Maybe this trope should be titled 'Made of Rubber'. This ends in a grotesque boneless-giraffe effect that largely defies the laws of physics, not to mention anatomy. In one scene, an alien kicks a character's head off without breaking the skin of his neck, instead stretching it to a good three feet longer than it should be. A good example is Gantz, in which several of the gory deaths, even of main characters, involve slopping entrails that look like overly moist hamburger.In fact, the physiology of anime humans sometimes seems to revel in adding Made of Plasticine flesh to its already gratuitous High-Pressure Blood. Especially any anime involving Samurai, Eldritch Abominations, or The Legions of Hell. Not to be confused with Claymation, a form of Stop Motion animation that commonly uses Plasticine models over a wire skeleton. It is however, almost always averted with their bigger, deadlier counterparts Mechanical MonstersĬompare Bloodier and Gorier, which almost always involves this. Oddly enough, this always seems to be played deadly straight with Mecha-Mooks who, if anything, should avert this trope even further. On the other hand, sometimes the physical forces at work are just too much for the human body to endure, making this one, when handled correctly, a particularly gruesome Truth in Television. Zombies at least have the excuse of being, well, rotten, but the ease with which vampires can be staked through the heart and pristinely decapitated makes one wonder if they even have bones. Vampires and zombies in any media are great examples of this. The implied force just does not gel with the visible effect. Bones snap like twigs, flesh rips apart like wet paper, contact with fire burns a body to a charred skeleton within moments and at worst, the entire body is simply splattered by whatever force hits it like an overripe tomato. Accidental contact with a pointed object leads to out-the-other-side impalement. A bleeding wound will create a spray of so much High-Pressure Blood the victim ends up Overdrawn At the Blood Bank. But in fiction, Heads and limbs may be instantly, cleanly severed on contact with anything resembling a bladed weapon or sharp-edged object. In Real Life, it requires considerable skill and force to, for example, cleanly sever a human limb with a bladed weapon. The polar opposite of Made of Iron, this trope manifests when the human body is represented as being much flimsier and more easily dismembered than it really is, or when its internal structures are depicted as a mass of bloody, spongy goo, with no sign of supporting bones or recognizable organs. Writers of violent fiction sometimes forget this. While you shouldn't press your luck, it is a fact that human beings can walk away from catastrophic accidents and savage attacks with little sign of external damage and survive wounds that should have been fatal by conventional wisdom. It can take a lot more punishment than most people think. It's made of complex organs, protected and supported by a strong skeletal structure, boasts tendons and muscles capable of exerting dynamic strength upon the objects it interacts with, and has the ability to heal and regenerate itself from damage over time. The human body is a pretty tough little piece of biological machinery.
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