Line #82 Main/SerialKillerKiller


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18
19	->'''Harry Morgan:''' Son, there are people out there who do really bad things. Terrible people. And the police can't catch them all. Do you understand what I'm saying?\
20	'''Dexter Morgan:''' You're saying...they deserve it.
21	-->-- ''Series/{{Dexter}}''
22
23	A violent, psychotic killer with a FreudianExcuse gets sick pleasure out of the suffering of their victims. It sounds like they're your basic SerialKiller, right?
24
25	They would be, but instead of terrorizing the innocent, the Serial-Killer Killer terrorizes the guilty. They spend their life tracking down serial killers so that they can give them justice. In short, they are a vigilante, who thinks themselves divine justice incarnate. For this reason, [[PoeticSerialKiller they kill serial killers in the same way that said serial killers would kill their own victims]].
26
27	Distinct from HeWhoFightsMonsters, because He Who Fights Monsters is more about good characters turning evil in the process of hunting evil, whereas this is more about someone who is evil, or crazy, or both from the outset. Arguably, they can be ChaoticGood and be an AntiHero, although they walk a VERY thin line between that and KnightTemplar.
28
29	SubTrope of VillainKiller. See also SmitingEvilFeelsGood, VigilanteExecution, VigilanteMan, KnightTemplar, PayEvilUntoEvil, HunterOfHisOwnKind, TheKillerBecomesTheKilled, NinetiesAntiHero, BullyHunter, DefendsAgainstTheirOwnKind, and AssholeVictim. Compare with the similarly named WifeBasherBasher, which they often are too. Also compare SympatheticMurderer. Contrasts BountyHunter and ProfessionalKiller, while they may also hunt serial killers, they are OnlyInItForTheMoney.
30
31	!!As this is a {{Death Trope\|s}}, [[Administrivia/SpoilersOff unmarked spoilers abound]]. [[Administrivia/YouHaveBeenWarned Beware]].
32	[[noreallife]]
33	----
34	!!Examples:
35	[[foldercontrol]]
36
37	[[folder:Anime & Manga]]
38	* ''Franchise/DOTHack'': Haseo, nicknamed "Terror of Death" due to his insistence on killing [[PlayerKilling PKers]] (which makes him a [=PKer-Ker=]).
39	* ''Manga/AnaSatsujin'': Rio mainly kills criminals, though she hates police and makes an exception for them. She will technically kill anyone she feels like, which includes her boyfriend.
40	* ''Literature/{{Baccano}}'': Vino is an incredibly violent assassin, and generally prefers to kill by smashing his targets' faces into the ground from a moving train. However, he takes pride in only killing other criminals, and refuses to do jobs on people who are not guilty. In its main plot aboard the Flying Pussyfoot, Vino actually can be considered the most heroic of those involved, as his brutal murder spree only involves the cultists and gangsters who were trying to harm the passengers. He even saves the [[ThoseTwoGuys comic relief]] from certain death.
41	* ''Manga/BrutalSatsujinKeisatsukanNoKokuhaku'': The protagonist, Dan Hiroki, is a detective who takes it upon himself to enact sadistic, lethal, and often [[DeathByIrony ironic]] punishments on people he believes to either have a good chance of dodging the law or are doing reprehensible things that aren't illegal.
42	* ''Manga/CodeBreaker''. Some of the Code Breakers recognize that they are evil themselves, though.
43	* ''Franchise/{{Danganronpa}}'': Both Takumi Hijirihara[=/=]Manga/KillerKiller and [[VisualNovel/Danganronpa2GoodbyeDespair Sparkling Justice]] (who are hinted, but not confirmed to be [[TwoAliasesOneCharacter the same person]]) exclusively kill criminals. [[spoiler: ''Killer Killer'' also has Fujigawa, Hijirihara's ChildhoodFriend who also became this but for the opposite reason, as Takumi enjoyed killing people who deserved it while Fujigawa was a ReluctantWarrior and WellIntentionedExtremist [[TheEvilsOfFreeWill who wanted to rid the world of violence]].]]
44	* ''Manga/DeadMountDeathPlay'': Misaki is an assassin well-known in the underground for the fact that she only kills mobsters and other killers. This is not because she has any actual compunction against killing "Good People", it's just she'd never taken a contract one until Polka.
45	* ''Manga/DeathNote'': Almost all incarnations of Kira fall under this trope, with the exception of the one profit-driven CorruptCorporateExecutive. Most notably, the main character [[Characters/DeathNoteLightYagami Light Yagami]] is a mix of KnightTemplar and AGodAmI, believing that he will become the "god of the new world" by completely eradicating the world's criminals. True to the series' penchant of showing what happens to HeWhoFightsMonsters, a good number of the Kiras [[JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope Jump Off the Slippery Slope]] into KnightTemplar (such as Light himself) or just plain AxCrazy (such as Mikami) territory.
46	* ''Anime/EdenOfTheEast'': Diana, Selacao number 11 hunts rapists and dispatches them by castration via cigar cutter.
47	* ''Literature/TheGardenOfSinners'': Both [[OccultDetective Shiki]] and [[RapeAndRevenge Fujino]] . This is part of the reason why the part of the story where they fight is the only one where both antagonists get out okay, more or less. (Well, that and the one where the antagonist has MindControl to stop Shiki from attacking him…)
48	* ''Anime/IDInvaded'': Akihito Narihisago is in Kura Prison because he shot the Challenger, who was a serial killer. He has also talked other serial killers into suicide while at the prison as well.
49	* William of ''Manga/MoriartyThePatriot'' targets abusers who are largely immune from the formal legal system, but most often his victims are serial killers.
50	* ''Manga/{{Murcielago}}'': Kuroko has murdered 725 people, and the only reason she hasn't been given the death sentence is so she can kill other mass murderers.
51	[[/folder]]
52
53	[[folder:Card Games]]
54	* ''TabletopGame/MagicTheGathering'': The [[https://scryfall.com/card/eld/95/malevolent-noble Malevolent Noble]] preys on child-eating witches, having killed a dozen of them by luring them with the promise of children's bones.
55	[[/folder]]
56
57	[[folder:Comic Books]]
58	* Creator/DCComics:
59	** ''ComicBook/{{Batman}}'': Creator/FrankMiller's Batman. Regular Batman spends his life fearing that he [[HeWhoFightsMonsters may become this if he ever loses control]].
60	*** In the ''ComicBook/BatmanVampire'' trilogy, ''Crimson Mist'' — the third volume in the trilogy — basically turns Batman into this after he succumbs to his thirst for blood, only just able to control his new urges by focusing only on killing his homicidal enemies who are themselves killers. He explicitly muses at one point that the inmates of Blackgate Prison are mostly only in for theft or less and don't deserve his kind of death.
61	** ComicBook/LadyShiva is a vicious BloodKnight who revels in death and chaos, but most of her victims are other assassins. This isn’t so much because of any moral judgement, as Shiva doesn't really care about such things, but simply because they provide the most challenge to kill.
62	* ''ComicBook/HackSlash'': Cassie Hack is a former FinalGirl who becomes a slasher-hunter. In one of the later comics, she's even referred to by a talk radio host as the "SKK". Samhain doesn't see the difference between her and any other slasher, a sentiment Cassie ''really'' doesn't appreciate.
63	* ''Franchise/MarvelUniverse'':
64	** For a time, ComicBook/{{Morbius}} would only drink the blood of criminals.
65	** Night Raven, from Marvel UK (though his stories take place mostly in the US), has targeted serial murderers, including an unauthorized successor to his mantle, Howard Bates, who had admired Night Raven as a child.
66	** ComicBook/ThePunisher hunts and kills as many criminals as he can. Currently he's killed over 48,000.
67	** The Scourge of the Underworld is an entire organization of these — though only a scant handful of its victims are actual killers.
68	** ComicBook/{{Venom}}, the Lethal Protector, from ComicBook/SpiderMan.
69	* ''Franchise/{{Predator}}'': Creator/AndrewVachss wrote a story where a Predator targeted serial murderers.
70	%%* ''ComicBook/SinCity'': Marv becomes this in "The Hard Goodbye".
71	* ''ComicBook/{{Spawn}}'': In an early story, Spawn tracks down a child predator who lures kids to their deaths with an ice cream truck. He then proceeds to kill him by stabbing him to death with ice cream bars.
72	%%** Suture from ''Curse of Spawn''.
73	* ''ComicBook/{{Twister}}'' features someone who slays serial murderers by twisting their heads around.
74	%%* ''ComicBook/TheUnforgiving'': Sinéad Harkin and the servants of Mother Maiden (the base for Music/WithinTemptation's album of the same name) are very much this.%%How?
75	[[/folder]]
76
77	[[folder:Fan Works]]
78	* Creator/AAPessimal: A new generation of Assassins think like this. They are not evil or psychopathic and in many respects are well-adjusted rational people — well, ladies. But this group of Assassins have decided on what they call Ethical Assassination. They still want the money and the contract fees and they respect the rules. Especially the Guild maxim of ''nil mortifi sine lucre''. But they exploit the latitude offered by being able to pick and choose their contacts and only choose clients whose passing will make the Disc a little bit cleaner. One informal "firm" is dubbed ''The Marriage Guidance Counsellors'', for instance: whatever the reason might officially be, these Lady Assassins choose only men with a reputation for things like wife-beating, rape, or child abuse. Then deal with it decisively. A [[LittleMissBadass younger]] [[BadassIsraeli Cenotian]] Assassin takes pleasure in targeting people who get anti-Cenotic. This adds retribution and job satisfaction to her contract fee.
79	* ''Fanfic/{{Gemini}}'': Captain June Harper is a dishonorably discharged former Time Agent now on the run from charges of PoliceBrutality and vigilante murder. She despises the concept of innocent people suffering, but the {{Hero Protagonist}}s who travel with her are consistently horrified by the ways in which she kills the people who threaten said innocents. TheLancer Damien [[DiscussedTrope claims that the only reason why he and the other heroes support her]] — even as they are hunted by the universe's law enforcement agencies for aiding and abetting a SuperVillain — is because she HatesBeingAlone and would just make new friends if she didn't have the heroes. They don't see themselves as supporting June Harper as a serial killer so much as they see themselves as distracting her from [[DarkMessiah starting an army of Serial-Killer Killers.]]
80	* Deconstructed in ''Fanfic/TheKillerRarityverse''. Fraught with murderous urges, Rarity tries to reconcile her heroic position with them by only hunting and killing villains. However, feeding the fire only makes her desires worse, and before long she's finding excuses to kill even the slightest of jerks. The kill that finally gets her caught and tried is [[spoiler: Iron Will]], who she murdered for making her friend cry with overzealous but well intentioned words.
81	[[/folder]]
82
83	[[folder:Films -- Animation]]
84	* ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeagueGodsAndMonsters'' depicts an alternate continuity of the Franchise/DCUniverse where ComicBook/{{Batman}}, instead of being Bruce Wayne, is Kirk Langstrom, a scientist who accidentally turned himself into a vampire while trying to cure himself of lymphoma (much like ComicBook/{{Morbius}}). He deals with the resulting BloodLust he suffers by feeding on mobsters and psychopaths. [[ActorAllusion Amusingly enough, he is voiced by]] Series/{{Dexter}}'s [[Creator/MichaelCHall actor.]]
85	[[/folder]]
86
87	[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]
88	* ''Film/{{Captivity}}'': The FinalGirl becomes one of these in an alternate ending.
89	* ''Film/TheCrow'': The title character, though not just any serial killer will do. [[RapeAndRevenge It's personal.]]
90	* ''Film/FinalGirl'': Veronica is specifically raised to ruthlessly hunt down serial killers.
91	* ''Film/HardCandy'': Hayley turns out to be a variant who targets child molesters rather than serial killers.
92	* ''Film/{{Holidays}}'': Jean of ''New Year's Eve'' unknowingly becomes one, as her date Reggie is a SerialKiller, whom she kills (as a serial killer herself).
93	* The eponymous ''Film/JohnDoeVigilante'', who spends his nights killing child molesters/abusers, rapists, and abusive husbands/boyfriends, culminating in the man who killed his wife and daughter (the very thing that spurred his killing spree).
94	* ''Film/JuliaX'': Julia and Jessica hunt and kill sexual predators. However, Jessica turns out to have a dangerously loose definition of 'sexual predator'.
95	* ''Film/SevenPsychopaths'': Zachariah Rigby and his girlfriend Maggie. They even caught the Zodiac killer!
96	* ''Film/SuspectZero'': Ben O'Ryan, who kills serial killers across the US. He knows about them due to having PsychicPowers. His goal is to find Suspect Zero, an undetected serial killer who's murdered all over the country. In the alternate ending, Mackelway becomes this too.
97	[[/folder]]
98
99	[[folder:Literature]]
100	* The hidden killer in ''Literature/AndThenThereWereNone'' lures other people who had killed and escaped justice from the legal system to an island and kills them one by one, as a result of his MoralSociopathy manifesting as an urge to kill living things combined with a strong sense of justice preventing him from going after innocents.
101	* ''Literature/BadMonkeys'': The main character claims to be a member of a secret organization devoted to killing people who are just plain evil and unredeemable. Of course, she could be lying. [[MindScrew Or not]].
102	%%* ''Literature/TheBishopMurderCase'': Literature/PhiloVance.
103	* ''Literature/{{Dexter}}'': The novels go a bit further than the show — not only do we have Dexter, the two children who he is raising are damaged in much the same way he is. He is trying to teach them to be like him, so as to prevent them from becoming even worse.
104	* ''Literature/ADowryOfBlood'': Constanta, upon becoming a vampire, decides to dedicate herself to killing and feeding off the most odious or evil of society. Her victims range from rapists, killers and war profiteers to just general AssholeVictims like people who would spit on a beggar or harass and grab a woman.
105	* ''Literature/TheFifthWoman'': The murderer turns out to be a rare female example of this trope.
106	* ''Literature/TheGirlFromTheWell'': The titular ghost Okiku hunts and kills serial killers who murder children.
107	* ''Franchise/HannibalLecter'': Hannibal Lecter, a cannibalistic serial killer with a sizable body count of his own, at times goes after other killers when he is not locked up, including Nazi war criminal Vladis Grutas in ''Literature/HannibalRising'' and disfigured paedophile Mason Verger in ''Literature/{{Hannibal}}''.
108	* ''Literature/IAmNotASerialKiller'': John Cleaver is this, with the added twist that the killers he hunts are not human.
109	* ''Literature/TheLaundryFiles'': In ''The Rhesus Chart'', Bob has a low opinion of vampire hunters for this reason. He notes that vampires are serial killers by necessity (they can't go more than six months between victims lest the extra-dimensional parasites that empower them start feeding on their brains), but "A VampireHunter is a serial killer who hunts serial killers." He even compares them to [[Series/{{Dexter}} Dexter Morgan]].
110	* ''Literature/LostAndGoneForever'': In an ironic twist, UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper turns out to be this in one of the epilogues. Not because he has any moral qualms about the murderer, but because their activities threaten Jack's [[RetiredMonster peaceful retirement]].
111	* ''Literature/ReginasSong'': All of the victims had criminal records to some degree, but the one the killer was explicitly looking for while she thinned out Seattle's rapist population was a serial killer. At her trial, one of the witnesses remarks that there was a perverse charm in one serial killer dying at the hands of another.
112	* ''Literature/TheSerialKillersClub'': Jeff Povey's point of view character manages to be invited into the titular organization after he takes down a serial killer... and begins to kill off the membership, one by one. He ''says'' he's not a serial killer himself... but he kills again and again...
113	* ''Literature/TheTwilightSaga'': Edward Cullen spent a few years killing serial killers, during his "rebellious" phase against Carlisle's vegetarian vampirism philosophy.
114	* ''Literature/TheVampireChronicles'': Some vampires tend to be this. Post-Akasha Lestat mostly kills and drinks mobsters, muggers, and the like… but sometimes cannot control himself and kills someone he deems particularly impressive. Another vampire, Pandora, when we meet her, is hunting a drug dealer.
115	%%* ''Literature/WatchMe'': Jay Fletcher.
116	* ''Literature/{{Worm}}'': [[AllYourPowersCombined Glaistig Uaine]] spent much of her pre-teen life hunting down and killing some of the most powerful supervillains on the planet, including [[TimeMaster Gray Boy]].
117	[[/folder]]
118
119	[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
120	* ''Series/AndThenThereWereNone2015'': Wargrave is a literal one in the backstory, as Edward Seton undergoes AdaptationalVillainy to become a genuine serial killer.
121	* ''Series/{{Angel}}'': After Angel gets his soul back, Darla accuses him of being this when he tries to win her back. She says that while he ''has'' been killing, it's only been "murderers and rapists." Then she tried to make him [[IfYoureSoEvilEatThisKitten kill a baby]] to prove himself.
122	* ''Series/AshVsEvilDead'': [[Franchise/EvilDead Ashley Williams]] has gained quite the reputation as a SerialKiller who leaves bodies dismembered and blasted beyond recognition, all of which is true… except for the fact the people he kills are [[DemonicPossession possessed people or corpses]] that gleefully slaughter anyone who gets in their way ForTheEvulz. Ash himself lacks any traits of a SerialKiller, however, and is more of an insane DirtyOldMan. {{Lampshaded}} in the aptly-named "Killer of Killers".
123	-->'''Ash:''' (having just killed a Deadite in front of the cop convinced he was a murderer) I told you: I kill killers.
124	* ''Series/{{Bones}}'': Jacob Broadsky, who first kills the serial killer Heather "The Gravedigger" Taffet, then several other criminals. He’s the dark Booth, holding to his own sense of justice as opposed to Booth's belief in the system.
125	** Broadsky's claims and beliefs are undermined by the fact that he often kills innocent people because they were in some sense impeding his own efforts, ranging from killing a woman to get her apartment because it provided a good view to killing 'squintern' Vincent Nigel-Murray because he mistook the young man for Booth through an infra-red camera.
126	* ''Series/{{Dexter}}'': [[Characters/DexterDexterMorgan Dexter Morgan]] realizes that he's evil, but has been programmed to [[EvenEvilHasStandards live within a]] [[LawfulEvil set of standards]] that are supposed to place him above common murderers. He sometimes allows himself to fantasize that he is a dark avenger of the innocent. Occasionally, when his target reveals that their victim had it coming too (such as a gay boy who killed his gay-bashers before they killed him), Dexter forces his need to go unsated that night.
127	* ''Series/DoctorWho'': In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E7AGoodManGoesToWar A Good Man Goes to War]]", Madame Vastra, a Silurian living in Victorian London, ''eats'' UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper, apparently with Inspector Abberline's blessing. [[ToServeMan Her species naturally preys on primates]], so this trope gives her an at least quasi-legal source of food.
128	* ''Series/{{Hannibal}}'':
129	** Hannibal Lecter is an unrepentant serial killer, but he also murders other serial killers such as Tobias, Georgia, and the "muralist" in the course of the show. He subverts this trope, however, since he kills the above serial killers to, respectively, defend himself, to destroy evidence of his own crimes, or to express his artistic side and respect for the killer's work.
130	** Will Graham has a touch of this trope played straight. Every person he's tried to kill (with or without success) was a serial killer. It's in his job to catch them, but Will ''enjoys'' killing in a way that both terrifies and thrills him. It's ambiguous about how much this comes from HeWhoFightsMonsters and how much is naturally there inside Will.
131	* ''Series/TheILand'': Hayden was imprisoned because she went around murdering sex offenders as a vigilante killer. This leads to her own death after she kills Brody for assaulting Chase and K.C.
132	* ''Series/TheInside'': "Prefiler"'s titular character, played by a pre-''Series/{{Lost}}'' Michael Emerson, profiles potential serial killers, tracks them down before they get a chance to kill, and kills them using their own intended methods.
133	* ''Series/LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'': One episode has a woman who can't handle that she killed a torturous murderer.
134	* ''Series/MurderOne'': Clifford Banks is a subversion: although most of his victims were unconvicted serial killers, his first-ever victim was his brother, whose murder he forgot and mentally pinned on a burglar. Ironically, this is what led him on the killer-killing path.
135	* ''Series/TheOuterLimits1995'': "[[Recap/TheOuterLimits1995S2E1AStitchInTime A Stitch in Time]]" has an unbalanced female scientist use her time machine to go back and [[KnightTemplar execute]] famous serial killers before they hurt anybody. Her resulting RippleEffectProofMemory does not improve her mental state...
136	* ''Series/TalesFromTheCrypt'': In the very first episode, "[[Recap/TalesFromTheCryptS1E1TheManWhoWasDeath The Man Who Was Death]]", Niles Talbot is an executioner who was recently fired after the death penalty was abolished in his town. As a result, he goes on a killing spree, killing those who murdered people and escaped justice by various means of electrocution. However, eventually karma bites him in the ass when the tables are turned on him and he is executed using his preferred method just as it was reinstated.
137	[[/folder]]
138
139	%%[[folder:Music]]
140	%%* ''Music/AvengedSevenfold'': The narrator of [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxsFtCSOJyc "Strength of the World"]].
141	%%[[/folder]]
142
143	[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
144	* In ''TabletopGame/{{Anathema\|2011}}'', your job is to murder people in order to control the global population. Players can choose to act as this. Additionally, if you fail to meet your daily kill quotas enough times, other shrouds will hunt you down and destroy you.
145	* ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'': The TabletopGame/ForgottenRealms have this as the encouraged behavior of the priests of the little-known deity Hoar, the LawfulNeutral god of retribution. Specialty priests of Hoar are called Doombringers, and are highly encouraged to kill or otherwise punish (as appropriate for the crime) criminals in a manner befitting the criminal's own misdeeds, especially if they can inflict an ironic punishment.
146	* ''TabletopGame/GeistTheSinEaters'': Sin-Eaters mainly focus on dealing with ghosts and helping them move to the afterlife, which in the case of ghosts born from a violent death often means avenging them by finding the one responsible for their murder. ''TabletopGame/HunterTheVigil'' supplement ''Mortal Remains'' mentions that [[SlasherMovie Slashers]] usually are ''[[HorrifyingTheHorror terrified]]'' by Sin-Eaters because of this.
147	** Likewise, ''TabletopGame/HunterTheVigil'' zigzags this trope with regards to the complicated relationship between hunters and Slashers. Hunters are all too aware that they are one bad HeWhoFightsMonsters jag away from potentially becoming a slasher; on the other hand, slashers make suitable targets, and nobody's really going to mind if overkill happens. However, VASCU, the faction that primarily deals with Slashers, is a notable aversion of this. They may focus on supernaturally-empowered serial killers... but they're a branch of the FBI, which means Slashers need to be arrested and prosecuted legally if possible. Of course, some of these Slashers are supernaturally charming or unstoppable engines of destruction, which means conventional justice is difficult if not impossible, which makes this trope apply, which is what VASCU is constantly on watch for because of the aforementioned HeWhoFightsMonsters problem...
148	* ''TabletopGame/OldWorldOfDarkness'':
149	** ''TabletopGame/MageTheAscension'' has the Tradition of Euthanatos. The Euthanatos view existence as a continual cycle of death and rebirth — "the Wheel" — and those who unbalance the Wheel through atrocities must be dealt with so that things can be set right. A specific version within the Tradition of the Cult of Ecstasy is The Children's Crusade, who specifically target child abusers. It's noted at several points that [[EvenEvilHasStandards even their erstwhile foes in the Technocracy typically turn a blind eye to The Children's Crusade when they act against one]].
150	** ''TabletopGame/WerewolfTheApocalypse'':
151	*** The tribal laws of the [[AmazonBrigade Black Furies]] forbid them from turning a blind eye to violence against women. Domestic abusers, sexual predators, and serial killers who murder women are all legitimate targets for them.
152	*** Among the [[ProudWarriorRaceGuys Get of Fenris]], the Hand of Tyr camp hunts down those who torment the innocent, including murderers.
153	*** One of the most depraved antagonists in the game is the Seventh Generation, a Wyrm cult that kidnaps children and uses them as human sacrifices. The Seventh Generation's killings and depraved rites have earned it enemies who hunt its members without mercy. For example, the Order of the Rose, an underground organization described in ''Rage Across New York'', hunts down Seventh Generation devotees. Also, one of King Albrecht's first projects after ascending the throne was orchestrating a Garou attack on the Seventh Generation. [[GuiltFreeExterminationWar The result was a slaughter of almost all Seventh Generation members.]]
154	*** Garou see killing wolves as a grave offense, and some Garou target hunters who slaughter wolves. Several characters in the ''Warriors of the Apocalypse'' character book, such as Volcheka Ibarruri and Gere Hunts-The-Hunters, torture and kill wolf hunters.
155	** In ''TabletopGame/VampireTheMasquerade'', anyone following the Road of Heaven, as opposed to the Road of Humanity, for their Path of Enlightenment only had a strict ban on all murder at the highest rank of the Path. On top of that, failing to ''punish'' major sin is a failing for anyone at least rank 3 on the Path. As such, while adherents to the Path are pretty rare past the Renaissance, it was a pretty popular choice for a Path of Enlightenment for anyone interested in the "Superheroes with Fangs" style of play (plus, since it used the same base virtues as the Road of Humanity, it was the easiest alternative Path to switch to).
156	* Exaggerated by the Night Haunter from ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}''. Konrad Curze was the Night Lords Primarch who had the misfortune of winding up on Nostramo, a hellish planet of perpetual night where cruelty and violence reigned. Curze wanted to do the right thing, but how can you do that when practically everyone is an evil bastard who only understands fear and force? Why, you become the most brutal serial killer on the planet and murder every other criminal, of course! And ''it worked'': the Night Haunter was so terrifying to the people of Nostramo that he practically became a king ruling from the shadows, and crime rates dropped to near-zero within a year. Then the Emperor turned up and recruited Curze for the Great Crusade, and in his absence, [[MachiavelliWasWrong Nostramo fell back into lawlessness and depravity because he never bothered to build the foundations for a lawful society and the Nostramoans didn't have to fear him anymore]]. Curze learned of this and [[EarthShatteringKaboom he didn't take it well]].
157	[[/folder]]
158
159	[[folder:Video Games]]
160	* ''Franchise/DotHack'': Haseo, the Player Killer Killer from ''.hack//Roots'' and ''VideoGame/DotHackGU'' [[PlayerKilling Player Killing and Player Killer Killing (ad infinitum)]] is SeriousBusiness in the World.
161	* In ''VideoGame/TheCatLady'', Susan Ashworth's primary goal is to kill five serial killers, called "Parasites".
162	* ''VideoGame/CityOfHeroes'': The Vigilante alignment is basically a Hero who kills instead of arrests. They're willing to forego saving innocent lives in order to get at the bad guys, and they are willing to get very brutal about going after said bad guys. Because Vigilante is the transitional alignment between Hero and Villain, a Vigilante who goes too far risks becoming a Villain.
163	* ''VideoGame/CondemnedCriminalOrigins'': Serial Killer X. Spying on FBI Agent Ethan Thomas, SKX figured out the identities of ten other Serial Killers and [[KarmicDeath murdered them in the way they did their victims]], which caused them to be confused for their own victims by the authorities and the investigation to go cold, thus keeping X's involvement unknown. In the [[VideoGame/Condemned2Bloodshot sequel]], his goals have [[MotiveDecay shifted to dissecting people in an effort to give himself superpowers]], though it should be noted that [[KnightTemplar while he claimed to have righteous reasons for his killings]], he also just ''really'' liked getting a thrill out of hunting them down and killing them, and he certainly didn't have any hesitation in killing innocent people, including several of Thomas' fellow officers.
164	%%
165	%% The Danganronpa example is under Anime & Manga.
166	%%
167	* ''VideoGame/DarkSouls'' has the Blades of Darkmoon covenant, which allows you to hunt down and invade players who have been indicted for [=PvP=] by doing it too much, cheating at it, or [[spoiler:for killing Dark Sun Gwyndolyn, the covenant's leader]].
168	* ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion'': Matheiu Bellamont. On one hand, he's a murderous lunatic with an ''incredibly'' disturbing TortureCellar and RoomFullOfCrazy. On the other hand, he only kills members of the [[MurderInc Dark]] [[ReligionOfEvil Brotherhood]]. To make it even more sketchy, he's not even the one who kills a lot of them!
169	* ''VideoGame/Fallout4'': Pickman is a MadArtist who kills people, paints creepy pictures with their blood, and arranges their bodies into grotesque displays. But he only targets Raiders, so it's cool. Not like anyone's going to miss ''them'' (unless their aim is off). Despite being a very minor character who only appears during a single small sidequest, his handsome and polished appearance, in addition to a strangely charming personality, has earned him a significant fan following.
170	* ''VideoGame/MadWorld'': Jack fits this well in both ''[=MadWorld=]'' and ''VideoGame/AnarchyReigns'', and he is ''very'' good at it.%%How?
171	* ''VideoGame/{{Manhunt}}'': James Cash becomes this, technically; he is hunting down and brutally murdering people for Starkweather's SnuffFilm, even using slasher-type methods of hunting and butchering, and the people he kills are Starkweather's "workers", which means they're all guilty of multiple murder as well.
172	* ''Franchise/MassEffect'': Garrus Vakarian becomes this between the first and second games. He became a vigilante in the in-universe WretchedHive, hunting down all sorts of criminals, often administering poetic justice against the more particularly heinous ones. He brutalized a slaver, killed a drug dealer using the same addictive and deadly drug the dealer sold, killed a specialist in biological warfare with a virus, and killed a dangerous saboteur by causing a space suit malfunction.
173	* ''VideoGame/NoMoreHeroes'' is in part all about this sort of thing. While the player character Travis Touchdown is part of a union of assassins, and as such does get the occasional mission to, y'know, assassinate someone, for the most part, his only concern is becoming the highest-ranked assassin in the union by killing off all the higher-ranked ones.
174	* ''VideoGame/{{Prototype}}'':
175	** The first game has Alex Mercer as this, in a way. He kills thousands of comparatively blameless soldiers to get to their leaders, the ones responsible for the outbreak of the disease ravaging Manhattan, and kill ''them''. His reasoning, insofar as 'reason' factors into anything Alex does, seems to be that however many people ''he'' kills, his targets are responsible for both far more deaths and much uglier crimes. Of course, his conscience is still developing throughout the game, so at the beginning, he was just a plain-old mass murderer... of guys who were trying to kill him for reasons he didn't understand at that point. ([[VideoGameCrueltyPotential Unless he also killed civilians.]])
176	** In ''VideoGame/Prototype2'', if you don't kill civilians and try to reign in any Marine deaths, then this trope is played straight. Everyone in Blackwatch is evil. [[TheEvilArmy Every. Single. Soldier.]]
177	* ''VideoGame/ThrillKill'': Tormentor is a judge executed in the electric chair after it was found out he acquitted criminals just so he could later torture and kill them instead.
178	* ''VideoGame/YandereSimulator'': Mission Mode takes place in an alternate timeline where Ayano is a ProfessionalKiller instead of a {{Yandere}}. It's possible for her to be stalked by a student known only as Nemesis, whose only goal is to find Ayano and kill her. The comic ''Retribution'' reveals she's Hanako Yamada, out to get revenge on Ayano for killing her brother, Taro, who was Ayano's first victim.
179	[[/folder]]
180
181	[[folder:Web Original]]
182	* ''Website/TheOnion'': [[https://local.theonion.com/series-of-serial-killer-killings-rocks-serial-killer-co-1819567448 "Series Of Serial-Killer Killings Rocks Serial-Killer Community"]]
183	[[/folder]]
184	----
185	->[-If they kill multiple serial killers, wouldn't they be a Serial Serial-Killer Killer?-]

Context Main / SerialKillerKiller