Even natural disasters seem to avoid killing infants and dogs. Something about a baby or puppy makes you stop, think twice, and show a [[EvenEvilHasStandards last flicker of compassion]]. Those who [[WouldHurtAChild don't have that last drop of humanity in them]] will generally be [[PlotArmor stopped from completing that act of evil some other way]].

* On ''{{Squidbillies}}'', this trope is invoked and has a [[LampshadeHanging lampshade hung on it]], as the Sherrif [[PaperThinDisguise disguises himself as a baby]] so that a pair of monsters won't kill him. It doesn't work.

Note that this doesn't seem to apply to the EnfantTerrible, who dies horribly in all manner of works.

* Ancient comics book example: In ''MarvelComics'' #8 (from 1940), [[ComicBook/SubMariner Namor]], in an all-out attack on the city of New York, detonates a bomb in the Hudson Tunnel, flooding it and killing everyone inside, kills a random pilot by ripping the propeller off his plane, breaks a lot of animals out of the zoo, including many poisonous reptiles, and then saves a baby from a stampeding elephant before flying off to destroy the George Washington Bridge.

It seems to be the cardinal rule in shows that thrive on violence: you ''[[SortingAlgorithmOfMortality are not allowed]]'' to kill '''babies or young children.''' Or '''dogs,''' unless it is [[ShootTheDog a heart-breaking moment]] that [[DeathByNewberyMedal symbolizes the end of innocence]]. (viz. "Boomer... will live!")

No matter how bad the BigBad is, he will always stop short of killing a baby. Even natural disasters will avoid killing infants and dogs. Something about a baby or puppy makes you stop, think twice, and show a [[EvenEvilHasStandards last flicker of compassion]].

Those who [[WouldHurtAChild don't have that last drop of humanity in them]] will generally be [[PlotArmor stopped some other way]].

Outside of CrimeAndPunishmentSeries (where all the death occurs off-screen) and shows where the [[SlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism cynicism]] is meant to be a selling point, this trope is almost always in place for babies. Dogs are less lucky: a villain can kill a dog only if it's meant to [[KickTheDog prove that he's a really horrible person]]. Doesn't matter if he's [[AMillionIsAStatistic gunned down 20 people in cold blood]], only a ''monster'' would kill your dog (but dogs seem to do better against natural disasters, since those can't actually be evil).

Of course, this only protects against killing babies ''in person''; destroying a city in a fiery conflagration and killing the no doubt tens or hundreds of thousands of babies therein is A-OK, because AMillionIsAStatistic and the [[RuleOfPerception audience won't see them]].
Whether or not this extends to pregnant women is a toss-up; fetuses have more relative protection than dogs, but less than already-born infants. Except in series where StatusQuoIsGod, because then the ConvenientMiscarriage will rear its ugly head.

The upper age limit for Infant Immortality varies. Only infants are truly immune from death, but small children enjoy substantially more protection than teenagers or adults. However, when teenagers are included below the upper age limit, it is frequently a case of OnlyFatalToAdults, and is frequently an AfterTheEnd setting.

The trope extends to just about anyone conventionally considered inherently "[[ChildrenAreInnocent innocent]]," and can therefore sometimes reach out to cover the mentally handicapped. Note that, if the baby undergoes a PlotRelevantAgeUp, they're not protected by this trope anymore - even if it's done in a way which leaves them still "really" an infant.

In animation, can lead to the BadlyBatteredBabysitter plot. In video games, HideYourChildren. In fantasy, it frequently results in NiceJobBreakingItHerod.

In AfterTheEnd, post-apocalyptic shows expect there to never be any bodies of children onscreen despite many adult corpses. [[TropesAreTools The sight of a dead child affects people deeply and is used very carefully by any director worth their chops.]]

Note that this does ''not'' apply in the aptly-named BlackComedy. Inverted grotesquely by UndeadChild and, in a more literal way, by WouldHurtAChild. Also, seems not to apply to the EnfantTerrible, who dies horribly in all manner of works.

Cats are fairly indestructible too. Compare OnlyFatalToAdults, when something by definition does not hurt children, in-universe.

'''Expect spoilers.'''

* Defied in ''ComicBook/TheWickedAndTheDefied''. The entire point of the recurrence is that the gods are incarnated into teenagers, who will die within two years. Everybody will be dead before they're twenty. Minerva, the youngest, will be dead before she's ''fourteen''.

* The child supervillain August Prince from ''Literature/{{Worm}}'' has this explicitly as his superpower; his presence renders people incapable of deliberately attacking or harming him.

--->''(Milhouse falls backwards into a meat grinder)''

* Any cartoon with a BadlyBatteredBabysitter.

* How many cat attacks has [[WesternAnimation/AnAmericanTail Fievel]] survived in the movies? He even climbs back up a cat's throat in the first movie and the sequel. His baby sister Yasha, [[WhatHappenedToTheMouse when she does actually appear]], is never put in any real danger.

* [[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons Maggie Simpson]] has shown to survive and evade situations that any character of an older age within the series would otherwise not be as lucky in. An excellent instance is in episode "The Call of the Simpsons", though there are few other similar instances.