History WesternAnimation / CelebrityDeathmatch

* BitchInSheepsClothing: Jenny McCarthy at the end of her deathmatch against Carmen Electra. After being repeatedly groped by Howard Stern, both team up to teach Stern a lesson. While Carmen is honestly worried about Jenny's safety when Howard Stern is about to blow up, Jenny is only waiting for the right moment to turn on Carmen, actually directing her right into her dead. She even calls Carmen a sucker for having fallen for her ruse.

* ObfuscatingDisability: The episode "Nick's Little Friend" has [[spoiler: the "Little Pals Foundation" send a paralyzed IllBoy (whose dream was to spend time in the booth with Nick) to the booth of CDM. He later uses the fact that "Little Pals" are allowed to do whatever they desire to do things like [[TroublingUnchildlikeBehavior smoke, drink alcohol, hire strippers, and take other people's money.]] At the end of the episode it's revealed that he was neither paralyzed nor a child, but rather a grown man who made up the "Little Pals Foundation" to scam people into giving him things for free.]]

* AnimalMotifs: During the fight between Creator/DrewBarrymore and Creator/FarrahFawcett, the two of them are trained in one of five Deadly Venoms -- a mysterious form of kung fu themed around animals. Barrymore's discipline is that of the Giraffe (tall and leggy with a long neck) and Fawcett's is that of the Dodo (a relic of the past with a silly name).

* AdmiringTheAbomination: During the fight between [[Series/CrocodileHunter Steve Irwin]] and {{Medusa}}, Steve Irwin spends the entire fight in awe of this "rare specimen".

* AmazonChaser: Albert Einstein spends his entire fight against Wrestling/{{Chyna}} trying to woo her, as he finds her incredibly attractive. Chyna isn't having any of it, and his constant swooning over her just makes her angrier and leads to her ultimately finishing him off.
* AndShowItToYou: A very common way that celebrities on this show finish off their foes is by ripping out their organs. Some notable examples include: [[spoiler: Creator/WilliamShatner tearing out Creator/BurtReynolds' internal organs and selling them on the internet, Kobe Bryant tearing out Shaquille O'Neal's organs and throwing them into a hoop like basketballs, [[Series/TheWeakestLink Anne Robinson]] getting her ovaries ripped out by [[Series/ThePriceIsRight Bob Barker]], and [[Music/{{Coldplay}} Chris Martin]] getting his heart ripped out by [[Music/{{U2}} Bono]] after Bono says to his audience that they can donate to his cause, if they "look into their heart".]]
* AnimalMotifs: During the fight between Drew Barrymore and Farrah Fawcett, the two of them are trained in one of five Deadly Venoms -- a mysterious form of kung fu themed around animals. Barrymore's discipline is that of the Giraffe (tall and leggy with a long neck) and Fawcett's is that of the Dodo (a relic of the past with a silly name).
* AnimateBodyParts: Creator/StephenKing's leg, an arm that may have been either that of Music/BritneySpears or Music/ChristinaAguilera, Ashlee Simpson's nose, UsefulNotes/AlbertEinstein's brain and spine, Creator/EddieMurphy's hand, Mary-Kate Olsen's stomach, Wrestling/TheRock's eyebrow, Paul Teutal Sr.'s moustache, Beni Trauma's arm, and Nicky Jr's brain have all been shown to move on their own.

** Nick's show, Suddenly Diamond, was cancelled because of inane humor, gratuitous violence, and lack of a perky female character.
* ArtAttacker: In the fight between Martha Stewart and Sandra Bernhard, Martha uses a hot-glue gun as a weapon, and [[spoiler: makes Sandra Bernhard's innards into a Christmas ornament.]]

* AssholeVictim: Many of the losers are portrayed this way, like [[spoiler: UsefulNotes/CharlesManson, Creator/SeanPenn, [=LeAnn=] Rimes, John Rocker, Laura Schlessinger, Creator/JenniferLoveHewitt, Music/KidRock, and Music/{{Eminem}}.]]
* AssKicksYou: Naturally present in the Jennifer Lopez vs. Dolly Parton fight, where Jennifer's butt and Dolly's breasts were enhanced with cybernetic add-ons.

** "Stone Cold" Steve Austin wears this trope as well. If you value your health, don't ask questions when he tells you to do something.

* AwesomeAussie: Steve Irwin is presented in all his wild, fearless glory, taking on ''the'' Medusa with his usual confident panache. He's not even a little scared of the mythological monster, he's just beyond thrilled to find such a rare specimen. [[spoiler: In fact, he slays Medusa by complete accident and is more pissed off at himself for killing such a rare specimen than relieved or happy.]]

* BarBrawl: Invoked with the "TLC vs. Dixie Chicks" fight, where the ring is done up to look like a Wild West saloon.

* BattleInTheCenterOfTheMind: Done ''literally'' with John Cusack vs. John Malkovich. Of course, the whole idea is a ShoutOut to ''Film/BeingJohnMalkovich.''
* BeatTheCurseOutOfHim: In the first HalloweenEpisode, Nicky Jr. gets possessed by a demon. The Undertaker solves this by beating him up until the demon exits his body.

** In all of Pam Anderson's fights her berserk button has been Tommy Lee. She challenges [=RuPaul=] to a deathmatch because of [=RuPaul=]'s attempt to flirt with Tommy who was her husband; [[spoiler: she even wins this fight]] because of this trope. In Pam's second fight, her berserk button gets pushed multiple times due to her opponent, Tommy's previous wife Heather Locklear trying to kill Tommy Lee, since they were literally fighting to determine whether or not he dies ([[spoiler: he did, right after Heather took Pam out.]]) In her third fight, she's fed up with Tommy and decides to take out her anger, which leads to [[spoiler: a major CurbStompBattle in Pam's favour.]]

--->'''Kim Cattrall''' (to "SARAH JESSICA PARKER"): "Honey, I was making ''Film/{{Porkys}}'' while you were still popping zits on ''Series/SquarePegs.''"

** Don't touch Christopher Walken's hair or he'll flatten your head till your eyes pop out.

** A sort of weird example with [[Series/CrocodileHunter Steve Irwin]], where he does manage to [[spoiler: kill Medusa,]] but it's completely by accident, and he's more interested in teaching the audience about her than actually fighting.

* BodyInflationGag: In the episode “A Celebrity Deathmatch Special Report”, [[spoiler: Keri Russell swallows a helium tank, inflates, flies up and explodes from the heat from the lights, taking the stadium and most people present with her. There's LampshadeHanging that she shouldn't have exploded since helium is inert, but not that fact she shouldn't have been able to float even by AllBalloonsHaveHelium logic since the tank which wasn't airborne was still inside her.]]

** In "Censorship Problems", both Ron Jeremy and Moe Howard are killed in the same fashion: impalement through the head [[DoubleEntendre with wood]]. Not only that, but consider the following: Tommy Lee killed Ron Jeremy with his penis, while [[spoiler: Larry Fine, after accidentally deaging himself into a sperm, helped Curly win the main event by [[EyeScream going for Luciano Pavarotti's eye]]]].

* BringMyBrownPants: Forewarned prior to Nick Diamond challenging Zalar the alien. Johnny tries to stop him by warning him that he has a spastic colon.

* FiveManBand: Season 1's main cast fits this like a glove:
** [[ConsummateProfessional Johnny]] is TheLeader.
** [[StrawLoser Nick]] is TheLancer.
** [[CombatReferee Mills]] is TheSmartGuy.
** [[GeniusBruiser Stone Cold]] is TheBigGuy.
** [[PerkyFemaleMinion Stacey]] is TheChick.

** The Paul Reubens vs. George Michael fight. Before the fight, Reubens (in character as [[Film/PeeWeesBigAdventure Pee Wee Herman]]) said that the secret word for the fight would be "sucker", and that when he shouted it, the crowd was to start screaming wildly. [[spoiler :Later in the fight, Reubens tricked Michael into [[SchmuckBait taming a tiger and making it go to sleep]]... only for Reubens to shout "Sucker!" Yeah, George kinda deserved that one.]]

-->--'''Mills Lane,''' referee

** "Brad Pitt vs. Keanu Reeves" has [[spoiler: Brad Pitt]] turn into a being of pure energy, become one with the Matrix, get inside [[spoiler: Keanu's brain]], make his head explode, then go back into the computer and blow himself up.

* RealityEnsues: After [[spoiler: [[Series/DawsonsCreek James van der Beek]] defeats Saddam Hussein (beating him to death with the American flag), Mills Lane... proceeds to slap a pair of handcuffs on Van der Beek for flag desecration, and takes him to jail.]]
** Robert Iler informs Frankie Muniz that, unlike [[Series/MalcolmInTheMiddle his show]], he ''can'' hear him when he [[BreakingTheFourthWall addresses the camera]].

* WizardDuel: The fight between Creator/MelissaJoanHart and Creator/AlyssaMilano. Both of them were known for playing witches on TV (being the stars of ''Series/SabrinaTheTeenageWitch'' and ''Series/{{Charmed}}'' respectively), so CDM has them do battle using magic.

** Technically, this happened to Jessica Simpson during the fight between Blink-182 and 98 Degrees, where they fought in giant mech suits. After the Blink-182 mech was down and the 98 Degrees robot went haywire, Stone Cold Steve Austin intended to use a growth ray to make himself a giant to stop the robot, lest the president be forced to use a nuclear missile. Thanks to Nick's bumbling, the ray hit Jessica instead making her into a giantess. Proportionally speaking (which means if a girl with a bigger chest than Jessica, let's say Pamela Anderson, was turned into a giantess of equal size to Jessica, she'd be bigger than Jessica at that size as well) she's still got the same bust size, just on a bigger scale, but as a giantess, her breasts are bigger than a human being... each.

** [[UsefulNotes/Tennis Andre Agassi]] kills Tiger Woods by using a pitching machine to fire tennis balls up Woods' ass until he explodes.

** Creator/AndreAgassi kills Tiger Woods by using a pitching machine to fire tennis balls up Woods' ass until he explodes.

** Andre Agassi kills Tiger Woods by using a pitching machine to fire tennis balls up Woods' ass until he explodes.

* NoHoldsBarredBeatdown / CurbStompBattle: Several matches, most infamously Andre Agassi vs. Tiger Woods, Pamela Anderson vs. Tommy Lee, and Mahatma Gandhi vs. Genghis Khan. [[spoiler: Andre, Pamela, and Gandhi]] won without a scratch.

* TooImportantToWalk: The ridiculously rich UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump[[note]] This episode was made 17 years before he became President. Back then, he was simply known for being a wealthy real estate tycoon.[[/note]] is carried onto the ring, encased in an exact replica of the famous Trump Tower. The men carrying the tower replica end up dropping it, and Trump fires them both.[[/folder]]

** Happens again during the [=Brandy=] vs. Music/CourtneyLove fight when Brandy didn't even want to fight [[spoiler: yet wins by accident by giving Courtney a bear cub whose mother mauls her to death.]]

* TooImportantToWalk: The ridiculously rich UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump[[note]] This episode was made 17 years before he became President. Back then, he was simply known for being a wealthy real estate tycoon.[[/note]] is carried onto the ring, encased in an exact replica of the famous Trump Tower. The men carrying the tower replica end up dropping it, and Trump fires them both.
* UltimateShowdownOfUltimateDestiny

** The fight between David Arquette and Paul Reiser ends when [[spoiler: Arquette jams several cellphones in Reiser's skull, then makes them all ring at the same time. The phones' microwaves cause huge tumors to develop in Reiser's head which then swells and explodes.]] It's actually kind of disturbing.

* KillSat: In one fight (taken from a time capsule from TheEighties), UsefulNotes/RonaldReagan tried to kill Ayatollah Khomeini with the "Star Wars" Strategic Defense Initiative satellite defense system. The first attempt failed and killed a random audience member, but the second attempt succeeded. [[SugarWiki/FunnyMoments Ronald Reagan then proceeded to hook up with Boy George while "Born In the USA" played in the background]].

*** 1. Nick, after [[spoiler: falling off of the announcer's booth in "Celebrity Deathmatch Goes to the Movies" ends up in a coma]] until he [[spoiler:'' [[SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome forces himself awake]]'']] in "Nick's Return", ''two episodes later''.

* AnimalMotifs: During the fight between Drew Barrymore and Farrah Fawcett, the two of them are trained in one of five Deadly Venoms- a mysterious form of kung fu themed around animals. Barrymore's discipline is that of the Giraffe (tall and leggy with a long neck) and Fawcett's is that of the Dodo (a relic of the past with a silly name)

* AnyoneCanDie: Well, ''almost'' anyone. The main cast does seem to be exempt, but given what happened to [[spoiler:Stacy]], even they can be killed if the need arises.

* AssholeVictim: Many of the losers are portrayed this way, like [[spoiler:UsefulNotes/CharlesManson, Creator/SeanPenn, [=LeAnn=] Rimes, John Rocker, Laura Schlessinger, Creator/JenniferLoveHewitt, Music/KidRock, and Music/{{Eminem}}.]]

** [[spoiler: UsefulNotes/AlGore wins his [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3mIo2MwFYpc fight]] against Music/WeirdAlYankovic]] by pulling a stick out of his ass (the "executive branch") [[note]] [[DontExplainTheJoke This episode was made back during the 2000 election,]] when Gore was best known for being wooden, stiff and bland as opposed to an environmental crusader. [[/note]] and beating him with it. That stick? ''A very large tree.''

** There was also the Creator/LucyLawless/[[Series/AllyMcBeal Calista Flockhart]] [[http://metalvideo.us/watch_video.php?v=99d3a80fb022 match]], where this Trope was used in a way that was, for lack of a better term, bizarre. An accident in the fight has [[spoiler:Calista wind up with her head up Lucy's butt, at which point, after a few minutes of struggling, Lucy is able to completely "absorb" Calista into her body through that end of her. This somehow causes Calista to end up in her womb, which results in Lucy, at the end of the episode, giving birth to Calista as she would a newborn daughter. (In short, this show is not only violent, it's downright ''[[WidgetSeries weird.]]'')]]
** Andre Agassi kills Tiger Woods by using a pitching machine to fire tennis balls up Woods' ass until he explodes.

** Not to mention Music/{{Blink 182}}'s mecha, against which the aforementioned boy band was fighting, and which was destroyed (with Tom, Mark and Travis still inside no less).

** Later, during the episode "Teen Night" the main event was a "Deathmatch Prom" where two couples battled to the death to see who would be Prom King and Queen- and while one of those couples (Creator/JenniferLoveHewitt and Creator/ScottWolf) merely played a couple on ''Series/PartyOfFive'', the other (Creator/ReeseWitherspoon and Creator/RyanPhillippe) was a genuine couple at the time.

** In all of Pam Anderson's fights her berserk button has been Tommy Lee. She challenges [=RuPaul=] to a deathmatch because of [=RuPaul=]'s attempt to flirt with Tommy who was her husband; [[spoiler:she even wins this fight]] because of this trope. In Pam's second fight, her berserk button gets pushed multiple times due to her opponent, Tommy's previous wife Heather Locklear trying to kill Tommy Lee, since they were literally fighting to determine whether or not he dies ([[spoiler:he did, right after Heather took Pam out.]]) In her third fight, she's fed up with Tommy and decides to take out her anger, which leads to [[spoiler:a major CurbStompBattle in Pam's favour.]]

** Bob Barker. Anne Robinson threatening to kill a puppy causes him to [[spoiler:''rip out her ovaries'', killing her.]]
** Creator/DavidSpade spends most of the match getting completely pummeled until he [[spoiler:slings one of Scottie Pippen's [[UsefulNotes/NationalBasketballAssociation NBA]] championship rings through Creator/StevenSeagal's brain.]]
** Don't mess with Mandy Moore—you may not live to see the consequences.
** Then there's Music/GarthBrooks, who managed to subdue ''Music/MarilynManson''. [[spoiler:Sure, Manson got the last laugh]], but it was still pretty darn impressive.
** A sort of weird example with [[Series/CrocodileHunter Steve Irwin]], where he does manage to [[spoiler:kill Medusa,]] but it's completely by accident, and he's more interested in teaching the audience about her than actually fighting.

** UsefulNotes/MichaelJordan is shown as the "good guy" in his fight with Dennis Rodman, but that doesn't stop him from shoving Rodman in the garbage can ([[spoiler:which somehow kills him...]])

*** Once Tina is voted into the ring, she comes across as a maternal and caring woman...until she pulls a FaceHeelTurn on Elisabeth, Colby AND Colleen. [[spoiler: She ultimately wins the fight.]]
** The ''Series/SexAndTheCity'' four-way match has Kim Cattrall prey on Kristin Davis's naivete when the latter seems too nice to actually put up a fight by giving her a poisoned ''Magazine/{{Cosmopolitan}}''. Turns out Kristin was only pretending to be nice and naive as she waits for Kim to take out Sarah and Cynthia before standing up, delivering a brutal insult calling out Kim for being a slut ("Unlike you, I NEVER SWALLOW!" referring to the poisoned ''Cosmo'') and then bisecting Kim using the biggest "back massager" (dildo) they made.
* BigEater:

** In "Censorship Problems", both Ron Jeremy and Moe Howard are killed in the same fashion: impalement through the head [[DoubleEntendre with wood]]. Not only that, but consider the following: Tommy Lee killed Ron Jeremy with his penis, while [[spoiler:Larry Fine, after accidentally deaging himself into a sperm, helped Curly win the main event by [[EyeScream going for Luciano Pavarotti's eye]]]].
* BrainsEvilBrawnGood: This Trope was Inverted and then played straight in the same episode, with UsefulNotes/AlbertEinstein and Wrestling/{{Chyna}}. First inverted when Chyna acts out the Heel wrestler part UpToEleven and ''brutally'' kills Einstein, simply ForTheEvulz. Then played straight when [[spoiler:Einstein's brain stages a FakedKidnapping of itself demanding a five million dollar ransom, so it can steal the money; it gets away with it too, and is last seen escaping to Brazil.]]

** In the earlier seasons, Pamela Anderson's breasts were more like the real Pamela's, but for the season 5 redesign they were turned into GagBoobs (which she uses to beat [[spoiler:Tommy Lee]] to death). Though if you think about it her redesign might be more accurate considering her earlier appearances only showed her breasts as being above average, yet Dolly Parton (who Pamela should be equal to if not greater than in bust size) had a pair of jugs the size of her head! There's similar problem when Anna Nicole Smith shows up (this was when she was... well fat to put it bluntly, but she still had a huge chest) where she doesn't look quite Dolly's size, she still looks bigger than Pamela. It was really strange that when Jenny [=McCarthy=] and Carmen Electra show up they look bigger than Pamela despite the fact that they aren't tied with Pam in bust size in real life unlike the last two.

** Technically, this happened to Jessica Simpson during the fight between Blink-182 and 98 Degrees, where they fought in giant mech suits. After the Blink-182 mech was down and the 98 Degrees robot went haywire, Stone Cold Steve Austin intended to use a growth ray to make himself a giant to stop the robot, lest the president be forced to use a nuclear missile. Thanks to Nick's bumbling, the ray hit Jessica instead making her into a giantess. Proportionally speaking (which means if a girl with a bigger chest than Jessica, let's say Pamela Anderson, was turned into a giantess of equal size to Jessica, she'd be bigger than Jessica at that size as well) she's still got the same bust size, just on a bigger scale, but as a giantess, her breasts are bigger than a human being...each.

* ByWallThatIsHoley: The match between [[Series/{{Friends}} Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, and Lisa Kudrow]] saw the ring decorated like a sitcom set. When [[spoiler:it collapses (killing the combatants)]], referee Mills Lane survives through this method.
* CainAndAbel: Russell Simmons vs. [[Music/RunDMC Rev Run]] [[spoiler:[[http://www.mtv.com/videos/misc/715489/celebrity-deathmatch-rev-run-vs-russell-simmons.jhtml Rev defeats Simmons]]]], [[Film/TheBreakfastClub Emilio Estevez]] vs. Creator/CharlieSheen [[spoiler:[[http://www.mtv.com/videos/misc/715671/celebrity-deathmatch-charlie-sheen-vs-emilio-estevez.jhtml Sheen defeats Estevez]]]], [[Creator/MaryKateAndAshleyOlsen Mary Kate Olsen vs. Ashley Olsen]] [[spoiler:[[http://www.mtv.com/videos/misc/715667/celebrity-deathmatch-mary-kate-vs-ashley-olsen.jhtml The third Olsen twin defeats both]]]], Creator/AshleyJudd vs. Music/WynonnaJudd [[spoiler: Wynnona defeats Ashley]], [[Music/{{Oasis}} Liam Gallagher vs. Noel Gallagher]].
** The latter had the completely off-the-wall ending of [[spoiler:Creator/{{Gallagher}} the comedian running in with his [[ThingOMatic Sledge-O-Matic]] and [[DropTheHammer taking out]] both Gallagher brothers by himself.]]
* CallBack: At the end of the "[[http://kisscartoon.me/Cartoon/Celebrity-Deathmatch/Season-03-Episode-08-Sex-Lugs-Rock-n-roll?id=13684 Sex, Lugs, and Rock and Roll]]" episode, Nick falls off of the announcer's booth and appears to be unconscious. Johnny's reaction? "Nick! Oh no, not again!"[[note]] the last time Nick fell off of the announcer's booth was in season 1's "Celebrity Deathmatch Goes to the Movies". The impact put him into a ''3 episode long coma''.[[/note]]

* TheCanKickedHim: How [[spoiler:Music/BruceSpringsteen]] wins his fight against [[spoiler:[[Series/TheSopranos James Gandolfini]].]]

** In the fight between Rev Run and Russell Simmons, [[spoiler:Rev defeats Simmons]] by spin-kicking his head off his shoulders. Later on during the fight between Johnny Depp and Orlando Bloom, the head (which is still alive) falls back into the ring, and the two duel while attempting to balance on it. (mimicking a scene from Pirates Of The Caribbean)

** The "No. 1 fan" from the beginning of "Fandemonium 2000" [[spoiler:is the catalyst behind N-SYNC and The Backstreet Boys being brought back to life for the main event]].
** After [[spoiler:Lil' Jon wins his match by default thanks to his opponent (Lil' Kim) being in jail]], he begins boasting about how he's the "King of the Lil' People". Then, Lil' Wayne and Lil' Bow Wow (who won the previous two bouts) come back to try and kick his ass.
** The Hanson kids [[UnexplainedRecovery return]] and attempt to do to [[spoiler:Manson]] what he did to them and [[spoiler:The Spice Girls]] in an earlier episode. Things go awry when one of the kids [[ItMakesSenseInContext loses control of a]] [[ChainsawGood chainsaw]].
* ChekhovsSkill: The Tahitian Skeleton-Pull Of Death.

* ClippedWingAngel: Music/MichaelJackson used his Moonwalker Magic to transform into an animal in a last ditch effort to defeat Music/{{Madonna}}. [[spoiler:He ended up as a hamster that Madonna easily kicked into the acid.]]

* CrackDefeat: [[spoiler:Gandhi over Genghis Khan, and David Spade over Steven Seagal.]]

** Pamela Anderson's first fight kinda went like this. She wasn't a moron, but her opponent, [=RuPaul=], seemed to have a major strength advantage over Pam. Then, when [=RuPaul=] thought it was a good idea to flirt with Pam's husband at the time, Tommy Lee, [[spoiler:Pam quickly brought her A-game, and proceeded to beat [=RuPaul=] easily.]]
** During [[http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2rbrox the fight]] between Creator/QuentinTarantino and Creator/SpikeLee, guest referee Creator/WoodyAllen is constantly being used as a weapon by both of them. [[spoiler:When Sun Yi tells him [[LysistrataGambit she won't give him loving if he doesn't start fighting back]], Allen quickly dispatches both fighters.]]

** [[http://www.mtv.com/videos/misc/715700/celebrity-deathmatch-loch-ness-monster-vs-bigfoot.jhtml The Loch Ness Monster vs. Bigfoot.]] [[spoiler:Nessie wins in seconds.]] Everyone present was expecting the longest, most epic fight in the history of ''Celebrity Deathmatch'', with Stone Cold Steve Austin calling it "a six-second suckfest".
** Same with the season 5's rematch of [[http://www.mtv.com/videos/misc/716136/celebrity-deathmatch-kobe-bryant-vs-shaquille-oneal.jhtml Shaquille O'Neal vs. Kobe Bryant]]. [[spoiler:Shaq ends the fight early by lifting and choking Kobe with one hand and then tearing his head off with the other.]]
** Pamela Anderson's third fight can only be described as this since [[spoiler:not only was she kicking the crap out of her opponent, he didn't really get to fight back, the only thing he really did was say things that pissed her off.]]
** [[http://www.ebaumsworld.com/videos/celebrity-death-match-mahatma-gandhi-vs-genghis-khan/82314035/ Gandhi vs. Genghis Khan]]. [[spoiler:Genghis Khan]] fails to get in a single hit.
** Subverted in David Spade vs. Steven Seagal. [[spoiler:Spade only gets in one hit... the winning one.]]
*** A similar thing happens in [[http://www.mtv.com/videos/misc/715727/celebrity-deathmatch-steve-irwin-vs-medusa.jhtml Steve Irwin vs. Medusa]] where [[spoiler:Steve doesn't even ''try'' to fight until he (accidentally) rips Medusa's head off.]]
** [[UsefulNotes/{{Tennis}} Andre Agassi]] [[http://www.vbox7.com/play:7c3524df vs. Tiger Woods]]. [[spoiler:Tiger]] never gets any offense in.
** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KuHu0Bm6_k8 Cameron Diaz vs. Meryl Streep]] is originally intended to be a staged performance with Diaz pretending to kill Streep. [[spoiler:However, Streep ends up taking her role too seriously and wipes the floor with Diaz.]]
** [[http://www.mtv.com/videos/misc/12459/richard-simmons-vs-billy-blanks.jhtml Richard Simmons vs. Billy Blanks]]. [[spoiler:Simmons]] only gets one hit, which does no damage, and all his attempts end up backfiring on him.
** Subverted in the [[http://www.mtv.com/videos/misc/715950/celebrity-deathmatch-eric-and-julia-roberts-vs-donny-and-marie-osmond.jhtml Julia and Eric Roberts vs. Marie and Donny Osmond]] fight. [[spoiler:Julia and Eric get absolutely ''no'' offense in, and yet they ''still'' win the match when Marie and Donny chew each other's heads off.]]

* DavidVersusGoliath: Creator/DavidSpade vs. Steven Seagal; Creator/ChrisRock [[http://www.mtv.com/videos/misc/716117/celebrity-deathmatch-chris-rock-vs-dwayne-the-rock-johnson.jhtml versus]] [[Wrestling/DwayneJohnson The Rock]]
** It's actually invoked and literalized in the case of Spade vs. Seagal. Before the match starts, Nick says, "Their names are David and Steven, but they might as well be David and Goliath." Seagal, of course, dominates the fight. He throws Spade out to the floor by his underwear, [[spoiler:where he finds [[UsefulNotes/NationalBasketballAssociation Chicago Bulls basketball]] star Scottie Pippen sitting in the front row. Spade borrows one of Pippen's championship rings and, using his underwear as a slingshot, launches the ring right through Seagal's head. When referee Mills Lane asks if Seagal is ok, he says, "Yeah, sure, Grandpa," and collapses face first on to the mat. This is topped off by Spade telling Seagal that the planned sequel to ''Hard to Kill'' had been cancelled.]]

** The-then 12-year old Haley Joel Osment vs Macaulay Culkin, who was ''20!'' Despite being somewhat LighterAndSofter than usual, with the gimmick being that the match was set in a playground like a schoolyard bully fight, it was still a Deathmatch and required a child to fight an adult. Osment managed to win with the help of the ghosts of former Deathmatch competitors who tore Culkin limb from limb at the end, but it was a close call, since he wasn't a physical match against Culkin at ALL.

* DeadlyRotaryFan: "Fandemonium I" features a giant killer fan wheel during the Creator/AdamSandler [[http://www.mtv.com/videos/misc/715689/celebrity-deathmatch-chris-rock-vs-adam-sandler.jhtml vs]] Creator/ChrisRock fight.

* DeathByIrony[=/=]KarmicDeath:
** At the end of the [[https://www.dailymotion.com/video/xbuyb6_celebrity-deathmatch-derek-jeter-vs_shortfilms Derek Jeter[=/=]John Rocker]] fight, [[spoiler:Jeter offs Rocker by shocking him with a [=DieHard=] battery. Prior to this fight, Rocker became infamous for a rant he made against the people of New York City. After his death via electrocution, what does Rocker's charred corpse resemble? The Statue of Liberty!]]

* [[DoNotCallMePaul Do Not Call Me Mark]]: On an episode where Wrestling/TheUndertaker ([[AsHimself voiced by him]]) fought a demon named Captain Doody[[note]]A parody of ''Film/TheExorcist'''s "Captain Howdy"[[/note]], Doody taunted him by calling him by his real name, Mark (Calaway).

* DisproportionateRetribution: While this does seem to be a staple in this reality (pretty much ''any'' excuse for wanting someone dead is legitimate) one case that stands out is the HalloweenEpisode [[spoiler:where Stacy Cornbred came back from the dead leading a zombie horde, intent on killing Debbie because she "stole her job". You have to take Debbie's side with this one; that was ''not'' her fault.]]

* DudeLooksLikeALady: Boy George obviously. In the 80s Flashback episode, he's in a match with ''Series/MiamiVice'' star Don Johnson because he somehow didn't know that B.G. is actually a man, and [[UnsettlingGenderReveal came within seconds of having sex with him]]

** Nick's attempt to [[SixDegreesOfKevinBacon connect Jesse Ventura to Kevin Bacon]] [[spoiler: resulting in a long roundabout which results in linking Ventura... [[ShapedLikeItself with Ventura]]]][[note]]For the record, [[http://oracleofbacon.org/movielinks.php?a=Kevin+Bacon&b=Jesse+Ventura+%28I%29&use_using=1&u0=on&use_genres=1&g0=on&g4=on&g8=on&g16=on&g20=on&g1=on&g5=on&g9=on&g13=on&g17=on&g21=on&g25=on&g2=on&g6=on&g10=on&g14=on&g22=on&g26=on&g3=on&g11=on&g15=on&g23=on&g27=on Ventura's Bacon Number is 2]].[[/note]].
** Another EF moment by Nick, in the "Sex, Lugs And Rock N Roll" episode, he tries to show Johnny his skill at smashing a soda can with his head which he learned in college... Except he forgot that you're supposed to use an aluminium can, and ends up nearly cracking his head open with a glass bottle.
** Creator/PamelaAnderson's first attack against Creator/RuPaul was to kick [=RuPaul=] in the groin... only for [=RuPaul=] to NoSell it by revealing s/he was wearing steel-plated underwear. Actually, the first half of that fight was an epic fail for Pam, but when she got her second wind, Pamela went from busty damsel/wimp to busty badass.
** During the [[Film/TheThreeStooges Three Stooges]] vs Three Tenors fight, Larry Fine got the idea to de-age himself back to his prime, and ended up de-aging himself to a sperm cell because he accidentally set the year too low. Subverted in that [[spoiler:he still somehow managed to help Curly Howard kill the two remaining Tenors by [[HeroicSacrifice slamming himself into Luciano Pavarotti's eye]].]]
** Music/MichaelJackson attempts to transform into a vicious animal during his fight with Madonna, only for the attempt to backfire and [[spoiler:transform him into a hamster that she easily kills.]]
* EurekaMoment: [[spoiler:Creator/HarrisonFord]] only got the idea of how to defeat [[spoiler:Creator/SamuelLJackson]] when the latter said [[spoiler:Ford]] [[ShownTheirWork should've stuck with]] ''[[ShownTheirWork carpentry]]''.
* EvenBadMenLoveTheirMamas: In the match between Music/LeAnnRimes and [[Music/WuTangClan Ol' Dirty Bastard]], ODB becomes [[BerserkButton furious]] and gets a serious second wind after Rimes insults his mother, [[spoiler:eventually beating Rimes to a bloody pulp.]] (Of course, the general theme of the match is to suggest [[MeanCharacterNiceActor that he isn't as "bad" as his reputation makes him out to be...]] [[NiceCharacterMeanActor Rimes, on the other hand...]])
** On "37th Annual [[ScienceFiction [=SciFi=]]] Fight Night", [[Franchise/StarWars Mark Hamill and Peter Mayhew]] made a guest appearance. The crowd called for Mayhew to talk like Chewbacca, which he tried to resist, explaining [[ShownTheirWork that Chewie's voice was the product of combining different animal sounds]]. Finally, he gives in and tries talking like Chewbacca, prompting Zatar the Alien[[note]]The episode opened with Music/CelineDion singing the National Anthem to boos, with fans holding signs reading "Sink the ''Film/{{Titanic|1997}}'' Chick" and "Make Her Shut Up", until Music/TheProdigy's Keith Flint ran in to stop her. Dion suddenly revealed herself to be Zatar the Alien, who ate Keith Flint's head.[[/note]], who was in the crowd at the time, to say, "Hey, [[StarfishLanguage nobody talks that way about my mama!"]]
* [[EveryoneHasStandards Even Celebrity Deathmatch Has Standards]]:

*** Even Mills Lane himself thought [[spoiler:James Van Der Beek had crossed the line by desecrating the flag in order to beat Saddam Hussein.]]

** [[spoiler:Creator/JamieKennedy explains this to [[Creator/SachaBaronCohen Ali G]]]] in order to kill him.

** The second Halloween episode had, among other things, zombies laying siege to the arena, led by the zombified corpse of [[spoiler:the show's first interviewer, Stacy Cornbred, looking to get her job back]] by any means necessary.

** Also cropped up when Music/RageAgainstTheMachine fought the Machine... which was a killer robot. Tom Morello and Zack de la Rocha were quick to call this out, as they were expecting a fight against TheMan. Tim Commerford and Brad Wilk try to pull a ScrewThisImOuttaHere, [[spoiler:only to become the Machine's first victims on their way out.]]

* ExplosiveStupidity: Jessica Simpson attempts to kill Nick Lachey by throwing a grenade at him, but is absent-minded enough to forget to remove the pin. [[spoiler:An enraged Lachey takes it upon himself to show her exactly how you're supposed to detonate a grenade... [[MemeticMutation And boom goes the dynami-]] er, grenade.]]

** At first, it seems like Kristin Davis was killed by Kim Cattrall's poison in the four-way "Series/SexAndTheCity" fight, only to pop up near the end to [[spoiler:finish Cattrall off (the only one left alive)]], revealing she had never ingested said poison:

** [[spoiler:Music/ArethaFranklin uses this tactic to win her fight against Music/BarbraStreisand after placing a diseased rat in a nearby bucket of water. She plays dead, tricking an exhausted Streisand into drinking from the bucket and contracting the bubonic plague.]]
** Don King tries to pull this off during his match against UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump. However, Mills sees through his poorly-acted "death", and then [[spoiler:becomes averted seconds later when Trump actually does kill him.]]

** [[Series/TheOC Mischa Barton]] pulls this off against Kristin Cavallari mid-way through the fight...[[spoiler: she promptly gets her ass kicked.]]

** The Elizabeth Hurley/Anna Kournikova prefight interviews include Hurley naked, with only random objects covering her naughty bits (it's a reference to the end of Austin Powers), and Anna getting rubbed down with lotion by Debbie Matenopoulos. That same fight also had pits filled with twelve-year-old boys who would tear them to pieces due to the fanservice driving them crazy. Kournikova gets knocked in... [[spoiler:but manages to kill them all and drag Hurley inside, tearing her in half by pulling her through the grates.]]

** Lucy Lawless vs. Calista Flockhart ends with [[spoiler:Lucy beating Calista by bending over in her Xena dress.]]

** Supermodels Rebecca Romijn and Naomi Campbell have a match in their underwear... [[spoiler:which ends with Naomi coughing up her own stomach and spraying Rebecca with lethal stomach acid, causing her to melt down into a flesh-colored puddle of goop with only her bra and panties remaining.]]
** The Creator/MelissaJoanHart[=/=]Creator/AlyssaMilano fight starts out as fanservice, with Johnny and Nick stating it was to see who was TV's [[HotWitch hottest witch]]. Alyssa is decked out in a revealing leather outfit and Melissa is wearing a red bikini. Then they start casting spells on each other that turn them into ugly, stereotypical {{wicked witch}}es.

** A variant: Creator/JKRowling places a curse on Creator/StephenKing that [[spoiler:causes blue flames to erupt from his bum, in the form of flatulence. It doesn't take long for King to use this to his advantage.]]
* FightingIrish: Referenced. During Bono's fight with Fabio and Yoko Ono, Johnny says Bono's "Irish temper is flaring".

** [[ConsummateProfessional Johnny]] is TheLeader
** [[StrawLoser Nick]] is TheLancer
** [[CombatReferee Mills]] is TheSmartGuy
** [[GeniusBruiser Stone Cold]] is TheBigGuy
** [[PerkyFemaleMinion Stacey]] is TheChick
* {{Flanderization}}: Nick's CloudCuckoolander/loser status is played up considerably more in the revival. The celebrities as a whole are also portrayed much less sympathetically than in earlier seasons, with {{Take That}}s which are far more blatant and oftentimes border on being mean-spirited, sometimes to the point that their faults are all that is seen on the show.

** MTV got this treatment when it was referred to as More Television Violence in once episode.

** The fight between Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee has Pamela [[spoiler:crushing Tommy's skull]] between her breasts.

* GainaxEnding: "Willie Nelson vs. Tony Bennett" ends with [[spoiler:Nelson taking off his bandana to reveal a third eye, which causes Bennett to disintegrate]]. Neither Johnny, Nick, nor Mills were sure what exactly happened.
** "Brad Pitt vs. Keanu Reeves" has [[spoiler:Brad Pitt]] turn into a being of pure energy, become one with the Matrix, get inside [[spoiler:Keanu's brain]], make his head explode, then go back into the computer and blow himself up.
--->'''Mills Lane''': [[spoiler:[[LampshadeHanging Keanu Reeves is the loser... and... uhhh... you know.]]]]
** "Celine Dion vs. Keith Flint" ends with [[spoiler:Dion eating Flint's head, then tearing off her skin to reveal that she's actually being controlled by an alien, who runs off into the audience, possesses Don King, and announces his plan to take over the world.]]

** Pamela Anderson's season 5 model does this.

* GenreBlindness: Parodied during the Jerry Seinfeld vs. Tim Allen match. [[spoiler:After Jason Alexander, [[Creator/JuliaLouisDreyfus Julia Louis-Dreyfus]], and Michael Richards have [[FaceHeelTurn turned heel]] on Jerry for ending the show, Johnny says, "We wrestling announcers are supposed to be so perceptive."]]

** Most prevalent during seasons 5 and 6.
* GrandTheftMe: [[spoiler:After she beats Helen Hunt, Leelee Sobieski steals Helen's identity so she can keep her far better career, she even tears the skin off Helen's hands and wears them like gloves so she can use Helen's fingerprints for confirmation.]]

** In the Creator/JackieChan vs. Creator/JeanClaudeVanDamme fight, Chan rips off Creator/ChuckNorris' arms and uses them to [[spoiler:slice off Jean-Claude's head.]]
** Also happens in Creator/SpikeLee vs Creator/QuentinTarantino, where both contestants use Woody Allen as a weapon.
** In the Creator/JohnTravolta vs. Creator/NicolasCage fight, [[spoiler:Cage]] is beaten to death with his own buttcheeks.

* HalloweenEpisode: Two of them- one from Season 2 and another from Season 3.

** The second was an EpisodeOfTheDead revolving around zombies attacking the arena- led by an undead Stacy Cornbred with a grudge against Debbie.

* HarsherInHindsight: InUniverse, in the "Dean Martin vs. Jerry Lewis" fight[[note]]Which was being aired from the CDM Vault after [[spoiler: Creator/RogerEbert was flung into the announcer's booth, which caused Nick to fall off, putting him into a coma.]][[/note]], Nick barely avoided getting hit by Jerry Lewis, who was knocked out of the ring. Nick's response?

** Another InUniverse example in "Creator/OJSimpson vs. Joe Namath", a battle filmed in 1973, when OJ was still a football player, was full of moments alluding to his eventual murder trial, including describing OJ as "a man who can do no wrong", OJ wanting to fight with (boxing) gloves and finding they don't fit, Johnny mentioning that OJ knows his way with sharp objects, and Johnny saying OJ "[[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial [is] never gonna murder two innocent people and then claim he was in Chicago]]". However, this reaches the pinnacle after [[spoiler:OJ won]]: after being declared the winner, [[spoiler:OJ begins freaking out for... some reason, adamantly stating that he ''wasn't'' the winner of the fight and vowing to find the ''real'' winner]].
** In yet another case of this trope from the "CDM Vault", there's the "[[Series/AllInTheFamily Carroll O'Connor vs. Sherman Hemsley]]" fight from the "Family Night '77" episode[[note]]Not a real episode, mind you; it's another fight from the 1970s.[[/note]], near the start, we see Nick getting into a small fight with his wife, who threatens to leave him one day. Earlier, in the actual episode proper, she tells Nick that she's divorcing him [[spoiler:so she can be with David Letterman]].

* HeroicBSOD: [[spoiler:Steve Irwin]] has one after he accidentally kills [[spoiler:Medusa]] during their fight.

* HeyThatsMyLine: Happens twice in the Mills Lane[=/=]Judge Judy fight, with the latter stealing the former's "Let's get it on!" and "I'll allow it!" {{Catchphrase}}s.
* HistoricalCharacterConfusion: Debbie does this in one episode, mistakenly crediting UsefulNotes/AlbertEinstein with UsefulNotes/ThomasEdison's inventions.

** [[spoiler:Charlton Heston chopping down the tower to kill Creator/RussellCrowe]] ends up causing his own death.
** While aiming for Music/ChuckBerry's berries, [[spoiler:Music/JamesBrown's laser shoes get deflected by Chuck's ring, causing him to get crushed my a overhead light.]] (Johnny quotes the exact Trope name.)
--->'''Nick Diamond''': Hoist on his own petard? Well I don't think the audience knows what "petard" means. Cause I sure don't.
** [[spoiler:Chris Kirkpatrick]] was killed at the end of the "*NSYNC vs. KISS" fight when [[spoiler:Gene Simmons crushed him thanks to Ace Frehley popping the balloons that lifted Gene to the ceiling. ''The very same balloons Chis used on him earlier in the fight''.]]
** [[spoiler:Bill Gates]] ultimately was killed by his own Robotic [[spoiler:Michael Flatley]] after he used it to kill the human version.
** [[spoiler:David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson defeat Creator/WillSmith and Tommy Lee Jones in the ''Film/MenInBlack'' vs. ''Series/TheXFiles'' match, despite the [[=MIBs=]] dominating the action while [David rambles on about a conspiracy, after the [=MIB=]s accidentally point their {{BFG}} the wrong way and fire.]]
** [[spoiler:Michael Jackson tries to use "Moonwalker Magic" to transform into a deadly creature, but it doesn't work and instead he transforms into a hamster, making an easy kill for Madonna.]]
** [[spoiler:David Copperfield tries to one-up David Blaine]] by levitating over a pit of piranhas, but he loses concentration and falls in.
** [[spoiler:Steven Spielberg loses in his match with Alfred Hitchcock, despite his opponent barely even fighting, when the spirits from the Ark of the Covenant turn on him because he didn't pay them for their appearance in ''Film/RaidersOfTheLostArk'' (''And'' left them out of ''[[Film/IndianaJonesAndTheTempleOfDoom The Temple of Doom]]'').]]
** [[spoiler:Jack the Ripper is killed by a barely aware Sherlock Holmes]] when the latter zips up the former's knife-lined coat.
** In "Cousin Grimm vs. Potato Khan", [[spoiler:Cousin Grimm seems to win by grating his opponent. However, Potato Khan's grated remains are shown to each still be alive, and they each regenerate into smaller Potato Khans small enough to crawl inside his brain and make him kill himself.]]

** The same subversion happens in the JK Rowling vs. Stephen King fight. She wears a wizard hat and at one point uses Harry Potter's flying broom, but after getting one of King's fiery farts (that she herself made possible with her magic wand) in her face, she takes on a grotesque appearance with burnt skin and singed hair.

* HurricaneOfPuns: Whether it's Nick and Johnny's commentary or the celebs themselves trash talking, this show is lousy with puns. Here's an example from the Al Gore/Weird Al match:

** Helen Hunt vs. Leelee Sobieski. After winning the fight, [[spoiler:Leelee has no trouble convincing everyone that she's Helen Hunt, going so far as to peel off the real Helen Hunt's hands and wear them as gloves, in case someone would check her for fingerprints. Let's repeat that everyone falls for her act, despite her doing this ''in full view of absolutely everyone''.]] Never mind that they wore dresses of different colors (Helen was wearing black, while Leelee was wearing white).
** This was done earlier in the Music/BritneySpears vs Music/ChristinaAguilera fight (who did wear identical outfits, not helping matters), to the point where [[spoiler: they were unable to determine who won. As the fight progressed, it became increasingly hard to tell the two apart, forcing Mills Lane to mark Britney with a rubber stamp. The fight ended with the two of them literally tearing each other apart, leaving only one moving arm. [[{{Series/ER}} Noah Wyle]] tried to prove who it was, but was proven wrong.]]

** Much later, Creator/JakeGyllenhaal vs Creator/TobeyMaguire was built on the premise that the two of them looked alike. Maguire even says during the fight that the only reason Gyllenhaal has a career is because he looks like Maguire. It even reaches the point where, when Gyllenhaal commands Doctor Octopus to attack Maguire, he attacks Gyllenhaal instead.
* IfYouDieICallYourStuff: [[spoiler:Stacy Cornbred had been dead for all of ten seconds before Nick called "dibs" on her parking space. (In fact, whether anyone in-universe ''genuinely'' cared about what happened to her at all is questionable, which is somewhat surprising, as there had never been any outward signs of dislike for her - unlike the later case with both her successors, where that was obvious.)]]

** [[spoiler:Martha Stewart defeated Sandra Bernhard]] by glue-gunning her to the mat.

** The fight between Creator/JenniferAniston, Creator/CourteneyCox and Creator/LisaKudrow takes place on a sitcom set heavily reminiscent of the ''Friends'' one, complete with the theme playing in the background.

* IsThisThingStillOn: Said verbatim: In "Presented by Big Bull Beer", the outcome of the main event fight between Creator/LeonardoDiCaprio and Creator/JackNicholson[[note]]the girls in the audience rioting after [[spoiler:Jack wins]][[/note]] causes the head of Big Bull Beer to end their sponsorship with ''Celebrity Deathmatch'' (Nick and Johnny had been promoting the beer throughout the show). After they ''think'' the taping is over, Johnny and Nick lament the outcome... then begin mocking how crappy the beer is. After a good laugh, Johnny notices that one camera is still taping. Cut to credits.
* {{Kayfabe}}: Invoked in the first Freak Fight featuring Cousin Grimm vs. Pierce [=McCrack=], two mutants created with the DNA from various celebrities who died on the show. When the fight starts the two just go in for a NoHoldsBarredBeatdown terrifying the audience, until "Stone Cold" Steve Austin (a professional wrestler) puts a stop to the fight and chastises them that the people don't just want to watch them beat the hell out of each other, they want to he entertained. Austin even demonstrates how to deliver a BondOneLiner before smashing someone's face in, and the two mutants start again making quips and slinging insults as they fight.

* KillSat: In one fight (taken from a time capsule from TheEighties), UsefulNotes/RonaldReagan tried to kill Ayatollah Khomeini with the "Star Wars" Strategic Defense Initiative satellite defense system. The first attempt failed and killed a random audience member, but the second attempt succeeded. [[SugarWiki/FunnyMoments Ronald Reagan then proceeded to hook up with Boy George while "Born In the USA" played in the background]]
* LeaningOnTheFourthWall: When Johnny wonders how much longer the "Evander Holyfield vs. Mike Tyson" fight would go on, Nick guesses "about a minute and 22 seconds", which is also the remaining length of the episode[[note]]"Deathbowl '99"[[/note]] before it ended.
* LetsYouAndHimFight: Jerry Springer tries this tactic when he's pitted against fellow daytime talk show hosts, Oprah Winfrey and Rosie O'Donnell. [[spoiler:Initially, it works until both ladies realize that he's playing them, and promptly team up and grab both his legs and pull, splitting him down the middle.]]
* LightFeminineAndDarkFeminine: The Brandy vs. Courtney Love fight: one is a kind, sweet, and childishly innocent pop singer, the other is a violent, wrathful, and often topless (as indicated by a comment by the referee) rock star.
* LiteralMinded: Nick when operating the [=VR2000=] during the Keanu Reeves vs. Brad Pitt fight. (Eg. "Handgun" = "Gun that fires hands", "Magnum Gun" = "Gun with [[Series/MagnumPI Tom Selleck's]] face", "Give me a normal gun you [[UnusualEuphemism twisted fruit]]!" = "[[InsultBackfire Give the Magnum Gun fruit ammo]]", and "Chainsaw" = "[[DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment Chain saw]]")

* LoopholeAbuse: Believe it or not, someone was once able to win a fight to the death ''by a technicality''. In the HalloweenEpisode match between FrankensteinsMonster and The {{Wolfman}}, [[spoiler:the Wolfman turned human again in the middle of the fight. Then he appealed to Mills, saying that because this was a fight to the death and his opponent was ''already'' dead (being made of dead body parts) he should be the winner. Possibly InsaneTrollLogic, but Mills actually agreed with this. Unfortunately for the Wolfman, [[TooDumbToLive he made the mistake of]] [[UnsportsmanlikeGloating laughing in his opponent's face]], and Frankie, who as Nick previously said, [[BerserkButton did not like teasing]], crushed his skull. (Making the fight a very weird double KO.)]]
** During John Edwards' bout with Miss Cleo, he kept predicting that she was going to die in that fight. Right as he was about to deal the killing blow, [[spoiler:Miss Cleo reveals that ''she's actually not Miss Cleo''. Rather, she's one of several ''thousand'' imitators of her]]. Or, as Edwards [[OhCrap pieces it together]]:
--->'''John Edwards''': Wait a minute... [[spoiler:If you're not the real Miss Cleo]], but one of us is going to die, that leaves...\\

* LossOfIdentity: Played with: In Eddie Murphy's fight with Nick Nolte, a combination of Murphy running late and ultimately showing up ''as'' Nick Nolte manages to make Nolte think ''he's'' actually Murphy (which Nolte justifies due to him playing so many roles in the past[[note]]plus the fact that he's clearly not mentally stable[[/note]]), and promptly beats himself unconscious just to be sure. And then Mills realizes the ''second'' Nolte is actually Murphy. [[ItMakesSenseInContext It's easier to follow by watching it.]]

** MadeOfIron: While it seems to be incredibly easy to rip out someone's body parts, the celebrities seem to be very hard to actually kill. Special mention goes to Michael Jackson, who got kicked into a vat of hydrochloric acid and managed to crawl out totally unharmed, protected by plastic surgery, and Colonel Sanders, who gets ''decapitated'' and still manages to run around like a mad hen [[spoiler:until he falls into a frying pan.]]

*** In the Britney Spears vs. Christina Aguilera fight, both combatants tear each other apart until [[spoiler:all that's left is an arm. A ''moving'' arm. Whose arm it is is never revealed.]]

** Horribly and hilariously played with in the Music/MariahCarey vs. Creator/JimCarrey match. [[spoiler:[[YourHeadAsplode Guess how she won their match?]]]]
** Also, [[spoiler:Jerry Stiller won his match with Music/BobDylan]] using a similar trick.

** Hilariously literalized on the episode "Masters of the Martial Arts," in the Brandy vs. Music/CourtneyLove match. The idea was that Courtney was mad about Brandy getting the lead role in ''[[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0128996/ Cinderella]]'' and wanted revenge, and Brandy wasn't sure why she was there and wasn't interested in fighting. Brandy offers Courtney a present. [[spoiler:Courtney opens the box and finds a baby bear. Out of nowhere, the Mama Bear shows up and destroys Courtney Love, giving Brandy the win.]] Announcer Johnny Gomez takes the time to remind the viewers not to give wild animals as gifts.

** One episode has one match (Tommy Lee vs. Ron Jeremy) being broadcast from an underground fight club (in reality, the arena's basement) in order to evade the censors. It doesn't work -- after Tommy Lee wins the match by [[EyeScream gouging Ron Jeremy's eye out]] [[GagPenis with his dick]], Johnny and Nick get a very stern warning from the [[FunWithAcronyms B.O.O.B.]] The next match (Music/AlanisMorissette vs. Music/{{Jewel}}) has Johnny and Nick finally getting arrested after Alanis celebrates her victory by stripping naked in front of the cameras[[note]]A reference to her video for "Thank You", where she walks around a town completely naked, except with [[GodivaHair her hair covering her breasts]] and a CensorBox. [[/note]].

** Debbie Matenopoulos
** Music/DollyParton with her GagBoobs vs. Music/JenniferLopez with her bottom
** All of the supermodels (Creator/TyraBanks, Claudia Schiffer, Naomi Campbell, Rebecca Romijn-Stamos)
** Music/JanetJackson and Music/FaithHill
** Carmen Electra vs. Creator/JennyMcCarthy
** Creator/MelissaJoanHart vs. Creator/AlyssaMilano (pre-witchification)
** Music/MariahCarey
** Creator/DemiMoore and Creator/NicoleKidman
** Creator/ParisHilton

* MushroomSamba: At one point, Nick Diamond, who is comatose, goes into a seizure and his son starts slamming a button he thinks is the "call nurse" button. It instead increased the amount of morphine he's given. He calms down, yes, but we are then treated to a delusion he has...of Jimi Hendrix referring a deathmatch between Jerry Garcia and Elvis Presley having just for him.

** [[Series/CrocodileHunter Steve Irwin]] is pitted against the Medusa from ''Film/{{Clash of the Titans|1981}}'', and [[spoiler:kills her ''by accident'' in mid-discourse about this marvelous reptilian creature]].

-->'''Johnny:''' Nice going Nick...

* NoHoldsBarredBeatdown[=/=]CurbStompBattle: Several matches, most infamously Andre Agassi vs. Tiger Woods, Pamela Anderson vs. Tommy Lee, and Mahatma Gandhi vs. Genghis Khan. [[spoiler:Andre, Pamela, and Gandhi]] won without a scratch.
** Also [[Franchise/JamesBond Roger Moore vs. Sean Connery]]. In the end [[spoiler:Moore crushed Connery]] with a boulder given to him by a cavegirl... Long story.

** A season 3 episode reveals that [[spoiler:Leonardo [=DiCaprio=] ''survived'' getting his face caved in by Jack Nicholson. He only had it fixed when he fought Woody Harrelson. This time, he died]].

** The Cameron Díaz vs. Meryl Streep also counts. It was a scripted fight for the "Celebrity Deathmatch Movie" where Streep loses. [[spoiler:But Streep, too engrossed in her role, [[ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice impales Diaz with a boom mike]].]]

* OutOfCharacterMoment: Mills Lane usually doesn't show much interest in who wins or loses, but in Sylvester Stallone vs. Arnold Schwarzenegger he shows very blatant bias towards Stallone. He also ''really'' didn't like Dennis Franz (which may or may not have had something to do with an earlier incident during Lucy Lawless' match with Calista Flockhart, where Mills had to have him kicked out). He was also shown to be pretty upset with [[spoiler:Jake Gyllenhaal after he beats Tobey Maguire to death with his own leg]]. ("You killed Spider-Man, you jerk!")
* PoliticallyIncorrectVillain:
** The John Rocker vs. Derek Jeter fight. Unsurprisingly, John Rocker doesn't get the most sympathetic of portrayals, and [[spoiler:is electrocuted to death by the match's end.]]

** Music/HilaryDuff was also portrayed as this in comparison to her competitor, Creator/LindsayLohan. Unlike Moore, however, [[spoiler:she wins her fight]], even using her purity as a weapon to [[DivineIntervention get God to help her out]] (He spawns a ton of alcohol to distract Lindsay with).
** Also, in the first season, Brandy Norwood is shown like this when put up against Courtney Love. [[spoiler:Brandy, too, wins her fight after she sics a bear cub on Love. She wins accidentally because the mother of the bear cub thinks Courtney was endangering its cub and viciously assaulted her.]]
** Subverted with [=LeAnn=] Rimes, for which this is just a front: when her façade slips, she becomes a foul-mouthed, chain-smoking psycho, interested in torturing [[Music/WuTangClan Ol' Dirty Bastard]] in every imaginable way. [[spoiler:In the end, she loses]]. (ODB turns out to be not such a "bastard" at all.)
* RagingStiffie: In the battle between the Osbourne kids and the Olsen Twins, Jack Osbourne gets [[spoiler:a fatal]] one after Mary-Kate whispered in his ear that she and Ashley sometimes shower together.
* RealAfterAll: "The Prophecy". Stacy finds a prophecy foretelling the death of one of the Deathmatch staff tonight. Various lethal-looking events happen to the staff throughout the episode, but they all survive. At the end she admits she made a mistake. [[spoiler:Then she spontaneously combusts.]]

* RealityEnsues: After [[spoiler:[[Series/DawsonsCreek James Van Der Beek]] defeats Saddam Hussein (beating him to death with the American flag), Mills Lane... proceeds to slap a pair of handcuffs on Van Der Beek for flag desecration, and takes him to jail.]]

* RedemptionInTheRain: Parodied. Oliver Stone arranges for one of these shots after he beats Creator/MartinScorsese... [[spoiler:only for the camera to slip off the crane and kill him.]]

* ReplacementScrappy: [[invoked]]
** Nick Diamond is very unhappy with new, egotistical sideline reporter Debbie Matenopoulos (formerly of ''[=The View=]'') when she replaced [[spoiler:Stacy Cornbred, who was killed several episodes earlier]]. Especially Nick, who is constantly arguing with her; Johnny doesn't seem to have much of a negative opinion of Debbie.

*** 1. Nick, after [[spoiler:falling off of the announcer's booth in "Celebrity Deathmatch Goes to the Movies" ends up in a coma]] until he [[spoiler:''[[SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome forces himself awake]]'']] in "Nick's Return", ''two episodes later''.
*** 2. At the end of "The Prophecy", [[spoiler: Stacy Cornbred]] spontaneously explodes. [[spoiler: She]] remains dead for the rest of the series.[[note]] Except for "Halloween Episode II", where she came back as a zombie... only to be killed by Debbie Matenopoulos.[[/note]]
*** 3. In "Family Night II", Nick is divorced by his wife [[spoiler:so she can marry David Letterman]]. This too remains permanent.
*** 4. In two different matches, [[spoiler:The Backstreet Boys got killed by the Beastie Boys and *NSYNC got killed by KISS.]] In the [[spoiler:Backstreet Boys vs. *NSYNC]] fight, the commentators had to find a way to bring them back.

*** 1. Don King is shown being killed by various things early on, but seems to keep coming back just to get killed. [[spoiler:Averted after his fight with UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump, who kills him and he's never seen again.]]
*** 2. [[spoiler:Shaq died in his first fight with Kobe Bryant]], but is magically alive for their rematch.
*** 3. [[spoiler:The Olsen Twins]] were both torn to shreds by Betty-Sue Olsen[[note]] (a Deathmatch original character)[[/note]] during their fight, yet are magically alive for their fight with Jack and Kelly Osbourne.
*** 4. Marilyn Manson crushes [[spoiler:Hanson]] under the light rigging in Hanson vs. The Spice Girls, but [[spoiler:Hanson]] is still alive enough to attempt to pull the same trick on Marilyn in Marilyn Manson vs Garth Brooks.
*** 5. [[spoiler:Music/RickyMartin]] got killed by Marilyn Manson, but got killed again by William Hung in a later episode.

* UsefulNotes/RonaldReagan: Makes an appearance in a flashback to 1985, refereeing (and later participating in) the fight between Boy George and Don Johnson. Its apparent by his introductory speech that his dementia has begun to set in.

** Aptly enough, before the first commercial break in "Robot Nicky", the Nick Diamond we saw in the announcer's booth was outed as a robot when Johnny accidentally rips off his face. (Although, him being magnetic was a dead giveaway). As we learn prior to the second fight, Nick skipped work in lieu of taking the vacation to Jamaica the the higher ups vetoed and used a robot to cover for himself.

* RoaringRampageOfRevenge: In the "Kevin Bacon vs. All Comers" fight, upon being told by Nick that he was tricked into coming on the show [[note]] Nick said he and his band, "The Bacon Brothers" could perform a song for the audience. [[/note]], Kevin goes ''nuts'' on Wrestling/JesseVentura (who was previously kicking his ass) by delivering the Fist of Chaos (punching through his chest, and then punching him in the face), climbing through said hole and, after a few more punches, ''[[spoiler:tears Ventura apart]]''.
** [[spoiler:He even wants to continue fighting [[note]] "Who's next?! Christina Ricci? Tom Cruise?!" [[/note]] ... even though a CDM All Comers match has three challengers, and Ventura was the last one.]]
** Pam Anderson's whole reason for fighting [=RuPaul=] is to get back at [=RuPaul=] for making a pass at Pam's then husband Tommy Lee, and [[spoiler:Pam actually wins the fight because [=RuPaul=] made the mistake to do it AGAIN, RIGHT IN FRONT OF PAM.]]

* SanitySlippage: After winning the "TLC vs. Dixie Chicks" fight, [[spoiler:Left-Eye Lopes goes mad with her own ego]], randomly starts talking about herself in third-person, claims to be the queen of the Earth "the snake from whence all creation came", and proclaims that from now on, both eyes will be left.
* SelfDeprecation: Sort-of. You know the "Creator/BillMurray vs. Chris Kattan" fight, which kept bashing Kattan? [[spoiler:[[AsHimself ...care to guess who they got to voice him?]]]]
** This played a part in Rodney Dangerfield's BatmanGambit against Don Rickles, as it forced Don to make better jokes against Rodney than Rodney made about himself (and burn out his material faster). [[spoiler:Became VictorybyEndurance when Don couldn't make good jokes and Rodney lays a NoHoldsBarredBeatdown (Johnny even said Rodney did "rope-a-dope" on Don).]]
* SelfFulfillingProphecy: The main plot of "The Mysterious T" concerns John Edwards predicting a bad fate for Nick, something involving the letter T and some head trauma. After Nostradamus (Edwards' original opponent) flakes on the fight, Nick has to bring in Miss Cleo as a replacement, which nets him a bill of ''$3,784'', which he immediately refuses to pay. Come the end of the episode, [[spoiler:Mr. T shows up, baseball bat in hand, to collect. [[BatterUp Guess what happens next.]]]]
** Interestingly, this was actually zig-zagged, since [[spoiler:Mr. T was ''also'' there because Nick hadn't paid his phone bill in several months]].

* ShoutOut: There have many times the episodes where there are references to the RealLife counterparts

** Music/MarilynManson had one called the Tahitian Skeleton Pull of Death, although it failed to work the second time he tried it (in that case, Music/RickyMartin just bit his hand off). [[spoiler:He won anyway, although [[ItMakesSenseInContext only his hand was declared the winner.]]]]

* SlobsVersusSnobs: The premise for a few fights, including Rosanne Barr vs Kelsey Grammer or the Three Tenors vs the Three Stooges.

** ''WebAnimation/DeathBattle'' can also be considered a spiritual successor, in the sense that two characters from different franchises duke it out in a battle to the death. Death Battle even occasionally uses real life celebrities (such as Justin Beiber vs Rebecca Black) as opposed to only using fictional characters.

** [[spoiler:The Loch Ness Monster kills Bigfoot]] in ''six'' seconds, before the bell rang. The audience were angry at this, and Austin called that match a "six-second suckfest".

** [[spoiler:Pam]] literally did some squashing to beat [[spoiler:Tommy Lee.]]

** The James Van Der Beek vs. Saddam Hussein fight ''definitely'' counts, if only for the conclusion.

** The Spice Girls vs. Hanson fight can only be described as this, since the two compete for the title of "Most Annoying Band In The World." [[spoiler: There's no actual finish, as Marilyn Manson chainsaws off part of the rigging, causing it to crush both bands. He then is interviewed about it where he goes on about being "the most evil man in America."]]
** "Fandemonium IV" concerns Series/{{Survivor}}[[note]]The contestants from the first two seasons are suspended above the ring and are voted in at random by the [=CDM=] audience (In Universe, of course).[[/note]]. This is what Nick has to say right off the bat:
--->'''Nick''': A great choice, Johnny! Everybody knows that [=CBS=] show is stupid. I mean, how can you call a show "Series/{{Survivor}}" when nobody dies?!? The networks may call that entertainment, I call it (gives a double thumbs down) poo.
*** Not to mention the end to the episode, where SoleSurvivor [[spoiler:"Survivor: Outback"'s Tina Wesson]] recalls how much of a dick Jeff Probst was on their season [[spoiler:and burns his face off with a torch]].
** The Shaq vs. Kobe Bryant rematch after the series reboot was quite obviously one to Kobe, the writers showing their clear biased opinions of the whole Kobe rape scandal by having [[spoiler:Shaq effortlessly tear off Kobe Bryant's head within the first few seconds the match starting.]]
* TeensAreMonsters: The entire premise behind the Frankie Muniz vs Robert Iler fight, both of them FormerChildStar going through puberty, simmering in a cocktail of hormones and frustration, facing the possible end of their careers. With the prize of a few extra years of childhood and fame thanks to the Deathmatch Time Machine, you better believe they're prepared to kill.

* TheyKilledKennyAgain: In the first few episodes, Don King would routinely get killed. Eventually, he would enter a Deathmatch of his own (against UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump), [[spoiler:where he would be [[KilledOffForReal killed off for good]].]]

** It also gives us Music/BustaRhymes vs. Creator/WilliamShakespeare, which [[spoiler:Shakespeare wins when Busta runs into the time machine, sending him back to the Bard's time.]]
** [[Wrestling/MickFoley Mankind]] gets to [[spoiler:defeat]] Creator/ErnestHemingway.
** A running gag in the [[{{Uncancelled}} Season 5]] match Creator/AdamWest vs. Creator/ChristianBale was everyone believing that Creator/AdamWest was dead and came back through this, no matter how much he tried to convince them otherwise. He eventually gets fed up with this and [[spoiler:storms off after he wins.]]

* TonightSomeoneDies: Stacey, in one episode, received a prophecy that one of the Deathmatch crew would die before the end of the night. She tried to warn everyone but they laughed it off. By the end of the episode, despite a few close calls, none of the crew was dead, so it seemed like the prophecy was bogus… [[spoiler: until Stacey spontaneously combusted.]]

** The Paul Reubens vs. George Michael fight. Before the fight, Reubens (in character as [[Film/PeeWeesBigAdventure Pee Wee Herman]]) said that the secret word for the fight would be "sucker", and that when he shouted it, the crowd was to start screaming wildly. [[spoiler:Later in the fight, Reubens tricked Michael into [[SchmuckBait taming a tiger and making it go to sleep]]... only for Reubens to shout "Sucker!" Yeah, George kinda deserved that one.]]
** [=RuPaul=] got challenged to a deathmatch by Pamela Anderson for trying to flirt with Pam's husband at the time, [[spoiler:and she decides the best thing to do is to try it again... needless to say, Pam let [=RuPaul=] have it.]]
** Brandy accepted Courtney Love's challenge to a Deathmatch despite not wanting to hurt anyone, because she didn't know what a "Deathmatch" was. [[spoiler:Subverted in that Brandy does end up winning, albeit by accident.]]

* VengefulVendingMachine: The "Prom Night Special" episode has Johnny Gomez announce that there will be two hours detention after the evenings matches for anyone caught tipping over vending machines in the arena lounge, [[KarmicDeath with a cutaway to two teenagers doing exactly that, with one getting crushed to death for his troubles]]

* VictoryByEndurance: [[spoiler:Rodney Dangerfield [[http://liquidtelevision.com/video/celebrity-deathmatch-rodney-dangerfield-vs-don-rickles/ won his "Roast Match"]] against Don Rickles by getting Don to run out of [[TheRoast material,]] when Rodney went on a NoHoldsBarredBeatdown that began with "Okay, Cueball, now it's time to teach YOU some Respect!" Each [[PunctuatedforEmphasis blow was then delivered]] with a letter of "Respect," the final one an uppercut that turned Don into pieces of meat for the grill in the ring.]]

* WhatAnIdiot: Invoked in-universe during the Pink vs Mandy Moore fight. Normally sweet girl Mandy Moore finally snaps, fashioning a giant lollipop into a shiv and looks ready to kill Pink, when Pink instead talks her off the ledge and convinces her to embrace being a good girl and hand her the shiv. Mandy does … only for Pink to remark she did not realize Mandy could be ''that'' stupid before killing her with the same lollipop shiv.

* WildlifeCommentarySpoof: [[Series/CrocodileHunter Steve Irwin]] spends his time in the ring doing a running naturalists' commentary on the Medusa he was ''supposed'' to be fighting. [[spoiler:He has a HeroicBSOD when he accidentally kills her.]]
* WimpFight: Jerry Seinfeld vs. Tim Allen. [[spoiler:Ended with the cast of ''Series/{{Seinfeld}}'' storming the ring to beat up Jerry for canceling the show, which the audience found far more entertaining.]]
** JK Rowling vs Stephen King, until Rowling summons Voldemort. [[spoiler:This leads to Rowling's death by King's [[ItMakesSenseInContext now-animated robotic leg]]]].
* WindbagPolitician: UsefulNotes/FidelCastro is portrayed this way in "[[VacationEpisode Celebrity Deathmatch Internacional]]". Since one of the fights in the episode (Antonio Banderas vs. Cheech Marin) is set in Cuba, Castro is the referee for that match. Before the fight begins, he outlines all the rules that the competitors must follow... which ends up taking several hours and results in Banderas, Marin, the audience, and even Johnny falling asleep.

* WorkedShoot: Creator/GeorgeClooney and Creator/MarkWahlberg try to stage a fake deathmatch for the purposes of [[MoneyDearBoy gambling fraud]], even though they were close friends in real life. This backfires when Creator/PaulNewman and Creator/RobertRedford notice how phony their 'fight' is and challenge them to a real one. [[spoiler:Newman and Redford win.]]
* WritingAroundTrademarks[=/=]YouWannaGetSued: Occurred during the fight between Tobey Maguire and [[PoorMansSubstitute Jake Gyllenhaal]], when the hosts had to avoid making explicit reference to [[Film/SpiderMan2 Doctor Octopus]], who Jake had brought in to attack Tobey. Instead, they referred to him as "a certain eight-armed villain from a certain hit superhero film" (paraphrasing).
* WrongGenreSavvy:

*** Similarly, we have [[spoiler:OJ freaking out over being declared the winner, despite the fact that he was ''allowed'' to kill Namath]].

--->'''Scott Stapp:''' ''(retributing the "favor" to Vedder)'' It's my voice too-ooo-ooo!
** [[spoiler:Vedder eventually wins by scraping Stapp's throat with a piece of barbed wire]], which gives him [[spoiler: a gravelly Music/TomWaits-like voice.]] Unfortunately, [[spoiler:Waits himself is in the crowd, and he promptly gets down to the ring and beats Stapp to a pulp.]]

** In one of the first episodes, Mariah Carey, during her fight with Jim Carrey, sings a ''VERY'' high note [[IncrediblyLongNote for an extended period of time]], much to the displeasure of everyone in the arena. [[spoiler:The intensity of the note cracks the InUniverse cameras and proves to be too much for Jim, whose head expands like a balloon before exploding.]]
** Happens again in Jack Black vs. Jack White, where [[spoiler:Jack White puts a button-up shirt with a slightly small collar on Jack Black, causing his head to explode.]] It's true that some of the fights can have silly and nonsensical endings, but even by Celebrity Deathmatch standards it's pretty ridiculous.
** The fight between David Arquette and Paul Reiser ends when [[spoiler:Arquette jams several cellphones in Reiser's skull, then makes them all ring at the same time. The phones' microwaves cause huge tumors to develop in Reiser's head which then swells and explodes.]] It's actually kind of disturbing.

* HoistByHisOwnPetard:

* TeensAreMonsters: The entire premise behind the Frankie Muniz vs Robert Ile fight, both of them FormerChildStar going through puberty, simmering in a cocktail of hormones and frustration, facing the possible end of their careers. With the prize of a few extra years of childhood and fame thanks to the Deathmatch Time Machine, you better believe they're prepared to kill.

** The-then 12-year old Haley Joel Osment vs Macaulay Culkin, who was ''20!'' Despite being somewhat LighterAndSofter than usual, with the gimmick being that the match was set in a playground like a schoolyard bully fight, it was still a Deathmatch and required a child to fight an adult. Osment managed to win with the help of the ghosts of former Deathmatch competitors who tore Caulkin limb from limb at the end, but it was a close call, since he wasn't a physical match against Caulkin at ALL.

** The-then 12-year old Haley Joel Osment vs Maucaulay Caulkin, who was ''20!'' Despite being somewhat LighterAndSofter than usual, with the gimmick being that the match was set in a playground like a schoolyard bully fight, it was still a Deathmatch and required a child to fight an adult. Osment managed to win with the help of the ghosts of former Deathmatch competitors who tore Caulkin limb from limb at the end, but it was a close call, since he wasn't a physical match against Caulkin at ALL.