History Main / AnvilOnHead

* On Day 6 of the Minecraftian ''[[LetsPlay/LifeSMP 3rd Life SMP]]'', Joel attempted to {{invoke|dTrope}} this on Scott by setting up a trap at his base while he was away, so that two anvils would fall on his head when he tried to enter. {{Subverted|Trope}} in that the trap was not set up correctly and only succeeded in giving Scott two free anvils.

** {{Exaggerated|Trope}} in the crossover with ''LetsPlay/EmpiresSMP'' when Impulse is tasked with killing someone via anvil during the Multi(verse) Tag event. He accomplishes this by dropping a cluster of ''[[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill 200 anvils]]'' on Scott with a redstone contraption.
** In season 9, Doc takes advantage of a moment that Etho is AFK to drop an anvil on him, something he's wanted to do for over ten years. This sparks a war between the two, waiting for the other to go AFK for even a few minutes to drop an anvil on them. This also prompted Doc to go [[AxCrazy Anvil-Crazy]] and attack any AFK player, and even several non-AFK targets. Eventually, several Hermits started to join in the anvil war as well.
*** Grian does this against Scar by tricking him into getting him to read the sign so Grian can use a redstone contraption to kill him with.

*** Xisuma pulls this one off against an AFK Ren by dropping an anvil on him during a TCG game.
*** During the TCG arena cup, False has to take an AFK Doc out by dropping an anvil twice against him. She also attempted to do this against Etho, but Etho ultimately moved after he realized what's going on.
** While on a quest spree, one of the quests Cub is tasked is to kill someone with an anvil. He manages to kill Scar with the 8th anvil Cub deployed.

* In [[http://grrlpowercomic.com/archives/1500 this]] ''Webcomic/GrrlPower'' strip, Sydney drops her teammate (named [[JustForPun Anvil]]) on a villain. She then does a [[WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes Road Runner]] [[InvokedTrope impression]], bemusing Harem, who [[DontExplainTheJoke doesn't get it]].

*** Grian and Scar manages to kill an AFK Impulse by pushing him into a hole and kill him with the anvil. However, it goes terribly wrong as dropping an anvil more than 3 blocks high causes the dropped items to despawn, as all three found it the hard day.

[[caption-width-right:300:It doesn't hurt when you hit it, [[RussianReversal it hurts when it hits you]]!]]

* ''Fanfic/DespairsLastResort'' features a dark example. [[spoiler: The culprit of the first case, Super High-school Level Animator Kaito Fujiwara, is executed by [[IronicDeath being crushed under a giant anvil]].]]

** In ''Literature/SmallGods'' a villain is killed when a tortoise is dropped on his head. The tortoise [[spoiler: is actually the god Om]] and in addition to saving the life of the hero it is his way of sending an Anvilicious message to the citizens of Omnia.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Exile}}'' and its remake ''Avernum'', a mage named X is obsessed with researching a spell which would teleport an anvil above somebody's head. [[spoiler: By Avernum 6, he perfects it.]]

* ''VideoGame/HauntingStarringPolterguy'': In the GainaxEnding, shortly after Polterguy [[spoiler:transformed into his human form again]], a huge anvil, presumably produced by Vito Sardini's company, [[spoiler: lands on Polterguy's head and makes him a ghost again.]]

* ''Series/LazyTown'' - literally. Robbie attempts to knock Sportacus out by putting a small anvil on one side of a seesaw and catapulting it at him, but misjudges it. HilarityEnsues.

** While on a quest spree, one of the quests Cub is tasked is to kill someone with an anvil. He manages to kill Scar with the 7th anvil Cub dropped.

*** Grian and Scar manages to kill an AFK Impulse by pushing him into a hole and kill him with the anvil. However, it does terriblly wrong as dropping an anvil more than 3 blocks high causes the dropped items to despawn, as all three found it the hard day.

** While on a quest spree, one of the quests Cub is tasked is to kill someone with an anvil. He manages to kill Scar with the 7th anvil Cub dropped.

** In season 9, Doc takes advantage of a moment that Etho is AFK to drop an anvil on him, something he's wanted to do for nearly ten years. This sparks a war between the two, waiting for the other to go AFK for even a few minutes to drop an anvil on them. This also prompted Doc to go [[AxCrazy Anvil-Crazy]] and attack any AFK player, and even several non-AFK targets.

** {{Exaggerated|Trope}} in the crossover with ''LetsPlay/EmpiresSMP'' when Impulse is tasked with killing someone via anvil during the Multi(verse) Tag event. He accomplishes this by dropping a cluster of ''[[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill 200 anvils]]'' on Scott with a redstone contraption.

* {{Exaggerated|Trope}} in the ''LetsPlay/HermitcraftServer''[=/=]''LetsPlay/EmpiresSMP'' crossover when Impulse is tasked with killing someone via anvil during the Multi(verse) Tag event. He accomplishes this by dropping a cluster of ''[[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill 200 anvils]]'' on Scott with a redstone contraption.

* ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog'':

* The aptly named homebrew [[https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?122824-(3-5)-Discipline-Falling-Anvil-v-2-(P-E-A-C-H-) Falling Anvil]] homebrew discipline for ''TabletopGame/{{Dungeons and Dragons}}' (versions 3.X) includes this in varying degrees, starting with flowerpots, and ranging upwards through anvils, safes, and finally Viking longboats. Of course, it also includes a wide variety of other toon-like attacks and defenses.

* In a commercial for Energizer batteries, [[WesternAnimation/WileECoyoteAndTheRoadRunner Wile E. Coyote]] is hired by the fictional Supervolt battery company to destroy the Energizer Bunny, and attempts to stop him with a homemade helicopter that carries an anvil. Thanks to the short life of the Supervolt batteries his helicopter runs on, [[HoistByHisOwnPetard Wile E. ends up taking a fall and getting hit by his own anvil]].

** When Helga tries to help Herr Flick, disguised as a monk, to get down from the belfry of Nouvion church tower, the bell falls upon his assistant, von Smallhausen (also disguised as a monk).

* ''Series/LeCoeurASesRaisons'': One of the many, ''many'' things ButtMonkey Extraordinaire Madge has suffered through the series is having a safe falling on top of hear head. '''Thrice'''.

* ''Series/{{Farscape}}''. The episode "Revenging Angel" plays this entirely straight, as John Crichton is in a coma dreaming he's in a ''WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes''-like cartoon. His first move is getting payback on Harvey!Scorpius by dropping the proverbial weight on his head.

** In season 3's "Mystery Spot", there's a GroundhogDayLoop where each day Dean dies a different death. The beginning of the day always starts the same way, and when he and Sam go outside, one of the things they see is movers trying to get a desk into a building from the ground floor. At the end of one Tuesday, out of nowhere it drops on our hero and [[BlackComedy kills him.]] Turns out the movers had spent the rest of the day trying to get it in the window.
** In the eighth season episode "Hunteri Heroici", the villain, who is using a senile RealityWarper to inflict cartoon physics on selected portions of the world in order to facilitate burglary, drops a literal anvil on an unfortunate security guard. The results are a little more grotesque than usual. Dean later tries to drop one on the villain.

[[caption-width-right:300:It doesn't hurt when you hit it, it hurts when it hits you!]]

->''Anvilaniaaaaaaaaaaa...\\

Anvilaaaaaaniiiiiiiaaaaaaaaaa...''

These large objects must be made of a heavy, dense material in order to survive hammer blows, and as such they weigh a ton (though not ''quite'' literally, for the smallest ones anyway) and are invariably dropped from great height and are used to crush heads, though hands, feet and rib cages sometimes create soft landing spots. They may drop without warning, or they may be heralded by the ShadowOfImpendingDoom and the BombWhistle. The victim usually just has time to [[DeathByLookingUp look up]] and see the falling object before it lands on them. Thankfully for the victim, as a {{slapstick}} trope, [[HardHead this is rarely ever fatal]].

* Exaggerated in the ''LetsPlay/HermitcraftServer''[=/=]''LetsPlay/EmpiresSMP'' crossover when Impulse is tasked with killing someone via anvil during the Multi(verse) Tag event. He accomplishes this by dropping a cluster of ''[[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill 200 anvils]]'' on Scott.

--->'''Darkwing''' (ringing a doorbell): Flowers for Negaduck.\\
'''Negaduck''': I hate flowers!\\
'''Darkwing''': Did I say "flowers"? I meant "skulls".\\
(Negaduck answers the door, only to find himself facing a huge slingshot.)\\
'''Darkwing''': Oh, did I say "skulls"? I meant, "ANVILS"!\\

'''Darkwing''': Oh dear, I dented my anvil.

* Independent animator Patrick Smith did a film called ''Delivery'', which featured two brothers beating each other up over a package. In this case, the beatings were animated realistically, with visible blood, injuries, and subsequent [[spoiler: NeckSnap]]. [[WordOfGod According to Smith]] it was meant to subvert this trope (and slapstick cartoons in general), saying that if an anvil falls on his character, he will die and the person who dropped it will feel remorse.

May have its origins in the real life practice of "anvil firing", which was used in America to celebrate the fourth of July: one anvil was laid upside down on the ground, a charge of gunpowder was placed in the hollow in the base, a fuse was laid leading out of it, and a second anvil was placed right-side-up atop the first. After everybody got far away and someone lit the fuse, they would watch the second anvil be launched high into the air, from which it necessarily had to fall back to earth. Obviously the real-life consequences of this trope place this FIRMLY in the category of DontTryThisAtHome, as a falling anvil could easily kill a person in real life.

* The indicatively named ''WesternAnimation/IAmWeasel'' short "I Am Cliched" has it happen right away, followed by Weasel complaining "getting hit by an anvil is the oldest cliché in cartoons!". After Baboon is targeted by a PianoDrop, a barrage of anvils falls atop the first one! [[OverlyLongGag Not to mention an elephant and a whale]], leading Baboon to note "all missing is the kitchen sink", guess [[KitchenSinkIncluded what]] falls on Weasel next?