A cage of bark, a prison of wood. A thing of rage where nature stood.
A character suffers from an extremely horrifying Fate Worse than Death. Suicide is not an option; even death never comes to free them from it. They are immobilized or otherwise contained, unable to communicate with anyone, and unlikely to be removed from this situation — not even by death — anytime in the foreseeable future.
This is often a variation of Taken for Granite in which the victim remains conscious, and the worst-case scenario for tropes such as Sealed Room in the Middle of Nowhere, Baleful Polymorph, Phantom Zone Picture, and Who Wants to Live Forever?.
Usually, when this arises, it is eternal unless he's freed by outside forces, but a "mere" years-long or centuries-long fate is possible. For instance, a robot with a 100-year battery life getting buried underground. In fact, this is a very common sci-fi trope involving artificial intelligences who are potentially immortal due to being made of software. Unfortunately, if a victim is rescued, he may well have been driven insane from the experience. (Some of the listed examples show exactly that.)
Sometimes appears as a Backstory, if a Sealed Person In A Can was aware while sealed away. Can overlap with Go Mad from the Isolation if the character's separated from other people rather than among them but unable to interact. Also a handy way to punish the villain with a horrible fate, while still leaving a door open for them to return someday.
Examples subpages:
- Anime & Manga
- Comic Books
- Fan Works
- Films — Animation
- Films — Live-Action
- Literature
- Live-Action TV
- Tabletop Games
- Video Games
- Webcomics
- Web Original
- Western Animation
- Other Media
