Discussion Main / DeathByLookingUp

Example-less picture: The picture potholes to Halo3, but nothing in the examples mentions the Halo series...

This is also probably not an example: death from bombs. We're looking for characters getting squashed by falling anvils, pianos, whales. It's a fictional trope, primarily.

• During World War II, Stuka dive bombers and the like were mounted with sirens in an attempt make them more terrifying to people the being dive-bomed. People looked up, and some died.

In this real life examples people didn't die when the looked up.

• A persistent legend in the Society for Creative Anachronism involves a field battle using siege weapons (which launch foam 'rocks' or bundles of tennis balls). A call of 'Rock!' rang out, and one warrior looked up just in time to get a 'rock' in the face grill.

This seems to be a non-example: the trope is the character dies when they look up. This character did not die.

• Didn't end in death, but it was part of what seemed to be an episode-long for Noah Bennet in the Season 2 episode "Cautionary Tales." At this point, Noah's been cornered by the man who was working with him and Elle, who has a bolt of electricity trained on him... until she realizes that he's not looking right at her, but rather behind and upward. The look of shock on her face is priceless as she turns around just in time to get clotheslined into unconsciousness by West.

Here's another mixed up death trope. Anvil on Head is the trope about actually getting squashed. Death by Looking Up is about the tendency for Anvil on Head victims to comically look up right before the splat. I'm gonna clean out all Anvil on Head examples.