Tear Jerker / Battle for Dream Island

As a Moments subpage, all spoilers are unmarked as per policy. You Have Been Warned.

Sometimes, Battle for Dream Island can have moments that never fail to make you reach for the tissue box.

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General

• Any time a character is eliminated can be quite sad, especially if it's one of your favorites. Ice Cube's elimination is one of the saddest. Her cry as she gets teleported...
• This video isn't sad in itself, but Michael's voice almost sounds like he's crying.

BFDI

• In "Rescission", the Announcer's diary can DEFINITELY get the waterworks flowing. It's hard not to sympathize with his situation when you learn about the nearing threat that he will have to leave all the beauties and wonders of Earth with which he has grown so close to never return from the vast, dark, empty expanse of space. (Although the extremely jarring tonal shift may lead to Bathos.)
  • The sadness might be alleviated with "B.F.B. = Back From Beginning", wherein the Announcer returns at last to Earth and to the show, taking Four's place as the host.

BFDIA

• Puffball getting angry when she realizes Pin accidentally killed her Speaker Box in "Get in the Van". It goes to show that Puffball really loved and cared for her Speaker Box.
• The ending of "Get in the Van" can be seen in this way. Evil Leafy has just eaten the FreeSmarters, as well as Tennis Ball, Golf Ball, and Rocky. Afterwards, Evil Leafy just stands there, staring into the distance as the colours become more faded while sad music plays, thus making the viewers feel bad for the dead contestants.
• Pencil accidentally making Ruby cry in "No More Snow!" is quite sad.
  • For context, Pencil yells at Ruby for no reason and Ruby breaks down in tears. First by shaking, then crying softly, before it becomes full-blown wailing. Book and Match show nothing but sympathy for Ruby. Even Pencil realizes that she went too far.
• The show's return in September of 2016 was tears of the happy kind for long-time fans.
• Though it's a bit small, due to Match's elimination in the last season, Pencil is pointing at the empty air in the IDFB intro where Match would be if she hadn't gotten eliminated in the season prior.
• In BFDIA 7, Rocky is flung to the WTF and he just sits there alone while sad music plays. Even though he seems fine with it, it makes one feel bad for him. Luckily, Firey joins him in BFDIA 8. However, it's not good news for Firey Speaker Box in the same episode, as he's reduced to crying up a storm now that his owners out of the show.
• In BFDIA 9, Tennis Ball gets upset at Gelatin because he made a joke about how he is not good at building shields last episode. Tennis Ball then goes on a rant about how people think Golf Ball is the "good" inventor and Tennis Ball is the "bad" one.
  Gelatin: I didn't mean it about the building shields thing, okay? It was just a joke!
  Tennis Ball: It isn't a joke to me! My trebuchet failed, and now my shield failed. Are you calling me a failed inventor?
  Gelatin: No, no, no, I'm not!
  Tennis Ball: Golf Ball's the one with the factory. Golf Ball's the one with the Dream Sauce. Everyone listens to her because they think she's the good inventor and I'm the bad one!

BFB

• Poor Taco gets trapped in a jawbreaker for around 20 days after Nickel tells David to give up on licking it long after BEEP loses and can’t be heard by the other contestants, even though she can hear them just fine. It gets worse in Episode 3, when her teammates think she has died permanently (Lollipop and Gaty) or abandoned her (Book and Ice Cube), all while she angrily yells at them to break the jawbreaker. Incredibly heartbreaking to watch. When she finally does escape, she's treated as a social pariah by the majority of the other contestants for the rest of the competition.
  Book: Taco was probably recovered too, and is still alive!
  Taco: That’s right!
  Book: So the reason she’s not here is...
  Taco: ...IS THAT I’M STILL TRAPPED IN THIS JAWBREAKER!
  Book: IS THAT SHE ABANDONED US!
  Taco: Book...no...
  Book: She must've gotten fed up with how slow our team chased the basket and went rogue! And... oh, the BETRAYAL! *pulls Ice Cube into a sad hug*
  Taco: No, Book! That’s not true! I’m right here! I’M RIGHT HERE!
• Then, things get worse for Taco in The Stinger for BFB 10. Taco tries to talk to Bell and apologize for deceiving her in BFB 6. But, things do not work out well.
  Taco: Uh, so, Bell...
  Bell: UUUUGGGHHHH!!!!!! Now, what are you trying to do?! Any twinkles I can take off the moon for you?!
  Taco: Bell, I am only making conversation with you.
  Bell: Oh, uh-huh, just like last time?!
  Taco: Listen, Bell, I'm sorry about...
  Bell: (furious) Have you considered that "sorry" might not cut it!?
  Taco: (sadly) You'd think I would know that by now.
  Bell: You set a reputation for yourself, Taco. For all I know, you could be using me as a tool to make your team win right this second! Just deal with it! I don't trust you, anymore! (With a bone-chilling Death Glare as she turns away) And I probably never will!
  • The depressed look on Taco's face hammers it home when Bell tears into her.
    • As the camera fades to black, we see Lollipop watching the entire scene unfold. Ouch!
• This exchange after Loser is kicked off.
  Donut: Loser, we haven't heard much from you today... any last words?
  Loser: Y'know what, I do. Guys, thank you for doing your best to make me feel welcome. I know it didn't last long, but I'm going to miss what we did together. We had fun, and that's all that matters. Good thing Four is gone, at least I can spend my last few days with you. I'm proud of you, and I hope we can meet again.
• Even worse considering Loser said this only after he was eliminated, and is likely to spend his last few days hurtling through space alone. And with Donut's Diary.
• During Leafy's rejoin, Braclety is about to ask her to take her drawing of Ice Cube and give it to her after Four refused to, but before she can finish her request Leafy grabs it, uses as a tissue and crumples it. It gets sad seeing how she destroyed her only memory of Ice Cube.
• Bubble's outburst at Match for her treatment of others and unfair cruelty of others. It's filled with so much emotion and Bubble's confession hammers it in to Match how much has changed ever since the first season. Match apologizes but isn't forgiven easily which she herself understands. Crosses into this again when BFB 12's pre-release voting results showed that Match will still be eliminated even after apologizing which means Bubble will lose another friend when they were about to redeem themselves.
  • In the episode proper, Bubble took Match's elimination very poorly, blaming herself for getting her "Best Friend" eliminated, and attacking Fanny for saying she didn't need Match.
• In Don't Dig Straight Down, it can be pretty sad to see your favourite character(s) being burned and killed by lava.
  • In the same episode, Spongy outright leaves his teammates to die in a lava flood he accidentally caused. It’s insanely disheartening to see the normally kindhearted and gentle Spongy callously abandon his teammates just because they failed to realize Tree was impersonating him during the previous challenge. Needless to say, Spongy quickly earned the fandom’s ire and he received the most votes when Team Ice Cube was put up for elimination in BFB 15.
• Gaty crying in BFB 15, she believes she is going to be eliminated and tells Saw that she doesn't want to be eliminated before breaking down in tears. It certainly doesn't help that her voice doesn't sound anything like her typical Vocal Dissonance.
  • Saw tries to comfort her, but doesn’t get far.
• Also, in BFB 15, Leafy and Firey get into an argument with each other. It turns out that Firey is pretending not to know Leafy because everybody hates her and if people found out that he was friends with her then they would hate him too. This makes Leafy sad and upset and asks Firey why he would do this before asking Firey to stop. Firey refuses and thinks Leafy is being selfish for asking that before Leafy and Firey decide to not be friends anymore for real.
  • Needle slapping Leafy just for trying to help Taco, telling Leafy to mind her own business. Poor Leafy.
    • Not to mention the ending of the episode: Leafy finally finds a friend in Eggy after Firey tells her she has no friends, only for Firey to turn Eggy against Leafy by telling her that Leafy stole Dream Island. If that wasn't enough, during The Stinger, Eggy, Needle, and Firey talk bad about Leafy behind her back while Leafy just sits there, overhearing everything and being very sad. Luckily, Coiny has overheard and oversaw everything and tries to be kind to Leafy, but still.
• Clock died off-screen somewhere between BFB 10 and BFB 11, and was forgotten by his own team, The Losers! who couldn't even remember his name.
  • It gets even sadder in the stinger of BFB 15, when Clock finally gets recovered and Eggy lies that they missed him all along in an attempt to spare his feelings. Clock is frustrated and walks away from his team after hearing this, sarcastically talking about how cherished he feels by his team before realizing he's just talking to himself.
• Four's Heroic BSoD when Two took his spotlight and stole most of the contestants away. Needless to say, just about all of his fans felt sorry for him throughout the whole scene.
  • Then it goes From Bad to Worse. How would you feel if some of your favorite characters abandoned Four?
• Another Tear Jerker involving everyone's favourite blue, cartoon number. Poor Four misses X in the beginning of X Marks the Spot. He even says the challenge is to bring him back. Everyone disagrees until he decided to put the original BFDI back in as the prize.
• In BFB 16, Four asks X if he will leave him for Two, while suffering the loss of all of the other contestants, X replies to Four that he may, only for Four to snap and cry and angrily makes X go. This causes X to feel so bad as he very reluctantly goes.
  Four: (sad and angry) Go! Just GO! (Breaks down crying in his elbow and makes stifling sobs noises as X watches with sympathy and very reluctantly goes)
• In BFB 17, it is quite subtle, but Ruby being threatened by Blocky from his gem-shears and her screaming is quite scary and a bit tear-inducing towards the audience as Ruby is a sensitive girl.
• In BFB 18, Leafy suffers from an anxiety attack from having to fight Firey on the other team. Considering their past, this hits hard.
  • It is very subtle, but, there's Ruby fighting Taco and getting badly punched by Taco. Considering how much of The Cutie and how sensitive Ruby is, this is quite hard to watch.
• In BFB 23, Purple Face escapes his box and chases the Have-Cots in an attempt to eat them! Leafy breaks down in tears and cries as she screams that she doesn't want to be eaten. She ends up OK, along with the others, but still...
• In BFB 24, you can't help but feel bad for Flower as she states that she knows that her bad attitude got her eliminated first in BFDI when she thinks she is eliminated. Fortunately, Blocky was the one who was really eliminated.
  • In the same episode, Gelatin gently but firmly tells Teardrop about her violent behavior towards him as of late, and asks Teardrop to leave him alone because of it. This causes Teardrop to sadly walk away, while Gelatin solemnly thanks her. Lollipop even states that she feels bad for Teardrop.
  • When Blocky gets eliminated, Woody hugs Blocky and cries, while Blocky comforts him, saying that he has to go.
  • Leafy gets scolded by Lollipop for no reason other than for accidentally interrupting the conversation between Firey and Lollipop. Poor Leafy is still treated horribly by the others.
• For those who were fans of FreeSmart in Seasons 2 & 3, seeing them crumble apart in BFB can be really disheartening. From Pencil becoming a Hate Sink out of nowhere in contrast to her normal, Adorkable, Rebel Leader self, to Match becoming a protege of this new Pencil who seems misguided, to Ruby and Bubble getting booted off way too fast, unceremoniously, and against some weighted competition, and worst of all, Book and Ice Cube (though, Icy tried to come back for a little bit) wanting to leave FreeSmart behind for good and never looking back, to the point of even being on the opposite show as Bubble and Ruby post-split. Seeing what was once a fun, rebellious, heartwarming team break down bit-by-bit feels like a massive gut punch. In the end, Golf Ball was probably right about alliances with 4 or more members not being built to last.
  • Additionally, watching Book regress from a polite, soft-spoken nerd to a short-tempered Jerkass with a scathing hatred for Taco can be more than a little disheartening, especially for those who were fans of her.
• After nearly eleven long years since the series began, Firey finally suffers his very first elimination in BFB 25 due to deliberately flunking the challenge in order to finally make amends with Leafy by building another ferris wheel that both of them could enjoy. He's screaming in terror as he's hauled into the sky to the BRB, and Leafy desperately doesn't want to let go of him out of guilt for making him lose another prize. Losing out on the prize is the least of Firey's worries, though, as he's glad that, at the very least, he and Leafy were able to bury the hatchet. It probably made fans regret voting him off.
• Two's No-Holds-Barred Beatdown at the hands of the contestants at the end of "You Know Those Buttons Don't Do Anything, Right?" is meant to be a Take That, Scrappy! moment as an attempt to acknowledge their Replacement Scrappy status within the fandom. However, In-Universe, Two hadn't done anything to warrant such a mauling outside of being at an elevation where nobody could hear them announce the contest rules. In fact, Four never received such a beating in spite of his Ax-Crazy nature, whereas Two, even though they're not necessarily evil, borders on Affably Evil territories. And not only that, fans started to be positive towards Two shortly after the split, since there really was no reason to be negative towards them and their new show, since they were just created.
  • In the same episode, Clock and Eggy leave Cake, and the look on his face says it all. Not only has he lost 3 of the Losers to Four (Leafy, Loser, and Firey), another 3 to another team (Coiny, Pin, and Needle), but now his only other friends leave him as well. Cake even begins to break down crying. Fortunately, Naily asks him if he wants to join her team with her and Bomby. Cake does while sniffling.
• You might fail trying not to cry while watching the stinger of BFB 28 (pictured above), considering the fact that X will be left without his best friend, Four, after he decided to merge with the desert after being replaced by Announcer earlier.
• A lot of things about the finale of BFB, Chapter Complete, was this for many:
  • Flower giving the BFB to Gelatin was a moment for fans of Flower seeing just how far she has come.
  • Four's Imaginary section with the eliminated contestants, anyone who didn't feel bad for him already definitely will.
  • Gelatin's Nostalgic Narrator moment near the end. it's just so good to see the contestants just be themselves.
  • After many years, Firey and Leafy finally get a happy ending, as they sail away to find a new Dream Island.

TPOT

• In, "The Worst Day of Black Hole's Life", Pin reveals in a surprising twist, that she hated competing in BFDIA and that it still negatively affects her when she has a quarrel with Coiny. The surprises Coiny and catches him off-guard. Pin, then, walks away, sad and disappointed.
  • It gets worse when you realize why she hates BFDIA... (She was forcefully deprived of her limbs and eventually her FACE too)
• When Clock gets eliminated in "The Seven Wonders of Goiky", Two doesn't fully eliminate him yet so he could work things out with Winner, who had just told him that the team would be better off without him. In the end, Clock gives it a shot, but it doesn't work. Two feels bad for him.
  • "Balancing P.A.C.T." continues from this, with Two trying to reach out to Winner to get them to understand, but Winner cuts them off, annoyed about the "special treatment" they've been receiving from everyone, just wanting to be recognized as a regular contestant. Gaty explains to Two later on that even if he wants to help, it's best to let them resolve the situation on their own.
• The challenge in "Oneirophobe's Nightmare" offers nightmares that can have very deep and sorrowful meanings:
  • Winner's story. They reveal that while they and Loser toured, Loser seemed to get all the fame and attention. While Winner liked seeing that for him, they felt left out themselves by not the lack of attention from the crowd, but by their friendship with Loser. They never wanted fame, they just wanted to tour together as friends. But Winner eventually has enough and Loser hits the mainstream, leaving them forgotten. Because of this, they hate thinking about their "fame" with Loser, and it explains how they got fed up with Clock constantly trying to push them back into fame. When Clock realized this, he apologizes deeply, explaning that he too has been forgotten about by his previous team, The Losers!, when he was killed. While Winner seemed reluctant to talk to Clock again, they eventually make amends and Clock is sent to the elimination place for real, as he was not there prior solely for this moment to happen.
  • Book's dream is about feeling lonely and forgotten, reflecting on her past actions during BFB. Especially with how the rest of her team felt about her, and even refusing to re-team with her in TPOT, you can really tell how bad she feels for what she did. Like how she berated of Taco for "abandoning" the team whenever she left or was never present. Her team even took the longest to figure out the issue, resulting in Just Not's 4th Cake at Stake. Thankfully in the end, Price Tag cheers her up by exchanging conversations with her about inclusion and interests, making her feel better.
  • Black Hole's nightmare reveals why he prefers to prevent death. Since he's a black hole, he could literally suck the whole universe if he wanted to. He would constantly beat himself up for accidentally sucking up a contestant and would even offer to forfeit challenges to prevent anyone's death. Fanny convinces him otherwise that sometimes it's ok and there's always a recovery center to recover said contestant if they so happen to be killed, making Black Hole feel better and ending his nightmare.

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