!! None but the Lonely Heart

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/mv5bothkotdkytgtzmizms00mwvklwjlnjetzjayzti3owi0nte5xkeyxkfqcgdeqxvyodi0ndgwnja_v1.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:350:Til' death, as they say...]]

->'''Crypt Keeper:''' (''dressed as a waiter and tending to a skeletal couple at a table; he stands by another skeleton playing a violin'') Damn you, Marcel! I told you they wanted ''violence'', not ''violins!'' (''he smacks the skeleton and knocks it over'') Good help is so hard to ''fiend'', isn't it, kiddies? (''to the couple'') Want a little more cham-''pain''? (''snickers; to the camera'') I hope you're hungry for tonight's murderous menu. It concerns a man who's discovered that the fastest way to a woman's heart... is with a pickaxe! I call this tasty little ''horror'' d'oeuvre: '''None but the Lonely Heart.'''

Howard Prince (Creator/TreatWilliams) is a sociopathic criminal who routinely courts rich elderly widows, seducing them hard enough that they agree to tie the knot with him. Once they hand over all their goods, he poisons them and leaves them to die while he reaps their riches to his twisted heart's content. Howard's partner Morty (Clive Rosengren) informs him that their rather hefty bank accounts have been noticed by the IRS, who have frozen them and sent Howard a subpoena for tax evasion. Upon hearing this, Howard decides to seduce one last old lady before he goes on the run, visiting the offies of the Forever Yours video dating service, owned by his unknowing accomplice Baxter (Creator/TomHanks), to check the potential candidates. Howard soon settles on Effie Gluckman (Creator/FrancesSternhagen), who predictably falls for him as her butler Stanhope (Creator/HenryGibson) grows suspicious of his motives. Howard begins discovering that someone has been sending notes to him, saying they know about what he's done and warning him to stop. When the notes don't stop coming, even after he murders one potential culprit after another, Howard goes mad with paranoia trying to find the actual blackmailer.
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!! Tropes:
* AdaptationalAlternateEnding: In the comic, Howard is dragged into a coffin by an undead woman (one he ''didn't'' kill, by the way) to spend eternity with his "new bride." In the episode, he suffers an even more ghastly fate, courtesy of the reanimated corpses of all his murdered wives.
* AdaptationalVillainy: Howard. His counterpart in the comic murdered his wives, but ''only'' his wives. He also knew when to cut his losses, and was going to give up his scheme when he found his latest mark. The episode's version of Howard is a full on psychopath who kills anyone and everyone he thinks might be on to him, even his accomplices.
* AgeGapRomance: Howard's chosen victims are rich old women looking for a man to spend their last years with.
* AlliterativeName: One of Howard's late wives was named '''Ma'''tilda '''Ma'''son.
* AssholeVictim: [[TheBluebeard Howard]] is one of the biggest ones in the entire series. There's also his accomplice, Morty, who assisted him in the murders and kept his finances from looking spotty to the IRS.
* AsYouKnow: Morty and Howard's banter at Matilda's funeral lets the audience know about Howard's racket, and the fact that Howard already murdered his first two wives.
* AxeCrazy: When his plan starts falling apart, Howard ''very'' quickly switches gears from a charming manipulator to a homicidal lunatic.
* BattleButler: Subverted. Stanhope catches onto Howard and holds him at gunpoint, but Howard manages to call his bluff and correctly deduce that he doesn't have it in him to pull the trigger.
* BittersweetEnding: The entire cast is dead by the end, but Howard ends up paying for his ''many'' crimes.
* {{Blackmail}}: The notes that Howard is given warn him to stop playing with old women's emotions, lest he face the consequences.
* TheBluebeard: Howard is a classic case. He preys on rich and lonely elderly women, charms them into marrying him, and finally murders them for their fortunes.
* TheCameo: Sugar Ray Leonard, the world famous boxer, plays the gravedigger at the cemetery, and Howard murders him when he's believed to be the only remaining suspect behind the blackmail notes.
* CassandraTruth: The gravedigger tries to warn Howard who's sending the notes to him and what they're planning to do. Howard doesn't listen and kills him, since he seemed to be the only possible person who was sending him the notes.
* ContinuityNod: The episode's writer, Terry Black, is credited as [[Recap/TalesFromTheCryptS3E7TheReluctantVampire Donald Longtooth]].
* CoversAlwaysLie: The comic book cover for the episode shows Howard shoving an old woman in a wedding dress down a flight of stairs. Howard does this to Effie, but she isn't wearing a wedding dress when it happens.
* CreatorCameo: Creator/TomHanks, who directed this episode, plays Baxter, the manager of the Forever Yours video dating service who (possibly unknowingly) helps Howard pick out potential marks. When Howard thinks of him as the source behind the notes, he kills him by shoving him headfirst into a TV screen.
* CruelAndUnusualDeath: Howard routinely inflicts these on the old ladies he pretends to fall in love with, and his male victims fare no better:
** He crushes Morty's windpipe by jamming his tie in a paper shredder.
** He shoves Baxter's head through a TV screen.
** He breaks Stanhope's neck with his bare hands.
** Finally, he impales the gravedigger with his own shovel.
** Howard himself ends the episode falling victim to a particularly horrific one, where he is [[DevouredByTheHorde slowly, gruesomely, and very painfully devoured by the zombified corpses of the old women he murdered]].
* DevouredByTheHorde: How [[TheBluebeard Howard]] [[AssholeVictim meets his end]], courtesy of his zombified wives.
* DiabolusExMachina: While Howard's zombified ex-wives give the sick bastard what he deserves, their reveal, as well as the reason they reanimated, is never given any explanation or foreshadowing whatsoever.
* DisproportionateRetribution: Believing that the gravedigger, the only possible suspect behind the blackmail notes, is wasting his time by warning him of what's about to happen, Howard pointlessly kills him with his own shovel.
* DirtyCoward: Howard is a smug and sadistic bastard for most of the episode, but when he's cornered by his undead wives, all he can do is scream and cry.
* EvenEvilHasStandards: As much of a monster as Howard is, he says to Morty that he wouldn't just take his victims' money and leave them to die broke and alone. In his words, he does his victims a favor by making them feel happy and loved before he kills them. How much of that is just bullshit he tells himself, like Morty seems to think, is up to interpretation.
* EverybodyDiesEnding: One of the few episodes where the ENTIRE cast is dead by the end.
* FauxAffablyEvil: Howard can turn on the charm at a moment's notice, but he's utterly irredeemable.
* GenreShift: The story seems like a down-to-Earth tale about a disgusting murderer who preys on old women, but the final minutes reveal that the reanimated corpses of Howard's ex-wives were the ones sending him the notes.
* GhostlyGoals: As Howard's undead wives tell him: "We couldn't live without you. And we can't ''die'' without you."
* GoldDigger: Howard, who marries widowed, rich old women, kills them, and steals all their assets.
* HateSink: The episode does everything it can to remind you that Howard is an utterly irredeemable monster. He's a shameless SerialKiller, an absolute jackass to anyone he interacts with, and possesses no likable or redeeming qualities of any kind (he even murders '''''Creator/TomHanks!'''''). Watching him be devoured alive by the old ladies whose lonely hearts he fooled with is downright cathartic after everything he's shown doing.
* HeadSmashesScreen: Baxter croaks when Howard rams his head through Forever Yours' TV. In a [[BlackComedy bit of screwed-up humor]], the TV keeps sparking and causing Baxter's corpse to twitch until Howard uses the remote to turn it off.
* IgnoredEnamoredUnderling: It's implied that Stanhope performs a background check on Howard and threatens Howard because he has his own feelings for Effie, in addition to caring for her as his employer.
* ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice: Howard subjects this fate to the gravedigger, the only logical culprit behind the notes, with the business end of his own shovel.
* ItsAllAboutMe: Howard's self-absorbed nature is what leads to his doom, as he never listens to anyone because what they tell him isn't how ''he'' wants it to be.
* IWarnedYou: The gravedigger warns Howard that "they" are coming for him and that he needs to start running. Howard doesn't heed this warning and kills the guy with his own shovel, just before his reanimated wives sink their teeth into his flesh.
* {{Jerkass}}: Howard is an absolute prick, and that's when he ''isn't'' killing innocent old ladies.
* KarmicTwistEnding: Howard is devoured by the undead wives he brutally murdered.
* KickTheDog: Howard spends the entire episode doing this. Of particular note is his lament on how he had to waste such a nice bottle of wine after poisoning Matilda, his first onscreen victim.
* KillerOutfit: When Howard kills Morty, he demonstrates why neckties and paper shredders are a really bad combination.
* LackOfEmpathy: Howard and his partner Morty aren't even a smidge upset after their deeds. Howard takes it up several notches when he murders Morty himself.
* LikesOlderWomen: Howard does. Or at least, he likes their money.
* TheLoinsSleepTonight: Howard lies to Effie that he suffers from impotence, excusing why he isn't able to perform that well in bed.
* TheLostLenore: Effie's departed husband Theodore, whom she still holds a candle for at first.
* LoveHurts: Howard's victims really ''do'' love him... so much that they literally can't die without him, hoping to take a piece (or several) of him back to the grave with them.
* ManipulativeBastard: Howard can't be described as anything but.
* MurderIsTheBestSolution: Even by this show's standards, Howard is a murder junkie, killing old women for their riches and everyone else around him when he thinks that they're on to him.
* MysteriousNote: Howard is given notes from an unidentified source who knows his modus operandi and warns him to stop before he kills Effie. The end of the episode reveals that his undead wives are the culprits.
* NeckSnap: How Howard kills Stanhope, breaking his neck with his own two hands.
* NoHonorAmongThieves: Howard is more than willing to kill his accomplices, should he suspect them of trying to blackmail him.
* NoNameGiven: The gravedigger, who delivers the notes to Howard under the command of his zombified wives.
* NotQuiteDead: Howard's poison doesn't kill Effie like it did his other wives, so he improvises by [[StaircaseTumble shoving her down her stairs]].
* NothingPersonal: Howard insists that what he does is just business, but no one else believes him... and for good reason.
* OurZombiesAreDifferent: Each of Howard's wives are in different states of decomposition:
** Effie and Matilda, his most recent victims, are still freshly rotting and slimy.
** Elizabeth, his second wife, is a dried-up husk that resembles a mummy.
** Clair, his ''first'' wife, is a worm-riddled skeleton in a torn wedding dress.
* PoeticSerialKiller: Howard watches Matilda writhe and die from the poisoned wine he slips her while reciting Andrew Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress".
* PoisonedDrinkDrop: Howard's usual method for snuffing out one of his marks is to give them poisoned wine.
* ThePowerOfLove: Howard's wives' love for him allows them to return from the grave, telling him that they can't live (or die) without him.
* ProperlyParanoid: Effie could apparently sense that Howard wanted her money, but the man's sweet talk managed to persuade her otherwise.
* RedHerring: Every man who isn't Howard seems to have valid reasons for sending him the notes, which keep coming after he kills each of them, with Stanhope being the most prominent. With everyone else dead, Howard assumes that the gravedigger at the cemetery, who pocketed a piece of his suit before digging Matilda's grave, is behind the notes. He didn't write them, but he ''delivered'' them because Howard's undead wives asked him to.
* {{Sadist}}: Howard ''very'' much enjoys killing, as much as he insists that it's NothingPersonal. He's so addicted to killing that he kills every other character in the episode through one way or another.
* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: Morty tells Howard that the authorities are closing in on them, as their bank accounts having been frozen and they're due before a grand jury on charges of tax evasion in 11 days. Morty's content to take what money they have left and flee to a country with no extradition, but Howard's relentless greed makes him tell Morty that they aren't ready to leave the US just yet.
* SerialKiller: Matilda, Howard's first on-screen kill, is actually his third InUniverse victim.
* SerialSpouse: Howard ends the episode with a total of four wives, one he murders late in the episode, one he murders in the ''beginning'', and two more that he murdered ''before'' the episode began.
* TheSociopath: Howard is a master of feigning love and empathy to reel in his victims, before he kills them without mercy.
* StaircaseTumble: This is how Effie ultimately meets her maker, as Howard has to "improvise" when his poisoned wine doesn't do the trick.
* StealthPun: Howard ''Prince'' is a manipulative and murderous psychopath; he's a literal PrinceCharmless.
* TamperingWithFoodAndDrink: Howard's routine with his wives is to kill them with poisoned wine. He doesn't show such a subtle method of murder with his male victims, and Effie's death show's that he's willing to MakeItLookLikeAnAccident if need be.
* TerribleIntervieweesMontage: Howard spends one scene fast forwarding through womens' dating videos as he looks for victims. None of their applications are any good to him, until he comes across Effie's video.
* TogetherInDeath: The goal of Howard's zombified ex-wives, which they accomplish in a rather gruesome manner.
* VillainProtagonist: Howard Prince, one of the biggest villains ever to appear on this show.
* VillainsWantMercy: In the last moments of his life, Howard begs his undead wives not to kill him, to no avail.
* VoiceOfTheLegion: Each of Howard's wives speak in a distorted voice when they return from the dead.
* WouldHarmASenior: Howard preys exclusively on rich elderly widows who desperately want some male company in their twilight years.
* WrongGenreSavvy: Howard originally assumes that his accomplice Morty is the one blackmailing him, so he kills him, and then kills Baxter the Forever Yours owner, Effie's butler Stanhope, and the gravedigger who buried his wives when the notes keep coming. The end reveals that the zombified wives themselves are the responsible party.
* YouWouldntShootMe: When Stanhope holds Howard at gunpoint and threatens to kill him unless he breaks up with Effie, Howard calls his bluff, realizing that as protective as the man is, he doesn't have it in him to kill someone. Sadly for Stanhope, Howard doesn't have that problem, using the opportunity to [[NeckSnap break his neck]].
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->'''Crypt Keeper:''' (''still tending to the skeletal couple, filling a wine glass for them'') Now that's what I call a happy ending. I had a feeling Effie would win Howard's heart. Not to mention his spleen, his kidneys, and his gallbladder! (''cackles'') So, will there be anything else? (''the woman-dressed skeleton's head falls off and shatters'') Mmmmm. I love a ''ghoul'' who gives you ''head''... and then lets you keep it! (''cackles'')