Stab the Salad

What, he couldn't find a bread knife?

"Heh heh! Take that, egg! Shit, this movie's dark."

— Allison Pregler, Lady Dragon 2

A character wields something in a threatening manner, the music builds, and then... the character does something utterly benign with that thing. It is often Played for Laughs.

It can overlap with Mistaken for Murderer. While that trope is an entire plot leading up to the reveal, this trope does it in less than one scene. The overlap is that such a plot can have several moments like this.

Subtrope of Bait-and-Switch. Compare Stab the Scorpion and Grossout Fakeout. Compare and contrast Mundane Made Awesome. Not related to Stab the Sky.

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Examples:

Advertising

• Used in a DiGiorno commercial parodying Psycho, in which "Mother" raises her knife.... and cuts the pizza.
• There was a Halls commercial in which someone raises his knife seemingly to use it to attack another person who's coughing and then uses it to chop a piece off from the pack.
• There was a commercial (can't remember what it was for) where a man buys meat from a butcher and leaves in a hurry (the place was rather unsettling) and the butcher is seen stepping outside the shop with what looks like an evil glare on his face. The man runs and is pursued by the butcher, who is holding a huge knife the entire time and is eventually cornered in an alley. The butcher reaches down then lifts up the knife and...simply says 'You forget your wallet.', which he then returns to the man.

Anime and Manga

• An episode of All-Purpose Cultural Cat Girl Nuku Nuku opens with the sound of a pounding heartbeat and shots of a gleam of light across a blade, a spurt of blood, and Akiko screaming in terror. Then comes the reveal — it's Akiko trying to cook, but she can't bring herself to cut up the fish on her chopping board.
• Early in Assassination Classroom, Koro-sensei steals a guided missile from a nearby military base and turns his tentacles into high-speed drills for a "demonstration" of their respective power in what looks like a punishment of Karma for leaving a dead octopus on Koro-sensei's desk... and cooks Karma breakfast instead.
• Ayakashi Triangle: After Matsuri seriously injures one ayakashi, Suzu seems to jump in to finish it off with a swarm of origami projectiles (which can explode, among other things). However, the origami instead bundle up around the ayakashi's wound so Suzu could use her healing power.
• Azumanga Daioh:
  • It might be a bit of stretch, but the famous "Osaka With a Knife" scene seems to partake of this trope. As Osaka walks toward Yukari, Yukari's eye widens in terror. The next shot is of ketchup being squirted on an egg so for a split second, it looks like Osaka stabbed Yukari in the eye.
  • Yukari then looks like she's going to soil herself when Osaka mutters "Aw man, I messed it up..." She was trying to wake up Yukari by banging pans together but grabbed...a knife instead (Which isn't the source of the mess-up. As far as Osaka was concerned, she messed up because Yukari had already woken up before she could start).
• In Case Closed an old woman becomes a suspect because an impressionable young boy witnessed her sharpening a knife with a terrifying expression. Turns out she's sharpening a sashimi knife for the purpose of giving it to her grandson, who had given up sushi training and was currently living in her house as a male escort but trying to hide this from her, and the terrifying expression is her trying to stay stoic and failing.
• Once you've seen a certain arc of Higurashi: When They Cry, you begin to realize that Rena's walking down the road with that billhook of hers back in the beginning wasn't out of any murderous intent, but because she had used it to hack things out of her way and pry out a statue from the garbage dump.
• The Legend of Zelda (Akira Himekawa): In the adaptation of Majora's Mask, the Happy Mask Salesman finally gets his hands on the titular mask after Fierce Deity Link ends its reign of terror. Fierce Deity Link warns the Salesman against ever losing it again by slashing open his backpack and just barely missing the man himself.
• In Magical Circle Guru-Guru, the heroes walk into the old witch's house to find her in the dark, cackling madly over a steaming cauldron of god-knows-what... it turns out she was just boiling potatoes.
  Nike: Can't you do it normally?!
• In one of the Ranma ½ OVAs, Kasumi has been possessed by a demon, at one point she raises a knife while laughing maniacally while the others cower in fear, then she uses it to cut paper dolls out of the bedsheets. Whether or not they were the bedding in use by her family, or simply ones she found lying about is never quite discussed.
• In an Alternate Universe detective episode of Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei, while investigating a multiple homicide, Nozomu witnesses the girls run out of the kitchen with knives and repeatedly stab something lying in the yard. Then they tell him that they were going to butcher a chicken for dinner, but it almost got away.
• Used as an excuse in Spy X Family during the Eden Academy interview. Murdoch needles Anya to the point of tears when he asks if she loves her stepmother or birthmother more, much to the fury of Yor and Loid. When Loid's patience snaps, he's lunging a fist towards Murdoch and instead slams it into the table in the last moment, citing that he was smashing a mosquito.
• An early episode of The Wallflower shows the guys being terrified of Sunako's creepy demeanor and maniacal laughter, with camera angles focusing on closeups of the knife and her face as it gets splashed with blood... while she's cooking them an excellent dinner. The blood? That came from a fish she chopped up.
• In Yu-Gi-Oh! there's a scene where Yami Bakura eats steak in a very...aggressive manner, so much that it was cut from the dub.

Comic Books

• Black Dynamite: The female officer at Guantanamo Bay enters Black Dynamite's cell with a cart full of nasty-looking bladed instruments, talking about her eagerness to "work on" him. It turns out she's a barber and cleans up his hair.
• In the Norwegian comic Eon, the title character has just accidentally murdered a door to door salesman (or so he thinks). When he and his friend realize what has happened they decide to call one of their other friends (whom they for some reason assume will know what to do). Unfortunately, they call him while he is cutting some wood. So when he arrives he is still wearing safety goggles and wielding a running chainsaw.
• Rivers of London: In the bonus strip "Red Mist", Molly manages to make the vigorous chopping of tomatoes look like a murder in progress. Toby the dog whimpering in the background (for sausages) only adds to the "ambiance".

Comic Strips

• A Dilbert comic (which later gave its name to one of the collections), "Bring me the Head of Willy the Mailboy" involves Dilbert being asked to complete this request. Dogbert freaks out when Dilbert shows him a bag obviously containing a head-sized, roughly spherical object, but it is then revealed to be a bowling ball.
• One FoxTrot Sunday strip set things up like a scene from a horror movie, making it look like someone was being stabbed to death. It turned out to be Roger doing a poor job of slicing up a turkey, and Paige was freaking out the whole time.

Film — Animated

• The Curse of the Were-Rabbit: When one of the villagers grumpily remarks that she hopes the rabbits "get what's coming to them", the next shot has Gromit holding something on a cutting board and raising a big knife... and then it's revealed he is actually cutting up carrots for the bunnies.
• The Road to El Dorado: At one point during the song "It's Tough To Be A God", Miguel and Tulio have their suspicions that the villagers may realize that they aren't actually gods, and we see the villagers raise their swords to them and bring them down while they scream and we see what appears to be blood spray, it turns out they cut open some watermelons.
• In Shrek, during the escape from the dragon's keep, Shrek tells Fiona and Donkey to run for it, before picking up a sword and grimly declaring, "I'll take care of the dragon". He then dramatically raises the sword and... stabs it into the floor, pinning down the dragon's chains so she can't follow them across the bridge.
• In The Super Mario Bros. Movie, Mario and Toad are distracted from their mission of going to Princess Peach by her guards, who insist she's "in another castle". Toad brings out his frying pan, seemingly wanting to bludgeon the guards with it... but he uses it to cook the guards food instead.

Film — Live-Action

• The opening shots of American Mary show black-gloved hands making incisions into flesh and then stitching them up. However, this turns out to be Mary practicing her surgical technique by sewing extra wings on to a turkey.
• Cloud Atlas: Zachry looks like he's about to stab Meronym but instead stabs a weird hologram thing next to her.
• In Crash Peter, who is hitchhiking, is picked up by officer Hanson. They awkwardly try to bridge the gap between their cultures but Hanson, at one point, thinking that Peter is drawing a gun on him, shoots and kills Peter. It turns out Peter was actually going to show him the St. Christopher figurine he always carries with him.
• James Bond:
  • Diamonds Are Forever: While pretending to be a waiter, Mr. Wint raises an ice pick-like device high in the air next to James Bond. He then strikes down but not to stab Bond: he drives it into the cork of a wine bottle, then uses it to extract the cork. That's because he intends to kill Bond with the Time Bomb hidden in the bombe glacée.
  • The Spy Who Loved Me: After Anya learns that Bond killed her lover during his opening scene, she simply tells him "When this mission is over, I will kill you." Towards the end of the movie, after they escape Stromberg's destroyed lair in his luxurious escape pod, she takes Bond's pistol, remarking "The mission is over, Commander...", and fires... blasting the cork off a bottle of champagne Bond was examining.
• Something similar happens in Loaded Weapon 1 where Spinach Destiny takes an icepick and stabs a block of ice repeatedly saying "I! HATE! VIOLENCE!!!"...as Jack Colt and Wes Luger look on. Moments later, she turns around and offers them "Snowcone?"
• Used in Disturbia where the suspected killer sneaks up on the woman with a knife and cuts off the tag on her dress.
• The Eiger Sanction (1975). Clint Eastwood plays an assassin sent to find an enemy agent among a team of mountain climbers, but he doesn't know which one it is. While he's sleeping, a climber flicks open a switchblade...which he then uses to splice some rope.
• Gangs of New York features Amsterdam getting into a fist-fight with McGloin, one of Bill the Butcher's lieutenants. Once the chaos is over and done with, Bill himself approaches Amsterdam with a large knife; there's a tense pause, but then the crime lord reveals that he's just been cutting up some raw steak - which he promptly applies to Amsterdam's bruises. Turns out "The Butcher" is actually a butcher by trade.
• The opening shot of Halloween H20: Twenty Years Later is of a hand holding a large knife and bringing it down. . .into a large pumpkin, which the knife-holder, a woman, proceeds to begin carving up to make a jack-o'-lantern for a group of delighted kids.
• In The Hand That Rocks the Cradle, evil nanny Peyton sneaks into baby Joey's room late at night. She menacingly approaches his crib - pillow in hand - as the music builds. She ends up just placing the pillow under the baby's head.
• In Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay, the duo end up in a black neighborhood and crash their car into a fire hydrant, spraying water everywhere and causing general havoc. The residents silently and purposefully collect tire irons and similar implements and march towards the accident scene. H&K flee in panic. Turns out the residents were planning to help fix the car.
• The movie version of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban has this. The executioner raises up his axe, the music plays as we hear a wet "thunk" and crows fly off... Later it's revealed that he only chopped a pumpkin in half out of frustration because Harry and Hermione went back in time and freed Buckbeak. The same trick is used in the book, except the axe is swung into a fence.
• And still something similar happens in Hot Shots! Part Deux as Topper Harley and Michelle Huddleston "reenact" a scene in Basic Instinct. After tying Topper to the bed, Michelle slowly grabs a screwdriver under the mattress. She raises it over Topper's head and stabs...a loose screw on the bed's frame which was squeaking loudly. Michelle tightens the screw and oils it even. She then tests the bed and once assured the squeaking had stopped, Michelle proceeds to romance Topper.
• In Kill Bill Vol. 2, Bill has the Bride effectively at his mercy, picks up a particularly large and sharp-looking knife, then uses it to slice the crusts off a sandwich for his daughter.
• M might be the Trope Maker: near the end, a beggar witness points out Hans Beckert (Peter Lorre) as being the child murderer; unfortunately, Beckert has already ensnared his next victim and is taking her to a candy shop. A criminal follows them, hoping to corner Beckert and save the child, and starts forward in horror as Beckert pulls out a knife... only to use it to cut the peel off an orange. Audiences at the time, familiar with the all-too-fresh string of murders which inspired the film, were not amused.
• In Mars Attacks!, the aliens toss an ominously glowing sphere into the White House's War Room. They shake the object, revealing it to be a snowglobe, point, laugh, then shoot everyone anyway.
• Men in Black. While facing the Mexican immigrant, K pulls out a knife in a threatening way. He swings it forward toward the immigrant - and slices open the immigrant's clothing, revealing an alien hiding inside the clothing and holding up the immigrant's "head".
• The Monster Squad pulls this off on the audience: After the kids are confronted by the Scary German Guy, the next scene shows him wielding a large butcher knife and threatening that their time is almost up...because it's their last chance for more pie. Scary German Guy is bitchin', indeed.
• Predator. Dutch is standing facing the prisoner Anna, who has her hands tied in front of her. He pulls out a knife while talking to her and then slashes down with it...to cut the ropes securing her wrists and free her.
• Played with in The Professional. Jean Reno is teaching a young Natalie Portman how to be an assassin. They set up a sniper rifle on the roof and shoot a politician jogging in the park, only for us to realize that it was a paintball gun.
• Creepy, Nightmare Fuel inspiring Nazi Torture Technician Toht (Ronald Lacey) does this in Raiders of the Lost Ark. He comes into the tent where Action Girl Marion is being held, effortlessly disarms her, then pulls out a strange chain and wood instrument. Everyone who remembers Toht holding a red hot poker inches from Marion's eye earlier in the movie holds their breath... then lets out a relieved sigh as it turns out to merely be a portable coat hanger. Hell, even Toht's ally Belloq lets out a relieved sigh at that point!
  Toht: Now...what shall we talk about?
• Resident Evil (2002). The Red Queen computer demands that the remaining protagonists chop off Rain Ocampo's head (because she's infected with the T-Virus) before she'll let the rest of them go. Alice appears to agree. She raises up the axe, the music swells, and...Alice chops into the video monitor the Red Queen has been using to talk to them.
• Slight variation in Romancing the Stone, since no prop is involved. After bringing the villain the map he wanted in exchange for her kidnapped sister, Joan Wilder has nothing of value left to keep said villain from eliminating her. With the music playing menacingly, the villain growls "Joan Wilder ... you and your sister... are free to go!"
• In their final fight in Rush Hour 2, Dragon Lady Hu Li grabs a pair of chopsticks and then uses them to tie her hair back before she takes on Carter.
• Sonic the Hedgehog 2: Eggman approaches Knuckles to discuss the possibility of continuing to work together against Sonic, while Knuckles is in a Literal Cliffhanger. When Knuckles initially rebuffs him, Eggman has his drones surround Knuckles, and Knuckles readies for a fight... Only for the drones to form a makeshift staircase to help Knuckles back up the cliff.
• A Study in Terror: When Annie Chapman enters the slaughterhouse, a knife is shown raised threateningly in the air and thrusting down suddenly. It turns out to be the slaughterman Chunky cutting open a pig.
• A particularly dark form of this shows up in Trick 'r Treat, in which the "innocent" explanation is almost as bad as what the audience had first assumed. It really looks like Serial Killer Steven Wilkins just knifed his own son, Billy. But no, he was just helping Billy carve a jack o' lantern out of a human head.
• Whacko, a Psycho parody, opens with one of these, done by an actual serial killer who uses a Halloween pumpkin motif.
• Near the end of the last story in Wild Tales, after guzzling some champagne, upset Ariel makes his way to the wedding cake table, draws the knife sitting upon it, to the concern of the guests... and cuts himself a slice of cake.
• The Wrong Box begins with the establishment of a tontine - a contract where a sum of money gets inherited by the last surviving member - at a boys' school. A series of quick vignettes shows the members dying off over the decades until it settles on a bedridden, elderly man, one of the last two survivors. His grandson picks up a knife, walks up to him - and hands it to him to open a letter.
• In Zodiac, Robert Graysmith is cornered by potential Zodiac suspect Bob Vaughn, who stabs forwards...with the key he inserts to unlock the door before politely letting Graysmith out and wishing him good night.

Literature

• In Craig Shaw Gardner's Bride of the Slime Monster Roger ends up on a world that runs on foreign film tropes at one point. The woman he's been trying to communicate with raises a knife while saying made-up words like "slashen" - and then cuts a piece of bread and cheese for the journey to see her sister.
• As mentioned above, done in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, where the executioner swings his axe into a fence instead of Buckbeak.
• Older Than Print: In Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Magnificent Bastard Cao Cao, on the run from the law (long story), takes refuge with a friend of his father's. Said friend runs off for a while, leaving Cao Cao to wait. Cao Cao overhears the sound of a knife being sharpened and a whispered: "hurry up and make the kill!" Cao Cao charges into the kitchen, murdering everyone in sight... before discovering that the intended victim was a pig.
• In The Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson, when Shirley has just started school in America, she notices a huge stick by the window and thinks it's for beating disobedient children, like how her teachers in China used a bamboo cane. That same day, she agrees to sneak off of the school grounds with some other students, so they can buy lunch elsewhere. When she returns to class, she sees the teacher getting the stick and thinks that her escapade was discovered and she's going to get beaten for it... only for the teacher to use the stick to open the window.
• In The Truth, one of the residents of Mrs. Arcanum's boardinghouse is spouting off some of the local variant of Fantastic Racism, and another resident, who's a dwarf, takes out a small axe...to cut the top off his hard-boiled egg. Probably also to remind the fantastic racist that he's a dwarf sitting at the same table where civility is expected and if things do go wahoonie-shaped he's armed.
• In the Dr. Watson At War series by Robert Ryan, a Femme Fatale Spy has Dr. Watson chained up in an abattoir, and is slicing up meat with the sharp knives there. It's been shown that she's more than willing to torture and kill with knives, so Watson tells her to just Get It Over With. She's quite willing to do so, provided Watson answer one question, which is: "How do you like your steak?"

Live-Action TV

• Angel:
  • In the episode "Bachelor Party", when Angel is spying on Doyle's ex-wife's fiancé, he sees him taking on a demon aspect and drawing out a knife. One Super Window Jump later, it's revealed that she knew about him being a demon and that the knife was to cut the strings on a parcel.
  • An ambiguous version of this trope occurs in "Sleep Tight". Holtz lets a knife drop out of his sleeve and into his hand as one of his followers starts questioning his orders; when she ends up agreeing with him, he uses it to peel an apple.
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer:
  • An episode in Season 2 does this. The group is together in the library preparing and sharpening weapons. Buffy pulls out a knife... and the camera zooms out while she chops vegetables.
  • The episode "All the Way" features a creepy-looking man wielding a knife and talking about how he's going to give Dawn and her friends "something special" for Halloween. Turns out it's a baked dish.
• Subverted in El Chapulín Colorado. We see a woman with a knife as the music becomes intense, just to cut some cake, then she proceeds to hide a gun in it.
• Cinderella Chef: Ding Qi threatens a man and pretends he's about to cut off a certain part of his anatomy. He raises the knife, brings it down, and then reveals he only cut a vegetable.
• Community: In "Horror Fiction in Seven Spooky Steps", Troy's scary story has him and Abed sewn together by Mad Doctor Pierce. After their initial horror, they realize they now have magical psychic powers, and levitate an iron skillet, clubbing Pierce with it. Then they levitate up a big kitchen knife and... cut a sandwich in two and happily share it. Then they conduct mad surgery on Pierce.
• CSI: "Dead of the Class" opens with David selecting a knife from the knife block in his kitchen, and then advancing menacingly on his pregnant knife who is lying on the bed. He then uses the knife to cut the tags off his new shirt as he prepares for his class reunion.
• Dexter:
  • This trope is the whole point of the title sequence, the difference in that everything he does is in plain view, while still keeping the menace.
  • The opening scene of season two seemingly echoes the season one opening murder scene, ending with the words "This is the only way I know how to survive. I'm coiled and ready to strike..." - zoom out to show Dexter bowling and missing a pin - "Although a spare will do."
  • At the beginning of an episode in season four, we see Dexter wielding a large knife and making threats about how his target's days are numbered. Pan back the camera to show Dexter addressing a Thanksgiving turkey.
• Dollhouse: Dr. Saunders reaches for a scalpel, apparently to cut up Echo's face like her own... then picks up a lollipop instead, sucking on it herself when Echo reaches for it.
• Ghosts (UK): The first flashback to Humphrey's death begins with a knife being brought down on something- then the camera pans out to reveal it's just him slicing a piece of meat.
• One Halloween Episode of NCIS starts with a scream as a knife is raised, and then brought down...upon a jack o' lantern while the knife-wielder is watching a horror movie (hence the scream).
• The New Avengers: The Teaser of "Complex" opens with what appears to be a sniper sighting down a rifle on someone exiting a building. As he squeezes the trigger, it is revealed that he is actually using a special long-distance camera mounted on a rifle-style stock to take a photograph.
• In Reaper, Nina, who was previously trying to kill Sam, lunges across the table towards him. It turns out she's going for a steak, and just has (literally) demonic table manners.
• Sabrina the Teenage Witch: In "Sabrina and the Beanstalk," Harvey is swept up the titular plant and captured by a Wicked Witch (who is surprisingly attractive, which helps him trick Harvey into thinking she's innocent). Sabrina watches in horror from below as the witch picks up a sharp knife and grins, then rushes to the beanstalk to save him...just in time to miss the witch cutting into a peach pie. Granted, she's only giving Harvey magical pastry to fatten him up, but she's not quite ready to slice him to stew yet.
• In an episode of Seinfeld, Elaine's boyfriend slowly walks up behind her and places his hands on shoulders, very close to her neck, causing her to freak out and scream "What are you doing?!", to which he says, "I was just going to give you a massage!", confused at her frightened reaction. (The reason for this is that he shares a name with Joel Rifkin, a Serial Killer who had been apprehended a few months before this episode aired.)
• In A Series of Unfortunate Events (2017), Esme fires a harpoon at a hot air mobile home. We see red liquid spraying, Hector (the man on the balloon) is heard screaming, and the people on the ground look on in disgust and horror. It turns out that Hector is fine... Esme just hit his stash of cranberry juice.

Magazines

• MAD #395's novelization of Emeril Live In the Style of Stephen King plays this for mock horror, with tomato juice as Symbolic Blood:
  The tomato was plump, sensuous. He felt the firm smoothness of its skin. He quickly, harshly held her down on the table and brought the blade down into her yielding flesh. Her essence spurted onto his white apron in one gush, then slowed to the merest trickle as, like someone possessed, he deliberately moved his knife back and forth into her. What goes through your mind, Emeril? Is there any twinge of remorse as you bring the knife down?

Music

• "Italian Leather Sofa" by Cake is about a woman who's more interested in her man's money than in him. It includes this odd little bridge in which she's either doing something sinister or maybe just preparing dinner:
  She's got a serrated edge that she moves back and forth. It's such a simple machine, she doesn't have to use force.
  When she gets what she wants, she puts the rest on a tray... in a Ziploc bag in the freezer.

Theatre

• La Cage aux folles invokes this in "Masculinity Lesson":
  Pick up that knife and make believe it's a machete.
  It'll take all your strength and steady nerves
  For hacking your way through the cherry preserves.

Video Games

• The last scene of Deltarune's first chapter has Kris dramatically pulling out a knife. The blacked-out opening scene of the second chapter makes it seems as if Kris is stabbing their mother, but she's just upset Kris cut up and ate a pie. Then the end of the second chapter implies Kris really was doing something nefarious between those two scenes with that knife, though still completely different from murder.
• The opening for Disgaea 4: A Promise Unforgotten shows the vampire tyrant Valvatorez stalking and murdering his latest victim: sardines. Fenrich is not amused by these shenanigans.
• Dragon Quest V: In a possible allusion to the Romance of the Three Kingdoms example (see Literature), at one point you can choose to stay at an obviously sinister-looking inn in a cave with a creepy old lady while travelling with your new bride. She hears something in the night and asks you to investigate but you've become paralyzed and from upstairs you hear the sound of a knife grinding...In the morning, it turns out that the old witch was just making sure you slept soundly while she sharpened your sword which gains a permanent attack bonus.s
• Sunky.MPEG and its sequel Silly.TIFF run on this trope, turning every genuinely murderous moment from the original Sonic.exe and Sally.EXE into a similar but genuinely benign scene. For example: In Sonic.exe, Tails walks through a corpse-strewn area, meets up with Sonic.exe, gets chased through a burning landscape by Sonic.exe, and bursts into tears at his touch before he's killed brutally. Meanwhile, in Sunky.mpeg, Tlels walks through a corpse-strewn area (according to the novel they're actually just animals holding a zombie costume contest), meets up with Sunky, gets chased through a burning landscape by Sunky, and bursts into tears at his touch before they do a little dance together..
• In Tekken 3, Kuma/Panda's ending has Kuma waiting behind a wall, only showing a sinister-looking shadow, looking like he's getting ready to attack Panda. But as she and Xiaoyu walk by, Kuma lunges forward with a bouquet of bamboo leaves, attempting to court Panda. Not noticing him, Panda and Xiaoyu just keep on walking.

Visual Novels

• Ace Attorney:
  • Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Spirit of Justice has Phoenix meet with a member of the Defiant Dragons, Datz Are'bal, whereupon Datz pulls out a huge combat knife. Phoenix is freaked out… and Datz merely uses it to peel an apple. Turns out to be subverted after a brief interrogation, as Datz claims he would have killed Phoenix if he was working for the crown.
  • Taketsuchi Auchi, the first prosecutor fought in The Great Ace Attorney, does this the second time he's beaten in court. He composes a death poem. Then, he brandishes a knife and holds it up to himself like he's about to commit seppuku... only to cut off a prominent strand of his hair instead. All the while, a sad reprise of Kazuma's theme plays in the background, and Prosecutor Auchi is crying a waterfall of tears.

Webcomics

• In Casey and Andy, we get a shot of someone approaching an oblivious Andy from behind while carrying a knife, looming closer, and... Casey asks Andy if he can borrow his steak knife.
• Lackadaisy:
  • Rocky finds the tire iron. In context, it's clear that he was doing it on purpose. (What's also clear is that he thinks it's hilarious, and that's the most important thing, whatever else may be on his agenda.)
  • Lacy does this to a half-asleep Wick quite by accident when she approaches him with a letter opener.
  • In one side-comic, a group of carolers trail into horrified silence when they wassail... Viktor and Mordecai holding mallets and wearing heavy leather aprons covered with something sticky and red. Cranberry sauce. Viktor found a recipe that requires pounding the bejeesus out of the things.
    Mordecai: Now's a bad time.
• Moring Mark: In The Owl House fan comic "What Could Have Been", the comic seemingly is about to depict the backstory of Philip Wittebane murdering his brother Caleb over marrying a witch, but he turns out to just be cutting a steak.
• Precocious: Can you match Bud's skill with a blade?
• Hannelore of Questionable Content is extremely neurotic and inadvertently creepy, so when we saw her pick up a big scary knife, it was a relief when she used it to cut up a watermelon.
• Tina of Wapsi Square is also quite creepy, and she pulled out a knife in front of someone she had been punching a few strips earlier. Fortunately, she merely uses the knife to cut a slice of pie.
• Zebra Girl: Confronting Sandra in her newly-recovered demonic form, Viv produces an object which appears to be some sort of bolo-type weapon, which she uses as a magical swing. Then subverted, when it's further revealed that yes, it does also serve as a bolo.

Western Animation

• One episode of The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius has the seemingly reformed Beautiful Gorgeous apparently trying to kill Jet Fusion on three separate occasions (strangling him, attacking him with a laser, and stabbing him), but each time, it turns out she's doing something related to their upcoming wedding (helping him try on a bow tie, engraving her name on her engagement ring, and practicing cutting a cake, respectively).
• In a live-action episode of Aqua Teen Hunger Force where it's shown the cartoon is a story written by H. Jon Benjamin based loosely on people he knows. Toward the end of the episode, he goes into Frylock's/T-Pain's room with a sword, panicking his roommate as he raises the sword and... presents it to him saying he was just bringing his sword back.
• Family Guy:
  • Done in an early episode where Lois decides to run for school board president. However, Peter is devastated when he discovers that Lois agrees with the firing of his favorite former teacher:
    Peter: I'm going to stop you the only way I can... [raising ax as if intending to strike] by killing you! - in the race for school board president. [uses ax to nail down sign advocating his election as school board president]
  • A later episode parodied the scene from Indiana Jones. Stewie, Brian, Dan Aykroyd, and Chevy Chase are captured in Russia and brought before Vladimir Putin. In addition to the coat hanger from the film, Putin also uses an AK-47 as a cigarette lighter and a crossbow to hang his necktie.
• Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends:
  • The episode "The Big Cheese" parodies the famous shower scene from Psycho: "I FOUND A CARROT!"
  • And in "Nightmare on Wilson Way", we see Bloo tying Mac to a bed and then raising an executioner's axe...before bringing it down to cut a sandwich in half.
  • "Bloo Done It" consists of finding reasons to cast suspicion on Uncle Pockets for being the "Best Imaginary Friend Ever". At one point, he chances upon a shadow of a hand stabbing a knife downward in Madame Foster's room, followed by Madame Foster's scream. Bloo thinks Uncle Pockets has murdered Madame Foster and accuses him of this in front of the whole house, but it was really just Madame Foster using an envelope opener, and screaming in joy that she had won a free spa trip.
• Futurama: When preparing a cake for Nibbler's birthday, a jealous Bender remarks that it will be a cake "They'll never forget", grabs a box of rat poison and... pours it next to a rat hole by the floor. Then puts the box away and starts making the cake.
• The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy:
  • A mace-wielding man known as "Lord Pain" comes to visit. There is a scene where Grim sees his silhouette performing a seemingly gory beating, and delightfully comments on how he is "mashing the kids like potatoes". Cut to inside, and it turns out he is mashing up actual potatoes for Mandy.
  • Another episode features Billy watching what appears to be a horror film, he cowers in fear as a killer is apparently carving up a victim with a chainsaw while laughing manically, it turns out to be a commercial advertising chainsaws and the man was using it to saw a log.
• Benjamin as Coach McGuirk in Home Movies buys a pricey sword collection he sees on TV and can't return them - he tries to use them as currency to buy groceries but comes off like a threatening sword-wielding lunatic.
• In one episode of Jackie Chan Adventures, Jade (outside her body) sees Shendu (who had possessed her body) going somewhere with a knife. She panics, music builds, she unsuccessfully tries to warn Jackie, cut to Shendu!Jade holding up the knife and...cutting an orange with it.
• In an episode of King of the Hill, Dale spends an entire episode being chased by someone he thinks is going kill him. He actually just wanted Dale to sign a form. When Dale is cornered by him, he reaches into his coat; Dale thinks it's a gun but it's just his papers and a pen.
• In part 2 of the pilot for My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, when the group comes upon a sea serpent distraught because of his mustache getting ruined, Rarity declares that she can't let "a crime against fabulosity" go unresolved, grabs one of the sea serpent's razor-sharp scales in her teeth and brandishes it menacingly upon which we hear a "thwack" and the sea serpent faints...turns out she was just cutting off a chunk of her own tail (though not nearly enough to reach her physical tail) to use as a hair transplant.
• The Patrick Star Show:
  • In "Olly Olly Organ Free", we think Squidina is using a chainsaw to open up Patrick and see his organs. She's actually carving a key, which Patrick uses to cleanly and painlessly open up his stomach like a cabinet.
  • In "Chum Bucket List", it looks like Plankton has murdered a bunch of people and is pouring poison into his chum. Those are just mannequins Karen left lying around, and he's just making a mixture to unclog his sink.
• Rocko's Modern Life:
  • In the first episode, we see Rocko saying he had enough of Heffer and then brings out a hammer and lunges to beat him... then it turns out he was talking about his busted vacuum cleaner.
  • And of course the episode where Rocko sees Bev Bighead stab her husband Ed to death. Turns out it was just a bust made of meatloaf.
• The Simpsons:
  • In the first ever "Treehouse Of Horror" segment "Bad Dream House", the Simpsons have just bought and moved into a haunted house and get turned against each other by the house so each and every one of them (including Maggie) get a sharp implement of some sort and they go stalking after each other... except for Marge who's just using the big-ass serrated knife she picked up to spread mayo on a sandwich.
  • In "Bart Of Darkness", we have Flanders seemingly chase Lisa up to the attic with an axe, muttering "time to put you away for good"... only for it to turn out that he was actually talking to the axe itself. In fact, the entire episode is a parody of Rear Window based on this trope, as Bart witnesses Ned Flanders' killing of Maude's favorite tree. It even has Lisa discovering a Schuman's farms head of lettuce and Jimmy Stewart watching Bart try to stop Flanders and concluding that "that sinister-looking kid's coming to kill me!"
  • "Cape Feare" has Bart becoming paranoid after receiving several death threat letters in a row from Sideshow Bob, causing this to happen with everyone he meets:
    • At first, Marge is walking towards Bart with a big-ass pair of scissors saying, "I'm going to get you... some ice cream at the store because we're saving so much money on Diet Cola!" and proceeds to cut some coupons out of the paper.
    • Later on, he sees Ned Flanders waving a Freddy Krueger-esque glove with the words, "Say your prayers, Simpson... Because the schools can't force you like they should!" He then goes back to using his glove to trim the hedges.
    Flanders: Maude, these new finger razors make hedge trimmin' just as much fun as sittin' through church!
    • When he's in class Mrs. Krabappel says he'll be her murder victim... in the school play on Lizzie Borden, starring Martin Prince as Lizzie.
    Martin: Forty whacks with a wet noodle, Bart!
    • Then Homer arrives, goes Motor Mouth with a butcher knife, and blurts "BARTYOUWANTSOMEBROWNIESBEFOREYOUGOTOBED??", finally revealing the case of brownies Marge had apparently cooked in between scenes.
    • Then Homer does it again showing off his new stuff, shouting "BARTYOUWANNASEEMYNEWCHAINSAWANDHOCKEYMASK?!".
  • In "Wedding for Disaster", Bart and Lisa think Sideshow Bob has kidnapped their dad. They see him through a window stabbing what looks like a human head and burst in to find that Bob was actually stabbing a clay bust of Krusty to aerate it (although he seems to enjoy it an awful lot).
  • "The Book Job" ends with Moe holding up a knife at Neil Gaiman and saying he was going to do something he wanted to do for a long time. He then slices a pineapple and congratulates him.
  • In "Take My Wife, Sleaze", Homer starts a motorcycle gang named the "Hell's Satans". Unfortunately, there's already a gang named that, and when they find out, they storm into the Simpsons' home, and their leader, Meathook, faces Homer, pulling out a switchblade... and a switchfork, forcing him to eat his Hell's Satans merchandise.
  • In "The Wife Aquatic" when Homer is introduced to a sailor, the sailor immediately opens a switch blade, then he informs him that he plays around with it all day and night.
  • "Treehouse of Horror XXII" short "Dial 'D' for 'Diddly'" has a montage of close ups of Ned Flanders doing what looks like murder, but are zoomed out to show him just doing mundane things. It's only with the last close up of him praying with his hands together is revealed to be him disposing of a mutilated body.
• SpongeBob SquarePants:
  • In "Jellyfish Hunter", SpongeBob finds Mr. Krabs abusing captive jellyfish for their jelly. SpongeBob grabs a wrench, and Mr. Krabs asks what he's going to do with it. SpongeBob angrily says "Something that should have been done a long time ago!" before tightening a bolt and saying "The squeaky bolt on this door was driving me crazy."
  • One scene in "Doing Time" makes it look like a couple of police officers are beating somebody with their nightsticks, when in reality, they were fixing a broken parking meter.
  • In "Karate Island", Udon reaches for something in his robe that makes a clicking sound. When he pulls it out, it turns out to be a pen.
  • "Whatever Happened to SpongeBob" has SpongeBob be threatened by a gang of Greaser Delinquents. One of them holds something in his face that seems like a switchblade but turns out to be a comb.
• Steven Universe: In "Gem Heist", Steven winds up in the processing chute of a People Zoo. After being stripped down to his underwear by the mechanisms in the tube, he sees a giant press and tries to run away from it down the conveyor belt, but is unsuccessful... and it just puts him in a new outfit.
• Disenchantment: In the season 2 finale, Bean, Elfo, and Luci are sentenced to death for supposedly killing king Zog. The night before their scheduled execution the executioner visits them in their cells, raises his axe....and cuts their chains. He was there to help them escape.
• The Owl House: When forced to care for three demon babies who won't stop screaming, Eda's soon at her wit's end and mutters something about how there's only one way out of this while pulling out a Bowie knife... which she then uses to cut up some apples for the little monsters to eat as a snack while she reads them a story.
• Total Drama: In the Island episode "Camp Castaways", the final four competitors are stranded on a seemingly deserted island. In one scene, Duncan is seen attacking and stabbing what looks like actual prey but just turns out to be a bunch of bananas. He's having a heck of a good time doing it too.

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