Tentacle Rope

Looks like Ariel is all tied up at the moment.

Basically when tentacles are used to grab and restrain. Can be played for laughs or horror; seeing a character get muffled by a pissed-off octopus can be hilarious, seeing a character get crushed by said octopus, not so much. Often used in cartoon Slapstick comedy such as Tom and Jerry, it's a cheap way to get some cartoon violence in without shedding blood. And often it is just a cheap way for a villain to restrain the hero.

As for the horror aspect, getting grabbed and devoured by something alien enough to have tentacles has been the subject of human nightmares probably for time immemorial.

Related to Combat Tentacles, only these are specifically for grabbing and binding, and not for other forms of attack. Often part of Typical Tentacle Tactics.

A Sub-Trope to Bound and Gagged. Compare Naughty Tentacles, Standard Female Grab Area, Spider Limbs, Variable-Length Chain, and Whip of Dominance. Contrast Knotty Tentacles, where the one with the appendages is the one being tied instead. See Instant Knots for when a chain, rope, or whip can wrap itself around anything that it hits.

Not what you read it as.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• Tentacle Rope is a famous trope among people who know hentai. And this is all we'll say about that here.
• In Assassination Classroom, Koro-sensei uses his tentacles to restrain a rampaging Kayano so that Nagisa can subdue her with The Big Damn Kiss to render her unconscious, after which Koro-sensei is able to remove the tentacles that were causing her to rampage.
• Bleach gives us a Played With example with Luppi, who captures the buxom Matsumoto this way, then appears to want to do bad things to her, but then his tentacles grow spikes.
  • It also happens to Nemu Kurotsuchi, "courtesy" of Szayelaporro. And then it gets much, MUCH worse.
• Demon City Shinjuku: One of the three demons used tentacles to grab Mephisto.
• In Digimon Tamers Jeri is tied up by the tentacles of the D-Reaper. In the original she is tied in a cross shape. This was edited (badly) in the dub to be less religious looking.
• In Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha A's, the Sand Worm's tentacles that almost crushed Signum earlier were later used on Nanoha and Fate as a restraining device by the Book of Darkness.
• Haruna from Negima! Magister Negi Magi uses it on Nodoka and Yue to prevent them from fleeing before a misunderstanding could be cleared.
• In the final battle of Nyaruko: Crawling with Love!'s first season, Nyarko is captured by Lloiger in this fashion and squeezed hard enough to crack her Henshin Hero form's armor (as well as breaking her helmet); she's able to break free after Mahiro throws her crowbar. Of course, since the series is inspired by the Cthulhu Mythos, this trope's use should come as no surprise.
• Penguindrum features the three penguins, in the background, fighting three octopus to make takoyaki (fried octopus). Naturally, one of the octopus manages to hold two penguins up with its tentacles at one point.
• Pokémon Adventures:
  • During the finale of the RS arc, Winona ends up captured by Maxie and Archie, held by Archie's Tentacruel. She ends up nearly suffocating to death as well.
  • Various grass types' Vine Whip ability has been used as rope to pull other people up from cliffsides all throughout the entire anime.
• A very common power for a Monster of the Week in the Pretty Cure franchise.
• Mammon (née Viper) from Reborn! (2004) is a particularly... interesting example of this trope. S/he is, physically, a baby — somewhere around one or two years old — and carries around what looks like a roll of toilet paper, using illusions to turn the paper into what is a cross between this trope and Combat Tentacles.
  • Mukuro Rokudo, who, while not usually a practitioner of this trope, finally defeats Mammon by ''turning into a suspiciously tentacle-like black mass, forcing himself into her mouth, and making her explode. All while s/he screams for mercy.
• Used a lot in Sailor Moon by the bad guys to bind the senshi.
• Sgt. Frog has tentacle-like creatures which are used as living rope to capture prisoners.
• Squid Girl: In one instance, Ika does this to Eiko when she wanders into Eiko's room and falls asleep there... Rather, her tentacles did this all on their own. Ika herself was already long asleep.
• In To Love Ru, one episode deals with Lala cooking something disgusting in (as always) a misguided attempt to please Rito. Somewhere mid-attempt, a huge Octopus and Kraken leave her ingridents box and begin tying her up, as well as Rito and Haruna. Hilariously, the two cetalopods then begin bickering over who gets whom, with one offering Rito only to receive a slap in the face from the pissed-off other.
• Green Shocks, a plant-like Sorkin Kaiju from Ultraman: The Adventure Begins uses this technique among his other attacks to ensnare Ultrawoman Beth’s arms and try to drag her within range of the boiling acid hidden atop his head. When Beth manages to sever the tendrils, they grow back extremely quickly, and can even regenerate his entire body when the situation requires it, making him quite the challenge to face.
• In Umi Monogatari, Kanon is bound by an octopus woman's hair-tentacles in episode 2.
• Sometimes is used by the bad guys as a weapon in Wedding Peach.
• Used in an episode of Weiß Kreuz when Mad Scientist Masafumi Takatori mutates into a be-tentacled ape-creature and uses his new appendages to restrain most of the rest of the characters in the room.
• In Yu-Gi-Oh! 5Ds, this happened to Yusei in his first duel with Aki during the Fortune Cup, when she summoned her appropriately-named Rose Tentacles, but it was worse than most examples; it combined the trope with Combat Tentacles restraining him with four of them so it could hit him with a fifth. (And it was dangerous business, seeing as Aki is a powerful Reality Warper who could not fully control her powers at the time, making the summoned monsters every bit as capable of actually injuring him as they can in a Shadow Duel.)
• In Yu-Gi-Oh!: Capsule Monsters, Trents use head-roots, which work like tentacles, to restrain Celtic Guardian and Yami Yugi.
• In Yu-Gi-Oh! ZEXAL, No. 96 has used his tentacles to restrain both Yuma and Astral on separate occasions.

Comic Books

• Aquaman: Aquaman is in the habit of using octopi to bind up his foes.
• Freex: One of the shy teens, a female, was just full of all long, fleshy tentacles. Fortunately they wrapped around her body so a loose T-shirt meant she could pass.
• Spider-Man: In The Amazing Spider-Man (Lee & Ditko) #3, Doctor Octopus humiliates Spider-Man this way during their first encounter before throwing him out a window. The Hulk turned this against him.
• Superboy and the Ravers: Shaar Q will restrain suspects with her tentacles before slapping teleport prevention cuffs on them with the added benefit that she can use her tentacles to partially shift planes and interfere with teleporting attempts.
• The Umbrella Academy has Ben Hargreeves AKA The Horror, who possessed tentacles coming out from his stomach. His generally sweet demeanor meant that there were no Naughty Tentacles, and not even any proper Combat Tentacles, instead he settled for grabbing and constricting his foes. Or more often than not, just using his tentacles as handy rope for pulling and holding onto things.
• Wonder Woman:
  • Sensation Comics: A horticulturist grows "octopus plants" in his basement which reach out with long tendrils to pull in victims for consumption. Diana and Steve Trevor rescue the Holliday Girls from the things when the girls get nabbed while investigating the disappearance of a young woman and her father, who were fed to the plants by the horticulturist.
  • Wonder Woman (1942):
    • At the Holliday College dance in "Ectoplasmic Death" Dr. Psycho manages to ensnare all of his enemies in tentacle like strips of pink ectoplasm.
    • Huntress hallucinates her ankles are being wrapped in tentacles that are pulling her down after being drugged by Professor Fether.
  • Wonder Woman (1987): Julianna Sazia's secondary security system is a bunch of metal tentacles which restrain Artemis just long enough for Sazia's hologram to taunt her about her impending death, then attempt to squeeze her to death.
  • Wonder Woman (2006): Circe has a number of her snake inspired bestiamorphs restrain Diana by wrapping around her and trying to envenom her.
• X-Wing Rogue Squadron: Booster's tentacled copilot tried to restrain a young Wedge Antilles this way, but Wedge turned this against him off-panel.

Fan Works

• Fallout: Equestria: The Goddess uses psychically projected blue tentacles to force ponies into the Impelled Metamorphosis Potion vats in Maripony, turning them into alicorn drones. Or, in the case of Twilight Sparkle, to pull her into her "body" and absorb her.
• The Winx Club Play Dugeons and Dragons: The monster that the girls are fighting in the cover has snared Roxy with its prehensile tail.

Films — Animated

• The Brave Little Toaster music number B-Movie features a variant: power cords. They pull the heroes away from the light and lift the crazed appliances into the air at the end for a creepy crescendo.
• As seen in the pic, The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea has Ariel captured this way by Morgana after Melody pulls a Heel–Face Turn after finding out who she's really been working for. Furthermore, in the first version of the climax of the first movie, Morgana's fatter sister Ursula uses her tentacles to toss Ariel onto a rock and strangle Eric. Unbeknowst to her, the prince picks up the Trident from the sea bottom (courtesy of Sebastian) and throws it like an harpoon, shishkebabbing her on the chest. You can watch the video here.
• Being octopi, Octavius and his minions often grab the penguins in this way with actual tentacles in Penguins of Madagascar.
• Toy Story 3: In attempt to escape Sunnyside, Jessie assaults Chunk and Sparks (who are trying to put her in a cell) and makes a run for it, only to get snatched into the air by another of Lotso's henchmen (or henchwoman) Stretch, a purple rubber octopus and puts her in the cell she was supposed to go in.

Films — Live-Action

• Carved (2018): When the father gets ready to carve up the pumpkin, it shoots out vines that ties up his wrists.
• Cornstalks will often come alive in Children of the Corn films to tie people up, and maybe murder them as well.
• The creature in Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer uses its tentacles to snatch and restrain the students.
• An exploded headless torso does this with its intestines in Re-Animator.
• In Resident Evil: Extinction, during the final battle against Dr. Isaacs, who has transformed into a Tyrant, Alice is first caught off-guard by him and briefly loses her machete. As soon as she runs to retrieve it, Isaacs quickly grabs Alice's neck with one of his tentacles and starts choking her to death. Thankfully, Alice manages to find a way to get her machete back and cut off the tentacle strangling her before she dies of suffocation.
• Seeding of a Ghost has the Demon Fetus' final form, which has numerous tentacles allowing it to grab and ensnare victims. It's tentacles even impales a guy who tried hiding from it's rampage through a door.
• Space Jam: A New Legacy: White Mamba winds Lola up in her serpentine lower half during part of the game.
• Tokyo Gore Police has an... interesting example towards the end.

Literature

• Galaxy of Fear: The vesuvague trees of Ithor will grab people and strangle them with their vines, crushing the life out of them unless an Ithorian intervenes.
• The tentacled brains which latch onto Ron in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix are incredibly difficult to get off, leave lesions wherever they touch the skin and Mind Rape those they are touching.
• The Magic Treehouse: This cover◊ for the Japanese book #25.
• Moongobble and Me: In book 3, while passing through Bogfester Swamp, Moongobble and co. encounter an old woman fending off a beast, unseen except for its tentacles, that keeps trying to grab at her (and then at the group's wagon after she's pulled to safety).

Live-Action TV

• In the Doctor Who episode "The Pandorica Opens", a Cyberman's severed head attempts to grab Amy with some metal cables from its neck.
• Whenever a Monster of the Week in a Tokusatsu show, such as Kamen Rider, Super Sentai and its adaptation Power Rangers, is based on a cephalopod or has functional tentacles in general, you can expect that it will use them to constrict the heroes.
• Stranger Things: Vecna ties Max to a pillar with his tentacles while she's mentally trapped in his realm. Twice. He also ties Eleven to a door and Nancy to a chair. Robin, Nancy and Steve also get secured to a wall and half-choked by tentacles in the Upside Down. This is four of the five female regular cast we're talking about, with Joyce getting just plain Bound and Gagged in the Russia plot.

Role-Playing Games

• In Dino Attack RPG, tendrils of Maelstrom energy often act this way, wrapping around and forcibly constricting their victims.

Toys

• In BIONICLE, the characters Kalmah and Nocturn both have Combat Tentacles, but they haven't really used them memorably for grabbing people. Kalmah did have, however, an army of gigantic squids who had done this to a mutated Brutaka. In earlier books, Gali also got assaulted by a giant squid, which later reappears in a Prequel story told by the village elders.

Video Games

• The Warm-Up Boss of Beyond Good & Evil captures heroine Jade in a long column of chitinous tentacles, capturing her from the legs up and then trying to Mind Rape her.
• The Binding Of Isaac: Repentance has two examples. The enemy Evis can launch a tentacle at Isaac to restrict his movements, and the familiar Worm Friend can grab and immobilize an enemy, damaging them in the process.
• The Boktai series has octopi and plants that behave in almost the same manner. Both grab Django and squeeze some health out of him, while the octopus also drags him underwater to pummel him before letting go.
• Dead Space has these as a very annoying mini-boss to defeat. If Isaac doesn't shoot and defeat the tentacle that grabs onto him by the time he's pulled to the hole, it's instant death.
• In the Day 12 flashback scene in Final Fantasy XIII, Serah is surrounded and grabbed by liquid metal tendrils that pull her into the Pulse Vestige, making her the fal'Cie's prisoner.
• In Halo 2, the Master Chief wakes up to find himself wrapped up in Gravemind's tentacle arms after it saves him from death. Then The Arbiter and Monitor 2401 are also brought into the mix.
• In Kingdom Hearts II, Flotsam and Jetsam restrain Sora with their bodies during the "Ursula's Revenge" number, and try to strangle him to death. He gets saved by Donald and Goofy before using his Keyblade to vanquish the eels for good.
  • In the manga adaptation for the first game, Ursula does this to the entire party.
• In the Left 4 Dead series, the Smoker's main attack is doing this with his tongue.
• Morpha in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time has a tendency to grab Link and throw him across the room.
• The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker: There are plant tentacles called Dexivines that rise from the ground when Link draws near and latch onto him. They don't inflict damage and merely tether him to the spot, steadily sapping his MP so long as they are attached. They'll respawn indefinitely but can be killed in one shot and aren't much of a threat.
• Several of the tentacles used by the Watcher in the Water from The Lord of the Rings Online are strangling tentacles which a DPS character must destroy.
• The Lurking Horror has a very literal example. You climb down a rope and then realize that it's a tentacle.
• Most of the creatures from the Pokémon series that learn Wrap, Bind, or Constrict, such as Tangela and Tentacool, are this way when they use those attacks, binding their foes in their tentacles.
• Although more of a Grappling-Hook Pistol than a Tentacle Rope in [PROTOTYPE], the Whipfist power enables such a utility in order to latch onto distant objects, but does not in anyway tie them up. Similarly with the consume-tendrils that hold onto lesser organic beings, which take a moment to be assimilated.
  • In the sequel, Heller gets the "Tendril" power early into the game, which he uses as Combat Tentacles in addition to this.
• There are tentacles in Resident Evil – Code: Veronica and The Remake of the first game, which grab the female protagonist at one point in each.
  • In Resident Evil 4, the flower-ish growth that devours and assimilates Salazar and his "left hand" does so by wrapping tentacles around them and pulling them into itself.
• Richman 10 has King Octopus's unique card, the Octopus Tentacle Card, which shows octopus tentacles binding all opponents and stop them in place for one round.
• The boss Smorg in Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door is both this AND Combat Tentacles, being some weird tentacled creature that kidnaps pretty much all the passengers on the Excess Express in this way and attacking with its tentacles and whatnot.

Webcomics

• Many 'Cubi in Dan and Mab's Furry Adventures use this, or at least something like it. Their fighting style and the context often blurs the lines between Tentacle Rope and Combat Tentacles. Some of them like Dan's mom also bring in elements of Romanticized Abuse. All three aspects are shown in Abel's (spoilerific) confrontation with Destania. Starts here.
• The Toonami webcomic Endgame'' has Orcelot Rex (a robotic Space Pirate) tie up TOM with his tentacles and electrocute him. It leads to TOM dying. At least in the actual canon.
• Magical vines tie up Ecta in The Fourth. In her indignation, she claims never to have been "violated" in such a way.
• In Homestuck, Jaspersprite is introduced grabbing Rose this way to save her from falling to her doom.
• In Keychain of Creation, Nova uses cables as tentacles to restrain Secret before "eating" her, as her current form's regular limbs would be quite clumsy.
• In Yokoka's Quest, Kalliv casts a spell to bind the king centipede with magic vines, allowing Mao a clear shot to cast the fireball which killed it.

Web Original

• The Slender Man has the ability to sprout tentacles or branchlike appendages which he sometimes uses to give his friends (victims) wonderful hugs.
• In the Whateley Universe Carmilla has used her tentacles like this. She once wrapped up Shadowolf complete with a tentacle Neck Lift and scared him so bad he wet himself.

Western Animation

• Marceline the Vampire Queen from Adventure Time employs this in an attempt to dissuade Finn from bringing her to the movies with him by turning into a giant tentacle monster.
• Batman: The Animated Series: Poison Ivy's various plant mutations have Vine Tentacles that are often used to wrap around and restrain others. In her first appearance in "Pretty Poison", the mutant flytrap she kept in her greenhouse captured Batman when he snuck in, coiling around his wrists and waist, allowing Ivy to flirt with him and get touchy with him as he struggles. Eventually, as she prepares to give him a poisonous kiss, the vines turn him around to face her and wrap around his thrashing head, forcing him to hold still as she embraces him in a deep Forceful Kiss.
• Cosmic Quantum Ray: Played most cheesy in episode 12 "Mr Charm's Bad Vibration".
• Futurama: Leela gets the treatment often enough. Offhand: Beast with a Billion Backs, Möbius Dick.
• Kaeloo: A tentacle monster does this to Stumpy after randomly emerging from a toilet he was trying to clean.
• My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic got really carried away with this in Season 4. The season premiere had the black vines which did this to all of Ponyville (and a couple residents in one scene), then we got the Mane-Iac who inflicted this on the main cast with her Prehensile Hair, and then we got the Tatzlwurm that had three tongues it used to snare and drag prey into it's mouth a'la the Graboids.
• In the episode "Unity" from Superman: The Animated Series, Supergirl has been captured by Unity as shown in this clip.
• Wakfu: A common Sadida tactic when fighting with vines. Also used by Desherboss, Nox's puppet from episode 24.

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