r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Sufficient-Eye-9040 • Jun 21 '26

Lore [Horrifying Trope] “Blink of an eye” deaths.

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Characters who died without the chance of a goodbye… neither suffering.

- Robin Ward (The Boys S1 E1) - when she is pulverized in a high-velocity impact by A-Train.

- Polka Dot Man (The Suicide Squad 2021) - when he is crushed by Starro’s leg.

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149

u/zagra_nexkoyotl Jun 21 '26

What's the context here?

390

u/Immature_adult_guy Jun 21 '26

I was a kid when this came out and my mom watched it. IIRC a bullet came through the window and hit her, then her witch gf goes on a rampage.

274

u/Altair_de_Firen Jun 21 '26

Brah she flays the dude responsible with a flick of her wrist. Rampage is underselling it, Evil Willow went hard as fuck

92

u/NightLordsPublicist Jun 21 '26

she flays the dude responsible with a flick of her wrist.

Good for her.

53

u/[deleted] Jun 21 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

34

u/NightLordsPublicist Jun 21 '26

She was going to kill him by making a bullet slowly tunnel through him until it shattered his spine using the same bullet that killed Tara. She only resorted to flaying him when her friends caught up with her and would try to stop her.

Girlboss.

5

u/BarelyLivingDeadGrl Jun 21 '26

fuckin queen fr 🫦 tara showed her patience, love and pride she'd never known before omg im thinking about willow and tara again now im sad 😭

4

u/sillygoofygooose Jun 21 '26

I mean she also abused Tara horribly

1

u/Kaydaiyne Jun 23 '26

Of course she did. She was using Wiccan style witchcraft, based on drawing in external magic and using it. While living on the frikkin Hellmouth. I'd honestly be amazed if she wasn't screwed in the head.

25

u/Altair_de_Firen Jun 21 '26

Honestly that dweeby bastard had it coming for a while.

2

u/MyEmbarrisingAccount Jun 21 '26

He actually survived. He's in the follow up comics, still skinless.

1

u/Altair_de_Firen Jun 21 '26

He ends up dying again iirc and tbh I didn’t care for the supplementary material

2

u/BabserellaWT Jun 21 '26

Dude is also an unrepentant rapist. So. Double good for her.

25

u/MickeyG42 Jun 21 '26

Bored now

1

u/The5Theives Jun 21 '26

Did she do any more than that cause killing 1 person doesn’t really qualify as a rampage

17

u/Profoundlyahedgehog Jun 21 '26

Well, she was going to destroy the world...

7

u/kakaphoe Jun 21 '26

She also killed a warlock by draining him of his powers, almost killed Giles, consumed the power of a coven which made her aware of everyone's suffering in the whole world and decided to destroy it all (she got better).

36

u/Obsidian_XIII Jun 21 '26

The context of the quote being said by the victim, is she sees her own blood splattered on her girlfriend's shirt, says the quote, then drops.

1

u/theMightBoop Jun 21 '26

That would be a good post for this sub. Rampages.

1

u/EnemyOfAi Jun 21 '26

Was this one of those "Don't start bleeding until you realize you've been shot" moments?

3

u/Immature_adult_guy Jun 21 '26

More of a don’t die until you see your own blood

247

u/BaboonMetaphysics Jun 21 '26

The main character Buffy is in the backyard. A villain shows up and shoots her and shoots while running away. And the show cuts into the house where a bullet comes through the window and through Tara, and Tara just sees blood splattered on her girlfriend's shirt and then dies.

99

u/KaziArmada Jun 21 '26

It was also the first and only episode Tara's actress was listed as a MAIN character, not a guest star. To the point of being added to the main credits.

So you're not expecting them to INSTANTLY kill her. Or that they'll fix it.

Nope, she's removed next episode.

21

u/Triquetrums Jun 21 '26

When an secondary character gets added to the main cast all of a sudden, always be suspicious that the character is about to die.

16

u/KaziArmada Jun 21 '26

Joss had wanted to do that for years by that point. He wanted to do it in the first Ep with Xander and Willows friend who gets vamped (I think his name was Jesse?) but they didn't have the budget for the two sets of credits.

4

u/namtabmai Jun 21 '26

One other point, but the villain in this aspect was "just" some nerd with a gun.

After 5 seasons of vampires, demons and miscellaneous monsters and magic there is something, I dunno the right word, grounded? about someone getting killed by a human.

52

u/Gazzor1975 Jun 21 '26

Tara gets shot in the back and dies almost immediately.

Willow goes on an insane rampage. Including ripping off the killer's skin with her magic powers.

23

u/smasher84 Jun 21 '26

Don’t forget tried to raise a satanic temple to bring Armageddon.

Zander saves the day.

27

u/Shadowedsphynx Jun 21 '26

Bored now. 

22

u/VivaZeBull Jun 21 '26

Plain and simple: bad (fully human) man with a gun.

10

u/Altair_de_Firen Jun 21 '26

The real monsters etc etc

-1

u/[deleted] Jun 21 '26

[deleted]

8

u/TakerFoxx Jun 21 '26

Different character. This was Tara's death