Karma Overdose

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The time has come for the [[Big Bad]] (or [[Jerkass]] or just whoever's in the wrong in the moment) to [[Laser-Guided Karma|get their karma]]. However, the punishment is so bad that the audience (and potentially the characters in-universe) feel sorry for them. Whether it be you feel the crime in question wasn't that bad or the punishment is that awful, [[Unintentionally Sympathetic|you will feel that person]] [[Alas, Poor Villain|got the short end]] [[There Is No Kill Like Overkill|of the stick]]. Can overlap with [[Disproportionate Retribution]], [[Alas, Poor Scrappy]], [[Alas, Poor Villain]], [[Unintentionally Sympathetic]], and [[Jerkass Woobie]]. '''Note''': On TV Tropes, this is known as "Karmic Overkill." The title was changed slightly to avoid potential copyright issues with TV Tropes.

Examples of Karma Overdose include:

Anime and Manga

• Blood-C: With the reveal of the twist that Saya's whole mission was all a lie, that she was a Elder Barn and all her friends are actors, most of whom don't actually care about her. You'd expect to feel perfectly content and satisfied about their deaths. However the show is so gory, that when they did beat the dust, some people couldn't help but feel a smidge of pity for them. That's not to mention the infamous 'bunny' scene, where several people who probably didn't know the extent of the experiment get slaughtered by bunny-looking elder barns in strange but cruel ways.
  • The twins, Nene and Nono, get this. For Nene, she's tripped by her own sister and stomped into bloody pulp by Dog. For Nono, her death was so brutal, some did feel sorry for her (for context: she's picked up, forcefully put into a split, then Dog starts to tear off her leg before finally eating her!).

Fan Works

• Generally, if there's a Ron the Death Eater that gets taken out/treated quite harshly and is a Base Breaker (Alas, Poor Scrappy can also feature here), the audience might think this.
• A lot of Miraculous Ladybug salt fics (particularly the ones concerning Lila) have this reaction towards Miss Bustier's class. There's a good chance they'll have their whole lives ruined just because they didn't believe Marinette (who often turns into a Designated Hero). The person who typically gets this the worst is Adrien/Chat Noir.

Western Animation

• In a Broken Base kind of way, some think Eric Cartman potentially ending up homeless in the future is this.
• In the much-hated episode of The Loud House "No Such Luck," Lincoln tricks the family into thinking he's bad luck to avoid attending their scheduled events and have some time to himself. Yes, Lincoln doing this was wrong. However, as the episode goes on, the family goes too far in trying to avoid him. Them making him sleep outside is what got this reaction the most.
• My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic has suffered from quite a few of these:
  • "Boast Busters": For as obnoxious and rude as she was, many people thought Trixie having her home smashed by the Ursa Major (actually Minor) was a bit too much.
  • "The Mysterious Mare-Do-Well": This despised episode has one of the more infamous examples of this happening. Rainbow Dash is in over her head with fame, so her friends decide to dress up as the hero Mare Do Well. However, we see everyone disregarding Rainbow Dash and how much it hurts her to be alone, making Rainbow Unintentionally Sympathetic. Many had wished her friends had at least had try talking to Rainbow before concocting the plan to upstage her. Even fans that did think Rainbow needed this lesson either thought this was too cruel or that it was a horrible execution.
  • Another infamous example with "Ponyville Confidential". Diamond Tiara has the CMC go out and publish embarrassing/not true headlines of everypony. Not that this isn't a bad thing, however the CMC (i.e children) getting ostracized by everyone (including the Mane Six and their own families, with only Rarity seemingly being the only one to try thinking to be rational about it) gained the trio several sympathy points by the fandom. Not helping was Diamond Tiara was the one orchestrating the whole event, blackmailing the trio when they tried to get out of it (which, by the way, is never called out on) and Featherweight is the one that listened in on and took the embarrassing photos/secrets.
  • "Scare Master" (though this is more of a Broken Base than the previous RD example): Yes, this episode shows Rainbow not having a care about anyone with her pranking thus setting her up for karma. However, some thought the whole town pretending to be cookie-invested zombies just to get back at her for a few pranks was a bit much.