You Have Failed Me / Marvel Universe

Marvel Universe

Comic Books

Comic Books

• Doctor Doom. Mostly with his robotic henchmen, though.
  • In one instance during a battle with the Fantastic Four, his head scientist had a flamethrower and the flames were getting dangerously close to a priceless painting he obtained, so he shot him with the gun the scientist built for him. He also kills that henchman's vengeful brother (also a henchman) who tried to trick Doom into a device that would kill him.
  • Doom's tendency towards this was parodied in The Superior Foes of Spider-Man, where the backstory of the Doom portrait involves him doing this to a random painter because he doesn't like how the commission turned out (and because Doom accidentally said some... unfortunate things while drunk in front of the guy). Since the guy is a decently well-known painter it causes his works to posthumously skyrocket in value.
• Played with in Eternals (2021). Thanos tells Eternal scientist Domo that he’ll be killed if he fails. Rather than trying to trick him, Domo honestly tells Thanos that he failed. Thanos kills him, keeping his word - but then immediately has him resurrected (and acknowledges his honesty and loyalty).
• In the Marvel Universe, HYDRA has this as their standard policy. In fact, in the years when the organization was in disarray without the overall control of Baron Von Strucker, the various factions seemed to spend more time killing each other after each defeat than achieving anything.
• It's impossible to count how many gang mooks working for The Kingpin have gone into his office to report failure and never came out alive. For a specific example, one of the better variations on this trope in recent years was the Tangled Web of Spider-Man issue #4, "Severance Package", in which the Kingpin deals with an underling who botches an illegal arms job. The story is especially chilling because it's told from the point of view of the underling, who knows full well that he's about to die but refuses to run away, despite having a wife and children. Impressed by the man accepting his fate, the Kingpin kills him but does grant the underling's final favor, to allow his family to live.
• Runaways
  • Near the end of volume one, the Pride's main mole in the police, Lieutenant Flores, tries to capture the kids without telling the Pride in advance. The ensuing fight destroys the Hostel, nearly gets all his men killed and, more importantly to The Pride, endangers their children. His bosses are there when his men find him.
    Flores: I thought I was dead.
    Geoffrey Wilder: And for once, you were right. *shotgun*
  • Ironically this ends up being the fate of the Pride themselves; after the team ruins their Evil Plan, the Gibborim get fed up with their pathetic failures and behavior and kill them all.
• This is also done in The Punisher: Welcome Back, Frank, Garth Ennis's opening The Punisher mini-series. Ma Gnucci, after having her arms and legs torn off by a polar bear in the NY Zoo, berates her Mooks for failing to catch Castle and then orders one of them executed for asking her how she's feeling. The guy she orders to do it protests, so she orders him executed as well. She goes through about three underlings before she finds someone willing to shoot the previous executees.
• Subverted by Emperor Selim in Miles Morales: Spider-Man (2022), after his general tells him that Miles and the rebels escaped with the power source to his shield that kept Brooklyn locked away from the rest of the world. After making a show of threatening him, he admits that Miles is a Worthy Opponent and that he himself barely beat him last time, so how could his normal human commander expect to. Complimenting the man on what went right and telling him that the Empire needs every warrior fighting at their best, he sends him on his way with a handshake.

Films

Films

• Marvel Cinematic Universe:
  • Red Skull, after the Howling Commandos led by Captain America managed to destroy one of HYDRA's bases in Captain America: The First Avenger, has an officer brought to him, to which the officer stated that they fought to the last man. Red Skull, not in a forgiving mood, states "Evidently not!" (the officer himself still being alive and thus not having fought to the last man) and then uses his Tesseract/Cosmic Cube-powered handgun to vaporize the officer.
  • Loki has the threat of this hanging over him throughout The Avengers — either he retrieves the Tesseract, or Thanos will hunt him down and make him pay. Come Avengers: Infinity War, Thanos finally catches up with him... and slowly and painfully crushes the life out of him, right in front of Thor.
  • Spider-Man: Homecoming: After having enough of Shocker's repeated disregard for his instructions and lack of respect Toomes kicks him off the crew, and vaporizes him with a ray gun. Partly Subverted, as it's revealed immediately afterwards that Toomes mistook the gun for a harmless anti-grav device and didn't intend to kill him.
• Marvel Rising: Secret Warriors: When Ms. Marvel manages to outwit and freeze Exile, Hala immediately considers him a failure and offers Ms. Marvel his former job. When Exile protests that she used trickery, Hala bluntly tells him that it doesn't matter how she won, only that she did. Downplayed because Hala never even considers killing him, apparently not deeming it worth her time.
• In Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, the Prowler (A.K.A. Aaron Davis) finally has the new Spider-Man in his grasp, but then it turns out Spider-Man is his nephew, Miles. Aaron realizes he can't kill his beloved nephew, but that the Kingpin (who is watching) will surely kill him if he refuses to kill Spider-Man. He lets Miles go anyway, and Kingpin immediately shoots Aaron dead.

Live-Action TV

Live-Action TV

• Wilson Fisk in Daredevil (2015) repeatedly uses this:
  • After Karen Page exposes a numbers racket that he was running at Union Allied Construction, Fisk has everyone involved in the scheme killed off. He spares Karen because everything she knows is now public knowledge, but he has her boss killed and staged to look like a drug overdose. Clyde Farnum (a guard that James Wesley had blackmailed into attempting to hang Karen in her jail cell, which failed as she fought back and clawed at his eyes) is shot in his basement and staged to look like a suicide. And Rance (an assassin that tried to kill Karen in her apartment, but whom Matt Murdock fought off) is hanged in his jail cell, ironically by the very method that Farnum had tried to do to Karen
  • After Detective Christian Blake, a corrupt cop on Fisk's payroll, accidentally leaks information to the "Devil of Hell's Kitchen" about the Russians' hideouts, Fisk arranges for him to be shot by a sniper while manning the scene of a hostage situation. This fails to kill Blake, forcing Fisk to send his partner Carl Hoffman to finish him off at the hospital.
• Luke Cage (2016):
  • Cottonmouth kills his lieutenant Tone after Tone, dispatched to find Chico, tries to take him out by lighting up Pop's barbershop with two submachine guns, killing Pop (who was a mentor and friend to Cottonmouth) in the process.
  • When Shades questions Diamondback's actions too much, Diamondback decides to send Zip to kill him. The attempt backfires as Shades is able to grab a gun, kill both of Zip's men, get Zip to admit to Diamondback's complicity, then shoots Zip in the head.
• Spider-Man (Japan): The last episode of the series has Professor Monster give Amazoness one last chance in killing Spider-Man. Amazoness thinks she succeeds, but after Spider-Man is revealed to be still alive, Professor Monster responds by having Bella and Rita mortally wound her. Amazoness tries to spite her boss by fleeing in his escape rocket as she dies, but Professor Monster simply blows the rocket to Kingdom Come as it takes off.

Western Animation

Western Animation

• The Avengers: United They Stand ended the episode "Comes a Swordsman" on a rather disturbing note by having Taurus punish the Swordsman for his failure by ordering his minions to tear him into twelve pieces.
• Iron Man: Armored Adventures: Hammer activates the explosive nanites in Mr. Fix when the prototype Titanium Man armor fails to live up to expectations. Unfortunately for Fix, that's not the end of it.
• M.O.D.O.K. (2021): In the first episode, M.O.D.O.K. tries this on the CPA Supreme when he learns they are bankrupt, but the CPA Supreme reminds him that he still has to do M.O.D.O.K.'s personal taxes. Instead, M.O.D.O.K. shoots Gary's arm off.
• Marvel's Spider-Man: Hammerhead attempted this on Flint Marko, only to accidentally turn him into Sandman. The one pulled off by Keemia, his own daughter, however is far more successful.

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