Web Animation / Heavy is Dead

"It is good day to be NOT dead."^POW!"You are dead!" "I AM DEAD!"

The Team Fortress 2 animation Heavy is Dead is a "murder mystery" parody by Antoine Delak, the same guy who made the Gorgeous Freeman series. The story is about an unlucky RED Heavy, who tragically perished at the hands of a conniving BLU Engineer, who later acts innocent as Heavy's comrades (and Heavy himself, who keeps forgetting that he died) dig into the mystery of his demise.

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Tropes are dead! TROPES ARE DEAD!? YES! THEY DIED!!!

• Accidental Hero: Demoman — a Team Killer and a Prankster who jokingly took the blame for Heavy's murder — ends up inadvertently saving the day by revealing who the actual murderer is.
• Accidental Murder: Medic is introduced when the ambulance he was driving crashes into a building and crushes Soldier out of nowhere, though Medic comes out just fine.
• Achievements in Ignorance: How did Heavy survive being shot in the head? By being stupid enough to literally forget that he's dead.
• Actor Allusion: At one point Sniper says "Well, Now What?" — a line that belongs to Half-Life 2 male citizens who share a voice actor with Sniper. As well as the exclamation of "dead!" and his "Oh God..." after the Medic pronounces the Heavy dead on the scene.
• Actually Pretty Funny: Demoman demonstrates how Heavy died by shooting Sniper. Everyone bursts into laughter when he says it's a joke.
• Adaptational Intelligence: Soldier is normally portrayed as a bloodthirsty, jingoistic cloudcuckoolander. Here, however, he's one of the few people to do something remotely productive: he uncovers what he believes to be the murder weapon. Of course, the Engineer had shot the Heavy with a different pistol that had a large telescope attached to it, but, still, points for effort.
• Ascended Meme: The video itself has become one. In 2023, YouTuber ShorK would upload a video of the Team Fortress 2 cast reacting to the video and then recreating it.
• Badass Boast: Spy gives one so badass that everyone present applauds. Even the murderer himself!
  Spy: So, did you see the murderer?
  Sniper and Engineer: No, sorry mate.
  Spy: I will find him, I will capture him, And no one will ever die again!
  Sniper: [applauding] Ah, well, that's nice.
  Engineer: [applauding] I am damn proud right now.
• Big Bad: BLU Engineer, Heavy's devious murderer.
• Boom, Headshot!: Heavy "dies" by getting shot in the head by Engineer. He survives it by being too dumb to know he's supposed to be dead.
• Bowdlerise: Some examples from the "family-friendly" version of the video which was created for the original voice actors to react to and dub over:
  • Engineer now announces his intent to kill Heavy before missing. The Heavy still goes along with it.
  • When Medic attempts to revive Heavy by kissing him, he is stopped by a sign falling on him.
  • Scout enters saying "Clippity clop, everybody!"
  • Demoman chucks his revolver at Sniper and knocks him out cold, complete with circling stars.
  • Engineer now falls over in his death with his hands crossed and holding a rose, turning into a grave shortly.
  • Lampshaded when Spy attempts to hang himself. This time, the YouTube logo cuts the rope, preventing his suicide. It's ultimately ineffective, though, as a train turns around just to run him over.
• Bullying the Disabled: The Engineer killed the Heavy because of his weight and unattractiveness, something that he's more than happy to gloat about after his cover is blown.
• Butt-Monkey: Poor Scout. Nobody reacts when he points out that the Heavy is dead, the Spy sends him home in embarrassment, his mother immediately kills them both in a fiery crash when he does leave with her, and then when the Medic tries to "heal" them, all three of them explode. And to add insult to injury, Scout only gets 15 seconds of living time on-screen before he gets killed off.
• The Cameo: The head-swapped cast of Crash Bandicoot appears in the background at one point (with Tiny Tiger appearing separately from the others earlier).
• Captain Obvious: It may be hard to believe, but Heavy is actually DEAD^note THE HEAVY IS DEAD?!.
  Medic: In my medical opinion, THAT HEAVY IS DEAD!
  Sniper: Doc? What happened?
  Medic: My professional opinion? The Heavy was killed!
• Captain Obvious Reveal: A deliberate one: the Engineer is shown killing the Heavy at the start, and is the only character wearing BLU colors in a RED team. Nobody figures out it's him until he accidentally (and then deliberately) confesses.
• Character Death: Believe it or not, the Heavy is dead.^note THE HEAVY IS DEAD?! The Engineer shoots him with a telescope. Subverted in that Heavy keeps getting revived, but has to act dead because everyone insists he's dead. Played straight with the rest of the team, who are picked off one by one in other ways.
• Content Warning: YouTube placed one for the Spy's suicide.
• Deadly Prank: Demoman, in an attempt to trick his team into thinking he killed Heavy, fatally shoots Sniper as a demonstration. He then reveals to his team that his confession was a joke. They buy it.
• Death as Comedy: Quite a lot of mileage is gotten out of the characters dying, primarily from Heavy constantly forgetting he's dead, and due to how abrupt and slapstick the others' deaths are.
• Death by Irony: Medic makes his entrance by mowing Soldier down with his ambulance and trying to revive Heavy, and is killed when Scout's crashed car explodes as Medic's running over to try and revive him.
• Death Is Cheap:
  • The Heavy is killed at the beginning but doesn't do a very good job of staying dead.
  • While it is technically subverted by the rest of the cast (all of whom die in strange ways that are treated as permanent) this trope is frequently discussed in various ways, such as Medic claiming that Heavy being dead isn't "anything to worry about" or Demoman's cold-blooded murder of Sniper being treated as a joke.
• Department of Redundancy Department: Pretty much the entire cast points out multiple times that the Heavy is dead^note THE HEAVY IS DEAD?!. This is treated as a shocking revelation every single time.
• Devil in Plain Sight: The BLU Engineer is found alone with the Heavy's body and is the only one present not from the RED team, but nobody ever suspects he's the killer. He only gets found out because the RED Demo makes a completely random guess that he later dismisses as a joke.
• Dies Differently in Adaptation: In the "Family-Friendly" edition, Spy's suicide is prevented by YouTube, but then is abruptly run over by a train.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Why does Engie kill Heavy? Because he's fat, ugly, and dumb.
• Disappointed by the Motive: In contrast to Heavy's heartbreak over the revelation, the Spy looks back and forth between the victim and perpetrator in exasperation and confusion when the Engineer confesses that he killed the Heavy because he was fat, ugly, and dumb.
• Doomed Protagonist: The titular Heavy, who dies after 5 seconds of screentime. Inverted at the end, when he's literally the only surviving character.
• Dramatic Irony: The audience knows the Engineer killed Heavy from the start, but none of the other characters knows that until later (more specifically, three).
• Driven to Suicide: The RED Spy, who was driven past his Despair Event Horizon due to everyone being idiots.
• Drowning My Sorrows: What Engineer appears to be doing right before Heavy kills him back, suddenly being at a bar with a bunch of empty drinks.
• Dwindling Party: The RED Team loses almost all of its members throughout the video.
• Easily Forgiven: Demoman shoots and kills Sniper while confessing about killing the Heavy? Everyone is stunned in shock. Him clarifying that it was a joke? They all jointly laugh.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Played with. Engineer, who murdered Heavy, is horrified when the Demoman shoots his teammate Sniper. But when Demoman passes it off as a joke, Engie joins the others in laughing at the "joke". But it's kind of Hypocritical Humor for Engie to be so horrified by Demoman's lame excuse for murder, considering that Engie had a piss-weak reason for killing Heavy.
• Every Car Is a Pinto: Scout's car explodes into flames after his mother crashes it into a wall.
• Evil Laugh: Engineer does a sinister chuckle after killing Heavy, and maniacly laughs when he admits that he's the murderer.
• Evil Is Petty: The reason Engineer killed Heavy? Because he's fat and ugly.
• Fake Shemp: Almost all of the Team Fortress 2 cast featured in the video reprised their roles for "The TF2 Voice Actors Recreate Heavy is Dead", with the exceptions of Grant Goodeve (the Engineer) and Rick May (the Soldier), whose lines remain sentence-mixed archived audio, due to Grant Goodeve preferring to stay out of the public eye and Rick May having passed away a few months after the original Heavy is Dead^note THE HEAVY IS DEAD?!.
• Finger Gun: Just like he can in the game, the Heavy blows the Engineer away by pointing at him and shouting "POW!"
• Forgetful Jones: Everyone. Every time the Heavy's death is brought up, the main cast shouts "The Heavy is dead?!" Even the Spy, the perpetrator, and Heavy himself keep forgetting that the Heavy died.
• Forgotten Fallen Friend: Not for the Heavy, but the other characters rarely seem to care when the other characters die or get killed during the video. The only exception is when the Medic tries to save Scout from a burning car and Heavy, Engineer, and Spy's reaction to Sniper being shot by Demoman. Even then, they all laughed and forgot about him when Demo said it was just a joke.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: TONS. Special mentions include:
  • The book the Heavy is reading right after Engineer shoots him is labelled "HOW 2 DIE".
  • A YouTube monetization icon appearing over Sniper's crotch when he does a pelvic thrust, referencing the site's aggressive demonetization of videos containing offensive content.
  • The gameshow answers turn into "Haha shid pants", "Poop", and "The Jews faked the moon landing".
  • When Spy requests that everybody get back to the point, he holds up a map sign that says "To the point". After the shot cuts away to the Heavy and back, just before Spy throws the sign away, it now says "To the porn".
• The Friend Nobody Likes: Scout. His mere appearance puts the entire RED Team into a Stunned Silence and Spy, exasperated with Scout's antics, orders him to go home. When he dies in a car crash shortly afterwards, no one besides Medic even mentions it.
• Funny Background Event: There is always something happening in the background of every shot or scene, ranging from signs placed in funny ways to references to just plain abstract scenes.
• Get Out!: When the Scout shows up, the Spy orders him to go home. The Scout reluctantly agrees and enters his mother's car... which crashes into a wall and explodes.
• Gross-Up Close-Up: There are a few abrupt close-ups of the Demoman's mouth when he's drinking or belching.
• His Name Is...: A variation. Heavy tries to tell Spy who he thinks the killer was, but both Spy and Engineer immediately shush him because he's dead, which Heavy goes along with.
• Hitler Cam: As the Engineer starts to break down after being revealed as the Heavy's killer, the camera momentarily pulls down to show him from a very low angle, making him look big and evil.
• Hope Spot:
  • The Medic attempts to revive the Heavy by kissing him on the nose. A ray of light appears, and Heavy rises while laughing, starts to announce that he's alive... and inexplicably bursts into Ludicrous Gibs. The "family-friendly" version instead has a street light short out and knock him out.
  • In the "family-friendly" version, the YouTube logo saves Spy from his Seen-It-All Suicide… only for Spy to get abruptly killed by a detailed train.
• How Did You Know? I Didn't: Word for word when the Demoman accuses the Engineer of being the murderer.
• Hypocritical Humor: The Spy gives an exasperated "We know!" when Soldier informs him that the Heavy is dead^note THE HEAVY IS DEAD!?. Less than a minute later, the Soldier tells the RED team that a pistol was used to kill the Heavy, the Spy shouts "The Heavy is dead?!" in a genuinely shocked voice.
• Idiot Hero: The Heavy, who can't remember the fact that he died, even when he's poking his corpse.
• I'll Kill You!: The "family-friendly" edition has Engineer say "I'm gonna make you dead!" before shooting and missing, though Heavy drops dead anyway.
• Insane Troll Logic: The Spy is under the impression that by finding and capturing the Heavy's murderer, this will by extension ensure that "no one will ever die again!"
• Irony: The title is called Heavy is Dead and it involves almost all of the other characters trying to figure out who killed him, and dying in the process. By the end of the video, Heavy is the only character who's still alive.
• I Was Just Joking: Demoman's accusation (and subsequent shooting of Sniper) was supposed to be a joke.
• Jerkass Has a Point: Engineer's "The Reason You Suck" Speech towards the Heavy was both spiteful and full of bigotry, but he's right about the Heavy being dumb.
• "Just Joking" Justification: Demoman shoots Sniper, and then claims it was just a joke. They buy it.
• Karma Houdini: Subverted with Demoman. After tricking his team into thinking that the Sniper's death was a joke, it looks like he'll get away scot-free, but he dies of alcohol poisoning shortly after accidentally revealing the true perpetrator.
• Karmic Death: Heavy pulls a lethal No, You on Engineer, who "killed" him at the start.
• Killed Mid-Sentence: The Spy does this, to himself, after deciding to end it all after the main conflict is resolved. Subverted in the family friendly version, but his line is still cut off.
  Spy: Well, that was idiotic. Off to hang myself! Watch and le-[ded]
• Killed Off for Real: By the end of the video, everyone but The Heavy.
• Kiss of Life: The Medic attempts to revive the Heavy by kissing him on the nose. It only revives him for a few seconds before the Heavy inexplicably bursts into Ludicrous Gibs.
• Large Ham: Everyone has their moments, but special mention goes to The Medic, who screams almost all of his lines at the top of his lungs and is animated very eccentrically.
• Laughing Mad: Engineer laughs out loud during his Villainous Breakdown just before confessing to the murder.
• Letting the Air out of the Band: How the short ends, to drive home how stupid the whole thing was.
• The Load: Nobody appreciates Scout's mediocre efforts to figure out what happened, not that he even did much beyond point out Heavy's demise, and Spy immediately tells him to leave.
• Ludicrous Gibs: Medic's attempt to revive the Heavy results in the latter unceremoniously exploding. He's shown to be fine less than a minute later, though.
• Motor Mouth: Scout, after being told to go home.
  "Frickingunbelieveablenoseriouslyyouallsuck..."
• Never Trust a Title: By the end of the short, Heavy is the only character who isn't dead.
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Realizing that Scout and his mother crashed their car, Medic runs into it, causing it to explode and kill him.
• Not Now, We're Too Busy Crying Over You: Heavy almost reveals that the Engineer shot him until the Spy and the Engineer shush him because he's supposed to be dead.
• Not Quite Dead: Heavy is quite an active character despite being, y'know, dead.
  Heavy: [poking his own corpse] I think Heavy is dead.
• Not So Above It All:
  • Initially played straight and justified. Although the BLU Engineer is sneaky enough to kill the Heavy, he still goes along with the insane behaviour of the rest of the group because he has to avoid being caught. Subverted at the end when he gets fed up with the other's behaviour and has a Villainous Breakdown.
  • Despite the Spy's attempts to be an Only Sane Man, he joins in with his team's antics when they shout "The Heavy is dead?!" and laughs at Demoman's 'joke'.
• No, You: Engineer attempts to end his shouting match with Heavy by telling Heavy to fuck off because he's dead (or at least, supposed to be). Heavy responds thusly before shooting him with a Finger Gun.
• Only Sane Man: Zig-zagged with Spy. While Spy is much more mature than his allies (not that that's saying much) and is dead-serious about finding out who killed Heavy, he genuinely gets caught off guard when being informed that the Heavy is dead^note THE HEAVY IS DEAD?!, and laughs at Demoman's 'joke'.
• Out-of-Character Moment: It is very unusual of Medic to care about the well-being of his patients, let alone throw himself into a burning car to save someone.
• Played for Laughs: Everyone's deaths (especially the RED Spy's suicide) are humorous and slapstick in their execution.
• Poking Dead Things with a Stick: The Heavy pokes the Heavy's corpse with a stick to confirm that the Heavy is dead^note THE HEAVY IS DEAD!?. Don't think too hard about this.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: The Engineer is revealed to be one when he reveals that he killed the Heavy because of his weight, unattractiveness, and unintelligence.
• Psychopathic Manchild: The Engineer, despite his seemingly normal exterior, is revealed to be one when he goes Laughing Mad before confessing to the Heavy's death and throws insults that a school bully would make when his motive is questioned.
• Rapid-Fire Comedy: This short traffics in Mood Whiplash, blink-and-you'll-miss-it background events, and a heavy dose of absurd repetition.
• Reaction Shot: When the Soldier confirms that the Heavy died, the Spy, Engineer, and Sniper all react in a shocked fashion. They are then immediately shown to have been posing in front of a green screen.
• Reckless Gun Usage: Once Soldier finds the gun, he immediately points it at the rest of the party, freaking them out in the process.
• Red Herring: Parodied. Demoman pops up out of nowhere, claiming to be the Heavy's murderer, and casually shoots Sniper as a demonstration. Everyone is horrified... until Demo tells it's a joke and everyone bursts into laughter.
• Running Gag: Continually acting surprised whenever anyone declares the Heavy to be dead.
• Seen-It-All Suicide: Upon seeing the Engineer be revealed as the real murderer, then Heavy coming back and killing the Engineer with a lethal No, You, the RED Spy decides that the whole exchange was so idiotic that his only recourse is to hang himself.
• Self-Deprecation: At the end of the video, both the Spy and Heavy admit that the situation was stupid.
• Shout-Out:
  • This exchange, shortly after Spy enters:
    Spy: The Heavy is dead.
    Heavy: Yes. (subtitle says "sandwich")
  • The gameshow gag — Spy and Engineer tell Sniper that the Heavy is dead^note THE HEAVY IS DEAD?!. A Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?-style display promptly appears.
  • When Soldier enters, Heavy, Spy, Sniper, Engineer, and the Announcer are all posed to resemble Manuel Sanchez's ''The suicide of Seneca''◊.
  • In Pyro's background appearance, he is painting with an easel, which is a nod to another Machinima video, "Pyro Paints" by That Gray Cartoon Pony.
  • Soldier declares "HE DIED" and Medic declares "THE HEAVY WAS KILLED" both in a very similar style to the dramatic courtroom presentations of the Ace Attorney series.
  • There are tiny desk Engineers dancing in the grass when Soldier picks up the gun.
  • As Soldier shows the gun to the rest of the living mercs, a RED Demoman and BLU Sniper carrying a pizza appear in the background before quickly running off. This is a reference to ItalianNinja98's video, Requiem for a Pizza: The Meeting.
  • When Sniper asks "Well, now what?", he does Giorno and Gold Experience's pose with Spy.
• Skyward Scream: Exaggerated. When Heavy and Engineer are arguing near the end, Heavy interrupts Engineer by shouting Engineer's name into the sky. When Heavy does so, his head suddenly grows several times larger.
• Sole Survivor: When all is said and done, the only surviving main character is, ironically enough, Heavy.^note The Soldier is run over by the Medic's ambulance, Scout and his mother die in a car crash, Medic is killed in the explosion resulting from said crash, Sniper is shot through the chest as a joke by Demoman, Demoman succumbs to alcohol poisoning, Engineer has his head blown off by Heavy's No, You, and finally, and Spy hang himself after finding the entire situation stupid. And while Pyro doesn't die, they serve no role other than a quick cameo.
• Spared by the Adaptation:
  • In the "family-friendly edition" of the video, Demoman throws his revolver at Sniper and knocks him out cold, complete with sparkling stars, though he is still treated as "dead".
  • To a lesser extent, Heavy is alive from start to end in the family-friendly edition of the video compared to the original thanks to Engineer missing his shot, like the Sniper above, he's still treated as "dead".
• Spies Are Despicable: A rare aversion in a Team Fortress 2 work. The Spy is honestly doing his best to figure out who the murderer is.
• Stylistic Suck: In true GMod Machinima style, the character movements and speech are awkward and erratic. It only makes it funnier. One particularly interesting case happens during Engineer and Heavy's shouting match where, in sharp contrast to the Rapid Fire Funny Background Events, the camera remains fixed on the barely-animated Spy looking back and forth at the argument before shrugging, with text eventually appearing informing us that "IT'S TRADITION." This is, most likely, a reference to a common practice by people who animate Smexuals where they will cut to a character who isn't speaking to avoid having to animate particularly complex scenes—usually with text to the effect of "Sorry, got lazy."
• Suddenly Shouting: The Medic is quite fond of doing this
  Medic: In my medical opinion, that HEAVY IS DEAD!
• Suicide as Comedy: Spy, being the last one alive aside from Heavy, declares the whole thing idiotic and does a back-flip off a chair with a noose around his neck, and he is Killed Mid-Sentence with a Critical Hit sound effect.
• Surrounded by Idiots: The Spy, despite being Not So Above It All. He gives an exasperated "We know!" when Soldier informs him that the Heavy is dead,^note THE HEAVY IS DEAD?! groans when the Scout shows up and orders the Scout to go home, is visibly Disappointed by the Motive when the perpetrator is revealed, and deems the series of events as idiotic before hanging himself.
• Surprisingly Sudden Death: IN SPADES! Characters die in the most abrupt and out-of-the-blue ways possible. For example, Soldier gets randomly run over by Medic's ambulance, Demoman just drops dead from a "Critical Shit", and Scout's mother crashes the family car (and Scout himself) into a wall.
• Surreal Humor: Some of the gags fit the bill, such as the myriad of Funny Background Events, the game show gag, and the moment where Heavy inexplicably duplicates and pokes his own dead body with a stick. ^note  Though he could’ve just respawned.
• Team Killer: Demoman casually shoots Sniper as a Deadly Prank.
• Tempting Fate: Heavy's first statement is "It is good day to be not dead!" Unsurprisingly, he is immediately killed.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: When Engineer confesses the murder of Heavy and is questioned on why he would do such a thing, Engineer goes on a tirade where he states that it was because the Heavy was fat, ugly, and dumb.^note The official subtitles only transcribe the Engineer's tirade (and Heavy's complaining) as "They both argue", but the sound bites used by Engineer are essentially several of his domination lines strung together, making it easy to figure out what he's saying.
  Engineer: Heh heh heh....HAHAHA! That's right! It was me!
  Spy: You Monster!
  Heavy: But why?
  Engineer: 'Coz you're FAT, boi. And another thing? You're ugly. (Heavy: Engineer, stop!) You're a whole herd of ugly. (Heavy: Engineer, you are so mean!) You're dumb as a box of rocks. (Heavy: Is not funny.) I've seen better sides of beef been run over by a combine!
  Heavy: ENGINEER!
• Throwing Your Gun at the Enemy: In the "Family-friendly" version, Demoman throws his gun at the Sniper, knocking him out cold.
• Title Drop: The phrase "Heavy is Dead" is said 14 times throughout the short.
• Too Dumb to Live:
  • Yes, Medic, running headlong into a flaming car wreck is totally a good idea. It totally won't explode and kill you.
  • Inverted with Heavy, who is so dumb he forgets he died. Or that he respawned. Or maybe he never died in the first place (he was shot with a pistol, after all). It isn't clear which.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: To be expected in a Garry's Mod machinima, but what stands out the most is no one commenting on how the Heavy is suddenly sitting on a chair, back to life while poking at his own dead body on the ground. Everyone, including Heavy himself, is still trying to figure out who killed him.
• Villainous Breakdown: Once Demo accuses BLU Engineer, the latter realizes the gig is up and goes insane as he confesses that he was the one who killed the Heavy.
• Whodunnit to Me?: The Heavy is just as confused about why the Heavy is dead as everybody else. Humorously enough, unlike most versions of this trope, Heavy isn't a ghost—he's just so stupid that he keeps forgetting that he's dead.
• You Are Fat: Why did the Engineer kill the Heavy? "Coz you're fat, boy!"
• You Don't Look Like You: Downplayed; every character has most of their features from the main game intact, but most of them (save Engineer) are wearing cosmetics from Team Fortress 2:
  • Heavy is always seen wearing a pair of Cool Shades.
  • The Spy is wearing a military hat.
  • The Sniper, by contrast, isn't wearing his normal hat and is instead wearing a pair of shades and smoking a cigarette holder. His hairline is also noticeably receding (note that he's only in his late 20s in the main game).
  • The Soldier is given a rather bushy beard and a General MacArthur pipe.
  • The Medic is bald, fully bearded, and has opaque shades.
  • The Scout is wearing a ridiculously tacky unicorn hat and an open track jacket.
  • And the Demoman is wearing a pair of shades with a red wide-brimmed fedora while smoking a cigar.
• You Just Told Me: When the Demoman unwittingly pointed out the Engineer as the real murderer:
  Engineer: How did you know?
  Demoman: I didn't! (burp) That was a joke too.
• You Monster!: Spy says this to BLU Engineer when everybody realizes that he's the murderer.
• Visual Pun: In the "family-friendly edition", when the Demoman throws his gun at Sniper and knocks him out, the gun landed in his mouth barrel first.

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Spy: Well, that was idiotic. Off to hang myself! Watch and le—(CRIT)
Heavy: I am alive! Is nice. Yes, this is stupid!

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