History Main / CirclingVultures

[[folder:Film -- Animated]]

[[folder:Film -- Live Action]]

[[folder:Live Action TV]]

** ''Series/{{CSINY}}'': In "No Good Deed", vultures circling a body on a rooftop lead investigators to it after a long search.

!!'''As a DeathTrope, all Spoilers will be unmarked ahead. Beware of the vultures.'''

* During the animals' soccer game in ''Film/BedknobsAndBroomsticks'', vultures serve as medics, waiting on the sidelines for the referee (Mr. Brown) to be trampled by the players. A RunningGag is made of them rushing into the field to "treat" Mr. Brown, only to be waved away after he turns out to be alive.

* Although it's not a direct example, the sequence in ''[[Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion End of Evangelion]]'' when the [[MonstrousHumanoid MP Evas]] are air dropped into the geofront is obviously intended to {{invoke|dTrope}} this.

* In the RoundRobin comic book ''ComicBook/DCChallenge'', ComicBook/{{Aquaman}} is stranded in the desert, dying of dehydration. (This is the "can only be away from water 60 minutes" version of Aquaman.) Vultures are circling. [[{{Cliffhanger}} What can he do?]] Wait until one lands and then open it up and drink its blood - since blood is like 98% water, it counts.

* These are the first clue to the fate of Duke Jared's army in ''Literature/HighDeryni''. It isn't pretty.
* Referenced in "Tiger! Tiger!" in ''Literature/TheJungleBook'':

* In ''[[Literature/{{Tarzan}} Tarzan the Untamed]]'', Tarzan has to [[CrossingTheDesert cross a large, completely barren desert region]] to reach an area of good hunting beyond. By the third day his food and water are gone, and [[ThirstyDesert the desert has no springs or other water sources]], nor any edible life of any kind that he can find. There's only a single vulture circling overhead. Being Tarzan, though, he subverts the trope and makes the vulture his salvation when he lures it into arm's reach, and kills and eats it.

[[folder:Newspaper Comics]]
* The subject of several gags in ''ComicStrip/TheFarSide'':
** One example being a depiction of "the perils of improper circling": two of the vultures bonk heads in mid-air.
** One famous strip has some vultures gathered around an unseen corpse. One of them is wearing the guy's hat and coat and says mockingly "Hey! Look at me, everybody, I'm a cowboy! Howdy, howdy, howdy!"
** Another strip cartoon has a parched desert traveler crawling his way towards a pool of water. This prospect disappoints one vulture hovering above him, but a second vulture prepares to [[PianoDrop drop a piano on him]] before he reaches it.
** Yet another strip shows Pinocchio stranded in the desert, with the vultures replaced by ''woodpeckers'' intent on pecking on his wooden body.
** Another strip features two elderly men feeding birds at a park bench, commenting on the smaller birds eating their seed [[BlackComedy but wondering why two much larger birds nearby just stare at them]].
** And another one has the vultures gathered around a pepperoni pizza.
* One newspaper cartoon by Andrzej Mleczko depicted a vulture sitting on a branch, looking down at a dying rhino: "I hope I am not bothering you, sir, I am just waiting for you to croak."
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* ''Film/{{Airplane}}'': They're not circling, but' a bunch of vultures perch over the heroes as they prepare to crash-land.

* ''Film/TheAndromedaStrain'' (1971): When the SCOOP team approaches the town of Piedmont they see buzzards circling over the town, a {{Foreshadowing}} of the dead bodies they will find there.

* ''Film/TheAndromedaStrain'' (1971): When the SCOOP team approaches the town of Piedmont they see buzzards circling over the town - a {{Foreshadowing}} of the dead bodies they will find there.

** Just the film the series is based one, the military in search of the Scoop satellite sees buzzards circling over Piedmont, {{Foreshadow}}ing the massacre ThePlague has caused.

* The PteroSoarer Scrapadactyls from ''WesternAnimation/{{Dinotrux}}'' will often circle above injured Dinotrux, making it easy to find someone in need of rescue.

* ''Webcomic/KevinAndKell'': [[https://www.kevinandkell.com/1997/kk0310.html In one strip]], Ms Aura (a school teacher and a turkey buzzard) is circling above Rudy's homework. Rudy and Bruno comment that this isn't a good sign.

!!'''As circling vultures are mainly a forshadowing for a character death, it is considered a DeathTrope, and all Spoilers will be unmarked ahead. Please use the vultures as a warning.'''

!!'''As a DeathTrope, all Spoilers will be unmarked ahead. Beware.'''

* ''WesternAnimation/BeavisAndButtheadDoAmerica'': Beavis and Butthead wander off into the desert in an idiotic attempt to try and reach Washington D.C on foot (from ''New Mexico!'') and end up slowly dying from dehydration (after briefly stumbling across two drifters who are heavily implied to be their long-lost fathers). Sure enough, the vultures show up. One even attempts to gnaw on Beavis while he's still alive. While very near death, they still take a moment to giggle at two of the vultures having sex. [[spoiler: They're eventually found by Muddy, the movie's BigBad who "rescues" them just so he can shoot them.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/SnowWhiteAndTheSevenDwarfs'': Two vultures follow the Queen in her Wicked Witch disguise as she goes to the cottage to get Snow White, and their presence alerts the WoodlandCreatures that there is something seriously wrong about the "peddler woman" with her basket of apples. In the end, the vultures were not after Snow White at all, but after the Queen, and as she [[DisneyVillainDeath falls to her doom]], the vultures slowly circle down after her. Though they may be aware the Queen was trying to poison Snow White when they seem eager as the Queen was offering Snow White.

* ''Blog/TetrapodZoology''

* ''Film/{{Fall}}''. A vulture swoops down on Becky who has apparently died of exposure after being stranded on top of a 2,000-foot-high derelict transmission tower. However when it tries feasting on her wounded leg, she turns out to be PlayingPossum and kills it for enough sustenance to survive a little longer.