History Main / StabTheSalad

* The opening for ''VideoGame/{{Disgaea 4|A Promise Unforgotten}}'' shows the vampire tyrant Valvatorez stalking and murdering his latest victim: ''[[TrademarkFavoriteFood sardines]]''. Fenrich is not amused by these shenanigans.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Tekken}} 3'', Kuma/Panda's ending has [[spoiler:Kuma waiting behind a wall, only showing a sinister-looking shadow, looking like he's getting ready to attack Panda. But as she and Xiaoyu walk by, Kuma lunges forward with a bouquet of bamboo leaves, attempting to court Panda. Not noticing him, Panda and Xiaoyu just keep on walking.]]

* In ''Manga/YuGiOh'', Yami Bakura eats steak in a very...aggressive manner, so much that it was cut from the dub.

* In 'Manga/YuGiOh', Yami Bakura eats steak in a very...aggressive manner, so much that it was cut from the dub.

** In the first "[[HalloweenEpisode Treehouse of Horror]]" episode, the Simpsons have just bought and moved into a haunted house and get turned against each other by the house so each and every one of them (including Maggie) get a sharp implement of some sort and they go stalking after each other... except for Marge who's just using the big-ass serrated knife she picked up to spread mayo on a sandwich.

** "In The Great Louse Detective", Bart and Lisa think Sideshow Bob has kidnapped their dad. They see him through a window stabbing what looks like a human head and burst in to find that Bob was actually stabbing a clay bust of Krusty to aerate it (although he seems to enjoy it an awful lot).

* In ''WesternAnimation/{{Shrek}}'', during the escape from the dragon's keep, Shrek tells Fiona and Donkey to run for it, before picking up a sword and grimly declaring, "I'll take care of the dragon". He then dramatically raises the sword and... stabs it into the floor, pinning down the dragon's chains so she can't follow them across the bridge.

* In the ''Dr. Watson At War'' series by Robert Ryan, a FemmeFataleSpy has [[Franchise/SherlockHolmes Dr. Watson]] chained up in an abattoir, and is slicing up meat with the sharp knives there. It's been shown that she's more than willing to torture and kill with knives, so Watson tells her to just GetItOverWith. She's quite willing to do so, [[WeHaveWaysOfMakingYouTalk provided Watson answer one question]], which is: [[NoMrBondIWantYouToDine "How do you like your steak?"]]

* In the ''Dr. Watson At War'' series by Robert Ryan, a FemmeFataleSpy has [[Franchise/SherlockHolmes Dr. Watson]] chained up in an abattoir, and is slicing up meat with the sharp knives there. It's been shown that she's more than willing to torture and kill with knives, so Watson tells her to just GetItOverWith. She's quite willing to do so, [[WeHaveWaysOfMakingYouTalk provided Watson answer one question]], which is: [[SoMrBondIWantYouToDine "How do you like your steak?"]]

* In the ''Dr. Watson At War'' series by Robert Ryan, a FemmeFataleSpy has [[Franchise/SherlockHolmes Dr. Watson]] chained up in an abattoir, and is slicing up meat with the sharp knives there. It's been shown that she's more than willing to torture and kill with knives, so Watson tells her to just GetItOverWith. She's quite willing to do so, [[WeHaveWaysOfMakingYouTalk provided Watson answer one question]], which is: [[SoMrBondIWantYouToDie "How do you like your steak?"]]

* ''Webcomic/MoringMark'': In ''WesternAnimation/TheOwlHouse'' fan comic "[[https://moringmark.tumblr.com/post/700723079540785152/what-could-have-been What Could Have Been]]", the comic seemingly is about to depict [[spoiler:the backstory of Philip Wittebane murdering his brother Caleb over marrying a witch]], but he turns out to just be cutting a steak.

** In the episode "Bachelor Party", when Angel is spying on Doyle's ex-wife's fiance, he sees him [[GameFace taking on a demon aspect]] and drawing out a knife. One SuperWindowJump later, it's revealed that she knew about him being a demon and that the knife was to cut the strings on a parcel.
** An ambiguous version of this trope occurs in "Sleep Tight". Holtz lets a knife [[NothingUpMySleeve drop out of his sleeve]] and into his hand as one of his followers starts questioning his orders; when she ends up agreeing with him he uses it to peel an apple.

** The episode "All the Way" features a creepy-looking man wielding a knife and talking about how he's going to give Dawn and her friends "something special" for Halloween. Turns out it's a baked dish.
** Another episode in Season 2 does this. The group is together in the library preparing and sharpening weapons. Buffy pulls out a knife... and the camera zooms out while she chops vegetables.

* ''Series/{{Community}}'': In "Horror Fiction in Seven Spooky Steps", Troy's scary story has him and Abed sewn together by MadDoctor Pierce. After their initial horror, they realize they now have magical psychic powers, and levitate an iron skillet, clubbing Pierce with it. Then they levitate up a big kitchen knife and... cut a sandwich in two and happily share it. ''Then'' they conduct mad surgery on Pierce.

* ''Series/{{Dollhouse}}''. Dr. Saunders reaches for a scalpel, apparently to cut up Echo's face like her own...then picks up a lollipop instead, [[KickTheDog sucking on it herself when Echo reaches for it]].
* ''Series/GhostsUK: The first flashback to Humphrey's death begins with a knife being brought down on something- then the camera pans out to reveal it's just him slicing a piece of meat.

* ''VideoGame/SunkyMPEG'' and its sequel Silly.TIFF run on this trope, turning every genuinely murderous moment from the original VideoGame/SonicEXE and Sally.EXE into a similar but genuinely benign scene. For example: In Sonic.exe, Tails walks through a corpse-strewn area, meets up with Sonic.exe, gets chased through a burning landscape by Sonic.exe, and bursts into tears at his touch before he's killed brutally. Meanwhile, in Sunky.mpeg, Tlels walks through a corpse-strewn area [[spoiler:according to the [[https://www.deviantart.com/superlooneydude/journal/The-Sunky-MPEG-Story-595495491 novel]] they're actually just animals holding a zombie costume contest]], meets up with Sunky, gets chased through a burning landscape by Sunky, and bursts into tears at his touch before [[spoiler:they do a little dance together.]].

* ''VideoGame/DragonQuestV'': In a possible allusion to the ''Literature/RomanceOfTheThreeKingdoms'' example (see Literature), at one point you can choose to stay at an obviously sinister-looking inn in a cave with a creepy old lady while travelling with your new bride. She hears something in the night and asks you to investigate but you've become paralyzed and from upstairs you hear the sound of a knife grinding...[[spoiler:In the morning, it turns out that the old witch was just making sure you slept soundly while she sharpened your sword which gains a permanent attack bonus.]]

* In ''Series/SeriesOfUnfortunateEvents'', Esme fires a harpoon at a hot air mobile home. We see red liquid spraying, Hector (the man on the balloon) is heard screaming, and the people on the ground look on in disgust and horror. It turns out that Hector is fine... Esme just hit his stash of cranberry juice.

* ''Series/{{CSI}}'': "Dead of the Class" opens with David selecting a knife from the knife block in his kitchen, and then advancing menacingly on his pregnant knife who is lying on the bed. He then uses the knife to cut the tags of his new shirt as he prepares for his class reunion.

* In Craig Shaw Gardner's ''Bride of the Slime Monster'' the main character ends up in a universe run on foreign film tropes at one point. The woman he's been trying to communicate with raises a knife while saying [[AsLongAsItSoundsForeign made-up words]] like "slashen" - and then cuts a piece of bread and cheese for the journey to see her sister.

* OlderThanPrint: In ''Literature/RomanceOfTheThreeKingdoms'', MagnificentBastard Cao Cao, on the run from the law (long story), takes refuge with a friend of his father's. Said friend runs off for a while, leaving Cao Cao to wait. Cao Cao overhears the sound of a knife being sharpened and a whispered: "hurry up and make the kill!" Cao Cao charged into the kitchen, murdering everyone in sight... before discovering that the intended victim was a pig.

* In ''Literature/TheTruth'', one of the residents of Mrs. Arcanum's boardinghouse is spouting off some of the local variant of FantasticRacism, and another resident, who's a dwarf, takes out a small axe...to cut the top off his hard-boiled egg. Probably ''also'' to remind the fantastic racist that 1. [[YouKnowImBlackRight he's a dwarf]] sitting at the same table where civility is expected and 2. if things do go [[HoldYourHippogriffs wahoonie-shaped]] he's armed.

* In ''Film/{{Zodiac}}'', Robert Graysmith is cornered by potential Zodiac suspect Bob Vaughn, who stabs forwards...with the key he inserts to unlock the door before politely letting Graysmith out and wishing him good night.

* ''Series/{{Ghosts}}: The first flashback to Humphrey's death begins with a knife being brought down on something- then the camera pans out to reveal it's just him slicing a piece of meat.

** Taketsuchi Auchi, the [[WarmUpBoss first prosecutor]] fought in ''VisualNovel/TheGreatAceAttorney'', does this the second time he's beaten in court. [[spoiler:He brandishes a knife, composes a death poem, and holds it up to himself like he's about to [[DrivenToSuicide commit seppuku]]... then [[BaitAndSwitch cuts off a prominent strand of his hair]]. All the while, a [[DarkReprise sad reprise]] of Kazuma's theme plays in the background, and Prosecutor Auchi is crying.]]

* ''VisualNovel/PhoenixWrightAceAttorneySpiritOfJustice'' has Phoenix meet with a member of the [[LaResistance Defiant Dragons]], Datz Are'bal, whereupon Datz pulls out a huge combat knife. Phoenix is freaked out… and Datz merely uses it to peel an apple. Turns out to be [[SubvertedTrope subverted]] after a brief interrogation, as Datz claims he would have killed Phoenix if he was working for the [[GodSaveUsFromTheQueen crown.]]

* ''Film/ResidentEvil''. The Red Queen computer demands that the remaining protagonists chop off Rain Ocampo's head (because she's infected with the T-Virus) before she'll let the rest of them go. Alice appears to agree. She raises up the axe, the music swells, and...Alice chops into the video monitor the Red Queen has been using to talk to them.