History Main / InnOfNoReturn

** In ''WesternAnimation/Transylvania65000'', WesternAnimation/BugsBunny checks into a castle hotel owned by a vampire who plans to suck his blood.

* Advanced ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' adventure module ''TabletopGame/TheApocalypseStone''. The [[DemonLordsandArchdevils devil prince]] Moloch is following the players so he can get [[TothePain revenge]] on them. He has his minions slaughter everyone in an inn and then cast an illusion over the place so that when the party arrives everything looks normal. [[spoiler: The minion in disguise offers the party food, mentioning the inn's special pork buns, and after they eat he asks if they want to stay the night. When they wake up in the morning they're all laying on beds of spikes and razors and when they come downstairs they see that the inn is a [[JustforPun bloody mess.]] There is one table set with a tray of pork buns with a note on it that hints at [[TheSecretofLongPorkPies exactly what was in the buns...]] ]]

Basically, a place of accommodation that kills its customers and robs their corpses. For unknown reasons, this turns up a lot in French literature/works set in France. Sometimes, to "get more bang for the buck," the proprietors will [[TheSecretOfLongPorkPies "serve"]] their guests as well. One wonders how these places advertise and attract guests/victims, other than the possible curiosity if rumors of their crimes are publicized. See also HellHotel and InnSecurity, although in the latter, attacks on guests are generally not by the inn's owners. A less dangerous innkeeper is the PilferingProprietor.

Basically, a place of accommodation that kills its customers and robs their corpses. For unknown reasons, this turns up a lot in French literature/works set in France. Sometimes, to "get more bang for the buck," the proprietors will [[TheSecretOfLongPorkPies "serve"]] their guests as well. One wonders how these places advertise and attract guests/victims, other than the possible curiosity if rumors of their crimes are publicized. See also HellHotel and InnSecurity, although in the latter, attacks on guests are generally not by the inn's owners.

* Creator/RoaldDahl's story "The Landlady", although in this case, the killer is simply psycho rather than greedy.

* ''WesterAnimation/LooneyTunes'': Creator/ChuckJones seemed to really like this trope.

* WesternAnimation/PorkyPig and Sylvester check into a hotel full of murderous mice in the ''WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes'' short ''Claws for Alarm''.

* ''VideoGame/ChainedEchoes'': The White Rose Inn, whichs seems to be an ordinary inn, but is actually run by a MadScientist that uses the place to abduct passing travelers so he can experiment on them, which almost always results in their deaths.

If it is just impossible to leave, and you stay forever, see LotusEaterMachine.

-->-- '''Music/{{Eagles}}''', "Hotel California"

* InnOfNoReturn: The White Rose Inn, whichs seems to be an ordinary inn, but is actually run by a MadScientist that uses the place to abduct passing travelers so he can experiment on them, which almost always results in their deaths.

[[folder:Gamebooks]]
* ''Literature/FightingFantasy'' has more than one of these:
** The second ''Literature/{{Sorcery}}'' book, ''Cityport of Traps'', has an inn called the "Wayfarer's Rest", and if you spend a night in there the owner will install a guillotine booby-trap over your bed - if you could decipher the trap, you escape unharmed with nobody stopping you, otherwise you die via guillotine and the inn keeps your posessions.
** ''Literature/SpectralStalkers'' has a rather blatant one, called the [[IDontLikeTheSoundOfThatPlace Inn of the Ghostly Visitors]]. Turns out the owner is working for flesh-eating goblins and ''will'' drug you to sell for food.
[[/folder]]

* ''LightNovel/HighSchoolProdigiesHaveItEasyEvenInAnotherWorld'' gives us a probably unique sympathetic example: due to [[AristocratsAreEvil cruel edicts]] driving them to poverty and starvation, a farming village has turned to this as their only way to survive. They know what they're doing is wrong, hate themselves for doing it, and confess when Shinobu confronts them.

* Happens in "Rattle of Bones", one of the Literature/SolomonKane short stories by Creator/RobertEHoward. The Cleft Skull Tavern is run by a man who claims he was falsely imprisoned in the Karlsruhe dungeons. He now murders all travellers who stop at his inn as revenge on all men for his false imprisonment. Although, to be fair, perhaps the name '[[IDontLikeTheSoundOfThatPlace The Cleft Skull Tavern]]'' should have been a bit of a warning.

* In "[[Literature/{{Kane}} Raven's Eyrie]]", the eponymous inn. Before [[VillainProtagonist Kane]]'s raid, it used to be a popular caravanserai, however, as it turns out, not all of its customers survived the night. Its single rooms--for particularly wealthy guests, of course--had hidden entrances, while a tunnel leading to nearby river Cotras provided convenient means of getting rid of the bodies. And the disappearances could always be blamed on bandits, like Kane.

* From Wiki/TheOtherWiki article on Cave-In-Rock, Illinois: Isaiah L. Potts operated Potts Inn on the Ford's Ferry Road in Illinois, where travelers checked in, but sometimes failed to check out. It's noted in the ''Life Treasury of American Folklore'' p. 123: "Potts succeeded in persuading travelers to remain all night at his inn. Tradition says many a man took his last drink at Pott's Spring and spent his last hour on Earth in Pott's House."

* OlderThanFeudalism is the dubious hospitality of the wicked blacksmith Procrustes, of [[Myth/ClassicalMythology Greek myth]], and the proprietor of the Ur-example. Procrustes had a spare room and a spare iron bed, which [[SacredHospitality he would offer to people who came past his house]] (as it was on a major road a little outside Athens, there were a lot of those). The bed would prove either too short or too long for the guests, at which point Procrustes would get his tools out. If the bed was too long, he would stretch the guest to fit it; too short, and he would cut them down to size. (If the guest looked to be about the right size, Procrustes [[MortonsFork secretly had two beds]].) [[DeathByIrony Procrustres then got a big taste of his own medicine]] when he tried to do this to Theseus. One version had Theseus simply chop Procrustes to bits with an ax; other versions claim he made the evil innkeeper fit his own bed. [[TheUnreveal No one ever said whether he was too long or too short, though]]., although one version has Theseus ''keep moving him'' from one bed to the other, chopping and stretching as needed.

* [[MindScrew Possibly]] the subject of the song "Hotel California" by the Music/{{Eagles}}.

* In ''ComicBook/TheSandman'' issue "The Hunt," the protagonist of the story-within-a-story stops for the night in an inn like this. He survives; it's heavily implied that the innkeeper doesn't.

* The [[AC: Don't Go Inn]] in ''Literature/GalaxyOfFear''. Well, if you see the sign and don't leave within the day it's likely too late. [[spoiler: The ground [[QuicksandSucks eats people]]; the whole planet sort of serves as the "inn".]] In this case the slow rate of very carefully concealed disappearances and the friendly Enzeem work to make sure a small but not insignificant number of people stop by.

* [[MindScrew Possibly]] the subject of the song "Hotel California" by the Music/{{Eagles}}

* ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales2017'' features this in "House of the Lucky Gander!". Invited by [[BornLucky Gladstone Gander]] to enjoy a taste of the good life, Scrooge, Donald, the triplets and Webby wind up at a luxurious hotel in [[NoCommunitiesWereHarmed Macaw, China]]. Said hotel doubles as a casino and features everything from exotic animals and water dancing to a buffet. Gladstone spends the majority of the episode hanging around Donald and encouraging him to play all of the games despite Donald's [[BornUnlucky awful luck.]] Concluding that Gladstone wanted to make himself look good in front of his nephews, Donald tries to leave; when Gladstone tries to stop him, an ethereal shackle appears around his ankle. He reveals to the family that [[GildedCage he cannot leave the inn]] because the owner is a vampiric spirit that [[AbstractEater feeds on his natural good luck]]. He was hoping Donald's bad luck would rub off so he could be free.

* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Port_murders Burke and Hare]].
* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bloody_Benders The Bloody Benders]]

* [[BitchInSheepsClothing Dorothea Puente]]'s boarding house in [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothea_Puente Sacramento]].
* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raya_and_Sakina Raya and Sakina]], the first women to be executed in modern Egypt (1921), run such an inn for travelling women in Alexandria and killed their guests to rob them of their money and jewels.

* ''L'Auberge rouge'' (''The Red Inn''), a 1951 French film VeryLooselyBasedOnATrueStory in which a couple of innkeeper kill their customers to keep their goods, until the day a monk (Creator/{{Fernandel}}) comes at the inn. Had a remake in 2007.