History Main / MurderTheHypotenuse

* In ''Theatre/SweeneyToddTheDemonBarberOfFleetStreet'', Judge Turpin fancies Benjamin Barker's wife, and has him convicted of a crime he didn't commit and shipped off to Australia just to get him out of the way. However, as in ''The Crooked Man'' example above, he escapes from prison and returns to get his revenge on the judge.
** Arguably, Mrs. Lovett, with Sweeney and [[spoiler:Lucy]]. [[spoiler:She doesn't really do anything to Lucy, but still, she leads him to believe she's dead, just so she can have Sweeney all to herself]].

* ''Literature/AriaTheScarletAmmo'': Shirayuki Hotogi. A perfect Japanese beauty according to Kinji, except for one flaw -- jealousy, which turns her into a berserker who assaults any girl approaching Kinji. When she finds out that Aria is living with Kinji she goes as far as trying to murder her. She is shown to love Kinji to the point that she will do anything for him.

* ''Manhwa/ThreadsOfTime'': Sali Tayi comes to this conclusion very quickly when he discovers that Atan Hadas likes Moon-Bin.

* An episode of ''Series/LawAndOrder'' features the rather creepy example of a man who, obsessively in love with his best friend's wife, murdered him and framed it to [[MakeItLookLikeAnAccident look like an accident]]; the grief-stricken wife later independently fell in love with and married the best friend, completely unaware that she was marrying not only the man who murdered her husband but her own stalker.

* ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'':

** Also ComicBook/TwoFace's brilliant idea of trying to kill [[ComicBook/GothamCentral Renée Montoya's]] girlfriend.

* A ''Franchise/{{Superman}}'' story told in ''ComicBook/ActionComics'' #338 has an alien named Raspor chasing ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} as ignoring his partner, even though the former despises him and the latter is in love with him. Raspor's partner attempts to gun down Supergirl out of jealousy, resulting in Kara lecturing her on the stupidity of both shooting her invulnerable self and treating her as her rival.

** In the sixth episode of season two, Alex's disconnection from her handsome boyfriend Dean Moriarty coincides with the arrival of evil blonde Ronald Longcap Jr., a wizard student who immediately sets his eyes on Alex and is very unpleased in learning that she already has a boyfriend. Upon meeting Dean for the first time, Ronald leads the boy into the kitchen and in order to get him out of the way of his plans with Alex, uses a spell that traps Dean inside a huge cube of jelly, frozing him in time with an anguish expression. Ronald then uses a spell to turn into Dean and heads over Alex's where, under the guise of Alex's boyfriend Dean, breaks up with her so that she can be with him once she meets him as Ronald. His plans briefly works as the episode ends with Alex confessing she likes him and accepting to return to WizTech with Ronald. The episode ends with a shot of Dean still trapped inside the huge cube of jelly.

* On ''Series/You2018'', Joe murders [[spoiler:both Beck's casual fling Benji and her best friend Peach, who is secretly in love with her]]. This tactic works the first time, as Joe is able to cover up the murder but the second time eventually leads to Beck breaking up with him.
** [[spoiler: Love]] murders [[spoiler: Natalie after finding out that Joe has developed an obsession for her. Later, Love considers murdering Marienne for the same reason, but stops herself upon seeing [[MoralityPet Marienne's daughter]]]].
* ''Series/WizardsOfWaverlyPlace'':
This trope is used not once, but twice on the show. Dean Moriarty seems to be the go-to target (or romantic rival) for Alex's other boyfriends when it comes to this trope, because he's the hypotenuse in two different occasions, suffering great examples from two different romantic rivals.

* In ''Literature/{{Siren}}'', Vanessa's sister Justine dies in a "diving accident." It turns out that she was actually killed by [[LiteralManeater Zara]], who had targeted Justine's boyfriend Caleb. Caleb's love for Justine was so strong that he became the first person who ever resisted Zara's seduction, so Zara drowned Justine. It didn't work - instead of falling in love with Zara, Caleb fled Winter Harbor to escape from her.

* Narrowly averted in ''Literature/HowToFlyWithBrokenWings''. [[spoiler:Finn has a crush on Sasha and is jealous of all the time she's been spending with Finn, so he and some of the other Beckham Street Boyz lure Willem to the roof of the Beckham Estate with the promise that if he can fly, he can be a gang member and have lots of friends. Willem believes them and jumps off the roof with homemade wooden wings. Other gang members [[ForcedToWatch hold Sasha on the ground so she can watch him fall]]. Willem's life is saved when his wings catch on Finn's satellite dish. Finn, having a belated attack of conscience, runs down to his apartment and pulls Willem to safety through his bedroom window.]]

{{Love Triangle}}s are tricky business. Trust us, we've already done the math.

%%% This page has been alphabetized. Please add new examples in the correct order. Thanks!

'''Beware of spoilers.'''

It can get particularly twisted when some sides of the triangle are completely one-sided. Bob is in love with Alice, but Alice not only fails to realize it but is already in a relationship with Chris. This is a classic recipe for drama (or humor) but sometimes, it goes too far.

Sometimes, somehow, Bob gets the idea that Chris is the one [[GreenEyedMonster in the way]] of Bob's happiness with Alice, and if Chris were to somehow have an [[MakeItLookLikeAnAccident "accident"]], then surely Alice would come to love Bob instead. It's true -- LoveMakesYouEvil and these characters are ''really'' NotGoodWithRejection.

Not always the best thought-out plan, no. Sometimes, Bob may not even consider what would happen if Alice ever found out. In fact, in a lot of these situations, Bob doesn't even make any effort to hide his actions from her and seems to be convinced that she'll somehow fall in love with him as soon as he kills Chris.

Compare OppositesAttractRevenge and ComfortingTheWidow. This can overlap with DeathByWomanScorned if the hypotenuse in question is actually interfering with a relationship, and BetterPartnerAssertion, the leadup to this trope if the assertion is unsuccesful. Contrast IWantMyBelovedToBeHappy, which may be subverted into this trope, and vice versa. Also compare the ScarpiaUltimatum, where the threat to murder the hypotenuse may or may not be carried out. Contrast IfICantHaveYou, for when it's the Cathetus (Alice, for those a little rusty on their geometry) who will be murdered. If this is done indirectly by setting the hypotenuse up to be killed, it's either an UriahGambit (if Bob does it intentionally) or DeathOfTheHypotenuse (if the intent is limited to the author). Extreme SubTrope of RemovingTheRival.

* Attempted with extremely little forethought by Noah in ''Film/TheVillage'' when he learns that Ivy and Lucius are engaged. Naturally, not being possessed of full mental faculties, he sort of overlooks the "make it look like an accident and, with Lucius out of the picture, win Ivy over" part, but he does the "stab Lucius over and over again" part quite well.

* ''Film/MyAnimal'': Heather's probable motive to kill Richard, Jonny's boyfriend, is so she can have Jonny for herself (along with stopping [[DomesticAbuse his abuse of her]]). Jonny and she already had a romance starting.

* ''Manga/{{Shiki}}'' has Megumi who [[spoiler: after turning into a vampire murders her crush's best friend because she's jealous of how close they are]].

* Invoked [[spoiler:and ultimately averted]] in ''VideoGame/BlazBlue'', when [[spoiler:Hazama uses Tsubaki's ClingyJealousgirl tendencies over Jin and amps them up. She then sets out to kill her best friend Noel upon the belief that she's stolen ''her'' rightful place next to him]]. [[spoiler:But even then, once Tsubaki angrily curbstomps Noel and the physically/emotionally wounded Noel lies on the ground, waiting for the death blow... Tsubaki cannot bring herself to finish Noel off, and breaks down crying]].

** ''Series/KamenRiderFaiz'' gave us Masato Kusaka, who had an [[StalkerWithACrush obsessive one-sided crush]] on his childhood friend Mari Sonoda[[note]]Appropriately enough, Mari and Mio are played by the same actress, Yuria Haga[[/note]] and would smoulder and plot the murder of anyone he thought was trying to court her, particularly the main character Takumi Inui. [[spoiler:In the prequel story to TheMovie, he actually does kill Shuji Mihara[=/=]Kamen Rider Delta by throwing him to a monster, made worse by the fact that Mihara wasn't even interested in Mari; Kusaka was just jumping to conclusions and refused to listen to anyone]].

** In "[[Recap/JusticeLeagueS1E22And23Metamorphosis Metamorphosis]]", a {{squick}}y example occurs when Sapphire Stagg's extremely BoyfriendBlockingDad Simon (who loves his daughter maybe [[ParentalIncest a bit too much]]) doesn't like his daughter's fiance Rex Mason, so he tries to kill Rex. When that fails and Rex is transformed into Metamorpho, Simon pretends that the one who told him to do it was Rex's old friend John Stewart (a.k.a. Green Lantern), while showing him [[NotWhatItLooksLike a photo of John and Sapphire embracing]]. Metamorpho then invokes this trope himself as he goes after Green Lantern in a rage.