Basic Trope: A character is unable to commit suicide.
- Straight: Alice is an Apocalypse Maiden. As the process of world destruction begins, she can no longer move any part of her body, except her mouth. She begs her friends to kill her, knowing her death would stop the apocalypse.
- Exaggerated: Alice has a device planted in her muscles that forces her to move. So, even if she wants to be killed, if her friends try to kill her, she will fight back with all her power.
- Downplayed: Alice refuses to kill herself, viewing suicide as a cowardly way to die.
- Justified:
- Alice is a robot designed to destroy the world. Would the creator allow the AI to make his project fail?
- Alice wants for her family to collect on her life insurance, but the suicide clauses have yet to expire.
- The prophecy that Alice will destroy the world prevents her from being killed by a great many people, including herself. Only No Man of Woman Born can do the deed, and the one who fulfills that requirement is her friend Am.
- Inverted:
- Only Alice can kill herself.
- Alice cannot kill anyone but herself.
- Alice cannot heal herself.
- The only way Alice can die is to kill herself.
- Subverted: Alice attempts to commit suicide and finally succeeds.
- Double Subverted: She actually went into a coma, and is still alive.
- Parodied: Alice has a regeneration power that only works against injuries she inflicts herself.
- Zig-Zagged: Alice could kill herself but asks her friends to kill her as she doesn't have the nerve to commit suicide, but when all of her friends are killed, she finds the willpower to commit suicide, only to discover it to be physically impossible.
- Averted: Alice is never put in a position where she would need to self-terminate.
- Enforced: The creators wanted to add some drama to the work.
- Lampshaded: "I can't believe I have to kill you, Alice..."
- Invoked: ???
- Exploited: ???
- Defied: "We have to kill you? But I don't want to! Can we just find another way to stop the End of the World as We Know It?
- Discussed: "You know, Bob, I don't think I have the nerve to commit suicide if the process of world destruction begins."
- Conversed: "Wait, her friends have to kill her?!"
- Played for Laughs: Every time Alice tries to kill herself, silly coincidences keep her alive while simultaneously humiliating her. For example, she tries to hang herself but Bob swings an axe in a wild and desperate attempt to kill a fly and cuts her noose down, and when she tries to jump off a building, she ends up landing on a garbage truck, saving her and covering her in garbage.
- Played for Drama:
- Alice is not only destined to destroy the world, when she asks her friends to kill her, whether they refuse or accept her command, they are struck down and are no longer able to. Not only does Alice bring about the apocalypse, she watches her friends suffer in the most agonizing way possible and can't look away.
- Alice has a reason to kill herself, there is nothing in the prophecy she will destroy the world that says someone else has to do the deed (and unfortunately it definitely makes clear that it's either her or literally everyone else), Alice has enough guts to Face Death with Dignity if someone else does it… but she lacks the guts to do it herself. And she jumps through a lot of hoops to swindle her friends into doing it when they were already accepting of how awful the circumstances are (they may even have researched a way to bring her Back from the Dead once the situation has been solved). In the end, nobody knows what to think of her — whether she is a Dirty Coward, a hero undergoing a Moment of Weakness, or anything in between.
Please go back to I Cannot Self-Terminate, because I cannot erase myself from this screen.
