You Have Outlived Your Usefulness / Live-Action TV

Warning: Often serves as a Death Trope, and frequently involves spoilers.

Times where villains aim to eliminate some no-longer necessary minions or other loose ends in Live-Action TV series.

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• 24:
  • This is often done by the villains, especially when it comes to kidnapped civilians who have useful skills that they can exploit. It always ends badly for the poor civilians.
  • Also pulled by the heroes. Jack works with both Nina Meyers and Christopher Henderson to foil the terrorists, putting aside his desire for revenge. As soon as the terrorists are stopped or they no longer have a use, he killed them both. Both of them know him well enough to see this coming and take steps to avoid it, but both fail. He also pulls this one last time on Dana Walsh in the final season, but with a twist. Despite Dana being one of the villains, Jack carrying this out is to actually reveal that he isn't the hero this time around.
• Adam Adamant Lives!: After betraying Adam to the Face, Louise served her new master faithfully for sixty-five years. That didn't cut any ice with the Face; as soon as he was revived, he made off with his new, younger Femme Fatale sidekick, leaving Louise to die in Adam's arms.
• Alex Rider (2020): Dr Greif plans to kill the pupils he's replaced with his clones. Stellenbosch goes to carry out the murders, only to find Kyra's already broken them out. He falls victim to this trope himself when Yassen Gregorovitch murders him on the way to be interrogated. Finally, the duplicate Alex is gunned down outside the school by Yassen Gregorovitch.
• Alcatraz: Garrett Stillman was once betrayed by his partner in crime so now he gets rid of all his accomplices after they have fulfilled their role. He's also the victim of this trope, c/o Tommy Madsen.
• Arrow: At the end of the first season, this, combined with He Knows Too Much, is why Malcolm/Dark Archer kills the scientists who built the Markov earthquake-generating device for him upon its completion.
• Attila: Emperor Valentinian and his mother pull this on Flavius Aetius after he has defeated Attila, killing him on the basis that he's no longer useful to them.
• The pilot episode of Battlestar Galactica (1978) had the Cylons kill Baltar after they didn't need him anymore. ^note They also didn't trust him. Who would trust someone who would betray their own kind? This is changed for the series, when Baltar is spared by the new Imperious Leader because he's useful again.
• The Barrier: Agents of the Police State don't seem to care much about people surviving their Enhanced Interrogation Techniques, as long as they get the information they need. When Álex gets taken out of the interrogation room by a police higher-up who is curious about information other than what he was interrogated about, he's convinced to give that information by being threatened to be sent back to the interrogation room and the reminder that his chances of leaving it alive are limited.
• Battlestar Galactica (2003) plays this straight with Admiral Cain, shown in its full detail in the Razor flashback: during an attack on a Cylon staging ground, a large amount of Raiders jump in but Cain still orders her Viper compliment to launch in what is a blatant violation of her earlier promise of not sacrificing her underlings in a mad quest for revenge. Her XO calls her out on it, to lethal consequences.
  Belzen: This is exactly what you said we wouldn't do. Even if we succeed, is this really worth the lives and planes what it'd cost?
  Cain: Mr. Belzen, are you refusing to carry out my orders?
  Belzen: Sir, I cannot in good conscience obey that.
  Cain: Mr. Belzen, give me your sidearm...
  Belzen: Sir?
  Cain: I said, give me your sidearm! NOW!
  [Belzen turns over his weapon, she immediately shoots him in the head with it in front of the crew]
  Fisk: Gods...!
  Cain: Colonel Fisk... Colonel FISK! [Fisk steps up] You are now my XO.
• In The Boys (2019), it's revealed that Vought CEO Stan Edgar was the one who masterminded Soldier Boy being sold out to the Russians in order to more easily promote Homelander.
• Breaking Bad:
  • When Walt is working under Gus, this problem continuously hangs over his head as his antics strain Gus' tolerance of him. Walt repeatedly has to find ways to keep from being replaced or rendered unnecessary, which would mean certain doom for him, and he knows the clock is ticking, because Gus has guards and security cameras watching his every move inside the Superlab, meaning it's only a matter of time before Gus can replicate Walt's formula. When Jesse proves he can closely replicate Walt's formula without Walt, Gus promptly fires Walt, although it's ultimately subverted as Jesse made a deal with Gus not to kill Walt. Gus agreed to the terms, and changes his target to Walt's family instead.
  • When Jesse finds two of Gus' underlings using a kid as their assassin, he has to have Gus promise no more kids in the business for him to forgive them. Gus agrees to the terms, but later that same day, that kid is shot dead by the two guys since he's no longer of any use to them (whether Gus ordered the kid's death or the pair did it of their own volition is ambiguous). Things quickly go From Bad to Worse for everyone after that.
• In the first season of The Bridge (2011), this happens to Daniel Ferbe, who is gassed to death in his car after losing his job and no longer being useful as a spokesman for the killer, and the entire first group of terrorists in the second season, who are gassed to death in a shipping container after coming under police suspicion.
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Mayor promises Principal Snyder a reward for his services. A few hours later, he eats him.
• Burn Notice: The organization that burned Michael has killing operatives who outlive the usefulness as standard protocol. They have a similar protocol for operatives who Have Failed Them.
• Cannon: In "Flight Plan", the villain of the week leaves a trail of bodies behind him in his escape route across Mexico: killing each of his accomplices after they have fulfilled their part in his escape.
• Used in an episode of CSI. Three people work together rob a casino. One is killed by his partners at the scene. Another is killed sometime later. The mastermind, who had killed the other two, is himself killed by a Dirty Cop he had bribed earlier in the episode, who wanted all the spoils to himself.
  • Another episode has several Monster Fangirls show up to support a Serial Killer in his bid for freedom. In the end, one woman helps him escape, but as she's gushing about their new life together, she's killed by another woman. That one is then killed by still another in a later episode, and the last one is personally killed by the killer once her usefulness expires.
• Doctor Who:
  • This exchange from "Doomsday" sums up the Daleks' attitude:
    Rose: You didn't need to kill him!
    Dalek Sec: Neither did we need him alive.
  • The Cybermen kill their own programmed workhouse owners.
    • The Cybermen have even turned the statement that I Lied before they "convert" whoever helped them into a catch phrase... though arguably from their perspective that's not killing them.
  • "Pyramids of Mars": The first thing Sutekh's Dragon does on arriving is dispose of the minion who did all the preliminary work. Given that Sutekh plans to destroy all life anyway, from his point it's Pragmatic Villainy.
    Namin: Master, spare me. Spare me. I am a true servant of the great Sutekh.
    Dragon: I am the servant of Sutekh. He needs no other. [kills him]
  • "The Curse of Fenric": Fenric orders the destruction of his entire undead army the moment he no longer requires its services.
  • "The Idiot's Lantern": The Wire disintegrates its unwilling henchman Mr. Magpie when it doesn't need him anymore.
  • "Fear Her": Despite the Isolus telling Chloe it loves her, it leaves her to deal with the dangerous drawing of her abusive father the instant it can go home and doesn't need her anymore.
  • "The Runaway Bride": Lance is used for a key and then fed to the Racnoss children once the Empress doesn't need him anymore. It also comes with a side order of Even Evil Has Standards and Rewarded as a Traitor Deserves, as the Empress comments that she disapproves of males who mistreat their mates.
  • "Daleks in Manhattan": Diagoras, the human assisting the Daleks, has a foreman on the Empire State Building who threatens a work stoppage because of the speed Diagoras is demanding, as well as the unsafe conditions, hauled off by the Daleks to become either a pig-slave or one of the Dalek-human hybrids.
  • "Partners in Crime": The Adiposian royal family decides to let their nanny go when she has Outlived her Usefulness regarding the illegal breeding of their new generation on Earth.
  • "The Poison Sky": The Sontarans execute the human soldiers they brainwashed to serve them, and were planning on using their human pawn Rattigan and his students for target practice when they showed up, having lied to Rattigan that they would take him and his students to a (non-existent) planet that they could colonize.
  • "The Next Doctor": Miss Hartigan has the mind-controlled workhouse masters after they've delivered the children in their care to her. She and the Cybermen then attempt to dispose of the kidnapped children after they've gotten the Cyberking's starter engine up to 100%, but the Doctor and company save the kids just in time.
  • "The End of Time": After the Master opens the lock around the Time War, Big Bad Rassilon reveals his plan to destroy the entire universe so the Time Lords can become beings of pure thought. With the Master's role fulfilled, Rassilon also declares he's going to personally vaporize him for being "diseased — albeit a disease of our own making."
  • "Victory of the Daleks" has the last three Daleks (made out of whatever hodge-podge genetic elements Davros could scrabble together) activate a progenitor device that creates new-model, redesigned Daleks... who, of course, decide to exterminate their saviors, because they're inferior. The three Daleks are perfectly okay with this and even agree with the new Daleks' assessment because... well, they're Daleks.
    The Doctor: Blimey. What do you do to the ones who mess up?
  • "The Wedding of River Song": The Silence kill Madame Kovarian, not because of a specific failure, but because the best way to get at their enemies would happen to also kill her, and they hate their enemies more than they need her.
  • "Dark Water": Missy kills Dr. Chang when he's no longer necessary. And For the Evulz. After insisting he first "say something nice".
    Missy: Now, come on, let's not dwell on horrid things. This is going to be our last conversation, and I'm the one who's going to have to live with that.
• Ezel: Temmuz calmly instructs a unnamed henchwoman to kill Chucky after he kills Tevfik, as he has "served his purpose". The order is particularly shocking as Chucky was set up as an expected Morality Pet — not to mention he's no older than twelve at the very most.
• Subverted in Farscape; in an early episode, Crais nonchalantly killed a subordinate so no one else would know he had been recalled. When this was uncovered by his superiors much later, it was his downfall.
• The F.B.I.: In "The Assassin", the eponymous character kills the pilot who smuggled him across the border from Canada into the US.
• FBI: Most Wanted: In "A Man Without a Country", Trofim Sarkov kills all of the mooks he had used for his assassinations before he makes a run for the Russian consulate.
• Referenced in Firefly
  Mal: "They killed Heinrich? Guess he wasn't useful anymore."
• This happens to Max's boyfriend/colleague Tom in The Following. Mark and Daisy extort him into helping them after they catch him with the corpse of a colleague he just murdered, after which Mark throws acid in his face and Daisy shoots him. Daisy is acutely aware that she may end up a victim of the trope at the hands of Theo.
• A woman kidnaps geniuses on Fringe so she can get them to finish a formula. At the end, she gives the formula to a mysterious henchman, who tests it. The test successful, she has just enough time to stare in awe and exclaim it's amazing before the henchman pulls a gun and shoots her.
• Game of Thrones:
  • Littlefinger kills Dontos Hollard for this and He Knows Too Much.
  • Ramsay has Tansy hunted down by his dogs just because he's gotten bored with her and Myranda is a tad jealous.
  • The Master Torturer is tricked and murdered by Ramsay Snow in order to gain Theon's trust.
  • As the war starts winding down, Tywin has no problem selling Gregor Clegane out to Oberyn Martell.
  • King Maegor Targaryen had the builders of the Red Keep massacred to protect its secrets.
  • In a heroic example, Sansa executes Littlefinger once the Stark control of the North is achieved and she finds out the extent of his crimes.
• Gen V: In "Sick" Neuman meets the creator of a virus that can kill superpowered people in a parking garage. He hands over the virus; she confirms he is the only one who knows about it, promises him that he and his family will be safe—and then kills him by making his head explode.
• Narrowly averted in Heroes: Arthur Petrelli says "I think you may have outlived your usefulness" to Linderman, who's savvy enough to take the hint and stop slacking. (Oh, and betray Arthur by breaking his mind-control on Angela.)
  • The above perpetrator has Adam Monroe abducted and brought to him so he can steal his power. The victim tries to bargain his way out of it, insisting he can be of use to him alive, but the man disagrees and steals his power, the act itself killing him.
• Hitler: The Rise of Evil: Hitler is shown cultivating a close alliance with Ernst Rohm, particularly during his early years in Munich. However, when Rohm refuses to accept that the SA will never replace the German Army, Hitler purges the SA and has Rohm executed for "treason".
• JAG: In "Brig Break", once Gunnery Sergeant Gentry has got the nukes, he kills his accomplices.
• Happens in Episode 47 of Kamen Rider Wizard: Now that 4 Wizards have been created, there's no need for any more Gates to be found, so Medusa soon becomes the victim of this trope.
• In Kyōryū Sentai Zyuranger, Daizujin has this attitude towards Burai following "Reborn! The Ultimate God!". During the Zyurangers' hibernation, Burai's body got crushed by rocks. Daizyujin only cured him because they needed six Zyurangers in order to unleash Ultimate Daizyujin. Unlike the others, Burai awoke with a magic candle that would cause him to die at a certain time following Ultimate Daizujin's release. Daizyujin explained to the Zyurangers that they found it unnecessary for Burai to live beyond that event.
  • Later, in Tensou Sentai Goseiger, it was was revealed that this was partly the reason Buredoran was on every villain team: Gain knowledge from each group- Warfare from the first, magic from the second, and technology from the third- and let them all fall when he perfected them so no one could interfere in his master plan, sometimes even orchestrating the fall. Most notably is the third group, where he manipulates the Robogog and Metal-Alice into becoming severely weakened and then personally finishing them off. Soon after, while the Goseigers start talking about why Buredoran is doing this, Buredoran is currently taking over the third group's base and talking to himself about his plan, so the viewers can start to realize that Buredoran is the TRUE Big Bad and that the three groups were expendable to him. At the end of the episode and the beginning of the next, it's confirmed that this is the case.
  • Earlier, in Battle Fever J, when Big Bad Satan Egos grows to giant-size for the final battle, the transformation causes his castle to collapse on top of his last remaining henchwoman, Salome. It's not clear whether he did this deliberately, but he didn't seem too bothered either way.
  • In several Super Sentai series, especially during the '80s, a favorite tactic for disposing of useless, failing, or disobedient henchmen is to chuck them into the monster-making machine and mutate them into a mindless beast for the heroes to kill. Choushinsei Flashman's Emperor Lah Deus in particular was fond of this ploy, dispatching no less than seven unwanted minions thusly. It's then turned right back on him in the finale when his treacherous head scientist sticks a knife in his back.
• Kingdom (2019): The Queen murders any mother in her care who has given birth, and also any female infant they give birth to. The trail of blood from an escaping mother raises the Royal Commander's suspicion and leads him to investigate into the conspiracy.
• Law & Order: Criminal Intent: In "Revolution", the main villain strangles a henchmen he considers to have become a liability.
• In an episode of The Legend of William Tell, a summoned demon overhears two mooks discussing that the sorcerer will unsummon it when it has served its purpose. It's not happy about that. After the heroes have escaped, they discuss with the Kalem that they were lucky that the demon betrayed its master... at which point Kalem polymorphs into a Mook before their eyes for a second.
• In Lexx, His Divine Shadow was a parasitic Insect essence that would bond with human hosts to maintain the Divine Order dedicated to reviving his original Insect body. He would keep the hosts' brains around as Divine Predecessors which would act as advisors to the current incarnation as well as providing power. In "Gigashadow", the essence returns to its original body. When its essence makes contact with the Predecessors aboard the Lexx, they rejoice thinking it is their time of salvation. The Gigashadow has other ideas.
  Predecessors: Gigashadow! It is our time of rejoicing!
  Gigashadow: Wrong! It is your time of pain! You are no longer needed, human vessels of my essence.
  [the Gigashadow promptly pops each of the predecessors like grapes as they shriek in agony]
• In the Lois & Clark episode "Vatman" (S01E18), the villain drops this line verbatim while speaking to Superman.
• The Magician: In "The Illusion of the Fatal Arrow", a hitman is worried that a psychic might be able to identify, decides that his junior partner is too much of a potential weak link and kills him before going after the psychic.
• Textbook example in Merlin (2008). After a season of Unresolved Sexual Tension and heavy subtext, Morgause finally gains control of Cenred's army and immediately has Cenred dispatched by one of his own men.
• In the revival of Mission: Impossible, an episode has such order given to an underling (paraphrased):
  Big Bad: Find the best bomb expert in the city. Have him replace the bomb detonator with this one, then kill him.
• Murdoch Mysteries: In "This One Goes To Eleven", the murderer disposes of their accomplices once they have served their purpose; killing the two thieves after they have stolen the painting, and disposing of the forger when he threatens to become a liability.
• Jason Dean is sacrificed to NCIS after killing Colonel Bell for his real employer.
• NCIS: New Orleans: In "Sleeping With the Enemy", The Mole does this to one of his underlings; detonating the bomb he has just finished constructing in an attempt to make the NCIS team think that the underling was the mastermind and that he has just accidentally blown himself up, taking all of the explosives with him.
• The New Avengers: In "The Last of the Cybernauts...??", Kane employs Goff to get the Cybernauts working. Once they are operating, he quickly determines that Goff is only an engineer and incapable of making any improvements to the robots, he uses a Cybernaut to snap Goff's neck.
• Once Upon a Time: Peter Pan has Greg Mendell killed, and his Lost Boys try to do the same to Tamara, after they have successfully done the task he hired them to do (bringing Henry to Neverland).
• Once Upon a Time in Wonderland: Jafar tries this on the Red Queen, but stops when the Queen points out that her usefulness to him hasn't quite ended after all.
  • He does this to Amara and turns her into his staff.
  • He eventually does this to Anastasia after all. He uses her to make her wishes and give him the genie, then uses her as bait to get Will to tell him where his heart is. Once both tasks are complete, he decides he has no use for her and stabs her.
  • He does it again to the Jabberwocky immediately after achieving his goal.
• In The Outer Limits (1995) episode "Last Supper", a Mad Scientist is on the trail of an immortal woman he wants to experiment on. When his assistant manages to find her, the scientist stabs him in the chest.
• Person of Interest:
  • In the Season 1 episode "Mission Creep", Sam Latimer runs a ring of ex-soldiers turned criminals who conduct high-end robberies and noted for their discipline and efficiency (they can conduct a Bank Robbery in no more than a minute). Later on we learn why they're so effective: whenever the gang gets erratic or becomes a liability, Latimer kills the gang and hires a new crew. At the end of the episode, Latimer himself is killed by a client to tie up loose ends.
  • In Season 3, Team Machine repeatedly clashes against Vigilance, a faction similarly opposed to mass surveillance and government overreach ... but significantly more violent in their methods. Vigilance's leader, Peter Collier, is portrayed as a sympathetic character whose older brother was falsely accused of terrorism and driven to suicide. At the end of the season, however, it's revealed that Vigilance is secretly being funded and organized by Greer, the Big Bad, and its actions used to convince the government to invest in Samaritan, Greer's AI surveillance system. Once Samaritan is approved and put online, Greer has no further use for Collier or his organization - and they become Samaritan's first target.
• In Power Rangers Jungle Fury, Dai Shi, the Big Bad, and his Dragon Camille, gleefully allows his overlords to be destroyed, two of them by the rangers and one by the Phantom Beast Generals, when they are no longer useful in his plans now that he has learned enough about his techniques from them. It has a lot to do with the fact that Grizzaka, the leader of the Overlords, has laid claim to Dai Shi's position. The honeymoon is over.
  Camille: They've destroyed Carnisoar.
  Dai Shi: They did me a favor. One less overlord and a lot more power.
• In an episode of The Persuaders!, Danny Wilde (Tony Curtis) manages to recruit an actor impersonating a dead millionaire by warning him of what might happen when his employers don't need to hide the millionaire's death anymore.
• Revolution: In episode 9, Monroe "Doesn't need [Rachel] anymore" because one of her former colleagues is now willing to build an amplifier the electricity pendants. She kills said colleague with a screwdriver and then remarks "You need me now."
• The Sheriff of Nottingham, in the new BBC series of Robin Hood, does this a lot.
• The Rookie (2018): Armstrong is told to murder Nolan, and takes the gun willingly. It turns out to be empty though, and he's shot instead, presumably because (with his work for them revealed) he's of no more use to the mob.
• The Shadow Line:
  • Gatehouse kills Andy Dixon and his family in episode 3, because they've fulfilled their roles in his plan.
  • In episode 6, the Counterpoint leaders try to do this to Gatehouse himself. It fails, and prompts him to decide they've outlived their usefulness.
• In Smallville:
  • In "Stray", when Ryan refused to give the code and reveal that Gibson plans to shoot Debra forcing Gibson to shoot her, Gibson decided to get rid of Ryan.
  • In "Asylum", three of Clark's old enemies, Ian Randall, Van McNulty, and Eric Summers team up to lure Clark to them so Eric can steal his powers and use them to escape from Belle Reeve. After Van does his part by smuggling in a piece of kryptonite, Ian kills him. After Eric steals Clark's powers, he declares he's invincible and thus doesn't need Ian anymore, then throws him into a wall, presumably killing him.
  • In "Covenant", Jor-El's disposal of Kara after Clark discovers she is not actually Kryptonian. Instead of the normal phrase, he uses "She served her purpose."
• Subverted in Stargate Atlantis: Michael, a villain known to have a low opinion of humanity in general takes a gun away from a clone he created and tells him that he's "served his purpose"... then draws his own stun weapon and uses that to shoot him. It's possible he was just being cruel, though; the clone was already dying.
  • Played completely straight, and stated word for word by a Wraith queen in regards to Todd the Wraith in another episode.
• Star Trek
  • Star Trek: The Next Generation: In the episode "Starship Mine", Kelsey, the leader of a terrorist group trying to steal the highly unstable toxic waste of Enterprise's engine core, shoots one of her mooks after learning from him how to remove the trilithium from its container.
  • Star Trek: Deep Space Nine:
    • The Dominion used the Cardassians as help in invading Alpha Quadrant. And then it switched to the Breen. And it was planning to betray them, too.
    • The Dominion is also in the habit of executing Jem'Hadar soldiers as soon as they show signs of insubordination, conscience, honour, or really anything other than fanatical devotion to the Founders.
    • The Dominion also outfits all Vorta with a termination implant that leads to almost immediate death for a Vorta who activates it. Vorta are expected to activate it if they are captured. Also if a superior officer or Founder demands it they would activate it. Late in the Dominion War the Female Changeling states that she would order Weyoun to activate it if the Dominion Alpha Quadrant cloning facilities were operational. This was after she ordered en entire team of Vorta researchers trying to find a cure for a new disease attacking the Founders because she felt they were not working hard enough to find that cure to activate their implants.
    • Kai Winn has no qualms about doing this with Vedek Bareil. After he's injured during the middle of sensitive negotiations with Cardassia, she pushes for more extreme treatments right up until the treaty is signed. Then she says it's time to pull the plug. In Winn's defence, Bariel was given enough choice to insist that he be a part of the talks by any means, and chose to let himself die after the talks were concluded.
  • Star Trek: Discovery: Lorca, in his verbose way, puts it plainly:
    Lorca: Speaking of which, we've reached the tipping point, where your usefulness to me is outweighed by the risk of keeping you alive.
  • Star Trek: Picard: In "The Impossible Box", after Narek gains information from Soji about her homeworld, he locks her inside a room and tries to kill her with his puzzle box, in which he had placed a tiny canister that emits a poisonous, radioactive gas. Fortunately for Soji, her android strength activates and she escapes by punching her way through the floor.
• Supernatural:
  • In "It's the Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester", Samhain does this to the witch who raised him. Not a nice way to reward several hundred years of summoning.
  • And in Season 5, the demon Crowley helps the Winchesters in trying to stop the Apocalypse because he believes Lucifer is going to pull this trope on the demons once he's won (Lucifer hates humans, and demons are corrupted human souls—do the math). He's right.
  • Invoked by Dean in "Point Of No Return", where he says he'll only agree to become Michael's host if Michael pulls this on Zachariah first. After all, who's more important now?
    Zachariah: You listen to me - you are nothing but a maggot, inside a worm's ass. Do you know who I am?! After I deliver you to Michael?
    Dean: Expendable.
  • A somewhat unusual example happens in the Season 7 finale. Due to a deal, Crowley (who is now the king of hell) and his demons can't (actively) help the Winchesters fight the Leviathans. The demon Meg, who is fighting against Crowley, can. While the Winchesters don't turn on her, Crowley has his men grab her as soon as she has played her part.
• On Social Game shows such as Survivor, this is common. Some have noticed that typically when an alliance has all their threats down or, decides to turn on each other thinking the other target(s) are of no threat, this happens to one of two people. Either the person who carried the alliance through by winning challenges or making plans, or the low-man on the totem pole who just was another vote. More often than not, it's the first.
  • Russell Hantz pulled one of these every other episode (which alliance-mate Natalie White was fully aware of and used as her cover).
• In Teen Wolf, Kate offers to team up with Derek in exchange for giving her the identity of the Alpha. When she finds out that he doesn't know anything, she more or less declares this and tries to off him.
• In Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, Terminators typically dispose of human subordinates this way once their objectives are completed, usually to prevent them from talking about sensitive information. At one point, Cameron uses a man and his sister to find information on the Turk, on the promise that she would help them deal with The Mafiya goons out to kill him. However, once she has the information she abandons them to be killed, since they serve no further purpose to her, and she doesn't have anything else invested in their survival.
• In the True Blood episode "Release Me", Maryann has her servant Daphne put to death with a ritual dagger after thanking her for her efforts and service.
• Walker, Texas Ranger: Many of the show's villains do this to their accomplices all the time, usually when they don't want to share any of the loot or to prevent them from talking before or after they are arrested. When it comes to killing off the accomplices, either the villains do it themselves or the Rangers do it for them; in the latter case, it's usually before the accomplices are arrested.
  • Season 3's "War Zone" had the Rangers in pursuit of a gang of bank robbers in clown masks led by Mitch Bolton, who killed a fellow Ranger. After one of the mercenaries scream "Bolton" when another robbery is taking place, Bolton shoots him stone cold dead. However, Walker and Trivette heard him say Bolton's name, upon which they look up his information.
  • During the beginning of Season 6's "Test of Faith", Walker and Trivette are pursuing a trio of bank robbers and after they kill two of them, the leader gets away with an accomplice in a helicopter. Walker hangs on for dear life by grabbing the copter's skid, and eventually sidles up to the robbers and forces them to land so they can be arrested. Just before the landing, this exchange occurs between the leading robber and the helicopter pilot:
    Pilot: Jeez, that was close with those Rangers.
    Lead Robber: Are you kidding? They did us a favor. Half million dollars in loot and two less guys to split it with. Hell, if they were here right now, I'd kiss 'em both.
    Walker: (holding the robbers at gunpoint) I'll pass on the kiss! Take it down!
  • "6 Hours" in Season 9 had the Rangers dealing with Theodore McNeely, the traitorous bodyguard of wealthy 16½-year-old Heather Preston, who kidnapped her and threatened to murder her live on the internet within, well, six hours. After Heather is brought to McNeely's lair and restrained to her death chair, Edmund, one of the hired banquet gunmen, demands that McNeely pay him. How does McNeely do so? With a bullet to the chest! Then, he demands that his loyal pilot, William Borla, kill the other two gunmen who were arrested before they could be interrogated, so nobody can talk (especially also knowing two other gunmen were killed during the kidnapping).
  • In another Season 9 episode, "Legends", Michael Viscardi, the son of recently convicted Dallas mobster Samuel Viscardi, sought revenge against the people involved in his father's trial, with Alex, the prosecuting attorney, being at the end of his list. He has his middle man, Dean Scaggs, hire blind hires to perpetrate the hits against those involved in the trial, then the hires are killed so nobody talks. Scaggs kills the hire who killed the head juror before Gage and Sydney could arrest him, but Trivette manages to arrest one of the hires who killed the judge, upon which he identifies Scaggs as the person who hired him. When Gage and Sydney get a warrant for Scaggs' arrest, Scaggs is killed by Michael after he is followed by the two Rangers to his office, just before Michael can proceed killing Alex, but Sydney was disguised as Alex the whole time while the real Alex was in hiding (due Walker having arranged extra protection for her and everyone else in the trial), upon which he and his two mooks have their butts easily handed to them by her and Walker.
• In Season 3 of Warehouse 13, this trope is why even thinking of siding with Walter Sykes is a very bad idea.
  • Similarly, in the second season opener "Time Will Tell", Wells kills MacPherson by setting off his Disintegrator Leash after he becomes a liability to her plan.
• Wedding Season: Once Metts becomes more of a liability than an asset to the Block by admitting the heroes have a recorded confession from her the boss has her brains blown out.
• Wizards of Waverly Place:
  Justin: What's... what's going on?
  Gorog: Oh, you'll soon see. You brought me the Moral Compass, so I'm done with you.
• Young Sheldon: In "Training Wheels and an Unleashed Chicken", Brenda apologizes for Billy's pet chicken Belinda scaring Sheldon and assures her it will never happen again. She then gives Mary a roasted chicken, strongly implying that she cooked Belinda.

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