History ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill / Literature

** The [[Literature/{{Lensman}} Lensmen]] did it first, building a weapon that directed the entire energy output of a star into a single beam. [[LensmanArmsRace Then they moved on to more powerful weapons.]]

** On a more personal scale, the NewJediOrder novel ''Star By Star'' features both the New Republic and Yuuzhan Vong revealing their newly-developed infantry. The Republic fields YVH [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin "Yuuzhan Vong Hunter"]] [[KillerRobot battle droids]] capable of dueling ''starfighters'' and winning, and capable of incredible feats of precision, correctly identifying and gunning down infiltrators in a crowd of humans without harming the civilians; YVH droids commonly go ten-to-one against standard Vong warriors and win. On the other side, the Vong begin deploying ''voxyn'', [[HeroKiller Jedi-hunting]] beasts [[GeneticEngineeringIsTheNewNuke designed and shaped]] to be the ultimate killing machines, featuring razor-sharp claws and teeth, acid spit, blood that is both acidic ''and'' a neurotoxin, a deadly selection of retroviruses that live on their skin and spines, disorienting sreeches, and neural-shock attacks. The voxyn ultimately lose, due to CripplingOverspecialization -- they're weak against MoreDakka.

* The StarWarsExpandedUniverse novel ''DeathStar'' describes its use as "overkill in the most horrifyingly literal way possible". And indeed, blowing up a pacifistic planet just to KickTheDog is clearly overdoing it.

** Actually, vaporizing a planet is easier than blowing it completely apart. If you achieve one but not the other, most of the vapour will stay in the planet-sized fireball, due to gravity. The Millennium Falcon should have encountered an uncharted emission nebula, not uncharted asteroids.

** Special mention needs to go to the Piecemaker, though. There is a ''reason'' people generally endeavor to be a good distance directly behind Detritus when he fires the thing.

* This shows up a bit in ''TheDresdenFiles''.

** What does Morgan do when confronted with an EldritchAbomination? This happened to be back in TheFifties, so he lured it to a nuclear weapon testing ground and leaves it there. [[NukeEm On the day of a test]].

* In ''TheMagiciansNephew'', Jadis is described as having been Queen of a world that is ruined when the protagonists come upon it. The reason? Her sister wanted the throne. Instead of killing her and being done with it, Jadis finds and uses the Unspeakable Word, with the result that ''everyone'' but herself dies.

* Kelsier of the ''{{Mistborn}}'' series certainly has his moments. If you ask him, any member of the nobility, or any one ''working for'' a member of the nobility is little better than cannon fodder.

* Rand Al'Thor in ''TheWheelOfTime'' series has used this more than once. A scene in ''The Gathering Storm'' is particularly noteworthy: He has finally tracked down Graendal to her castle. She is a noted [[TheChessmaster Chessmaster]], and Rand doubts that he can outwit her. So instead, he sends in a pawn, a minor nobleman who's stupid, power-hungry and easily manipulated, as a messenger. She uses MindControl on the nobleman and sends him back to Rand, treating it as the start of an intricate game of backup plans and countermoves. It turns out that Rand [[IKnowYouKnowIKnow was prepared for that]]; he detects signs of the MindControl, takes that as solid confirmation of Graendal's presence, pulls out his biggest AmplifierArtifact, and ''drops a [[FantasticNuke Magical Nuke]] on her'', erasing the entire castle and everyone in it from existence. [[spoiler: It didn't work as well as he hoped, but he still managed to get one Forsaken, albeit not the one he wanted, and at least one Black Ajah]], so it fits this trope.

* The end of ''H2G2/MostlyHarmless'' has [[spoiler:the entire planet Earth destroyed, in all parallel universes to boot, with all the main characters on it]] because DouglasAdams was sick of being asked for more sequels. The radio drama [[spoiler:has them escape, in the nick of time]].

*** To elaborate: The Piecemaker is a converted ''siege ballista'', designed to send 5-foot iron poles through fortifications. Its wielder, [[OurTrollsAreDifferent Sergeant Detritus]], felt that this was a waste of a shot, so instead uses sheaves of regular arrows -- hundreds of regular arrows. This means that, fully wound, it's effectively a shotgun that fires at ''near escape-velocity''.
**** The Piecemaker is described as "a siege cross-bow that three men couldn't lift, [Detritus] had converted it to fire a thick sheaf of arrows all at once. Mostly they shattered in the air because of the forces involved, and the target was hit by an expanding cloud of burning splinters. Vimes had banned him from using it on people, but it was a damn good way of getting into buildings. It could open the front door and the back door at the same time.
**** Hence, [[CrowningMomentOfFunny "If Mr. Safety Catch is not on, Mr. Crossbow is not your friend."]]

* In '[[Literature/JackRyan Cardinal of the Kremlin]]' TomClancy remarks that the main problem with nukes is leaving enough enemy command structure intact that you can conduct post-conflict negotiations.

** The [[{{Lensman}} Lensmen]] did it first, building a weapon that directed the entire energy output of a star into a single beam. [[LensmanArmsRace Then they moved on to more powerful weapons.]]

* To ''CiaphasCain'''s [[PsychoLesbian Mari Magot]], overkill is inherently meaningless.

* In ''TheMerchantPrincesSeries'', a CycleOfRevenge quickly becomes this. When knowledge of the Clan, a dimension-traveling group of smugglers, comes to the attention of the government, PresidentEvil tries to ''NukeEm'' because of the potential security risk they represent. [[spoiler: Well, that's the pretext, at least. And his bomb succeeds only in hitting one castle, occupied mostly by an enemy of theirs at the time. However, a conservative faction of the Clan decides to retaliate by setting off ''three'' nuclear weapons in Washington, DC. They succeed. In retaliation, PresidentEvil's successor sends dimension-traveling ships to the Clan's home country, an area roughly the size of Massachusetts, and carpet-bombs them with nuclear weapons. It's called, appropriately, CARTHAGE, and probably would have caused nuclear winter on that world]].

* One of the first times the [[Literature/HonorHarrington Royal Manticoran Navy]] effectively fields its new missile pod technology in a fleet action, combined with its new long-range missiles that allow the fleet to start firing missiles long before they get within "normal" combat range, results in the enemy fleet getting obliterated almost before they can get a shot off. The number of missiles number in the tens of thousands, so many that a significant percentage are killed by other missiles as warheads detonate and another large percentage don't hit anything at all as there's only an expanding cloud of vapour instead of a target. The Solarian Navy, who have not been paying attention to this advance, have a fleet similarly obliterated after a skirmish with the Manticorans, and the Haven fleet at the end of ''Misison of Honor'', [[spoiler: now allied with Manticore]], are confident they will do the same to yet another Sollie fleet.

**** Hence, [[MomentOfFunny "If Mr. Safety Catch is not on, Mr. Crossbow is not your friend."]]

* Lampshaded in ''Homeland'' by R.A. Salvatore. While he and Alton are being swarmed by spiders, Masoj looks down at his crossbow in contemplation and remarks, "Overkill?"

* It wouldn't be an overkill thread without the {{Lensmen}}. When you're dealing with a planet, sure, no weapon is too powerful - but a fleet? The enemy's surviving ships (a fairly large number is implied) are huddled into the ideal globular defensive formation, weapons pointed out, shields mutually reinforcing... and the good guys direct several ''planets'' into the centre of mass, in addition to multiple planet-sized antimatter bombs. Yes, you read that right. Subverted slightly in that even after all this butchery is done, there are still a few survivors to be finished off.

* There is a collection of short stories set in the ''{{Warhammer 40000}}'' universe that's entitled "Planetkill".

* [[spoiler: Tigerstar's]] death in ''Literature/WarriorCats''. Killed by [[spoiler: having nine internal organs cut through, therefore losing [[CatsHaveNineLives all nine of his leader's lives at once]].]]

* In the ''{{Bolo}}'' novels, the 'Final War' against the Melconian Empire ended like this. The Terran Concordiat declared that every single planet in the Empire be completely cleansed of life. The Melconians made a similar declaration against the Concordiat at about the same time. Both succeeded. The war ended with both nations reduced to a few scattered remnants desperately searching for a planet that could still support life. Since the fragments of the Concordiat were slightly larger, they can arguably claim victory.

* RobertAHeinlein disapproves of this trope. As he has Sergeant Zim from ''Literature/StarshipTroopers'' comment, war is controlled violence, not killing for its own sake, and there are times where it would as foolish to destroy an enemy city with H-bombs as it would be to punish a baby by decapitating it.

* The StarWarsExpandedUniverse novel ''DeathStar'' describes its use as "overkill in the most horrifyingly literal way possible". And indeed, blowing up a pacifistic planet just to KickTheDog is clearly overdoing it.

* ''PerryRhodan'': has Arkon Bombs. Thrown on a planet the planet itself transforms into a nuclear weapon.

* Rand Al'Thor in ''TheWheelOfTime'' series has used this more than once. A scene in ''The Gathering Storm'' is particularly noteworthy: He has finally tracked down Graendal to her castle. She is a noted [[TheChessmaster Chessmaster]], and Rand doubts that he can outwit her. So instead, he sends in a pawn, a minor nobleman who's stupid, power-hungry and easily manipulated, as a messenger. She uses MindControl on the nobleman and sends him back to Rand, treating it as the start of an intricate game of backup plans and countermoves. It turns out that Rand [[IKnowYouKnowIKnow was prepared for that]]; he detects signs of the MindControl, takes that as solid confirmation of Graendal's presence, pulls out his biggest AmplifierArtifact, and ''drops a [[FantasticNuke Magical Nuke]] on her'', erasing the entire castle and everyone in it from existence. [[spoiler: It didn't work as well as he hoped, but he still managed to get one Forsaken, albeit not the one he wanted, and at least one Black Ajah]], so it fits this trope.

*** Palpatine didn't create Centerpoint, that was ThePrecursors. Palpatine ''did'', however, create the [[DarkEmpire Galaxy Gun]] which does pretty much the same thing. And the Galaxy Gun was destroyed by being {{ramm|ingAlwaysWorks}}ed by a Star Destroyer, so it's a double example of this trope.

* [[spoiler: Tigerstar's]] death in ''{{Warrior|Cats}}s''. Killed by [[spoiler: having nine internal organs cut through.]]

* In 'Cardinal of the Kremlin' TomClancy remarks that the main problem with nukes is leaving enough enemy command structure intact that you can conduct post-conflict negotiations.

* In the Halo expanded universe human ships ended up carrying salvos of "archer" anti-ship missiles that could decimate a human fleet (one archer could severely damage a destroyer) just to take down the shields of a covenant frigate. Justified that Covenant frigates can withstand tactical nuclear weapons.