Trope Finder

Psychic Strangle and Vorpal Pillow are the closest ones I could find.

It's odd that there doesn't seem to be one for normal methods of strangulation.

^It'd be like having one for dying by getting stabbed. Just getting stabbed is just a way someone can die; on the other hand Impaled with Extreme Prejudice is a noteworthy way to get stabbed.

That's just People Sit on Chairs.

^So is just shooting someone, but there's still a trope for it. Both for when it's played straight and for when the villain cuts to the chase and actually does it.

Just throttling someone isn't enough to be tropeworthy. If the attacker is strong enough, it might be a Neck Lift.

^^ There is no trope for shooting someone. Why Don't You Just Shoot Him? is about not immediately killing someone, No-Nonsense Nemesis is about a villain who refuses to hold the Villain Ball (a common maninifestation being that they defy Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?) Even there, shooting is not the trope- they could simply have The Dragon cut the hero's head off as soon as they've captured them, for instance.

^Why Don't You Just Shoot Him? can go either way. Someone may ask the question and the villain refutes the idea. Or, the villain might decide to do it before anyone has a chance to ask. Either way, it's about whether or not the hero gets shot.

Boom, Headshot! is self-explanatory and is also about shooting the victim. So is Blown Across the Room, More Dakka, and Macross Missile Massacre which is a more extreme version. Kame Hame Hadoken is a supernatural variation that utilizes Ki instead of firearms.

So yes, there are several tropes about several different ways to shoot someone, but none for simply strangling them. I just find it odd that strangulation is considered 'People Sit on Chairs' while shooting isn't, when they're equally mundane yet equally common ways to kill, in fiction.

The shooting tropes involve shooting characters in specific ways. There is no trope for "a character gets shot," only tropes for "characters get shot in ways that are unusual or dramatic."

And that's why we don't have a trope for "character gets strangled." To be tropeworthy, there'd need to be more to it than that.

Boom, Headshot! and Blown Across the Room both cover that, and the first one isn't unusual. Neither is ventilating the victim in a hail of gunfire.

There are also multiple ways to strangle someone besides using barehands:

• garrote wire (common in espionage films and stealth/action games)
• Force Choke (or telekinesis)
• using an article of clothing (belt, scarf, jackets, etc.)
• smothering the victim
• The Legend of Korra even came up with an all new method by having the victim's breath literally sucked out of them via airbending (won't spoil who did it to whom).

So we're clear: I'm not trying to be difficult, but tropes for just shooting someone do exist, which is tropable because it happens across all media. All I'm saying is strangulation is just as common as shooting and also has multiple ways it can be done for narrative purposes.

If an important character did die by being choked to death (i.e. barehands), how would you trope it? 'cuz as things stand, there isn't one for it.

Boom, Headshot! is "a character gets shot in the head" and Blown Across the Room is "a character gets shot ''and flies across the room from the impack". Both tropes are more cinematographic than just being shot.

^Sure, but both involve the victim being shot.

Likewise, approaching someone from behind and using a garrote wire to silence them is more suspenseful than just choking them. But choking the victim can still be suspenseful depending on whether there's a struggle, or seeing if the victim survives.

^ The point is, "Getting Shot" isn't a trope in and of itself, just like "Choking Someone" isn't a trope in and of itself.

^So what makes choking 'chairs', while shooting isn't?

If narrative purpose is what defines whether something is tropable, how is strangulation not tropable when there's multiple ways to implement it narratively?

I literally just said, getting shot isn't a trope. Getting shot is chairs. The tropes you mentioned are of course tropes, but just "someone gets shot" is meaningless, just like being choked is meaningless unless one adds meaning to it.

^^ Look at the Sword Tropes as your example: Spotting the hero because he's the guy with the sword is a trope. Using a ridiculously large sword is a trope. Using a sword in improbable ways is a trope. Making it rain swords is a trope.

"X character uses a sword" is not a trope.

Heroes Prefer Swords says otherwise.

The protagonist steps through the doorway, gets shot and dies. I'd say that's meaningful since the MC got taken out by a single gunshot. No warning, no music, no slow mo.

Or, if you prefer, a character gets shot and killed on a sitcom.

Both of those are real examples. The first was from the remake of Red Dawn. The other happened on an episode of Roc. So yes, simply getting shot in itself can have significance for the victim and the audience, especially if they don't see it coming. Neither did Marvin.

And those are tropes, yes. I fail to see the problem here. You're acting as though the trope in these cases is "character gets shot" and not "sudden death with no warning" and "sudden death in a sitcom". Neither of these two tropes would change in meaning, in narrative use, if the character was killed by a bow and arrow or bomb. You're acting like the gun is the important part.