History Main / ThrownDownAWell

* ''Series/{{Fargo}}'' [[Series/FargoSeason5 Season 5]]'': There's a well on Roy Tillman's ranch adjacent to the windmill, which is a mass grave where he buries the bodies of his victims. [[spoiler:Dot finds out about its existence when she sees his men toss Danish Graves' into it after killing him, and realizes that that's likely also the fate that befell Roy's first wife Linda. Dot later hides in the well to evade some of Roy's henchmen, and nearly gets killed before Ole Munch rescues her.]]

* In ''Film/{{Enchanted}}'', Narissa does this to Giselle after telling her it's a wishing well.

* ''Film/Cyborg1989''. A literal version in a flashback scene forms the incentive for Gibson to go [[RoaringRampageOfRevenge hunting Fender and his gang]]. Years ago Fender had Gibson and the family tied together and lowered into a well, and as an additional act of sadism the youngest member was given the rope and a chance the chance of stopping them falling. Except she's just a little girl who doesn't have the strength and the 'rope' is a strand of barbed wire that cuts her hands as tries.

* ''Film/Cyborg1989''. A literal version in a flashback scene forms the incentive for Gibson to go [[RoaringRampageOfRevenge hunting Fender and his gang. Years ago Fender had Gibson and the family tied together and lowered into a well, and as an additional act of sadism the youngest member was given the rope and a chance the chance of stopping them falling. Except she's just a little girl who doesn't have the strength and the 'rope' is a strand of barbed wire that cuts her hands as tries.

* Sassanid Persia apparently had a prison called "The Fortress of Oblivion", which became an AscendedMeme in the Extra History series about Khosrow Anushirawan where it was demonstrated that despite its badass name, Prince Kavadh escaped from it twice.

* Joseph (of the Dreamcoat) gets thrown in a pit by his brothers in Literature/TheBible (Literature/BookOfGenesis). OK, they pull him out and sell him as a slave, but that was the original plan.
** The prophet [[Literature/BookOfJeremiah Jeremiah]] gets lowered down an (almost) dried-up well, with the implied intention that he starve to death there. Fortunately some friends in high places spoke up for him and he got pulled out.
** Another prophet ([[Literature/BookOfDaniel Daniel]]) was thrown into a well ''with hungry lions''. He was pulled back out when he was just fine the next morning.

** King uses the trope to ''NightmareFuel'' effect in the short story "A Very Tight Place," as well. The titular "place" is, rather than a well, a [[{{Squick}} Port-O-Potty]].
*** Discussed in ''Literature/RitaHayworthAndShawshankRedemption'', in terms of older prison methods in the state of Maine. Rather than a well, Red describes a hellish fate called gaol, used to punish minor offenses such as leaving the house without a handkerchief on Sundays.

* ''Manga/OnePiece'': [[TheAlcatraz Impel Down]] officially has only five levels. Level 6, the Eternal Hell, is the prison for the most dangerous and heinous criminals whose only sentences are life imprisonment or execution. Just as the floor doesn't exist, prisoners sentenced to this floor are considered to no longer exist.

%% This list of examples has been alphabetized. Please add your example in the proper place. Thanks!

%%
[[quoteright:350: [[Film/{{Labyrinth}} https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/oubliette_6905.png]]]]

A fun word for a prison of this type is "oubliette" where a prisoner would be thrown to be literally forgotten about (from French "oublier" = "to forget").

* ''Film/SupermanFilmSeries'':
** General Zod to ComicBook/{{Superman}} in ''Film/SupermanII'', by sending him to the PhantomZone.
** In ''Film/Supergirl1984'', the villainess Selena does the same thing to the [[ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} title character]].

** In ''ComicBook/EscapeFromThePhantomZone'', Supergirl, ComicBook/{{Batgirl}} and their friend Ben Rubel are thrown into the Zone. When Ben wonders why he cannot feel anything but cold, Supergirl explains that is part of the punishment. Criminals are not supposed to find their banishment pleasant.
** ''ComicBook/ThePhantomZone'' mini-series tells how Jor-El discovered the Phantom Zone, and believing exile in a pocket dimension was more humane and cheaper of a punishment than killing or rocketing criminals into space, he built the Phantom Zone Projector to send them into the Zone.
--->'''Jor-El:''' I am about to propose a more humane, less costly, yet equally effective method of criminal confinement...in the Phantom Zone.\\
'''Councilor:''' Whatever that is, proceed, Jor-El. [...] By Rao!! She's vanishing--into nothingness!!\\
'''Jor-El:''' No, gentlemen--into another dimension. Lara is with us in this room, at this moment. She hears every word we speak, sees everything we do. [...] She is a wraith, unable to affect the material world in any manner. Nor can it affect her. In the Phantom Zone, she feels no hunger, requires no sleep-- does not age. She can neither touch nor be touched. She can only think-- as our criminals will be forced to contemplate the folly of her crimes.

Related to OutOfSightOutOfMind, PutOnABus and SealedRoomInTheMiddleOfNowhere. Compare AndIMustScream and AntiInterferenceLockUp.

** In ''ComicBook/ManyHappyReturns'', ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} has sealed [[EldritchAbomination Xenon]] away in an empty pocket dimension he can't leave.
** In ''ComicBook/SupergirlCosmicAdventuresInThe8thGrade'', the Imps of the Fifth Dimension punish Mxyzptlk by banishing him to the Second Dimension forever.
** In ''ComicBook/LastSon'', General Zod traps Superman in the PhantomZone.
** At the end of ''ComicBook/TheGreatPhantomPeril'', Superman sends Faora Hu-Ul and all Kryptonian rogues back into the Phantom Zone.
** In ''ComicBook/StarfiresRevenge'', the titular crimelord throws -a supposedly depowered- ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} and her own minion down in a pit built in the deepest basement of an abandoned castle.
** At the end of ''ComicBook/TheDeathOfSuperman1961'', Lex Luthor is sent into the Phantom Zone forever.
** In ''ComicBook/ReignOfDoomsday'', Lex Luthor traps the Superman Family in a dimensional maze located inside an invisible abandoned spaceship located on the far side of the Sun. Luthor also throws into his trap a bunch of Doomsday clones so the Supers are being permanently hunted down. However, Supergirl throws one Doomsday down an endless tunnel, and it does not return. Superman ponders it may be a way to get rid of the Doomsdays.

** ''ComicBook/TheLeperFromKrypton'': Subverted. Superman is dying from an alien disease which will him within hours, and Supergirl comes up with the idea of sending him into the Phantom Zone, where nobody can age or die, until a cure can be found. The Phantom Zoners do not want Superman to be saved , though, so they use their combined mental power to set up a barrier which Superman cannot pierce through.
** ''ComicBook/Supergirl1984'': Zaltar is banished to the Phantom Zone in punishment for stealing the Omegahedron, one of Argo City's life support systems.
** ''ComicBook/TheDominatorWar'': Brainiac 5 builds a device which throws the whole Dominator homeworld into the Phantom Zone to stop them from spreading across the galaxy.
** ''ComicBook/SupergirlsGreatestChallenge'': A race of shape-shifting aliens steals a Phantom Zone Projector to send Supergirl into the Zone.

* In ''Webcomic/SluggyFreelance'', in the ''Franchise/HarryPotter'' parody "Torg Potter and the Sorcerer's Nuts", Torg puts a sleeping [[SmugSnake Ralfoy Malfoy]] in a trunk and has him sent to Antarctica. He's later show trying to escape by bungee jumping (???). Of course, in the next installment he's back without any particular explanation.

* In ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'' Lapis Lazuli is trapped in a mirror that can show anything that it has seen. However, Steven frees her and she flees for the gem homeworld.

* In one episode of ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'' Cartman locked Butters in a storm cellar (convincing him that the world was ending) [[EvilIsPetty so that he could take his place at Kyle's birthday dinner]], causing the whole rest of the town to think he was abducted or missing.

* ''Superman Film Series'':

* ''Anime/SailorMoon'': In Creator/DiC's dub first season finale, the Doom and Gloom girls trap each of the Sailor Scouts, except for Sailor Moon, when they enter the Negaverse. Sailor Moon's magic frees them all and wipes their memories in the next episode. In the original however the DD Girls (rather graphically for a show aimed a young girls) ''killed'' every Sailor Senshi except for Sailor Moon in the first season penultimate episode, with Moon's dying wish in the next episode, made on a PowerCrystal whose magic is CastFromHP, resurrecting everyone (herself included.) Japanese kids apparently got sick watching the original, so it is not that bad it was censored.

* ''Manga/OnePiece'': [[TheAlcatraz Impel Down]] officially has only five levels. Level 6, the Eternal Hell, is the prison for the most dangerous and heinous criminals whose only sentences are life imprisonment or execution. Just as the floor doesn't exist, prisoners sentenced to this floor are considered to no longer exist.

* ''ComicBook/UltimateXMen'': [[IneffectualLoner Wolverine]] catches ComicBook/{{Cyclops}} as he's just about to fall down a chasm (depth unknown) whilst they're in Genosha, fighting some machine monster. Wolverine decides this is the best time to get rid of the [[MurderTheHypotenuse competition]] for ComicBook/JeanGrey and chucks him down. Luckily for Cyke but not really for Wolvie, Cyke survives, and after various hijinks (being rescued by the badguys) eventually confronts Wolverine a few weeks later. Wolverine goes "I was a twat. Do what you have to." What Cyke "had to" do was [[EyeBeams ZORT]] him with a single high-power blast, leaving him naked, scorched, and knocked the FUCK out in an Alaskan terrain. Scott leaves him there, saying that he's off the team. He does think better of it later, as much to prove that he can forgive as to bury the hatchet between them so that they don't end up like Xavier and Magneto.

* In ''ComicBook/StarWarsTales'' #5, ''Yaddle's Tale: The One Below'', the title character was imprisoned in a well by a tyrannical dictator after he killed her master as a potential bargaining chip. The wardens and villagers kept taking care of her well after the dictator forgot her and she was able to use the isolation to strengthen her connection to the Force. An earthquake ends up providing her an escape and she helps the villagers defeat the dictator's son when he comes to collect the planet as his inheritance.

* Similarly, the brothers in Creator/AndrewLang's ''[[http://www.mythfolklore.net/andrewlang/412.htm The Bird Grip]]'' throw the hero into a lions' den, and in ''[[http://www.mythfolklore.net/andrewlang/368.htm The Golden Blackbird,]]'' into a lake.

* In ''Fanfic/KaraOfRokyn'', villain Blackflame is arrested and banished to the PhantomZone forever after her final attempt on [[ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} Kara]]'s life fails.

[[folder:Films -- Animation]]
* ''WesternAnimation/{{Coraline}}''. The hand of the Other Mother is smashed and thrown into a deep well when it escapes to the real world which doubles as a [[KarmicDeath Karmic End]] for her, after she did the same by trapping Coraline's real parents inside a snowglobe and Coraline ''herself'' inside the mirror.

* Just before the final battle in ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyEquestriaGirlsRainbowRocks'', the Rainbooms and Sunset are thrown down a stage trap into a locked room, where [[spoiler:[[HatePlague their tensions that have been building throughout the film]] come to a boil, [[EmotionEater fueling the Dazzlings with enough negative emotional energy]] [[NearVillainVictory to reach full power]]. Fortunately, Sunset is able to resolve their argument, and Spike, who avoided the trapdoor, fetched [[ChekhovsGunman DJ Pon-3]] to rescue them]].

[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]

* ''Film/TheRing'':
** Samara is tossed in a well by her mother.
** The book has it that Sadako was tossed in by a guy she threatened to kill.
** Sadako's father in the movies.
* In ''Film/{{Labyrinth}}'', Sarah falls into an oubliette, where she would've stayed if Hoggle hadn't rescued her.
** Subverted in that Hoggle was supposed to be there to rescue her and lead her back to the beginning to break her spirit. Jareth failed to take ThePowerOfFriendship into account though and Hoggle did a classic HeelFaceTurn.
%%* The basic plot of ''Film/{{Enchanted}}''.
* In ''Film/FirstKnight'', Malagant, the errant knight of the Round Table, stashes Guenevere in one, to lure Arthur and the other knights into a trap.
* In ''Film/ThePitAndThePendulum'', Nicholas ties up, gags and places his wife Elizabeth in an ''Main/IronMaiden'' (though it is one without spikes, which eventually makes her situation worse) in a ''Main/TortureCellar''. After he is killed while trying to murder several other people, Elizabeth watches helplessly as they (not knowing she is there) exit the dungeon proclaiming that "No one will ever enter this room again".
* ''Film/JohnAndTheHole'': John drugs his family and drags them into a remote hole in the forest of their rural home. They try to climb out but can't. [[spoiler:He eventually returns to let them out.]]

* In ''Literature/{{Lyonesse}}: Suldrun's Garden'' by Jack Vance, Aillas is thrown into an oubliette by the king. He discovers a number of skeletons all sitting against the walls as if in a conference, with a message scrawled on the wall, "Welcome to our brotherhood." Aillas manages to escape with his sanity more or less intact.
* In ''Literature/TheBartimaeusTrilogy'', Nathaniel threatens to do this to Bartimaeus if Bartimaeus gets him killed... although in this case it also invokes the GenieInABottle trope.
* In Murakami's ''Literature/TheWindUpBirdChronicle'', the narrator is thrown down a well in a somewhat symbolic episode. Actually, the author has [[AuthorAppeal a bit of a thing]] for wells.

* In ''[[Literature/HorusHeresy Vulkan Lives]]'', Vulkan is imprisoned in one of these. [[spoiler:He escapes by climbing the subtle imperfections in the walls]].

* ''Series/{{Charmed|1998}}'' stuck Leo in a giant block of ice for most of the last season (referred to by [[Website/TelevisionWithoutPity many]] as "The Doltsicle") before bringing him back for the series finale. (After the show's budget got slashed they couldn't afford the actor, but didn't want to kill Leo and Piper's near series-long marriage.)
* ''Series/StargateSG1'' has a clever variation using artificial gravity. Baal has O'Neill thrown into long cell with no door. ArtificialGravity then kicks in and causes the back wall to [[GravityScrew become the new floor]]. What was a corridor is now a deep pit with absolutely smooth walls. This leads to some fun interactions with guards and visitors, as the door is now a hole in the "ceiling", and those outside the cell seemingly standing on the wall.
* A memorable storyline on ''Series/AllMyChildren'' in 1991 involved crazy Janet throwing her sister Natalie down a well in order to take her place.
%%* Literally done to Desmond in the last season of ''Series/{{Lost}}''
%%* Lucifer's cage in ''Series/{{Supernatural}}''.
* Discussed on ''Series/TheMillers.'' Debbie figures they can't afford to pay for Tom to live in a nursing home, so she tells him "We're going to have to throw you down a well."
* In a segment of Series/DaAliGShow, [[FunnyForeigner Borat]] went to the southern U.S. to learn about country music. When he tries to sing a supposedly real Kazakh song translated to English, it turns out to be about throwing "transport", Jews, and finally his own family down a well.
* ''Series/{{Jessie}}'': The titular character was pushed down a well by her stepsister Darla.
* One of the defining moments of Grant Ward's childhood in ''Series/AgentsOfShield'' was his younger brother Thomas being stuck in the well. [[spoiler:Grant blamed his older brother Christian for the incident, but a discussion with Thomas himself in the third season revealed that it was ''Grant'' who threw Thomas down the well.]]

* Done in ''VideoGame/MetroidPrimeHunters'' on a CosmicHorrorStory scale: The resident EldritchAbomination, Gorea, is [[SealedEvilInACan sealed away]] in the [[HeroicSacrifice Seal Sphere]], which is then sealed away in the Oubliette, which, in turn, is sealed away in a rift between dimensions known as the Infinity Void. [[spoiler:He comes back by [[XanatosGambit tricking the Hunters into freeing him.]]]]

* ''VideoGame/RomancingSaga3'' has the Dead Man's Well dungeon. According to the game, [[TheDarkTimes during the time the world was ruled by the Archfiend and the Four Sinistrals]], the sick and old were thrown into the well located in Mazos until it became a mass grave.
* The plot of ''VideoGame/{{Furi}}'', almost in its entirety, consists of The Stranger attempting to escape this fate.
* This can be one of the fates in store for the courier in ''Videogame/FalloutNewVegas'' add-on "Dead Money". Should the player reach the vault at the bottom of the Sierra Madre, they have a choice to read a message on the computer nearby. Doing so will seal the room, immediately forcing an ending for the player and killing them, as the courier ends up accidentally getting permanently trapped in a death trap left for [[spoiler:Dean Domino]] that the courier unknowingly activated. Additionally, this can be done to [[spoiler:Father Elijah]]. By performing specific speech checks, he can end up stuck in the vault, and the ending even states that the only inevitable fate in that room is eventual death by dehydration and starvation. Once [[spoiler:Elijah]] dies, the Sierra Madre will make a new hologram in his likeness that will patrol around the hotel much like the previous ones you've encountered. While it implies the possibility of him living forever as a hologram, the holograms that have been seen up to this point simply act as guard dogs and fire on any potential intruders, once again locking him in a state of never being able to leave, the hotel itself becoming his new oubliette.
* ''VideoGame/DieYoung'' starts with Daphne having been thrown down a well and left for dead. [[spoiler: Escaping the well is the first Trial for [[JoinOrDie vetting]] those who are worthy of a place in the Community.]]

* Norm the Genie on ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddParents'' has been trapped a lot like this by Timmy. First, sent to Canada in a smoof lamp, then sent to Mars in the same smoof lamp and then Jorgen later took his lamp to be put on urinal cake. GenieInABottle, just like ''Literature/TheBartimaeusTrilogy'' example.

* In ''WesternAnimation/{{Coco}}'', the villain has Miguel and Hector thrown down a cenote (a sinkhole filled with water). They are saved by [[spoiler:Mama Imelda and her alebrije]].

* This is the driving force in the plot in ''{{VideoGame/Vanish}}''. You're thrown into a sewer filled with molemen and have to escape.

* This can be one of the fates in store for the courier in ''Videogame/FalloutNewVegas'' addon "Dead Money". Should the player reach the vault at the bottom of the Sierra Madre, they have a choice to read a message on the computer nearby. Doing so will seal the room, immediately forcing an ending for the player and killing them, as the courier ends up accidentally getting permanently trapped in a death trap left for [[spoiler:Dean Domino]] that the courier unknowingly activated. Additionally, this can be done to [[spoiler:Father Elijah]]. By performing specific speech checks, he can end up stuck in the vault, and the ending even states that the only inevitable fate in that room is eventual death by dehydration and starvation. Once [[spoiler:Elijah]] dies, the Sierra Madre will make a new hologram in his likeness that will patrol around the hotel much like the previous ones you've encountered. While it implies the possibility of him living forever as a hologram, the holograms that have been seen up to this point simply act as guard dogs and fire on any potential intruders, once again locking him in a state of never being able to leave, the hotel itself becoming his new oubliette.

* Joseph (of the Dreamcoat) gets thrown in a pit by his brothers in Literature/TheBible (book of Genesis). OK, they pull him out and sell him as a slave, but that was the original plan.
** The prophet Jeremiah gets lowered down an (almost) dried-up well, with the implied intention that he starve to death there. Fortunately some friends in high places spoke up for him and he got pulled out.
** Another prophet (Daniel) was thrown into a well ''with hungry lions''. He was pulled back out when he was just fine the next morning.