History Main / ImAHumanitarian

** ''The Rats in the Walls'' dealt with this trope as well, in a truly horrifying way. [[Spoiler: Subterranean stables full of degenerate humans bred for their meat]] are involved.

* {{Spider-Man}} villain Vermin is a human rat who lives in AbsurdlySpaciousSewer and eats unlucky bypassers. He can also command rats and often invites them to join in.

* On ''StrokerAndHoop'', the two buddy detectives wake up in a bathtub full of ice and assume they've had their kidneys stolen by two beautiful women; but, no, they're members of an enlightened cannibal cult who eat vestigial organs safely harvested from their victims. They took the boys' appendices and tail bones. Later in the ep, the cult goes even crazier, and tries the old "giant kettle" routine on Stroker (though they claim it's because they don't like him). They had to wait a while, as 100 gallons of water takes a long time to boil.

* In an episode of ''MutantLeague'', Razor Kid is threatened by the other starving players after a plane crash leaves them stranded in the mountains. With the help of his agent, he negotiates it down to his tail, which will grow back.
* An episode of ''EekTheCat'' had Anabelle made the queen of some bizarre-looking savages on an island out in the middle of nowhere. Problem was that, "In order for the queen to become a goddess, she must be cooked and then eaten by the king."

* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' Treehouse Of Horror episodes use this a few times. The earliest involved the school staff killing and cooking problem students (and eventually, all of them). Another was a parody of ''TheBlob'' where Homer became a voracious slime monster. Yet another is a parody of ''TheMostDangerousGame''... although it wasn't too necessary that time.

* The ''{{Sealab 2021}}'' episode "Frozen Dinner" finds the crew answering a distress call from two men trapped on an ice station, one of whom has decided to resort to cannibalism and proves remarkably dedicated to following that course of action no matter what happens. He even asks the crew for vegetables... so he can make a proper stew out of his companion.

* Pictured above is the cannibalistic [[EatsBabies baby killer]] from the season 2 premeire of ''{{Metalocalypse}}''.

* The 'island-dwelling tribe of cannibals' stereotype appeared very frequently in a great number of theatrical shorts from the start of animation through the Civil Right's movement, after which the racist elements of its characterisation were finally taken into account and became (after much lobbying) unacceptable for general airing. Episodes of ''WesternAnimation/TomAndJerry'', BugsBunny and BettyBoop among others which have plots revolving around tribal cannibals are often banned or heavily edited when they are shown.
* Lockdown from ''TransformersAnimated'' is a robotic version of this. While he doesn;t eat other robots he does strip them for parts to upgrade himself.

* An episode of ''{{Jimmy Two-Shoes}}'' had Jimmy and Beezy nearly get eaten alive by a tribe of cannibals. Fortunately, [[PunchClockVillain their shift ended in time]].
* ''WesternAnimation/TheAngryBeavers'': In the end of the episode – ''The Mighty Knothead'': After the girl racoons shockingly realize that Daggett is not the Mighty Knothead they imagined, Both Daggett and his brother Norbert are chased down by the girl racoons. The beaver brothers thought they were safe in their house only to quickly realize, they, with their house are slowly being roasted alive and are about to be eaten alive by the vengeful girl raccoon tribe.

* The owner and staff of the motel (an InnOfNoReturn) in the ''TazMania'' episode "A Midsummer Night's Scream", who plan to eat Bushwacker Bob and Taz.
* An episode of ''CourageTheCowardlyDog'' featured an [[PigMan antropomorphic pig couple]] who were set up as this. [[spoiler: It's eventually revealed that they only make food scupltures and Courage just misunderstood the situation]].
* The Summerween episode of ''[[GravityFalls Gravity Falls]]''

* In [=Cormac McCarthy's=] ''TheRoad'', almost all life has been destroyed in an unseen apocolapse. So you can guess what the bad guys eat -- and what they eventually store, and raise, and hoard -- for food. [[spoiler:It will redefine your view of BlackComedy, that's for sure.]]

* Creator/HPLovecraft's ''The Picture In The House''. It's really creepy, though the ending [[spoiler:in which the main character escapes the cannibal because lightning explodes the house and he wakes up somewhere else]] has a bit of {{Narm}} to it.
** Unless you assume that by [[spoiler:his ambiguous wording about that means that [[PosthumousNarration he was killed by the lightning bolt]]...]]
** ''The Rats in the Walls'' dealt with this trope as well, in a truly horrifying way. Let's just say that [[spoiler: subterranean stables full of degenerate humans bred for their meat]] are involved.

* Used to terrifying effect in ShingekiNoKyojin. The Titans are a bizarre race of giant humanoids who have no particular behaviors except eating people... but not for food. They don't derive nourishment from eating people, and and can't even digest them in the first place; when it's full, a Titan regurgitates it all back up, and is ready for seconds. They apparently eat ''only'' for pleasure, and [[ApocalypseHow that's why humanity only has one settlement left.]]

** You see, [[InSovietRussiaTropeMocksYou In your country, you eat fish. . . ]]

* "Casket Canyon" in ''JonahHex'' #66 features an isolated town forced into a NoPartyLikeADonnerParty situation. However, some of the townsfolk seem to have become quite fond of the taste of human flesh and will cheerfully kill and eat any strangers who wander into town.

* In PoulAnderson's "The Sharing of Flesh", the ship that finds a lost human colony discovers that all humans on it practice cannibalism. The computer discusses how it is taboo in all known cultures except sometimes to save lives, and historically may have been part of HumanSacrifice and magic -- plus one culture that regarded it as just plain meat, which the British exteriminated. Evalyth finds herself sympathetizing with the British.

* In Creator/RobertEHoward's ''The Hour of the Dragon'', ConanTheBarbarian scorns the rumor that the worshippers of Asura eat human flesh and eats their meat. [[spoiler:He's right, as Asura is one of the few Hyborian gods who isn't a [[OurDemonsAreDifferent demon]] or [[EldritchAbomination worse]], and is merely maligned by rival priesthoods.]]

* This comes up in the second book of the ''CouncilWars'' series. Humans have the ability to Change themselves into any form they wish including mythical creatures and sentient animals. The Heroes are organizing a fighting retreat along with [[OurMermaidsAreDifferent Mer-people]], Dolphionos (humans Changed into Dolphins) and [[OurDragonsAreDifferent Dragons]] (who are not changed humans). Due to short supplies they end up eating their opponents (humans who are Changed into either Orcas or a sort of Manta-Ray like creature). Interestingly they don't seem particularly bothered by this other than a single exchange noting that while it is technically cannibalism the Orcas were eating the Mer-people first so they started it.

* There's the [[Series/Hannibal TV series]] showing how Hannibal Lecter and Will Graham met, so this plays a large part of the show. There's also a bunch of unwitting eaters, although the the only characters who have unquestionably (and unwittingly) ate human flesh were those at his dinner party in "Sorbet".

* There's a [[Series/Hannibal]] TV series showing how Hannibal Lecter and Will Graham met, so this plays a large part of the show. There's also a bunch of unwitting eaters, although the the only characters who have unquestionably (and unwittingly) ate human flesh were those at his dinner party in "Sorbet".

* Hannibal Lecter of ''Literature/TheSilenceOfTheLambs'' fame.
** ESPECIALLY Hannibal Lecter of ''Hannibal'' and ''Hannibal Rising'' fame. [[spoiler: oh where, oh where, has my little sister gone....]]

** Hannibal also drugged and {{Hannibal Lecture}}d nemesis and main villain Mason Verger into cutting off his own face and feeding it to his dogs, during which he eats his own nose. It is implied Mason had previously allowed industrial accidents to go overlooked in his meatpacking plant, exposing the market to trace amounts of his workers' flesh. Mason also took bites from his sister's buttocks while sexually abusing her throughout their childhood.

* ComicBook/{{Batman}} foe Corelius Stirk, who operates under the delusion that he requires the nutrients and hormones from people's hearts in order to stay alive, and these are best prepared with norepinephrine by inducing fear in the victim prior to death.
** The Comicbook/{{Batman}} villain Killer Croc started out as a gangster with a skin condition, but as time has gone by, his humanity and sanity have slipped away. He does currently eat people.
*** The Flamingo is a psychotic hitman. Despite his name, as well as his pink uniform and vehicles, he is a sociopathic, mindless, killing machine, nicknamed "the eater of faces", a title he has lived up to.

** ''{{Hoodwinked}}'', the 2006 animated adaptation of this story, features a FridgeLogic example: a few police officers seen at Granny's house are pigs. But at the same time, we learn that Kirk sells schnitzel on a stick out of a truck. Schnitzel, for the record, is created from pork, which comes from pigs. Unless we to assume there are two different kinds of pigs - sentient and non-sentient types - existing in this part of the forest, you wonder [[NightmareFuel what would happen if a pig ate something from Kirk's truck]].

* Partially subverted in the ''Literature/CodexAlera'' series, the Marat race eat their enemies to "partake of their strength", but unlike the usual examples they aren't portrayed as being evil, except in part of the first book, before we get to see them in some detail, and in fact, [[spoiler: TheHero ends up married to one in the end.]] A more antagonistic faction portrayed as "evil" or "deviated" is shown [[NightmareFuel eating their captives alive]].

* In ''Series/{{Dollhouse}}'', "The Attic," Echo and [[spoiler: Dominic]] go into The Attic, [[spoiler: a literal land of NightmareFuel that includes a Japanese man forced to eat his own legs. As sushi. And the only way for Echo and [[spoiler: Dominic]] to escape is for them to "enjoy ourselves." {{Squick}}.]]

* The original [[MultipleEndings worst ending]] for ''VideoGame/{{Disgaea 2}}'' invariably pops up under the term of NightmareFuel, because you get to hear, with horrifically realistic sound effects, Adell killing his siblings and then eating them. The sound effects are removed in the English dubbed version, which some argue makes it ''worse''.

** [[spoiler: [[NightmareFuel The Broodmother]] is a case. Darkspawn would capture women and feed them their own kin until they became bloated monsters that gave birth to more darkspawn.]]

* Comes up a couple of times in ''SurvivalOfTheFittest''.
** Warning, not only spoilers here but excessive NightmareFuel.

* While in the ''literal'' sense this trope doesn't apply in ''WesternAnimation/BeastWars'' (though Tarantulas probably would have eaten any hominid he managed to catch), the technical sense gets more than its look in. Tarantulas relishes eating living creatures, and is quite willing to add Cybertronians to the menu- a fact made [[NightmareFuel terrifyingly clear]] in the third episode. In fact, in the first season, it was this literal appetite for carnage and bloody gluttony that was his defining trait, to the extent that his official season 1 profile talks mainly about his appetite and defines him as a "twisted gourmand", as opposed to the MadScientist and Machievallian plotter of seasons 2 and 3. Rampage, we are reminded regularly, (mainly by the PsychoForHire himself), tortured, butchered and ''ate'' the entire population of no less then two Maximal colonies before ending up in the ''WesternAnimation/BeastWars''. In one of the first season episodes, Dinobot eats a psuedo-clone of himself (a biologically grown raptor with a cybernetic brain).

* [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Gluttony]] in ''Manga/FullmetalAlchemist'' is an ExtremeOmnivore whose only concern in life is eating people, all kinds of objects, [[spoiler:and chunks of ancient ruins]]. Fellow homunculus [[spoiler:Pride]] ends up [[spoiler: [[DeathByIrony devouring him]]]].

* In the Michael Palin-scripted TV movie ''Secrets'', a brand of chocolate that accidentally becomes contaminated with the mashed-up bodies of a pair of unfortunate humans becomes wildly popular with the public, necessitating drastic action on the part of the factory managers to keep stocks up...

** The Rat King is a mythological figure who murdered a man's sons and fed them to him in a pie. He was transformed into a rat by the gods in punishment - not for the act itself, but because he violated SacredHospitality while killing them when they were his guests.

* RobertHeinlein's ''Literature/HaveSpaceSuitWillTravel''. The Wormfaces kill their human minions and turn them into soup so the Wormfaces' can eat them.

** [[spoiler: Lord Manderly emulates this with three Freys, and takes two slices of each for himself, but is careful to do it once they're no longer his guests. That would be hypocritical after all, as he hates the Freys because they murdered his king and son while they were their guests.]]

** In ''A Dance With Dragons'', Coldhands provides Bran and co, who are starving with some nice roasted pork. Pork from pigs Coldhands somehow managed to find in the middle of a barren, snowy forest, and which [[SarcasmMode coincidentally]] turned up shortly after Coldhands killed some Night Watch deserters.