Line #258 Main/FateWorseThanDeath


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10	[[quoteright:300:[[ComicBook/{{Fables}} https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/fables_fate_worse_than_death_4.png]]]]
11	[[caption-width-right:300:And then Geppetto became a ''real'' bastard!]]
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16	->''"When I'm through with you, you will beg me to allow you to die."''
17	-->-- '''Count Magnus Lee''', ''Literature/VampireHunterD''
18
19	Think death is the cruelest fate? Think again. There are several things much worse: [[ColdBloodedTorture torture]], [[TheThreeCertaintiesInLife taxes]], [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking and tofu]], to name but a few. More often than not, some unfortunate soul will experience it. Originally, this phrase was used to mean the {{rape\|IsASpecialKindOfEvil}} of virgins in Gibbon's 1781 work ''Decline and Fall of the [[AncientRome Roman Empire]]'', but now there's [[MindRape even]] [[AndIMustScream worse]] [[TransformationHorror than]] that.
20
21	Sometimes, for writers, DeathIsCheap. Or maybe they have children as their intended audience (or a nosy censor) and can't kill off a villain or character. So, they have to get creative with the fate bestowed upon their unfortunate character.
22
23	This phrase is usually used in a JustBetweenYouAndMe moment by the EvilOverlord as they boast about the agony-inducing DeathTrap that awaits the hero for [[DisproportionateRetribution delaying their plans]]. It's also fairly commonly used as a warning to the hero [[YouAreNotReady against seeking forbidden power or knowledge]], and consequently to foreshadow the particular KarmicDeath the villain will suffer because of meddling with the universe's CosmicKeystone.
24
25	The more fantastic the particular setting, the more creative villains (and sometimes heroes) usually get with this trope. If the victim is immortal, this fate may even ''[[WhoWantsToLiveForever replace]]'' death, which might suck royally. For characters who welcome dying (for example, to become martyrs and be posthumously considered heroes), one could invent a lot of ways to prevent their dream from coming true (and sometimes, just for added cruelty, kill them anyway). If the writer believes that a character deserves some LaserGuidedKarma, the fate might be a case of BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor. That is not to mention the tortures so horrible that death seems a mercy and a long-awaited release: {{Mercy Kill}}ings are common when heroes find anyone in this state. If the character can only beg for assisted suicide, ICannotSelfTerminate occurs; if they can act on their own, they are often DrivenToSuicide. Indeed, since all involve choosing death over a given fate, the characters often conclude that death is preferable to ''that'' fate. Contrast CruelAndUnusualDeath, for when the victim instead gets a gruesome death that sucks beyond telling.
26
27	HitThemInThePocketbook may be this for a CorruptCorporateExecutive.
28
29	Compare CruelMercy, EmptyShell, ToThePain, ThePunishment, {{Room 101}}, TailorMadePrison, and CoolAndUnusualPunishment. For extreme examples of this trope, where the victim cannot escape their fate via said preferable death, see AndIMustScream. Not to be confused with AFeteWorseThanDeath, though the two can occasionally overlap.
30
31	[[noreallife]]
32
33	Administrivia/NoRealLifeExamplesPlease. It should also be noted that DoNotTryThisAtHome applies in full in this case. While reality can often suck ''a lot'', using this trope as an excuse for suicide (or simply choosing death when given a choice) is nearly always a wrong answer. That's not even mentioning using MercyKill as an excuse for choosing death for ''someone else'' against their will. Additionally, a lot of people who suffer life-changing accidents like [[EyeScream losing their sight]], their [[TheSpeechless voice]], becoming paraplegic, [[AnArmAndALeg losing a limb]], etc... can move on and cope with their disability and discover a new outlook on life rather than be doomed to despair.
34
35	----
36	!!Example subpages:
37	[[index]]
38	* FateWorseThanDeath/AnimeAndManga
39	* FateWorseThanDeath/ComicBooks
40	* FateWorseThanDeath/FanWorks
41	* [[FateWorseThanDeath/LiveActionFilms Films — Live-Action]]
42	* FateWorseThanDeath/{{Literature}}
43	* FateWorseThanDeath/LiveActionTV
44	* FateWorseThanDeath/MythologyAndReligion
45	* FateWorseThanDeath/TabletopGames
46	* FateWorseThanDeath/VideoGames
47	* {{FateWorseThanDeath/Webcomics}}
48	* FateWorseThanDeath/WebOriginal
49	* FateWorseThanDeath/WesternAnimation
50	[[/index]]
51
52	!!Other examples:
53	[[foldercontrol]]
54
55	[[folder:Advertising]]
56	* An anti-drug PSA showed a young man sitting in a hospital room. He talks about how two years earlier, his brother celebrated his birthday by doing crack with his friend Rick. The camera pans over to show the brother on life support. Before this reveal, the man says "Sometimes, I think Rick was the lucky one. He died."
57	[[/folder]]
58
59	[[folder:Arts]]
60	* The drawing ''Esto es peor ("This is worse")'' by Creator/FranciscoDeGoya from his ''Art/TheDisastersOfWar'' shows the mutilated body of a Spanish fighter spiked on a tree, surrounded by the corpses of French soldiers.
61	[[/folder]]
62
63	[[folder:Audio Plays]]
64	* In ''AudioPlay/ThirtySixQuestions'', Judith claims that having her husband Jase leave her was worse than death. This would be a hyperbole if not for the fact that Judith ''actually knows what death feels like.''
65	-->'''Jase:''' Okay, Question 18: "What is your most terrible memory?"\
66	'''Judith:''' Uh, dying. That was pretty bad. [...] Finding out you skipped town without telling me where you were going super sucked.\
67	'''Jase:''' Okay, gotta pick one.\
68	'''Judith:''' You leaving, then.
69	[[/folder]]
70
71	[[folder:Films -- Animation]]
72	* Happens in many ''Franchise/{{Barbie}}'' movies.
73	** In ''WesternAnimation/BarbieAsRapunzel'', [[BigBad Gothel]] puts a curse on the tower that if anyone with a lying heart is in it, they can never leave. [[HairOfGoldHeartOfGold Rapunzel does not have a lying heart]], but Gothel does, so when Gothel is [[spoiler: tricked into entering the portal to Rapunzel's tower she is trapped there forever]].
74	** In ''WesternAnimation/BarbieofSwanLake'', [[BigBad Rothbart]] is turned into [[spoiler: the cuckoo bird in a cuckoo clock. It's well-deserved, however, after he [[ForcedTransformation turns Odette into a swan and various children into woodland animals against their will]]]].
75	** In In ''WesternAnimation/BarbieAndTheMagicOfPegasus'', Wenlock has a liking for doing this to his victims. He [[spoiler: turns his [[ForcedTransformation wives into pigs]] once they bore him, [[ForcedTransformation turns Brietta into a pegasus]] for refusing to marry him, turns Brietta's parents and the rest of the villagers to stone when her younger sister Annika refuses to marry him, and traps Ferris in the latter's welcome mat]].
76	** In ''WesternAnimation/BarbieInTheTwelveDancingPrincesses'', [[TheVillain Rowena]] tries to [[spoiler: curse Genevieve into "dancing forever and ever" with a magical wish-granting flower. Unfortunately for her, Genevieve uses the fan [[DramaticIrony Rowena gave her]] to blow the spell dust back at Rowena instead. As shown by what happens to her henchman, even someone else physically trying to stop Rowena from dancing can't break the spell]].
77	* In ''WesternAnimation/TheBookOfLife'', unlike the vibrant, unique, and happy Remembered, the Forgotten are all dull, similar, moaning zombies who randomly turn into dust. Made all the worse when you understand that not everyone deserves this fate; it's just what ultimately happens when no one alive knows who you are regardless of your deeds.
78	* In ''WesternAnimation/CorpseBride'', [[spoiler:Lord Barkis]] suffers this when he unwittingly drinks the poisoned wine meant for Victor at the latter's wedding and dies. With him no longer living, the dead swarm him and drag him off to an unseen, but [[NothingIsScarier certainly unpleasant fate]].
79	* In the Red Robin path in ''WesternAnimation/DCShowcaseBatmanDeathInTheFamily'', [[spoiler:if the viewer has Two-Face's coin come up scarred side, Harvey will let Jason live once Jason tells Harv to kill him already, figuring killing Jason would be mercy and that letting Jason live with the guilt of his actions and failure will be worse.]]
80	* Franchise/DisneyAnimatedCanon
81	** In ''WesternAnimation/{{Pinocchio}}'', the boys who end up on PleasureIsland end up making jackasses out of themselves, [[spoiler: as in, [[KarmicTransformation being permanently transformed into donkeys through their drugged beer and cigars whenever they act up.]] The majority of them are then shipped out to the harshest of conditions to work as slave labor and the few that can still talk wind up aware in full of said fate, [[FridgeHorror although you can't help but wonder how much sentience the "lucky" few still possess and how much longer it will last...]]]]
82	** In ''WesternAnimation/TheLittleMermaid1989'', [[spoiler: Ursula invokes this on some of the merfolk by turning them into sea polyps whenever they fail on the contracts that they made with her; though it is more likely that she deliberately sabotages her clients' efforts to uphold their deals, just to satisfy her own power. She even manages to subject King Triton to the same fate by using Ariel as a hostage in order to cement her new role as the unquestionable ruler of the seas. Thankfully, Eric sets the record straight by fatally impaling Ursula, setting all the cursed merfolk (including Triton) free and back to their normal forms.]]
83	** The ArcWords of ''WesternAnimation/AladdinTheReturnOfJafar'' are the Genie Jafar's response to being reminded of his inability to kill: "You'd be surprised what you can live through."
84	*** That's the basis of Jafar's EvilPlan, he states that: "It's not enough that we simply destroy Aladdin. After all, there are things so much worse than death." [[spoiler: It sure is: Aladdin gets framed for supposedly murdering the Sultan and receives the death sentence for it. Not only Aladdin learns that he will be executed, but Jasmine, the love of his life, ordered it. Then, a few seconds before the execution, Aladdin realizes that the one who ordered it was actually Jafar in disguise. Aladdin nearly died not only knowing that his enemy had returned, but having no idea what the latter did with Jasmine, or what he will do to her afterwards. Thankfully, Iago's HeelFaceTurn was enough, not only just to save Aladdin at the last minute, but also to destroy Jafar for good.]]
85	** Hades ultimately is given this at the end of ''WesternAnimation/{{Hercules}}''. After Hercules rescues Megara's soul from The River Styx, he punches the god into the river himself. Being a god, of course, he ''can't'' die, but the last shot of him fighting a losing battle against both the waters' current and the many vengeful, undead souls that drag him further underneath as his minions Pain and Panic watch on, too frightened of him and his wrath to fish him out.
86	** ''WesternAnimation/ThePrincessAndTheFrog'': After [[spoiler:Dr. Facilier]] fails to stop Tiana from destroying his blood talisman, his [[EldritchAbomination "friends"]] arrive to claim their debt by dragging him into their realm, something he is clearly ''very'' terrified of. While otherwise karmic considering he was planning this fate for all New Orleans in the name of profit (both [[WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity figuratively]] and [[{{Greed}} literally]]), it's still, for all intents and purposes, a man being dragged to hell to endure never-ending torture for ''a mistake he made''.
87	** ''WesternAnimation/{{Frozen\|2013}}'': [[spoiler:Prince Hans]] has a somewhat pitiable appearance in ''WesternAnimation/FrozenFever''. For his attempted murder of Anna and Elsa in Arendelle, his family penalized him to forced labor, which includes shoveling horse manure. From the brief look at his condition in the Southern Isles, he's in a bleak and unfriendly environment, with the stables alone looking dark and uninviting.
88	*** The TieInNovel ''Literature/AFrozenHeart'' expands on [[spoiler:Prince Hans's backstory]], showing him panicking when the guards drag him to be deported to the Southern Isles without even seeing Anna and Elsa one last time. He's begging to be let go, not wanting to return to the hellhole he was desperately trying to escape from in the first place. Considering the book expands on his role and reveals more about him than the movie did, it's clear to the reader he will suffer far worse treatment [[spoiler:than he has from his family beforehand, [[FreudianExcuse who were already horrible to him.]]]]
89	** ''WesternAnimation/TheEmperorsNewGroove'' has this humorous example:
90	--->'''Yzma:''' ... Then I bet you weren't expecting ''this!''\
91	''[hikes up her skirt]''\
92	'''Pacha:''' Gaaah! ''[covers his eyes]''\
93	'''Kuzco:''' Nooo!\
94	'''Yzma:''' Ah-HA! ''[reveals a thigh sheath and pulls out a vicious-looking dagger]''\
95	'''Pacha:''' ''Phew.''\
96	'''Kuzco''': Oh, okay.
97	* This is almost definitely the fate of [[spoiler: the Tallest after going through the titular Florpus]] in ''WesternAnimation/InvaderZimEnterTheFlorpus''. The last time we see them, they're stuck in or passing through a hellish-looking dimension surrounded by flames and screaming. Even if they make it out to the other side, who knows how long that would take?
98	* ''WesternAnimation/ParaNorman'': [[spoiler:This is the sad fate of Judge Hopkins and the members of his jury after convicting Agatha to death. Agatha placed a curse upon all seven of them, turning them into zombies. Thus, they spend five hundred years suffering with the knowledge of their mistake. Fortunately, Norman is able to understand them and helps to end the curse, freeing them and allowing them to properly pass on to the afterlife -- though Hopkins isn’t too pleased about what awaits him.]]
99	* Creator/{{Pixar}}
100	** ''Franchise/ToyStory'':
101	*** For toys it is a terrible fate to be forgotten by children, left alone and abandoned without no one to love them. Even getting shelved, like what happened to Woody and Wheezy in ''WesternAnimation/ToyStory2'', is almost as bad.
102	*** Worse is to be tossed into the garbage, as Stinky Pete says, "spending eternity rotting in some landfill." Conscious the entire time, until finally all your plastic parts degrade into a puddle of goo.
103	*** In ''WesternAnimation/ToyStory3'', [[spoiler:Lotso winds up tied to the front of a garbage truck by a truck driver who had a Lots o'-Huggin'-Bear as a kid, with other more decayed toys strapped to the truck to show Lotso what's ultimately in store for him]]. The previous {{Big Bad}}s, [[EnfantTerrible Sid]] and [[WellIntentionedExtremist Stinky Pete]], received [[HumiliationConga crushing defeats]] but ultimately wound up better off, but this guy was so [[KnightOfCerebus extra evil]] that he was given this fate instead.
104	** This is implied to be [[spoiler: [[BigBad Ernesto de la Cruz's]]]] fate at the end of ''WesternAnimation/{{Coco}}''. After it is revealed that [[spoiler: he [[EtTuBrute murdered his best friend Hector to steal the songs]] he used to achieve his fame in life and the afterlife, the people of both the living and dead worlds learn the truth, and he loses his fame, respect, legacy, and fans.]] He will likely spend the rest of his time in the afterlife alone, and shunned, until the day there is no one left alive that remembers him or the things he did, and he [[DeaderThanDead fades away]].
105	* Discussed [[spoiler: but ultimately averted]] in ''WesternAnimation/Shrek1'' by [[BigBad Lord Farquaad]], who upon Fiona's true form being revealed, had his guards seize her and Shrek. He then said that while Shrek would be tortured, namely [[AnArmAndALeg drawn and quartered]] and that he'd ''beg'' for death to save him, she would be given [[SealedRoomInTheMiddleOfNowhere the same fate]] she had already endured at the beginning of the film.
106	[[/folder]]
107
108	[[folder:Jokes]]
109	* There's a joke of a movie that was so bad that the audience walked out... when it was shown on an airplane.
110	[[/folder]]
111
112	[[folder:Music]]
113	* Music/CreatureFeature's aptly named song "A Fate Worse Than Death", which is actually not so much about this trope but more about how incredibly many horrible ways to die there really are, and yet that the fact that you'll be dead afterwards means your fate was still much better than the one this trope entails.
114	* Inverted with Elvis Costello's "Senior Service," about workplace dysfunction, saying it's "a death that's worse than fate."
115	* A song called "Johnny I Hardly Knew Ye", tells about a soldier (named Johnny), who came home alive from a war, but is so horribly disfigured and crippled that even his family could not recognize him. Since he can no longer walk or use his arms and hands, they decided to have him beg on the streets (Ye're an armless, boneless, chickenless egg Ye'll have to put with a bowl out to beg). The lyrics said very pleasing things about his loss of legs and arms (Where are your legs that used to run, hurro, hurro; Ye haven't an arm, ye haven't a leg, hurroo, hurroo), him being overly skinny (So low in flesh, so high in bone).
116	* The song "One" by Music/{{Metallica}} details the life of a soldier, after he loses all his limbs, his sight, his speech, and his hearing due to a landmine. He has machines that breathe for him, and so he's unable to die. His mind functions perfectly, leaving him a prisoner in his own body.
117	-->Darkness, imprisoning me! All I see, absolute horror! I cannot live, I cannot die! Trapped in myself, body my holding cell!
118	* Music/{{Vocaloid}}:
119	** In "Hitobashira Alice (Alice Human Sacrifice)", the Third Alice is condemned to live forever seeing herself as a decaying body, as a punishment for fooling and using people to become a queen. Whether it was an illusion or if she was constantly decaying until she rotted completely is debatable; either way, both punishments are valid for this trope.
120	** Len's fate in the song "Re_Birthday" (which is very possibly a continuation of the [[Music/{{Mothy}} Evil Series]]). He is doomed to spend eternity in an empty room with his hands bound in red handcuffs (representing bloodshed) and his ankles bound in blue shackles (representing tears spilled), all while reliving the sins he committed in his life. It's made a little more jarring in that [[GodSaveUsfromtheQueen Rin]], who ordered him to commit all of those atrocities to begin with, [[KarmaHoudini gets off essentially scot-free]]. [[spoiler:In the end, it's her [[MagicMusic lullaby]] that ends up saving him, and [[EarnyourHappyEnding they get to be reincarnated as twins, just as they had wished]].]]
121	* Depending on how you look at it, the fate of the doctor's wife (and possibly the doctor himself) from a song of the same name by The Clockwork Quartet. The lyrics are written as entries in the doctor's journal, detailing his beloved wife's slow death by an incurable disease. He becomes more and more obsessive in his attempts to save her, until he has sacrificed his business and his entire life in order to keep her alive... to no avail. By the last stanza she has died, but the doctor replaced her heart with a mechanical device that keeps her other organs alive. The doctor is completely maddened by his tragic inability to let her go, and his wife is kept in a permanent state between life and death, unable to simply pass away because he won't let her.
122	* "And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda" by Music/EricBogle (and later covered by Music/ThePogues), about a young Australian rover sent off to the [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarI Battle of Gallipoli]]:
123	-->''Then a big Turkish shell knocked me arse over tit, \
124	And when I woke up in my hospital bed \
125	[[AnArmAndALeg And saw what it had done]], I wished I was dead—\
126	Never knew there were worse things than dying.''
127	* Mentioned in "Keep Quiet" by Music/TheProtomen. 'They say, this city, she's been dead for years now, so death is not something that scares me. There's worse things than death here.'
128	* Many descriptions of the fates of the Egyptian dead in Music/{{Nile}} songs contain this element. Some of these souls can get particularly unlucky and wind up in AndIMustScream situations.
129	* The eponymous pirate in Music/{{Alestorm}}'s ''Captain Morgan's Revenge'' curses his mutinous crew to this: "As sure as hell's my final fate, you'll all soon die or worse!"
130	* The Song That Never Ends.
131	-->''This is the song that never ends \
132	It just goes on and on my friend \
133	One day I started singing it, I don't know what it was \
134	'''[[FridgeHorror And I will keep on singing it forever]]''' just because\
135	This is the song that never ends...''
136	* The novelty song "The Thing" is about a man who finds a box containing unidentified contents and being stuck with it for the rest of his life because everyone he shows it to turn him away in disgust, including a shopkeeper he tried to sell the box to, his own wife and [[EvenBeggarsWontChooseIt a hobo asking for a handout]]. In the penultimate verse, it is shown that not even death will allow the man to be rid of the box, as St. Peter refuses to allow him into Heaven and orders him to take the box with him to Hell just because he had the box in his possession. The man then ends the song with one last verse warning the listener that they should never pick up any strange boxes they happen to find on the beach, or else they too will be stuck with it for eternity and unable to get rid of it.
137	[[/folder]]
138
139	[[folder:Philosophy]]
140	* Philosopher Nick Bostrom classifies [[ApocalypseHow doomsday scenarios]] into four categories. The first two, ”bangs” and “whimpers”, are situations in which everybody dies, the difference being whether it’s instantaneous or drawn-out. But the other two, “crunches” and “shrieks”, are basically fates worse than death for ''all humanity''. Crunches are the less bad of the two, indicating that human culture and scientific knowledge have gone backwards and cannot recover. But shrieks are the worst of all, being when human nature itself has changed to make virtue impossible, but mankind lingers on as some [[TranshumanTreachery posthuman]] [[HumanoidAbomination abomination]].
141	[[/folder]]
142
143	[[folder:Stand-Up Comedy]]
144	* Creator/JohnPinette, a BigEater, once went to the doctor for a checkup and found out he had a gluten allergy. After being told what kinds of food he'd have to stop eating, he started desperately begging the doctor to "Check again! Maybe it's just cancer!"
145	[[/folder]]
146
147	[[folder:Visual Novels]]
148	* ''Euphoria'': Almost all of the girls are trapped in one at the end of the [[EarnYourBadEnding "Brute End"]]. For those not squeamish, [[spoiler:they end up as mutilated and mind-broken {{Sex Slave}}s]]. It really says something that the one who fell victim to a CruelAndUnusualDeath can be considered to be ''the lucky one''.
149	* ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight'' has the Fate Route and what happened to the other survivors of the fire ten years ago. On a [[BlatantLies completely unrelated note]] [[SchmuckBait one wonders what's]] [[BodyHorror under the]] [[AndIMustScream church]]... Makes it worse that Shiro ''must'' to visit it [[spoiler: and see the "survivors" barely alive after being turned into [[PoweredByAForsakenChild Gilgamesh's sources of mana]]]], unless the player wants him [[HaveANiceDeath to get storyline killed.]]
150	** Additionally, Archer considers his fate as a Counter-Guardian to be this, constantly forced to go against his ideals, saving the many by sacrificing the few. [[spoiler: Just like [[GenerationXerox his dear old Daddy, Kiritsugu]].]]
151	* ''VisualNovel/TheFruitOfGrisaia'': Every route in the novel has a bad ending, but only two of them could be clearly considered as worse than death.
152	** [[spoiler:One is Makina's, where witnessing protagonist Yuuji's death causes her to snap, keeping his rotting body in a garbage bag, talking to him as he was still alive.]]
153	** [[spoiler:The other is Michiru's case, where her attempted suicide causes her to suffer permanent brain damage, leaving her with [[EmptyShell no sense of self]], and Yuuji to live out the rest his life with her and the knowladge that he could not help her, twisting the knife further, Michiru shows signs that she is still vaguely aware that she loves Yuuji.]]
154	* One of the antagonists of ''VisualNovel/NineHoursNinePersonsNineDoors'', despite being (likely) the worst character in the game, survives, while the ones that weren't as bad as [[spoiler: him]] were brutally killed. It turns out that [[spoiler: Akane's plan was to have him be exposed publicly for his crimes, something that he, Ace, deems A Fate Worse Than Death.]]
155	* Fates Worse than Death are disturbingly common in ''VisualNovel/SayaNoUta''. The protagonist, Fuminori, is unable to see the world as anything other than [[EvilIsVisceral a mess of infected-looking flesh]] and so finds himself trying to figure out a painless way to die before meeting the eponymous Saya. [[spoiler:While all of the series' characters other than Saya end up insane, suicidal, or some combination of the two depending on the ending, Yoh Tsukuba is probably the most notable example. While simply seeing Saya can drive most people completely insane, Yoh is mutilated and tortured by her until, over the course of twenty hours, she becomes one of the same species that Saya belongs to. By the time Koji accidentally kills her, it's very clear that death is what she wants]].
156	[[/folder]]
157
158	[[folder:Web Animation]]
159	* Lampshaded with Colin Hunt in Season 7 of ''WebVideo/ArbyNTheChief''. Being part of an evil clan alongside sadist [[BigBad Eugene]] and psychopath [[TheBrute Tyler]], Colin is revealed to be [[PaedoHunt a pedophile]]. Also by the season's end, [[spoiler:Eugene commits suicide and Tyler is shot and killed by a cop]]. Colin is still alive, but thanks to Arbiter and Master Chief's intervention is now rotting in prison for a LONG TIME.
160	-->'''Arbiter:''' Not sure how long Colin will be imprisoned for, but due to the fact that he's a white, introverted software nerd and a kid fucker, [[PariahPrisoner he'll likely be targeted by his inmates]] for rape and [[PrisonRape sold as a cell bitch]] for a pack of smokes.
161	* ''WebAnimation/BrokenSaints'': Oran's speech to the defeated scumbag Mars in Chapter 19, Act 3: "I have seen you scum -- staked to the ground at night -- belly and manhood split wide, wailing as jagged beaks tear and peck -- as a million insect jaws carve the pulp. And when morning comes, I am standing over your seeping husk. You cannot turn from the horror. You cannot stop the rising sun that burns you into blindness. You cannot close your eyes... '''''for I am feasting on their lids.'''''
162	* At the end of his ''WebAnimation/DeathBattle'', Starscream's [[OurSoulsAreDifferent spark]] is last seen interred within Rainbow Dash's belly. In an Q&A, it is stated he is still alive, but the only machinery in Equestria is a sewing machine. Boomstick even lampshades this trope afterwards.
163	** Another example is the Thanos vs Darkseid battle. Thanos is invited into Darkseid's home dimension and learns the hard way that the Infinity Gauntlet won't work outside of his own universe and he can't outright give Darkseid's true form the Snap. Darkseid puts Thanos through the Omega Sanction where he'll be subjected to fates and deaths each more humiliating than the last, starting with Deadpool making out with Death and shooting the Mad Titan dead with a common gun.
164	* In the ''WebAnimation/HomestarRunner'' cartoon ''Doomy Tales of the Macabre'', Strong Sad takes the role of a ''Tales from the Crypt''-esque storyteller and gives each of the other residents of Free Country, USA a terrible, ironic doom in the vein of this trope... That is, except for Coach Z.
165	-->'''Coach Z:''' Hey, what about ''my'' doom?\
166	'''Strong Sad:''' Um... You're ''already'' Coach Z. No sense in beating a dead horse.\
167	'''Coach Z:''' Hey, good point!
168	* ''WebAnimation/OverlySarcasticProductions'': {{Discussed}} in the ''Trope Talk'' episode "Fates Worse Than Death", where Red goes through the most common examples of this trope. She also makes the observation that this trope, as racked with FridgeHorror as it is, is nevertheless incredibly common in children's media; by their very definition, fates worse than death ''aren't'' death, so they come to take the place of actual character death in any work for young audiences that adheres to NeverSayDie.
169	* Hopper 006 in the ''[[WebAnimation/SodorTheEarlyYears Sodor: The Modern Years]]'' episode "Endgame" is turned into a waste metal truck, as punishment for inciting the trucks on the Little Western Brachline to act up.
170	* In ''WebAnimation/{{RWBY}}'', there is Curse of CompleteImmortality and Reincarnations, both of which were bestowed ironically by the God of Light. First, being unable to die through mortal means unless you discover the importance between life and death. And the second is that your soul would be transferred into some poor unfortunate person who happens to be "like-minded" like the person in question when the last one dies until the two souls become one person, thus the next vessel loses their individuality, which is something which won't end until the god removes it.
171	** Salem, the BigBad was someone who spent most of her life alone, without love or freedom until Ozma rescued, then gave her both. However, after his death due to an illness, because she tried deceiving the gods to revive him, Salem was then turned immortal, this kept her from reuniting with Ozma even in the afterlife. After rebelling against the Brothers Gods in retaliation, with some Humans, the God of Darkness erased all Humanity, leaving Salem alive and alone on a barren planet (until humanity returned and evolved again), with nothing aside from soulless creatures, her final suicide attempt, which turned her into a monster no different from them. In the end, she lost her sole reason for doing all this and even her daughters, leaving her as nothing but a woman who wants nothing more than to die and find peace.
172	** Ozma, the BigGood was turned into a reincarnator, entrusting with a mission to "redeem" the current humanity for the Gods, in an attempt to see Salem again. Realizing the monster Salem turned into and the death of their children, leading to a series of depressed past lives until he realized that his former love couldn't be destroyed and his sole mission became almost impossible to accomplish as long as she intervened. And let's not forget over a thousand years numerous hosts lost what was pretty much their lives, which was soon overtaken by all of them becoming Ozma as a result.
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176	* Jim Jum from ''WebVideo/SkyblockButEvery30SecondsARandomItemSpawns''. Sentenced to hang for eternity in the sky. [[spoiler: Made worse for the fact he's hanging for a crime he [[MiscarriageOfJustice did not commit]] and when Wilbur tries to free him he dies an UndignifiedDeath.]]
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Context Main / FateWorseThanDeath