Line #101 Main/Tontine


1	->''"Duh, essentially, we all enter into a contract whereby the last surviving participant becomes the sole possessor of all them purty pictures."''
2	-->-- '''Milton "Oxford" Haas''', ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', "[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS7E22 The Curse of the Flying Hellfish]]"
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4	This is when a group of people take one or more collectively owned items of worth and put it in trust. The last surviving member of the group will then receive the items. Coincidentally, participants in a tontine tend to have a slightly short life expectancy.
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6	Originally, a Tontine was an investment where multiple participants would buy in for an equal amount. The entity running the Tontine (usually a bank) would invest the money and pay out dividends. When a participant died, his dividends would be paid out to the remaining members. The last surviving member would receive the entire principal. This trope was commonly used in older murder mysteries, but has since fallen out of favor. This is probably because most kinds of tontine are now illegal, for the precise ''reason'' of being such a good setup for a murder mystery...
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8	This is almost an example of a ForgottenTrope. It's also almost a subtrope of InheritanceMurder, saved only by the fact that murdering people over a tontine is ''technically'' optional.
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10	Not to be confused with "Tontine Therapy", an Australian euphemism for [[VorpalPillow smothering someone to death with a pillow]] which takes its name from pillows with the Tontine brand name. Not that it can't be the murder weapon in the above trope, but the etymology is separate.
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12	----
13	!!Examples:
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15	[[foldercontrol]]
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17	[[folder:Anime & Manga]]
18	* ''Manga/TheKurosagiCorpseDeliveryService'', volume 3: suicidal and/or people desperately needing money sign on to a game where they make certain changes to their life insurance, so that it pays into an escrow account after they die. Since insurance won't pay for suicides, the members of the game have to get murdered - by other people playing the game. The players need to find the other members of the game and kill them, or lead other members who are more comfortable with murder to kill the ones whose house they have discovered. The game ends when about two-thirds of the original group dies and the rest gain an equal share of the collective amount gained by the escrow account for a second chance at life.
19	* ''{{Anime/One Piece}}'' A variation of this: Brook and his old crew made a promise to reunite with a baby whale named Laboon. Later on, Brook and his crew were killed by attackers wielding poisoned arrows. Along with playing their last song, the crew entrusted Brook to fulfill the promise to Laboon using the power of the Yomi-Yomi fruit: an ability that grants the user an extra life. Unfortunately, he was stranded on the destroyed ship for 50 years until he met the Straw Hat Crew and told them of his story and determination to fulfill his promise from his crew to Laboon.
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22	[[folder:Board Games]]
23	* In the VCR Mystery Game version of ''TabletopGame/{{Clue}}'', [[DesignatedVictim Mr. Boddy]] does a variant in his [[spoiler:latest]] will where the last surviving person among those who attended the reading would claim the entire inheritance. Naturally, all sorts of attempted murders occur.
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26	[[folder:Comic Books]]
27	* The very [[https://dc.fandom.com/wiki/The_Case_of_the_Chemical_Syndicate first]] ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'' story, [[ComicBook/DetectiveComicsNumber27 "The Case of the Chemical Syndicate."]] Stryker, Lambert, Crane and Rogers all own equal shares of the titular syndicate. One of them decides he wants the whole thing. Murder ensues.
28	* In Creator/DCComics' ''ComicBook/BirdsOfPrey'' #75, we learn that the [[ComicBook/{{Blackhawk}} Blackhawk Squadron]] had a tontine. As with the ''Series/{{MASH}}'' episode "Old Soldiers", it was in the form of a bottle, and was drunk by the [[FishOutOfTemporalWater time-tossed]] Lady Blackhawk, last surviving member of the squadron.
29	* One figured into the last adventure about the practically unknown Golden Age hero, the Whistler. A group of people who all happened to be named after historical figures had one between themselves, and someone was murdering them to collect on it (the guy named after Julius Caesar).
30	* Creator/MarvelComics has a WWII-era group who put aside a bottle of liquor as a tontine: the Young Allies. ComicBook/BuckyBarnes tracked down the other two survivors, and they have a laugh over it-- thanks to being cryogenically frozen over the years, Bucky is still in his mid-twenties and will obviously outlive them all. Bucky says he'd rather share the bottle with them now instead of drinking it when they're dead, so they each have a glass. Bucky finds himself the sole survivor very shortly afterward, and [[LibationForTheDead pours the rest of the drink]] out over a memorial to his friends.
31	* The last story starring the very obscure Golden Age hero the Whistler was about one of these. All of the members of the group were named after historical figures (Abraham Lincoln, Julius Caesar, Cleo Queen, etc.).
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34	[[folder:Fan Works]]
35	* In the ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' fanfic ''[[https://www.fimfiction.net/story/433005/a-tontine-of-fun A Tontine of Fun]]'', by Estee, a scam artist sets one of these up with the intention of absconding with the principal when everypony's back is turned. [[spoiler: She doesn't account for the idea that a certain immortal ruler might want to get in on it.]]
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38	[[folder:Film -- Live-Action]]
39	* ''Film/TheHappytimeMurders'': After talking to the former producer of "The Happytime Gang," Phillips and Edwards learns that essentially all of the former actors were put into a tontine, in that each of the surviving actors gets an equal cut of the residuals when the show starts being replayed in syndication - but with each actor that dies, each slice to the surviving actors gets bigger, until of course there's only one recipient still alive.
40	* A variant in ''Film/AStudyInScarlet''. The Scarlet Ring is a trust where, when any of the members die, their assets become part of the trust. However, rather than going to the last man standing, the trust is waiting for an certain investment to come through at which point the money is split among the surviving members. [[spoiler:The 'investment' is the sale of stolen jewels.]]
41	* In the British/German 1959 production ''Film/TenSecondsToHell'' (aka ''The Phoenix''), a German team [[BombDisposal defusing bombs]] in post-war Berlin put half their salaries in a fund to be used by whoever survives the next three months in the job.
42	* Played with for the movie ''Film/{{Tomcats}}''; a group of friends promised each bachelor in the group would put aside money every year in a fund going to the last remaining bachelor. The main character, one of the two left in the contest, has incurred a massive gambling debt in Vegas and must now get his last friend to marry before the casino owner makes good on some very nasty promises. The added hitch is of course that the last friend is still completely happy as a bachelor, and his stated life goal is to have sex with every woman in the world, while never once actually having a relationship.
43	* While it's not an actual literal tontine, the MacGuffin in ''Film/TheWholeNineYards'' is a joint account of 10 million dollars between three people, and all three need to be present in order to withdraw the money. Oooor...one person and two death certificates, which, given the relationships between the three people involved (mob boss, mob boss's hitman-turned-police-informer, and the estranged wife of said hitman-turned-police-informer) is probably inevitable.
44	* The events of ''Film/TheWrongBox'' are set in motion by the opening scene in which a group of children are made part of a tontine.
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47	[[folder:Literature]]
48	* Creator/AgathaChristie used this as a plot in several of her books. In ''Literature/FourFiftyFromPaddington'', Literature/MissMarple uses this exact word to describe Luther Crackenthorpe's will. The vast Crackenthorpe fortune will go in equal portion to his heirs...and if someone starts murdering the heirs before Luther finally croaks, the shares to the remaining Crackenthorpes will go up.
49	* ''Literature/ArlyHanks'': The men of Maggody arrange a tontine for possession of the bass boat in ''Merry Wives of Maggody'', apparently not aware that such a document is illegal and unenforceable. Roy Stiver Lampshades how tontines had never made much sense to begin with, even in mystery novels.
50	* ''Literature/BloodlineSidneySheldon'' featured Roffe & Sons Pharmaceuticals, a company whose founder saw to it that his heirs wouldn't be allowed to sell their shares unless all shareholders agreed to it. Detective Max Hornung, who was investigating the murder of Sam Roffe, compared that with the tontine.
51	* The plot of ''Literature/TheButlerDidIt'' by Creator/PGWodehouse features a tontine set up by millionaires for their sons just before the 1929 stock market crash, and the butler (not Jeeves) manipulating what happens to the lone kids still in the running for the tontine.
52	* The ''Literature/DoctorSynTheScarecrow'' book ''The Amazing Quest of Doctor Syn'' involves one member of a tontine trying to wipe the others out.
53	* Creator/ElleryQueen:
54	** Variant: ''Literature/LastManToDie'' featured a tontine, but instead of foul play, the last two members died on the same night. Which one died first?
55	** In the short story "The Inner Circle", a tontine provides the motive for murder. After three members die of natural causes in the one year, the murderer realises there is only one person left standing between him and the money.
56	** There's another Creator/ElleryQueen story where three Civil War veterans have a tontine to decide ownership of a fortune they discovered during the war. The grandchild of one of the men finds out and plots to murder the other two, not realizing that [[WorthlessTreasureTwist the "fortune" is in Confederate money]].
57	* Variant: In ''Literature/TheLastMansReward'' a group of neighborhood kids living in the same temporary apartment building buys a box of baseball cards at a garage sale, which contains many rare and valuable cards. They hide it in a cave, and the last kid to move out of the apartment building gets to keep the whole box.
58	* Deliberately invoked in the novel ''Literature/LastToDie'' by James Grippando. A millionaire leaves his considerable fortune in trust with the stipulation that the last surviving member of a particular group of people would inherit the entire amount. He did it because he hated all of the prospective heirs and wanted them to fight one another for the money.
59	* In the short story "The Magnum" by Creator/JackRitchie, Amos Weatherlee tells Harry Sloan the story of how the cursed object of a tontine has caused the members of the tontine, a group of Spanish-American war veterans including Weatherlee, to [[WhoWantsToLiveForever apparently become immortal]]. [[spoiler: Weatherlee is a Con Man who has made the whole thing up to trick Sloan into buying himself into the tontine.]]
60	* ''Literature/{{Mordew}}'': The Occult Tontine are a small group who [[GodIsDead killed God]] and stole his power untold centuries ago. Now they're {{Sorcerous Overlord}}s, at least two of them locked in a ForeverWar, and the prize for the final survivor is implied to be [[DeityOfHumanOrigin godhood]].
61	* The Epicurean Club in Creator/NeilGaiman's short story "The Sunbird" was founded "with the proceeds of a tontine, which [the founder] had taken great pains, [[DeadlyEuphemism in the traditional manner]], to ensure that he had collected in full."
62	* In Jody Lynn Nye's 1993 science fiction novel ''Literature/TaylorsArk'', the title character rescues a little girl from a colony planet that has been ravaged by a disease that has killed off all of the other colonists except her. The bank that owns the colony worlds wishes to sell them to the highest bidder, and is using the virus to kill off the colonists on said worlds. Unfortunately, the colonists on the planet where the girl was found anticipated this and set up their estate plan in the form of a tontine, making the girl a multi-millionaire.
63	* Thomas Bertram Costain's ''Literature/TheTontine'' follows the lives of three young people entered in a Victorian tontine.
64	%%* Seen also in ''Literature/TheWrongBox'' by Creator/RobertLouisStevenson and Lloyd Osbourne.
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67	[[folder:Live Action TV]]
68	* The main plot of an episode of ''Series/BarneyMiller'', appropriately titled "[[Recap/BarneyMillerS8E08 The Tontine]]". Unusual in that the participants seemed to be quite amicable towards each other; it's a pair of elderly men who played chess to see who will commit suicide and who will claim the tontine. The [[AmoralAttorney lawyer handling the case]] is shockingly indifferent to their fates.
69	* ''Series/TheBrokenwoodMysteries'': The plot of the [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin aptly-titled]] episode "Tontine" is that members of the group start dying under suspicious circumstances.
70	* In ''Series/TheDailyShow'' during the "You're Welcome" session John Hodgman (Resident Deranged Millionaire) suggested that they solve national debt problems by making Social Security a tontine. And by making murder legal. Seconds later he attempted to strangle Jon Stewart.
71	%%* It has been used as recently as ''Series/DiagnosisMurder''.
72	* This was used in an eighth season episode of ''Series/{{MASH}}'' called "Old Soldiers" with Col. Potter. Note that in this case, the tontine was not an investment, but rather a bottle of brandy, to be drunk in a toast by the last surviving member of the group.
73	* ''Series/MurdochMysteries'': In "Kommando", the murdered soldiers were all members of a tontine, which muddies the waters as to motive.
74	* Was a key plot element in an episode of ''Series/TheNBCMysteryMovie'', wherein a group of men pooled their money and started a tontine back in the 1930's. They were all now very elderly and the surviving members were dying due to "accidents." It was revealed that the grandson of one of them was getting rid of the others so that when his grandfather died, he'd inherit the money. When caught he angrily observed that the tontine was a stupid idea, as when the last survivor collected the money he'd be too old to enjoy it.
75	* "[[Recap/TheWildWildWestS2E16TheNightOfTheTotteringTontine The Night of the Tottering Tontine]]" on ''Series/TheWildWildWest''. West and Gordon are assigned to protect a government scientist invested in a tontine whose members are being killed off.
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78	[[folder:Video Games]]
79	* In ''VideoGame/TheColonelsBequest'', the titular Colonel declares that every person at the manor at the time he makes the announcement (Apart from the player character) who outlives him will receive an equal share of his fortune. By morning, virtually everyone in the manor is dead. [[spoiler:Though the person who did most of the killing wasn't primarily concerned about the money.]]
80	* In a Sniper Assassin level in ''VideoGame/Hitman2'', 47 is contracted to eliminate three of the surviving members of a criminal organization called the Yardbirds so the client (Aleksander Kovak, the gang's leader) can collect on a tontine they created after a large heist. This level is canonically set before the beginning of the game, as revealed in "Nightcall". A news report shows that Kovak was [[AllForNothing almost immediately arrested afterward]], as he tried to [[TooDumbToLive convert all of the money into Bitcoin at once]]. This drew attention after the authorities realized it was the same amount the Yardbirds stole in their final heist.
81	* One of the cases in ''Franchise/SherlockHolmes: Consulting Detective'' involved the murder of a Waterloo veteran, and there was mention of a tontine involving the survivors of that battle, thus implying that the killer might be one of the other surviving veterans (There weren't many left, seeing as this takes place roughly eighty years after the battle) or an heir of one of the other veterans. [[spoiler:The killer was actually the brother of the deceased's former mistress, who was seeking revenge for the dishonor of his sister and did not care about the tontine one way or the other.]]
82	* ''VideoGame/SniperElite5:'' One of thé enemies you can scan brings up the message "Daniel Redler: Has a tontine running with friends from school. Is quite confident he'll win it."
83	* In ''VideoGame/WestOfLoathing'', while exploring the (re)Boot Hill cemetery, you can learn about a tontine established by three members who apparently all died at the same time, and as a result, the reward lies hidden somewhere. It's possible for the player to solve the puzzle and claim the treasure.
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86	[[folder:Web Animation]]
87	* In ''WebAnimation/CampCamp'', the Quartermaster apparently has one of these along with his "Quartersister" and two other unknown individuals. Or at least he ''did'' until it was whittled down to just him and one of the unknowns.
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90	[[folder:Western Animation]]
91	* ''WesternAnimation/{{Archer}}'', "The Double Deuce." When members of Woodhouse's old UsefulNotes/WorldWarI flying squad start dropping dead ([[spoiler:of perfectly natural causes that were played up as "dubious" by [[IfItBleedsItLeads desperate-for-sales newspapers]]]]), he suspects that it's because of the tontine they set up. [[spoiler:One of the members does end up being murdered, but by Archer in the belief Woodhouse is about to be killed by him due to a fairly-understandable misconception from [[ArtisticLicenseGunSafety Woodhouse staring into the barrel of a revolver to inspect the bore's condition with an operator holding it with a finger on the trigger.]] The episode ends with the surviving two members of the tontine staring at each other with seemingly dark intent for a second [[SubvertedTrope before instead]] Woodhouse's squadmate comments that [[MistakenForGay he was surprised that Woodhouse and Archer were allowed to adopt a baby together.]]]] Cheryl, Pam and Cyril hear about this and discuss starting an ISIS tontine, pointing out that since the rest of their coworkers are either field agents that go on dangerous missions or work in parts of the building with NoOSHACompliance it'll be that much easier to win. Cyril does acknowledge that Tontines are illegal, but it doesn't stop him from joining in.
92	* ''WesternAnimation/ScoobyDooWhereAreYou'': A Colonel bequeathed his residence and one million dollars to be evenly split among five beneficiaries. Each beneficiary is required to spend one night at the residence [[OnOneCondition to be allowed to receive their share of the estate]]. The shares of those who fail will go to the beneficiaries who don't fail. [[spoiler:The lawyers who informed the beneficiaries about the will tries to get rid of them (scare them away before daybreak, not kill them) to get the money but they get caught and Scooby-Doo, as the only beneficiary who spent a night at the Colonel's home, inherits the whole estate. Unfortunately, the dollars are [[WorthlessTreasureTwist Confederate money]].]]
93	* Used in the ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' episode "Raging Abe Simpson and His Grumbling Grandson in 'The Curse of the Flying Hellfish'". It's revealed that Abe Simpson and Mr. Burns served together during UsefulNotes/WorldWarII, and their squad (the Flying Hellfish) acquired a set of priceless German paintings, with the agreement that the last member of the Hellfish to survive would get them. It ends when [[spoiler:just as Abe manages to claim the paintings by "discharging" Burns, the State Department shows up, confiscates the painting and presents them to a descendant of their original German owner for diplomatic purposes. The descendant is not too worried about their safety, either.]]
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96	[[folder:Real Life]]
97	* There is a set of eighty silver goblets that have been reserved for this purpose. Upon each of them is engraved the name of one of the men who flew on the Doolittle Bombing Raid of 1942. With it is a bottle of 1896 (The year of James Doolittle's birth) brandy. This bottle was intended to be opened by the last two survivors of that mission to [[ToAbsentFriends toast those that have gone before them]]. With only four men left, all of whom were in their mid-nineties and in failing health, they decided to open the bottle together in 2013.
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Context Main / Tontine