Torso with a View

Like, crap man, look at that. That's like his stomach plug, on the ground back there. You don't see that every day. I mean that doesn't even seem possible if you think about it, with body organs and cartilage and bones. I mean I'm no doctor or nothin' but that was like one clean chunk.

—Narrator, Kung Pow

Have you ever had one of those days when you're just walking along and then suddenly something bites you in the ass? Or the stomach? It eats your partially digested breakfast, a few major organs, and maybe a good segment of your spine. Now you have a massive hole running through your body and your day is ruined. What else can you do but to keep walking and ignore it?

Fortunately, as you are a fictional character, you do not fall down due to your loss of support structure. Nor do you die before you hit the ground because your organs just got ripped out. However, most real-life living bodies have a very specific anatomy, with most vital systems in the torso and the head. If a hole ever got punched through any of that, you would crumple over. And die. Yes, very specific.

This trope is about bodily integrity. For this trope to work, the character does not necessarily have to survive, nor does it have to be the torso. A multi-inch or more hole running through any vitally important part of the body will do. The most important factor is that their body remains stable as if nothing happened.

This trope works for- or against- either Made of Iron or Made of Plasticine, Depending on the Writer. Similar to a bigger version of Invisible Holes. Sometimes paired with Made of Explodium for whatever reason, and frequently caused by Impaled with Extreme Prejudice or Efficient Displacement.

Not to be confused with Totem Pole Trench where the bottom person looks through the coat.

As a Death Trope, all Spoilers will be unmarked ahead. Beware.

Examples of Torso with a View include:

Anime and Manga

  • Bleach is the king of this trope. Most of the villain characters have holes punching through very important parts of their body. Most have one where their HEART is. This is supposed to symbolize their lack of a heart (being evil demons) but it still raises biological questions.
    • Grimmjow in particular has one taking up most of the space between his ribcage and his pelvis.
    • Szayelaporro has one in his crotch.
    • Harribel has one in her womb.
    • Nnoitra has a hole through his brain.
    • Mayuri Kurotsuchi takes this Up to Eleven. In the Soul Society, Uryu lands a critical on him and removes almost his entire center section. The only thing connecting his two halves was the remains of his clothes on one side. Mayuri's pissed off and in a lot of pain, but still standing firm.
    • When Rangiku fought Allon, Allon ripped away a good chunk of her torso. She almost died, but was recovering several chapters later.
      • A similar thing happened to Izuru in chapter 494.
    • Called out almost to the point of lampshading by Ulquiorra. He has a hole going through the base of his neck, but when he scooped out a similar hole in Ichigo's neck, Ichigo almost died.[1]
  • Averted in One Piece. The Going Merry's keel breaks shortly before Franky joins the crew. The Merry becomes so unstable she has to be scuttled.
    • Minor character Farafra is introduced in the Alabasta arc. He's missing so much of his shoulder that his arm shouldn't be attached anymore.
    • Whitebeard gets half his head blasted off before dying. He doesn't even die of that.
  • Wasn't there a scene in Dragon Ball where Goku punches a hole in Piccolo's chest large enough for him to fly through and Piccolo still remains floating in the air for a few minutes, doing stuff?
    • The Dragon Ball scene is when Goku finally kills Demon King Piccolo. Basically, Piccolo gets to say a few lines, spit an egg far away, and say a few more words about it. All while still flying. Then he explodes.
    • Frieza was cut in half and he was still standing... well, not exactly.
  • Happens to Lordgenome in Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. He gets better. Sort of.
  • Daitarn 3: Used after Daitarn 3 uses a Sun Attack on a megaborg and crashes through them, leaving a massive hole in their body before exploding. The penultimate episode poked fun at this by using a scatter attack version, literally filling Nendol (the Monster Of The Week in the episode) with holes before exploding.
  • In Darker than Black, when Wei blasted holes in people, one ended up like this. Bonus points for having this right over a peephole viewed from another side.
  • Naruto: During his fight with Kidoumaru, Neji has a hole blasted through one of his shoulders. Though it obviously causes him a lot of pain, he is able to continue fighting, even when he takes another similar blow to his side.
    • Potentially justified as the damage was caused by arrows. They may be mortally wounding, but as long as they didn't hit the vitals one can still fight with arrow wounds.
  • In Soul Eater, Shinigami gets part of his head blasted off during his battle with the Kishin. He's fine.
  • Over the course of the series, Alphonse from Fullmetal Alchemist gets bits and chunks removed from his body, some with very nice rounded edges. Subverted in that he's a magically animated suit of armor. At one point he does crumple over.

Alphonse: Oh, great! Now my arm's come off!! This is a terrible day!

  • Nagi in Deadman Wonderland dies from one of these, but manages to hold down a Dragon so that the protagonists can kill him.
  • In the first episode of Cowboy Bebop, a potential red-eye buyer is shot in the head, and his assailants are shown through the hole in his head.
  • Punctures by Shintaro Kago uses this in its main plot, where people puncture items or even themselves to solve various daily issues. In the series, people have dug holes through their hands, their chests or even straight through their face, but can still seem to function completely normally.
  • In an early chapter of Claymore, Clare gets a hole punched in her stomach by a yoma. She does something (not clear what) to stop the bleeding, then finishes off her opponent.


Art

  • The surrealistic classic The Madonna of Port Lligat by Salvador Dali features Saint Mary and Baby Jesus... both with holes in their bodies that don't seem to be hampering them at all. Then again, this is a painting by Dali.


Comic Books

  • The Star Wars Expanded Universe gives us Gargonn the Hutt, who had half his head eaten off. You can see his brain.
    • It also gives us the Adarian, a species of aliens with a large, naturally occurring hole in their head.


Film -- Live Action

  • Blaine from Predator gets blasted by the Predator's superweapon. He doesn't survive, but his body doesn't seem to notice it's no longer with spine.
  • Near the beginning of Kung Pow, the protagonist punches a clean hole straight through a mook's stomach, leaving a solid, cylindrical "stomach plug" lying on the ground, to the Narrator's astonishment. Much later, the mook makes a reappearance, swinging the plug as a weapon from a chain connecting it to his body.
  • Goldie Hawn's character in Death Becomes Her plays this for laughs, and it's featured in the film's poster, which shows Bruce Willis' arm holding a candlelabra through the opening.
  • The aliens from the Alien movies reproduce this way. Their young burst out of the chests of infected victims, leaving a nice hole. They die. Subverted in that the area they burst out of isn't a major load-bearing portion of the body, and that the hole only goes halfway.
  • The Alien example turns into an Actor Allusion courtesy of John Hurt in Spaceballs, complete with a Lampshade Hanging.
  • In Terminator 2, this happens to the T-1000 multiple times. Being a shapeshifter, it gets better. Subverted since it has neither vitals or a centralized support system.
  • In Fortress, a guy is shot by a gun turret, leaving a wound like this. He falls over dead a few seconds later.
  • Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, Scorponock carves a nice hole through Jetfire's torso. Subverted in that it paralyzes Jetfire, and it's suggested he's dying afterwords.
    • A modified version of this is how Megatron kills Optimus Prime.
  • In The Final Destination, an auto mechanic gets diced by a chain-link fence. A single diamond-shaped chunk falls through, giving us a lovely view of the other main characters freaking out.
  • In the Dukes of Hazzard film, Bo Duke is shown a turkey that has a nice hole blown through it. The rednecks that chases them afterwards then shoot some in a tree, a sign, and their own dashboard.
  • During the climax of The Quick and the Dead, Gene Hackman's character doesn't think he's been shot until he sees the hole in his shadow.
  • The is the result of the Leprechaun magically blowing a man's heart up in Leprechaun: In the Hood.
  • Happens to Freddy (via a laser beam shot by Alice) in A Nightmare On Elm Street 4 The Dream Master. He fixes himself up with just a wave of his hand.


Film -- Animated

  • Mulan: During the "A Girl Worth Fighting For" number, Yao's line is about how his girlfriend will tend his battle scars. The accompanying visual is of the girlfriend peeking through a hole in Yao's chest
  • In Space Jam, Marvin as the referee accidentally fires his starter gun through Sylvester. Tweety flies through the hole and comments "Holey putty tat!"
  • In Osmosis Jones, Thrax tries to jab a prone Jones in the chest with his lethal-touch fingers, only to find he's stuck his nails into the floor underneath him. As a white blood cell, Osmosis has a mutable body, and made a hole through his own torso for Thrax's hand to pass harmlessly through.


Live-Action TV

  • Happens to a villain in an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. His species had a highly decentralized internal body structure that granted them this ability.
  • An elaborate magic trick sometimes performed where the magician's assistant will be run through with a large 12"+ diameter drill. The drill is removed and they're fine! Averted magically!
  • Ultraman Ace: In episode 8 Ace literally punches a hole through Doragoy's torso shortly before being cut in half with a samurai sword.
  • Mentioned in the Firefly episode "Safe", when Shepherd Book is shot. Zoe talks about a soldier she knew in the war who had a hole shot clean through his shoulder that "used to keep a spare hanky in there." (See Real Life section below)
  • On Community Jeff meets one of his old law associates, played by Drew Carey, who has a hole through the palm of his hand due to a childhood accident.


Literature

  • Played with in Harry Potter. Nearly-Headless Nick was decapitated, but not all the skin got cut. The remaing skin should tear apart from the weight of his head, but instead acts as a very sturdy hinge. Somewhat justified since he's a ghost.
    • Averted as much as possible in Harry Potter, when Harry has the bones in his forearm magically removed. It doesn't leave a hole, his forearm goes all Gumby, and he can't use his hand because the muscles aren't attached to anything.
    • Played with again in Harry Potter when George Weasley gets his ear blasted off by Death Eaters. This is not this trope, but it is lampshaded as if it were.

George: Saintlike. You see. . .I'm holy. Holey, Fred, geddit?

  • Isaac Asimov's short story The Billiard Ball had a pair of inventors invent an anti-gravity device. It wasn't the same type of device one would see in fiction, and instead caused the test ball to shoot away at the speed of light. It punched a clean hole through one inventor's arm, chest, and the windows behind him (without shattering the glass). He died.


Music

  • Project 86: The cover of their album Songs to Burn Your Bridges By features a man in a suit with a gaping hole through his chest, holding a knife behind his back so the blade is visible through the hole. Then their music video for "The Spy Hunter" (the first track of that album) ended with vocalist Andrew Schwab getting shot with a cannon and reenacting the album cover pose. Then their video for "My Will Be a Dead Man" was a sequel and showed Andrew making a full recovery.


Newspaper Comics

"I could feel my spine shatter. It hurt... a lot."

    • Also happens to one of his snowmen.


Tabletop RPG

  • Paranoia. A picture in an early edition book showed a Troubleshooter with a huge hole in his body calmly walking around. It was jokingly said to be an example of someone with a large Macho Bonus (ability to withstand injury).


Web Original

  • In Homestuck, Kanaya gets a huge hole punched through her torso, which she dies of - temporarily. After coming back, she retains the hole, and is able to walk around with it quite happily. Perhaps justified as her species is implicitly invertebrate (Gamzee calls Karkat his 'iNvErTiBrOtHeR').
  • Done in Romantically Apocalyptic. The character is not only fine, but also (apparantly) the only one to survive the scene. The only things that get mentioned are that "it hurts alot", and that he no longer makes a suitable human raft.


Video Games

  • Commandant Steele dies from a huge tentacle through the chest in the main campaign of Borderlands. When she's brought back for the final Downloadable Content, the resulting hole in her torso is still there, but doesn't seem to slow her down.
  • The geth platform identified as "Legion" in Mass Effect 2 has a gaping wound in its torso, partially patched with a salvaged piece of N7 armor.


Western Animation

  • In one episode of Ed, Edd 'n' Eddy the Eds are playing with one of Ed's robot toys. It accidentally collides with Eddy and chews a huge hole in his stomach.

Eddy: Ed! Your stupid toy ate my breakfast!

  • In a Pink Panther cartoon, the Panther is ironing his fur when the phone rings, and as he answers it the iron burns through his body, leaving an iron-shaped hole. He tries to cover it up by putting a clock that matches the shape perfectly.
  • On one Wile E Coyote and The Road Runner cartoon, Wile E. tries to stop the Roadrunner by holding a metal plate in front of him. The Roadrunner just rips through the plate, leaving a Roadrunner-shaped hole through it... and presumably through Wile E.'s body as well. Wile E. looks down in shock and tiptoes out of frame.
    • Possibly a lampshade since Wile E. seems to realize that this isn't how anatomy is supposed to work.
  • In SpongeBob SquarePants, Sponge Bob is trying to get paint off Mr Krabs' first dollar by blasting it with water as Patrick holds it. The water leaves a hole through Patrick, and as he lifts it up to see the dollar, we see that the area covered by the dollar and his hands is left intact.
    • A weird gray area between Subversion and Aversion in Spongebob himself. This is part of his natural anatomy.
    • In "Sandy, SpongeBob and the Worm", one character has his butt bitten off by the Alaskan Bullworm. Twice.
  • In one episode of The Simpsons, Homer gets his guts ripped out by a badger. He's fine.
    • Bart, a.k.a. "Stretch Dude, created a hole in his stomach using his rubber powers to dodge The Collector's phasers.
  • Banzai the hyena was once so hungry he said he felt like he had a hole in his stomach. Then he illustrated it by literally pulling his belly into a doughnut shape.
  • Subverted in Squidbillies. One episode shows the Sheriff with a large chunk bitten out of his torso. When he unbuttons his shirt to show the wound, his torso promptly begins to sink, but he seems to be unhindered by the wound as soon as he rebuttons his shirt.
  • Teen Titans loves this trope. It frequently appears in the show, Go! comics, and The Movie. Most cases are surprisingly Justified.
    • This happends to Raven in one issue of Teen Titans Go!!, but is partially justified as Larry had turned her into paper beforehand.
    • Happens to Brushogun's Godzilla-monster in The Movie. Its made of ink, so it grows back.


Real Life

  • It is possible for a gunshot wound to heal this way, assuming the bullet was high-enough caliber. One photograph of a Civil War soldier shows the soldier sticking a ramrod through a bullet wound that healed as a hole.
  • In some cattle farms, the caretakers will surgically install a porthole in the side of the cow to allow them to monitor its digestion.
  • Body piercings can be stretched to a large degree, leading to the infamous saucer-in-the-ear look.
  • The curious case of Alexis St. Martin (1798-1880), whose stomach was ventilated by a musket ball at close range. Surprisingly, he survived some forty years after his accident, and his perforated guts allowed surgeon Dr. William Beaumont to study the mechanics of human digestion firsthand, by dangling food into the abdominal fistula on the end of a piece of cord and observing the stomach acids at work.
  • This guy
  1. ↑ Unfortunately that's where Ichigo's hollowfied hole is
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