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Multi-Armed and Dangerous

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"Perhaps you missed... my extra arms!"
So, you've got a character that you want to show is really dangerous. You could give them the normal two arms or legs, but that's just not enough. Maybe you could replace one of those arms with a really big gun, or a sword, or have it transform into something else.

If that doesn't work, you can always give a character extra arms... because two arms good, four arms better, right?

For obvious reasons, normal humans don't get this treatment, because it would look pretty awkward having to do bodily cleaning... and having four arms to go around would be a tailor's nightmare. If you're a mutant or an evil genius, you don't have to worry about this, because Freaky Is Cool.

Multi-Armed and Dangerous characters come in two flavors:

  1. The extra arms are a regular part of the body.
  2. They're made from prosthetics/synthetic materials that are usually attached to the person.

They often have Super-Strength. Their ability to fight with extra arms is a fantastic form of Heroic Ambidexterity. Combat Tentacles are a subtrope. Occasionally you'll see such characters fighting with a weapon for each of their hands. Can sometimes be used as Spider Limbs.

This isn't what they mean, by the way, on the news when they say "The local bank was robbed by four armed men", but "To be forewarned is to have four arms."

As of the 21st century, there is (very expensive) technology that allows a person to control an artificial limb with the same mental process as an organic limb and can be used to control extraneous limbs with only a minimal period of adjustment. Truth in Television is only a matter of time...

Sister Trope to Multiarmed Multitasking, and they're the children of Vertebrate with Extra Limbs.

For other extra body parts, see Extra Digits, Extra Eyes, Multiboobage, Triple Nipple, and Multiple Head Case.

Examples:

    open/close all folders 

    Anime & Manga 
  • Lang Bao Bao from 3×3 Eyes, in her monster form grows two extra arms. Later, one of the Nine-Headed Dragon Generals named Agassi sports six feminine arms on a muscular male body.
  • Justice from Afro Samurai has three arms, one of which is kept hidden.
  • Maya from Animal X turns out to have this, though it's a case of Cursed with Awesome as while the extra limbs are a boon in combat, they're caused by mutation and a sign of infertility (it's also implied that she's slowly dying due to birth defects).
  • The main villain of Bizenghast, Lady Hetka, has several arms where her legs should be.
  • Bleach:
    • Nnoitra Gilga, whose released form allows him multiple arms, as well as regeneration powers. Initially he has four arms, and four scythes to go with them. When one of his arms is promptly sliced off by his opponent, the regeneration kicks in and he also ups the arm count to six.
    • Wonderweiss's release form also lets him grow a bunch of extra arms coming from his shoulders.
    • When Renji learns the true name of his Bankai, one of the powers he gains is the ability to summon a third arm that moves along with his left arm and is strong enough to crush giant stone slabs.
  • The battle-suit (mini-mecha) Double Edge from the anime Blue Gender has a pair of gigantic blades on its shoulder that not only allow it to slice and dice but also double as grappling claws.
  • Umidori Kuroyoru from A Certain Magical Index has the esper ability "Bomber Lance", which lets her fire lances of compressed nitrogen from the palms of her hands. Deciding she wanted the ability to fire more than two at a time, she underwent some good old-fashioned augmentations so she could attach multiple robot arms to her body to fire multiple lances. Individually those lances are smaller since the cybernetic palms are usually smaller than her own, but by combining them together she can make some massive lances.
  • In the anime Claymore you can see a male Awakened Being, who has six arms.
  • A fair few Digimon have more than one pair of arms:
    • Kimeramon of Digimon Adventure 02 is a mashup of several heroic Digimon with Devimon (yes, that Devimon) and a Kuwagamon. It has both of Devimon's arms and one each from Kuwagamon and SkullGreymon.
    • Asuramon is a humanoid with three heads and four arms that acts as a Villain of the Week in Digimon Frontier and an Elite Mook in Digimon Fusion. He can shoot fire out of each of his four hands for some mean fireball and Elemental Punch attacks.
    • GrandGeneramon of Digimon Fusion has four arms, each made from one of the Seven Death Generals. The ares are those of NeoMyotismon, Gravimon, Olegmon, and Apollomon, though it soon loses the latter two thanks to their "hosts" no longer being a part of it.
    • Oujamon of Digimon Universe: App Monsters is Dokamon's Ultimate-grade form and is a blue, four-armed lion that fights like a wrestler and wears armored gauntles on all four of its hands.
    • Recurring antagonist Millenniumon has six arms, four inherited from Kimeramon and two more on its Machinedramon Battle Aura.
  • Dragon Ball:
    • Tenshinhan used a technique that had him grow two additional arms to fight Goku in the original series. Goku countered by moving his arms so fast it at least looked like he had six.
    • Inverted in Dragon Ball Z with Caterpy, a giant Caterpillar warrior that "fights" Goku in Otherworld. He lives up to his Multi-Armed status with 10 arms to use for combat. His "Dangerous" side... Not so much.
  • The diclonius in Elfen Lied, who have multiple arms in the form of telekinetic vectors. And boy, are they dangerous!
  • Fairy Tail: The Etherious demon Ezel of Tartaros has four arms and a bunch of tentacles in place of legs. Each of these allow him to use his Curse to unleash incredibly powerful cutting attacks with a swing of his limbs. When he goes One-Winged Angel, his arms turn into actual swords.
  • Mamoru Nagano is probably the king of this trope, because if he designs mecha the chances are that they will be multiarmed. In his own series, The Five Star Stories, the biggest, nastiest and most heavily armed mecha of all times, the Jagd Mirage, had not just two like The O, but four deployable sub-arms, which, together with its two additional sub-legs, drove the limb count to ten. These sub-arms could be used to wield swords of guns, but generally were used to manipulate shields (called veils there) to cover the mecha and brace it against the immense recoil of the two truly titanical cannons it carried as its main armament.
  • In Franken Fran, Fran occasionally affixes as many as four extra arms to her body for particularly delicate procedures; Apparently, turning a mutilated human into a giant caterpillar with a human head is fussy work.
  • Devil Getter in Getter Robo VS Devil Man has four arms◊ each one with the power from, the other forms from getter robot.◊
  • The armed suits seen in Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex feature two sets of arms; a large pair scaled to the mecha used to operate weapons and manipulate large/heavy objects, and the pilot's own smaller arms to allow him to perform tasks the larger arms would be unsuited for.
  • Gundam has fun with this trope in several series.
    • Asura Gundam from Mobile Fighter G Gundam is an intentional Hindu reference.
    • The O, personal mobile suit to Big Bad Paptimus Scirocco of Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam has a pair of beam saber wielding sub arms in its skirt armor, thus turning the massive Mighty Glacier looking machine into a Lightning Bruiser melee combat monster as it can wield four beam sabers at once with perfect control thanks to its mentally controlled biocomputer. That's because The O was designed by none other than Mamoru Nagano, who is a great fan of this trope.
    • The Gaplant TR-5 from Advance of Zeta also has skirt-armor subarms, while Gundam Hazel can be equipped with, in addition to the aforementioned skirt-armor subarms, two giant wire-guided rocket arms developed from the Psyco Gundam on its shoulder and wire-guided arm-shield on its forearm.
    • The Xeku Zwei from Gundam Sentinel has two more sub arms for melee and shooting a giant beam bazooka.
    • The Neue Ziel from Mobile Suit Gundam 0083: Stardust Memory has six arms, each capable of generating gigantic beam sabers. UC, usually considered the most "realistic" of the various Gundam Alternate Continuities by its devotees, ironically is even more guilty of overdoing with arms than even Gundam 00.
    • Seravee Gundam from Mobile Suit Gundam 00 has four BFGs, two on its shoulders and two in its knees. These all are capable of sprouting hands equipped with beam sabers in addition to the Seravee's normal pair, allowing Seravee to simultaneously fight with six beam sabers at one time. One can see that they really went out of their way to keep Seravee from suffering from its predecessor Gundam Virtue's weakness in close-range combat. That's right: Seravee is a BFG-toting long-range artillery mobile suit with multiple arms wielding multiple beam sabers as back-up weaponry.
    • The Seravee's side story variation, Seravee Gundam GNHW/3G, shows that you can never have too much of a good thing. Holy shit.◊
    • Gundam Build Fighters and Gundam Build Fighters Try don't have too many stock suits with extra arms... but the individually-sold weapons packs do, allowing you to create, for example, a Crossbone Gundam with manipulators armed with a pistol, a knife, a guan dao and a hook. One suit with extra arms from Try is the GM Powered Cardigan, which has guns and shields mounted on extending arms.
    • Ashuramaru of SD Gundam Force, a living Shout-Out to the Asura Gundam mentioned above. Notably, he has two normal arms, while the other four are attached to his Shoulders of Doom. It's implied that he received them when he joined Kibaomaru, and by extension, the Dark Axis.
    • Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans has Gundam Gusion Rebake and its Fullcity variant, with 2 sub arms that have ordinary manipulator hands and are controlled by Brain/Computer Interface.
    • Mobile Suit Gundam Thunderbolt: A major part of the series's design aesthetics are the "sub-arms" which are crane like additions to the Mobile Suit back-pack. Their use show the major differences in design choices between the Federation and Zeon: Federation suits use their sub-arms for defense (having them hold the shields while the MS's main arms use the weapons) while the Zeon suits use them for offense (often the sub-arms weild guns or are used for quick reloads or weapon switching).
  • High School D×D: When Siegfried activates his Sacred Gear, he grows a third arm from his back, allowing him to wield three swords. When he activates Balance Breaker, he grows three more arms to wield six swords at once.
  • Some Chimera Ants in Hunter × Hunter have multiple arms, and they're all far stronger than normal humans.
    • Isaac Netero's Nen ability, the "100 Type Guanyin Bodhisattva", is a giant golden manifestation of a buddhist goddess with many, many arms. It's one of the most powerful Nen abilities in the series.
  • One of the teams in The Law of Ueki, which has a military theme, has a guy whose special ability is growing extra arms. To carry more guns. The upgraded form of this ability is even more arms. To shoot even more guns.
  • In the Manga William Shakespeare version of Macbeth, Macduff appears to sport two extra cybernetic arms under his normal ones, allowing him to use four katanas at once.
  • In Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha The Movie First, the Giant Mook from the original series that Nanoha and Fate worked together to take down was replaced with a six-armed Humongous Mecha. Unsurprisingly, it was a lot harder to take down than the original two-armed Giant Mook.
  • Musuko ga Kawaikute Shikataganai Mazoku no Hahaoya: Veronica is a demon with four arms, which she mainly uses for Mundane Utility, such as playing two-player games by herself or brushing her teeth while washing her body in the shower. Though since she sometimes mixes up which arms are doing what, one time brushing her teeth with shampoo, she decided that two hands are enough for some things.
  • My Hero Academia:
    • Mezo Shoji, AKA "Tentacole'', has multiple arms as part of his Quirk, which can also be used to replicate other parts of his body like eyes and ears.
    • There are multiple minor characters with four arms (Shoji has six): one of the villains who attacked the USJ, Fourth Kind (a pro hero that Kirishima and Tetsutetsu interned with), and one of the Nomu in the Hosu City attack.
  • The Orphan in the sixth episode of My-HiME has, surprise surprise, six arms.
  • Masashi Kishimoto likes to use this trope in Naruto:
    • Kidoumaru, one of the Sound Four ninjas has six arms.
    • Sasori has the Third Kazekage's puppet form equipped with this, ironically being one of the few examples in the series to be caused by a jutsu.
    • One of Pain's multiple bodies, the Asura Path, has six arms, and on top of that, THREE FACES. Like all the other Paths of Pain, this is actually a reference to Buddhism; the asuras are a type of diety which also have those features.
    • Hosts of a tailed beast are capable of making limbs out of chakra sprout from their body. Killer Bee makes Combat Tentacles while Naruto eventually learns to make them into many extra limbs that can each make their own Rasengan. This even includes making a pair of tiny hands coming from his finger that form their own tiny Rasenshuriken.
    • By far and away the most dangerous example of this trope is Madara Uchiha's Susanoo, especially its perfect form. Four arms, two strange blades, and capable of contributing to his techniques through also using hand signs. He cuts a mountain in half with it just to show off!
    • The above example is topped by, fittingly enough, his archenemy Hashirama Senju. To fight a Nine-Tails sheathed in the above-mentioned Perfect Susanoo, he creates a giant moving Kannon statue, complete with one thousand arms.
    • Asura sports a 6-armed, 3-headed variant of Kurama's chakra form. Naruto jerry-rigs a similar aura by fusing three Kurama clones together while in Six Paths Sage Mode, and he uses the additional appendages to form a normal/Tailed Beast Rasenshuriken combo, powerful enough to engulf an entire country.
  • Negima! Magister Negi Magi:
    • A multi-armed demon is part of the Canis Niger group of bounty hunters.
    • A one-panel tournament opponent also has four arms.
    • And Dynamis' One-Winged Angel form can grow (and shoot) hands at will.
  • Rengoku in Ninja Scroll: The Series is a shinobi that bears four arms. Additionally, as she's proficient with self-surgery, she has a penchant for removing her own arms and attaching other beings' limbs (animals included) onto her own body to suit her current needs.
  • One Piece:
    • Nico Robin, whose Devil Fruit ability allows her to grow vast numbers of replicas of any of her body parts (she almost always uses it to make more arms). She can grow them from any place. Any. Place.
    • Hatchan, an octopus fishman, has six arms, which he uses to wield six swords at once. However, this doesn't help his subpar swordsmanship.
    • Roronoa Zoro has also developed a technique that, via the physical manifestation of his dark feelings, grants him three heads and six arms, for a total of nine swords (one in each hand, and one in each mouth).
    • Vice Admiral Onigumo has a Spider Devil's Fruit, whose mastery of it allows use to manifest the extra arms he'd normally get in his hybrid form via his hair, allowing him to use eight swords at once.
    • During the Thriller Bark story arc, we get a brief glimpse at a zombie general who has four arms, each holding a pistol. Given the nature of the island's zombies, we can presume that these were grafted on by Dr. Hogback. Unfortunately, we never see this zombie again, and can only imagine the badassery that he could have dealt out.
  • Puella Magi Madoka Magica takes this trope to its logical extreme with Patricia: A Witch that's literally just a bundle of 6 arms in a sailor fuku, that forms something like a rudimentary "spider". Look!◊
  • One of the one-off characters in Ranma ½, Rouge, fell into "The Spring of Drowned Asura". Asura is a Hindu god (or demon) with three faces and six arms. Rouge and Pantyhose Taro manage to destroy the Tendō home in a fight over therapeutic magnets.
  • Rebuild of Evangelion 2.0
    • The Ninth Angel Bardiel, in control of Eva Unit 03, reveals a second pair of arms when its first pair are already occupied.
    • The new version of Zeruel also uses this trope: when it enters the Geofront, it unfolds itself and keeps this multi-tentacled appearance.
    • Rebuild 3.0 has Eva Unit 13, which has an extra pair of arms. It puts them to use by wielding two Lances of Longinus at once.
  • Rebuild World:
  • Played with in Ronin Warriors: one of the Dark Warlord Sekhmet's special attacks involves growing four extra arms, each with its own sword. The first time he does this, his opponent Ryo has no idea how to counter it. Fortunately, Tagalong Kid Yuli snaps a picture of Sekhmet with his pocket camera, and it shows that the six arms are a trick: Sekhmet really has only two arms, he just gives the illusion of six by moving his arms at super-speed.
  • In Sengoku Youko, Senya develops a 1000-armed Super Mode based on their image of Senju Kannon after realising that his gradual Metamorphosis into "The 1000-Demon Devil" can be steered in a positive direction. The perfected version of this form has arms of Pure Energy and resembles an asura.
  • Dolor, the Giant Clan founder in The Seven Deadly Sins, has four arms. The other giants have only two, though.
  • Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann:
    • Enkidudu, the final and most powerful version of Viral's Ganmen.
    • A parody drama CD (100% official, just not canon) also has a six-armed version called Enkidududu and an eight-armed Enkidudududu.
    • Tengen Toppa Enki Dulga has two faces and fourteen arms wielding THIRTEEN SWORDS and a Kanabo in the second film.
  • Hentai manga Tokyo Akazukin features a female assassin with four arms, which she uses to wield two swords and two guns at the same time.
  • In Ultimate Teacher those with invertebrate genes can grow extra arms, depending what genes they were mixed with.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh! ZEXAL:
    • Number C39: Utopia Ray has two normal arms and two mechanical arms. His two main arms wield each one BFS, while his mechanical arms wield an even bigger one.
    • Number C39: Utopia Ray Victory has four arms, two of them are hidden inside the other two arms. With four swords, his Signature Attack has the shape of two Vs.
  • YuYu Hakusho: Itsuki has six additional "Shadow Hands", which allow him to travel between dimensions and to create dimensional portals. This also allows him to control demons from different dimensions.
  • Yuki Yuna is a Hero: Karin's Mankai form has 4 arms each wielding a giant katana.

    Asian Animation 
  • Mechamato: Janitoor's upgraded form grants him additional mobility and a sort of Mini-Mecha which adds two larger arms that he can use along with his default arms.

    Card Games 
  • Magic: The Gathering: The orochi-bito from Kamigawa, despite being Snake People, have four arms. The mutated vedalken of Mirrodin likewise sport four, while Ravnica's and Alara's mostly only have two, with the exception of Vigean Graftmage who at least has the excuse of being a mutant.
  • Munchkin: Super Munchkin has the "Four-Armed and Forewarned" power, which gives your character two extra Hand Slots for items.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh!: Too many monsters to count. Here are a few honorable mentions.
    • The Ritual Monster, Garma Sword, has six arms wielding six swords with all six of his arms.
    • Number C39: Utopia Ray has two normal arms and two mechanical arms. His two main arms wield each one BFS, while his mechanical arms wield an even bigger one.
    • Number C39: Utopia Ray Victory has four arms, two of them are hidden inside the other two arms. With four swords, his Signature Attack has the shape of two Vs.

    Comic Books 
  • Black Moon Chronicles: During a massive engagement between the Black Moon and the Empire of Lynn, Haazheel Thorn transforms into a gigantic four-armed titan to throw magic blasts at the opposing armies.
  • Bucky O'Hare and the Toad Wars!: Deadeye Duck, the team's irritable four-armed gunner. He's capable of quadruple-wielding and prefers to shoot first and ask questions later.
  • Chase Variant features a female lead that sports four arms.
  • Copperhead: The members of the the Sewell family have four well-developed humanoid arms. It's a great advantage in fistfights.
  • Cyberforce: Stryker was a mutant born with four arms... three on one side. After an accident resulted in the loss of all three right arms, he was fixed up with cybernetics, once again, for all three. Not only is he a pretty normal guy aside from a slight temper problem, he gleefully uses his three right arms to triple wield pistols in combat.
  • The DCU:
    • Batman: Member of the League of Assassins, and one-time Love Interest of Bruce Wayne, Penumbra is trained in a mystic discipline from India that allows her to manipulate the shadows around her into constructs. These constructs can include clothes, such as her suit, weapons, such as knives, swords and even crossbows and multiple arms, which she uses to fight her opponents.
    • The demon Hellrazer has two arms and two long tentacles coming out of his hips.
    • Robin (1993): In Red Robin, Goliath of the Council of Spiders has six arms and super strength, and another member of the team has a set of four removable mechanical arms and usually wields a gun in each hand, including his two naturally occurring ones.
    • Seven Soldiers: The Bride from Frankenstein and its follow-up Frankenstein: Agent of S.H.A.D.E. has four arms.
    • Superman:
      • In Krypton No More, Superman and Supergirl fight the J'ai, a warrior race of aliens with four arms.
      • In a Golden Age issue, Superman takes on a villain named Grax whose gimmick, aside from being as smart as Brainiac, is that he has four arms.
    • Wonder Woman:
      • Wonder Woman (1942): The Crimson Centipede, a Silver Age villain, has sixteen arms and can reliably wield eight guns simultaneously.
      • Wonder Woman (1987): Cottus is one of the three Hecatoncheires, or hundred — handed ones, and looks like a creature made almost entirely of shadowy arms. He is the main creature the Amazons have spent thousands of years keeping from passing through Doom's Door, at the cost of many Amazon lives.
    • Young Justice: Rip Roar, wrestler from Apokolips, has four arms and more hair than the floor at Supercuts.
  • Doctor Who: In "The Deep Hereafter", Hecto Shellac has six arms that allow him to wield six guns.
  • The F1rst Hero: In the "Fight For Your Life" storyline, we're introduced to Odinson, an extrahuman cage fighter/mafia muscle who has a third arm.
  • Ironwood features a four-armed Amazonian woman, though she only really becomes armed and dangerous after her skin, flesh and fabulous pair of chesty bulbs are disintegrated, turning her into a four-armed skeleton wielding a sword and shield with her lower pair of arms, and a huge flail with her upper pair.
  • Marvel Universe:
    • Dark Avengers: Ai Apaec has about eight limbs, and he could be joined by any other deities from mythology who were examples should Marvel decide to use them.
    • Avengers Academy: Coat of Arms only has two naturally but her coat gives her two more.
    • Earth X:
      • Hawkeye's mutation from when everyone on Earth gained superpowers was four arms. We only see them in flashback, but he probably gained some ability to Dual Wield bows.
      • There's a woman with six arms who goes by the name of Black Widow (no relation to Natasha Romanoff). She had sporadic appearances within the comic, appearing either in long shots or as part of the background, as well as having no spoken dialogue. An early concept sketch for Venom also showed her with six arms, generated by the symbiote.
    • In Marvel vs. Capcom 2, the trope title is a nickname for the team of Spiral, Omega Red, and Shuma Gorath.
    • Space: Punisher: The Hulk has four arms.
    • Spider-Man:
      • In The Six Arms Saga, Spider-Man attempted to get rid of his superpowers... but the attempt failed rather spectacularly, giving him six arms.
      • The Spider Doppelganger has multiple clawed arms.
      • Doctor Octopus famously sports four additional mechanical limbs, as do derivatives from Doc Ock's mold like Lady Octopus and the Squid.
      • Spider-Man/Deadpool: Itsy Bitsy is a woman who received DNA from both Spider-Man and Deadpool, which caused her to turn into a psychotic spider-like creature. She has six arms armed with guns and sharp organic webbing.
    • X-Men:
      • Mystique, in one of the issues of her solo series, uses her shapeshifting abilities to grow a pair of extra arms to use in combat. It's noted that she could not maintain this state for long, as the transformation apparently put her under heavy strain.
      • Spiral has six arms (two of which are cybernetic, presumably replacing real ones lost from injury in a battle that happened before her first appearance); she's also both a sorceress and can fight with a sword in each hand.
      • Sugar Man is a Cephalothorax with four arms.
      • The X-Men 2099 once fought a twisted version of the original five X-Men. The Beast parallel had three arms, two on the right side and one on the left.
      • In the X of Swords event - Breakout Character Pogg Ur-Pogg is a giant demonic crocodilian bio-mech mercenary with six arms, superhuman strength and so heavily armoured it can withstand BFG firepower from Domino, Bishop, Forge and Gwenpool as well as psionic arrows from Mirage. The Vescora are other-dimensional four-armed aliens that can dismantle and harvest material from reality itself, they're so dangerous that a swarm of them are able to overcome one of the top-tier demon giant worm summoned from Amenth.
      • Barbarus (a Savage Lands mutate with 4 arms and strong enough to overpower the goddess Sif) and Forearm (a superhumanly strong Mutant Liberation Front terrorist with 4 arms) are practically indistinguishable from one another. The former probably directly inspired the latter, though. Marvel likes this trope.
  • The Mortal Kombat comics once showed a six-armed Shokan named Grum. He got his ass kicked by Sub-Zero, despite wielding six nunchaku.
  • Ronin (1983) features a humanoid four-armed rat ninja who threatens the title character at one point. He loses one arm to the samurai almost instantly, but still puts up a good fight with the remaining three.
  • Simone: The Best Monster Ever: Santa Claus, in this comic, is a Spider Person with multiple legs and four arms.
  • The Transformers: Monstructor is depicted as having four arms in IDW's run of the comic books: his two large arms formed by Bristleback and Wildfly, and a smaller pair that are Slog's monster-mode arms.

    Fan Works 

    Films — Animation 
  • Lilo & Stitch: Stitch has four arms, but keeps the lower pair retracted when not in use. Many of his "cousins" have extra arms as well. In fact, this is so common among Jumba's experiments that, as revealed in the Lilo & Stitch: The Series episode "Kixx", there is apparently a training manual on how to fight against four-armed monsters.
  • Ne Zha: In their initial battle, after Taiyi Zhenren freezes their hands together, the Chaos Pearl overwhelms him by growing four more arms and beating the tar out of him with only one pair.

    Films — Live-Action 
  • One of the assassins in Æon Flux (based on the animated show as well) has hands instead of feet.
  • In the original Clash of the Titans, the Kraken has four arms and the goddess Thetis says that it's capable of destroying the entire city of Joppa and all of its inhabitants. In the 2010 version it has two arms and two tentacles.
  • Numerous Godzilla monsters sport multiple arms, most frequently the Big Creepy-Crawlies.
    • Godzilla (2014): Both MUTOs possess eight limbs total: the female has four forelegs, two hind legs, and a set of smaller arms, while the male MUTO has two forelegs, two hind legs, a pair of enormous wings, and a set of smaller arms. The Teaser Trailer Monster has several arms with hooked claws.
  • The Golden Voyage of Sinbad. A statue of the Hindu goddess Kali is animated, "grows" a sword out of each palm of her six hands and fights Sinbad and his crew.
  • Maybe not as dangerous, but used as a surprise: Zaphod tags Arthur with a surprise lower left (or is it centre?) in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005). According to the novel, Zaphod had the extra arm fitted to improve his ski-boxing.
  • Men in Black 3 features a four-armed alien thug at a bowling alley who pulls four guns on Agent K. Subverted because K makes short work of him anyway.
  • Several Kaiju (Trespasser, Scunner, Knifehead) in Pacific Rim have four arms. The Chinese Jaeger Crimson Typhoon has three arms (one large right arm and two small left arms).
  • Six-Shooter in the Puppet Master movies is a cowboy puppet with six arms and as many little revolvers.
  • Star Wars:
    • General Grievous has arms that can both split in two. He's a cyborg, so it kind of makes sense. In Star Wars: Clone Wars he could hold lightsabers with his feet, too. So theoretically he could use five lightsabers at once (one foot would still be needed to stand on). In Legends, Grievous had repulsorlift installed in his feet so that he could float and use his feet as hands, thus allowing him to Sextuple wield Lightsabers.
    • Obi-Wan's contact Dex had four arms, but this may just avert this trope as he didn't play any part in the main series other than an information source. Star Wars: The Clone Wars (not the same as the previously mentioned Clone Wars) introduces another member of the species, Jedi Master Pong Krell, who "merely" dual-wielded double-sided lightsabers, but did do a four-way Force shove.
    • The Expanded Universe has more than one multi-armed alien race; the Codru-Ji, for one. Gasgano (a Xexto) appeared in The Phantom Menace as one of the podracer pilots.
    • The Thisspiasians, who have four arms and no legs (they slither along on the ground instead). They, however, prefer to keep their two lower arms hidden in public.
  • Tales of Halloween: In "Ding Dong", Bobbie sprouts several extra arms in her Wicked Witch persona and uses them to attack Jack.
  • During the final chase sequence in Terminator 2: Judgment Day, the T-1000 can briefly be seen operating the helicopter's controls with two arms while reloading and firing his submachinegun with another two.

    Gamebooks 
  • Space Assassin has the deity, a six-armed Frankensteinian monster wielding six weapons simultaneously, serving as a boss battle.

    Literature 
  • Ubu Roy in Walter Jon Williams's Angel Station has four muscular arms by virtue of having been genetically engineered.
  • Visser Three from Animorphs morphs into a vaguely-described creature like this in The Threat. All that's really known about it is that it is "dark and large and has more arms than it should".
  • The Wreed from Calculating God have arms in front and back as well as two on either side. They escape the "two eyes" problem by having a single optical strip that runs around their entire "head". They suffer from multiple cognitive deficits as a (dubious) result, though.
  • The Chronicles of Narnia: The Last Battle shows that the Calormene patron deity Tash has four taloned arms.
  • Cradle Series: Sacred artists on the Path of the Endless Sword (such as Yerin) gain a silver sword-arm sprouting from their back when they first reach Gold. As they continue to advance, they gain more, until they eventually have six sword-arms and can hide them at will. Since the Path relies entirely on having a sword at the ready, the sword-arm means that they will never be disarmed.
  • The title character of Mikhail Akhmanov's Dick Simon novels was born in a human town on planet Tayahat whose gravity is 1.5 Earth norm. The planet is populated by a tribal race of four-armed humanoids. Their males live for combat, and boys are trained from young age to kill (as well as honor). Dick is brought to them as a boy by his father and is raised as one of them, before leaving to join the Academy, where he receives more modern training as an operative by a red-headed Texan.
  • Tang San's Eight Spider Lances from the Light Novel and animated Donghua adaption Douluo Dalu are an external Spirit Bone, and the first Spirit Bone Tang San received after the absorption of the Spirit Ring of the Man Faced Demon Spider. There are 8 spider-like legs that are fused with the vertebra of Tang San's body. Tang San can manipulate them at will and recall them into the body, storing them as energy near some of his ribs. The Eight Spider Lances contains the extremely potent poison of the Man Faced Demon Spider within the vertebra where the bone attaches to Tang San's spine, and these lances can be used to inject poison into another. Anyone who is even so much as scratched by or comes into contact with a lance without spirit power defense will immediately be poisoned and will shortly die unless Tang San removes the poison. The lances can also drain the life energy out of any living being and temporarily use it as its own.
  • Quadrus "Quad" Dominus from Duumvirate starts carrying a gun for each of his four hands after a brush with death. He's six at the time.
  • In Fengshen Yanyi, some taoist immortals have mastered the power to obtain a monstrous battle form with three faces and six arms, which they often use to wield multiple Fabao/Paopei (the magic taoist instruments) at once, such as Lu Yue, Yin Jiao and Luo Shuan. The iconic Prince Nezha goes one step further and can sprout eight arms (two for his lance, two for the Yin-Yang Swords and one each for the bracelet, damask, fire trap and golden tile), though since his swords aren't well known he's usually depicted with six arms. Minor antagonist Ma Yuan has a magic ability which allows him to sprout a third, extensible arm from his back, which he uses to manhandle his opponents and rip their hearts out of their chests.
  • In The Girl from the Well, one of the ghosts Tark fights in The Suffering is a hoso-de, a spirit which has seven arms.
  • Glerk of The Girl Who Drank the Moon is a swamp monster with six limbs and a prehensile tail. His combat strategy is to stand on his hind legs and wave five swords to frighten off enemies.
  • In a bizarrely non-fantastic example, Flint Murtaugh from Robert R. McCammon's Gone South is a bounty hunter with three arms: his own, and the single undersized limb of his parasitic twin, Clint. Clint is near-mindless, blind, and embedded in Flint's torso, yet has been trained by his brother to point a small pistol as a hold-out surprise. Subverted in that Clint can't aim or fire it properly, but Flint's quarry seldom realizes this.
  • One of the later Land of Oz books, Handy Mandy in Oz, features the adventures of a seven-armed goat herder who finds herself whisked away to Oz via an underground geyser. At several points she does indeed wield a weapon in each hand to go against her enemies, being quite adept at using her extra limbs.
  • The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Trilogy: Zaphod Beeblebrox has three arms. He wasn't born that way; he got the third one added on to help with his "ski-boxing". And according to And Another Thing..., this may actually be so he has one hand for each of Eccentrica Gallumbits' breasts. Though it's not clear entirely.
  • The Shrike from Hyperion is a 3-meter tall, 4-armed, time-manipulating killing machine (literally) covered in spikes. Granted, having 4 arms instead of 2 doesn't make it much more dangerous than it would already be, as it can stop time and wipe out entire armies.
  • Craynarbians from the Jackelian Series are an offshoot Human Subspecies with natural plates of crab-like armor and two extra arms: one ending in a serrated blade, the other in a heavy club. Some steammen are equipped with three or more arms.
  • John Carter of Mars:
    • The green Barsoomians are four-armed killing machines fourteen feet tall. They love to quadruple-wield BFSes as well.
    • The White Apes of those stories also had four arms. Technically speaking, both species have two arms, two legs, and two "intermediate limbs" that can be used as both.
    • A lot of the other animals on Mars had more than four limbs as well, such as the eight-legged thoats and the ten-legged banths, but these are usually legs, rather than arms. Worth mentioning, though, purely to establish that on Mars, four limbs is not the norm for vertebrates, the way it is on Earth.
  • Journey to Chaos: Giji Mesh has four arms and is a squad captain in the Dragon's Lair Mercenary company. She uses them to juggle swords.
  • Majipoor Series: Skandar are towering humanoids with four arms. They often use multiple weapons at a time when fighting and are pretty excellent jugglers as well.
  • The "Moties" from Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle's The Mote in God's Eye have asymmetric limbs — two small arms on the right, and one massive arm (the "gripping hand") on the left. Humans talk about how this arrangement gives Moties the ability to use fine dexterity as well as raw strength.
  • Isaac Asimov and Janet Asimov's The Norby Chronicles: The Others, Neglectful Precursors of the galaxy, have a head with three eyes, four arms, and two legs. The Mentor robots they left on Jamyn are built in imitation of them, much like humans tend to envision robots built in their own form.
  • The indigenous aliens of Marduk, in David Weber's Prince Roger series, had four arms, which along with being huge, allowed them to carry BFGs that the humans had used on their now-defunct power armor.
    • It was also useful with more primitive weapons since they could use their lower arms to hold up a shield while wielding a pike with their upper limbs. Similarly when equipped with simple breech-loading rifles they were able to reload with two arms while holding the rifle in the others.
  • Pritha Prithvi from The Red and the Rest is a human centaur: up until her shoulders she has the body of a human, then another torso again. Besides making her very tall, this gives her four arms, much like classical centaurs have four legs and two arms.
  • The warrior drone cho-ja in Janny Wurt's Empire trilogy. Their multiple arms also end in blades.
  • Marco from Strata has four arms, and is an extremely dangerous fighter. An invoked example, as his species (kung) normally have two arms, but those slated to be warrior-caste are operated upon before birth to cause them to grow extra limbs.
  • This is one of the key plot points in the Tipping Point Trilogy, by Alan Dean Foster. Bodily manipulation is as easy as getting new custom-fitted clothing and is often used to add extra limbs. Note that these are not necessarily weapons, or designed explicitly to carry weapons; for instance, a waiter may get an extra set of arms to improve carrying capacity.
  • In the Vorkosigan Saga, the Quaddies are so named because they have four arms and no legs (they are genetically designed freefall dwellers.) In Diplomatic Immunity, Miles notes how unfair it is that their troops can literally shoot and reload at the same time.
  • The Drummer from Wild Cards. His multiple arms aren't exactly combat-specific, but he can use them that way quite effectively.
  • Warhammer 40,000 novels:
    • The Chaos creature Skarhaddoth from Hammer of Daemons has four arms. In his first appearance he wields two meat cleavers along with two shields, and in his second he uses four scimitars. There are other multi-armed Chaos beasties stalking Draakasi. Dark Adeptus has various Techpriests with mechadendrites running around.
    • In Ciaphas Cain: For the Emperor, there is a plot point related to this trope. A tau ambassador is assassinated in the middle of a party and no-one can see who the shooter was, especially when everyone draws weapons in the ensuing confusion. It turns out to be the person who seemed one of the least likely, Governor Grice, because he's secretly a tyranid mutant and his shapeless clothes hide not a flabby body but an extra arm easily capable of coming out to fire a gun and withdrawing back, leaving his other two hands innocently empty.
    • Techno-magos Darioq, from the Word Bearers novel Dark Apostle, has four heavy weapons (two heavy bolters and 2 plasma cannons), multiple heavy melee weapons, and around 10 mechadendrites. Over the course of the novel, he rips off a Chaos Terminator's arms and cuts him in half. After being bathed in flames for several seconds.
    • Sulphus, the Techmarine from the Deathwatch novel Warrior Coven, has three mechanical arms and one organic one. These arms allow him to fly a speeder and use the turret at the same time as well as firing his bolter, something that would normally require three people. At one point, he uses two of his arms to hold on to a spinning Talos and the other two to rip an armour plate off. He then jumps inside, blows it up and does a walking out through the flames sequence like in the first Terminator.

    Live-Action TV 
  • Alien Worlds (2020): The monkey-like predators on Eden possess a second pair of clawed arms they mostly keep folded against their chests, but which they can extend to increase their reach and snag elusive prey.
  • The Book of Boba Fett:
    • In the first episode, Boba is attacked by a six-limbed sand monster. He's only able to get the better of it after getting on its back and strangling it with his slave chain.
    • Played for Negated Moment of Awesome when Boba is sneaking into Jabba's palace via the kitchen and finds himself facing a chef droid twirling six cleavers simultaneously. Boba is getting ready to fight it when Fennec Shand comes up from behind and severs its head.
  • Charmed (1998): When Piper and Leo got possessed by a couple of Hindu gods in one episode, Piper grows four more arms.
  • Doctor Who: Although we never see them, the Venusians who invented the type of aikido practiced by some incarnations of the Doctor are said to have five arms and five legs, which make its various maneuvers a lot more effective.
  • Monty Python's Flying Circus. One of Terry Gilliam's animations had a mugger saying "Hands up!" to a victim. The victim puts his hands up — and then another pair of hands (and arms), and another... then slams all of his hands on the mugger's head.
  • Michio Kaku's design for a super suit in Sci Fi Science included an extra pair of arms that were attached to the back and controlled by the user's brain (technology which is now developing). Kids
    Kaku: Why does Dr. Octopus get to have all the fun?
  • In the fourth season episode "The Way" of Xena: Warrior Princess, Xena and Gabrielle are confronted by a demonic sorcerer named Indrajit while in India. After Xena slices off one of Indrajit's arms, it grows back and is soon joined by four more. Now a six-armed warrior, Indrajit proceeds to prove his badassery by slicing both of Xena's arms off. But wait, there's more! Xena, literally disarmed at this point, calls upon the Hindu god Krishna to help her. He transforms her into an avatar of Kali Freaky Is Cool. Needless to say, if you thought Xena was wicked before, think about how dangerous she is once she becomes a four-armed goddess of death. Indrajit, surprise surprise, is no longer with us. When the battle is over, she is restored to normal.
  • Neil of The Young Ones was temporarily granted six pairs of hands by an unseen genie, but the genie was killed and the extra arms vanished before he could use his new appendages, or even show them to his housemates.

    Magazine 

    Music 

    Myths & Religion 
  • Aboriginal Australian Myths: In Queensland the sun goddess is said to have many arms, representing her searing sunbeams. Other versions of this tale claim its her pubic hair instead.
  • Almost all Hindu deities, but probably most notably Kali. Hindu deities are only depicted as having multiple limbs as an artistic representation of their divine omnipotence, making this more a variant on Multi-Armed Multitasking. Depending on the intent of the depiction, you can find representations of the Hindu gods with the standard 2 arms and 2 legs, rather than the typically thought of 6 arms, 2 legs, though sometimes eight or more arms are depicted, and occasionally even the legs get multiplied.
  • The Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara is often depicted with a thousand arms.
    • Most Fierce Deities in Buddhism have multiple arms and their work is to literally kill enemies of the Buddhists.
  • The three Hekatonkheir brothers in Hesiod's Theogony were massive giants (or perhaps deities) who embodied natural disasters, born with a hundred arms and fifty heads each. They were on the Greek God's side and greatly helped them in the battle against the Titans by throwing one hundred mountains a piece at once at the immortal enemies, whom they then served as jailers for in revenge for being sealed away earlier by Kronus.
    • There is also the Gegenees who fight Hercules and the argonauts, they have six arms. And some despictions of Geryon give him multiple arms alongside multiple torsos and heads.
  • Norse Mythology: As told in The Saga of Hervor and Heidrek, the giant Starkad Aludreng (grandfather of the more famous Starkad the Old) had eight arms and wielded four swords at once in combat. He was eventually killed by Thor for abducting princess Alfhild of Alfheim.

    Pinball 

    Podcasts 
  • Mooney, the titular monkey-creature in the Cool Kids Table game Bloody Mooney, has six-arms.

    Professional Wrestling 
  • Yarsminko and Mung Wun of Team Space Bug in Kaiju Big Battel each have four arms.

    Puppet Shows 

    Tabletop Games 
  • Arduin:
    • The Earth Demon has four long arms, whilst the Storm Demon also has four.
    • The Greater Demon Tankras, Hell's Own General, has 4 arms that each wield a different weapon; a seven foot long golden sword, a seven foot long silver battle axe, a spiked maul that paralyzes the part of the body it hits, and flaming darts that can be thrown great distances whilst potentially embedding into any unfortunate target.
  • Chaosium supplement All the Worlds' Monsters
    • Volume I had the following creatures: Air Squid (12 arms), Snake Ape (4 arms), Daughter of Kali (regular = 4 arms, Elder = 6 arms), Gnarled Gremlin (3 arms) and Telk (4 arms).
    • Volume III had the Yarzooyn, a large six-armed humanoid that attack with a sword in each hand.
  • Call of Cthulhu has a number of deities and monsters that have multiple arms/tentacles and can kill a human being quickly. Azathoth (up to 6 tentacles), Being from Xiclotl (6 tentacles), Cthugha (up to 4 tentacles), Dark Young of Shub-Niggurath (4 tentacles), Flying Polyps (up to 12 tentacles), Gugs (2 arms, 4 forearms), Old Ones (5 tentacles), Servitor of the Outer Gods (up to 6 tentacles), Shub-Niggurath (dozens of tentacles), Giant Squid (8 tentacles).
  • Champions:
    • One NPC villain in Enemies II (1982) was Grond, a 12 foot tall green humanoid with four arms and greater strength than most superheroes.
    • Adventurers' Club magazine #2, adventure "What Rough Beast''. The PC heroes must defeat a gigantic mutated bear with four arms and lethal claw attacks.
    • The Circle and M.E.T.E.. Two of the guest aliens at M.E.T.E. - T't'shlr (four arms and a lethal hand to hand attack) and Case 39 after it hatches (14 arms and superhuman strength). Case 39's mother has the same number of arms as its child and even greater strength.
    • The Hero System Bestiary had the Giant Squid (10 tentacles) and Giant Octopi (8 arms), both of which were quite dangerous to humans.
    • The raw Extra Limbs power is, incidentally, one of the cheaper ones in the game — 5 character points buy any number of extras, from a useful tail over an extra set of arms or two to a cloud of tentacles. This is because the power in and of itself is mainly cosmetic and doesn't include any "free" combat bonuses or extra actions per turn; those still have to be bought and paid for normally if the character is supposed to have them.
  • GDW's Dark Conspiracy adventure Hellsgate. Margaret Ryan betrays the Player Characters while in the service of an evil alien being and is Rewarded as a Traitor Deserves by having her body altered. The resulting Margaret-Thing has four arms: the two new ones have claws/pincers instead of hands. She can wield weapons in her human hands and attack directly with her claw/pincers.
  • Dungeons & Dragons:
    • The "Type V" or "Marilith" demon is a six-armed lamia. Each hand can wield a weapon.
    • Glabrezu demons. They have 4 arms, two of which have vicious pincers. And consequently Draegloth.
    • Arrow Demons, who multiple arms and use Bows Akimbo.
    • Sahuagin are a race of evil fishmen. The normal ones are dangerous enough, but some of them also sprout an extra set of arms.
    • Thri-Kreen ("mantis warriors") — badass race of social mantis-hoppers living in arid lands, abundant in (but not limited to) Athas, the Dark Sun setting. Has inheritance memory, poisonous bite, low water requirement, hard exoskeleton, derives construction material from saliva, jumps like grasshopper, throws big shurikens... and can wield small or medium weapons in each of four hands.
    • Dark Sun setting: B'rohg (tall humanoid giants with 4 arms that are formidable opponents), Feylaar (an ape-like Neutral Evil monster with four powerful arms).
    • 2nd Edition Forgotten Realms supplement The Code of the Harpers. If a spellcaster creates a magical construct (golem, gargoyle, etc.) inside a Harper refuge, either the creator or the construct can be given a Chance Element. One possible Chance Element is 1-4 extra arms, which give the recipient an extra normal attack for each arm.
    • The Xill, insect-like outsiders based off of A.E. Van Vogt's Ixtl, have four arms.
    • Second and third edition have the Modrons, Outsiders and embodiments of Law and Order who had geometric shapes based on their caste, and a number of limbs equal to that caste. Tridrones, Quadrones and Pentadrones, the most intelligent of the "base" Modrons, have three, four and five arms respectively (as well as an equal number of legs).
    • Additional 1st Edition modrons with multiple limbs: septon (7 arms), hexton (2 arms and 4 tentacles) and quinton (5 arms).
    • Dungeon Master's Guide 2 for 3.5e had the Abberant-Limbed trait, which allowed one to gain either an extra pair of arms, or an extra pair of legs. Either way, it added a couple of level adjustments. Other options included the Insectile Creature Template from Savage Species , Arachnoid Creature Template from Underdark (didn't apply to Humanoids, but see Template stacking...) and a web enhancement for customising the Half-Fiend Template.
    • The Known World setting of Basic D&D (and the Mystara setting of AD&D) have the Bone (Skeletal) Golem. It has four arms, all capable of wielding weapons.
    • The Greyhawk setting deity Hextor has six arms, with two hands holding shields and four holding weapons.
    • Module S1 Tomb of Horrors had a mutated four armed gargoyle that attacked anyone entering its room.
    • The White Wolf supplement Creature Collection III: Savage Bestiary had the multi-armed template, which could be applied to... well, anything, so long as it has arms. This includes your character.
    • Fantasy Flight's Legends & Lairs: Mythic Races had the four-armed siarrans. They tended to be Chaotic Good Technical Pacifists...with a healthy dose of Beware the Nice Ones.
    • There were enough of these in 3.5 that they had their own feats: Multiattack (allowing a monster to use all of his arms with less of a penalty) and Multi-Weapon Fighting (like Two-Weapon Fighting, but for more than two weapons).
    • 3rd Edition Creature Collection supplement. The Narleth was a half-human/half-spider monster with four arms ending in strong, clawed hands.
    • A number of deities and related creatures in the 1E AD&D Deities & Demigods Cyclopedia had multiple arms.
      • Babylonian mythos: Druaga (8 arms)
      • Chinese mythos: Lu Yueh (6 arms), Ma Yuan (8 arms), No Cha (8 arms), Tou Mu (16 arms)
      • Egyptian mythos: Anhur will sometimes take forms with more than 2 arms.
      • Greek mythos: Hecatoncheire (100 arms)
      • Hindu mythos: Agni (7 arms), Kali (4 arms), Karttikeya (12 arms), Surya (4 arms), Vishnu (4 arms).
      • Melnibonean mythos: Mist Giant (4 arms).
    • Additional deity-related creatures in the OD&D Supplement IV Gods, Demi-Gods & Heroes
      • Hyborian mythos (Conan): The Kraken (8 arms), Yama (8 arms)
      • Indian mythos: Devi (10 arms), Shiva (4 arms)
      • Norse mythos: Sterkodder (6 arms)
    • Dragon magazine #93 article "Nine Hells Revisited". The greater devil Kochbiel has 4 arms and wields 4 weapons.
    • From 1st Edition: derghodaemon (5 arms), squealer (3 arms), xaren (3 arms) and xorn (3 arms).
    • In the Forgotten Realms setting Garagos is the six-armed god of savage bloodlust.
    • 2nd Edition The Nightmare Lands supplement. The greater dream-spawn called Ennui have four arms.
  • Earthdawn: The Horror named Hate has twelve arms and can make three attacks per combat round.
  • Exalted:
    • The Unconquered Sun, the most powerful of the gods, is invulnerable, cannot lose at anything, and sports a pair of extra arms.
    • Some Lunars and Fair Folk can obtain a second pair of arms as a mutation. Even some mortals might end up afflicted with it, if they're unlucky enough to stay in the Wyld for prolonged periods (ie, more than 5 seconds).
    • Alchemicals and Infernals can also get in on this action. Alchemicals can install Manifold Transhuman Implants to access mutations, while Infernals can manifest them with By Rage Recast or just bless themselves with Verdant Emptiness Endowment enhanced by Scoured Perfection of Form. Both allow multiple limbs among the mutations they can grant.
  • Feng Shui:
    • Four Burning Fists and the Shiva Squadron from the "Glimpse of the Abyss" supplement have multiple arms, the former having four arms and the latter having eight arms like their Hindu god namesake. In addition, anyone who has the Creature schtick "Multiple Arms" can be Multi-Armed and Dangerous as well.
    • Plus, there's "Three Pistol" Sammy Chung from a Feng Shui fansite, who's a demon with three arms (the third one in the center) that, as his nickname implies, specializes in a rather freaky form of three-gun Guns Akimbo.
  • Games Workshop games:
    • The Chaos Gods from Warhammer, Warhammer: Age of Sigmar, Warhammer 40,000 and their spinoffs often gift their Daemonic and moral followers with extra limbs, that often end with powerful claws, slithering tentacles or some other form of combat orientated mutation. Slaanesh, god of pleasure and excess, and Tzeentch, god of magic and mutation, are particularly fond of this mutation.
    • Warhammer 40,000:
      • The those Tech-Priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus who are likely to enter battle are often equipped with additional limbs outfitted with a number of weapons, from basic laspistols to flamers and plasma weapons. The model for the Tech-Priest Dominus, a Tech-Priest granted command of the military forces of the Mechanicus, has four arms that allow him to carry a pistol, a larger arcane ranged weapon and the traditional two-handed axe that is the symbol of his faith.
      • The Ruststalker Princeps who lead the elite assassination squads of the Adeptus Mechanicus often have their combat abilities augmented with the addition of a third bionic arm so that they can wield a deadly chordclaw alongside a pair of transonic blades.
      • The multi-limbed Badasses are Techmarines and higher Tyranid organisms. Also, to some extent, Warp Spider Exarchs with their armour-mounted, independently fired weapons.
      • Greater Daemons of Slaanesh (Keepers of Secrets, as they're known) have two regular arms (and often carry large swords or whips) and two arms with huge pincers. The Masque of Slaanesh is a Daemonette special character with three arms (one normal, one small pincer arm and one large pincer arm). Some of the parts in the current Chaos Spawn kit have things like arms splitting into several limbs or big spiky tentacles coming off the back. But then, this is Chaos, of course there is.
      • Every Tyranid has six limbs. Some have two pairs of legs, some have six limbs that aren't much use for more than moving. The rest have two (or six) pairs of arms. And both pairs are either blades designed to rip you apart or holding guns made to shoot small organisms at you (which proceed to rip you apart).
      • The ultimate enforcer of this trope is the Swarmlord, the top tier tyranid, with four arms each equipped with an utterly lethal bonesaber, capable of delivering a devastating curb-stomp to almost anyone in the galaxy.
      • Dark Eldar Wracks and Grotesques (hideous Frankstenian monsters, except they're made when the various parts are still alive and conscious) tend to have any number of limbs, some with incorporated weapons. Their creators, the Haemonculi, like to do this to themselves too. To a lesser extent, Dark Eldar Scourges are particularly brave/stupid individuals who have paid a Haemonculus to make them capable of flight via surgical modifications to hollow wings and add wings and flight muscles.
    • Necromunda:
      • In the 1st and 2nd Edition of the game, Mutants in a Scavvy gangs could purchase extra arms that allowed them to wield more weapons during combat.
      • The 1st and 2nd Edition rules for Pit Slave gangs gave their leaders, Pit Slave Chiefs, the option to take a number of extra bionic arms that allowed them to use multiple weapons during combat.
      • Spyre Patriarchs, from the 2nd Edition of the game, were equipped with four cybernetically controlled combat arms. Two of these arms were sported high powered lasers similar to those fitted to the Yeld suit, while the remaining two were equipped with a pair of crushing power claws.
      • Genestealer Hybrids typically have between two and four arms. The 3rd Edition rules for Genestealer Cult Gangs allow a player to purchase an extra arm for their fighters as an item of wargear, allowing them to easily handle an unwieldy weapon or to gain extra attacks in combat.
  • Gamma World:
    • Orlens are humanoids with four arms. They all have the telepathy and telekinesis mutations, and some of them have additional mutations such as poison claws and devolution.
    • Any mutant can have the Additional Body Parts mutation, which can be 1-10 additional arms. One example is the menarl, a giant water snake with 1-10 arms and tremendous strength.
  • Godforsaken: Esecran are multilimbed monstrosities that can attack every foe in close range with a different limb.
  • Heart Of The Sunken Lands:
    • Gorbles and Goroulyas are four-armed monsters.
    • Purples are large four armed creatures that can maul foes with their claws. If their opponents are at a distance they can throw boulders instead.
  • Judges Guild:
    • The Thieves of Fortress Badabaskor. The would-be deity Angall of the Perpetual Void had four arms. He normally fought with two +1 swords in his right hands and two +1 maces in his left hands.
    • The Treasure Vaults of Lindoran. In one room the PCs can fight a four-armed bear that's as strong as a giant.
    • Dark Tower. The Lesser Sons of Set and Chosen Sons of Set can have multiple arms. Manahath the Chosen, a Chosen Son of Set the P Cs will encounter at the end of the module, has two pairs of arms.
    • The Dungeoneer magazine #10, article "Monster Matrix". The Reflector Beast has four arms and can attack its enemies with a long, thin dagger in each hand, and it can split its attacks among up to four opponents at a time. It can also throw up to eight daggers per combat round at anyone who tries to be clever and stay outside of its melee range.
  • Old World of Darkness/New World of Darkness
    • The game Werewolf: The Apocalypse has the Ananasi werespiders, whose hybrid form has either six arms, six legs, or four of each (the player picks one at character creation). However, it takes a fairly high-level spell to be proficient at multitasking. It's also worth noting that the Bagheera wereleopards/panthers' most powerful spell is the Juddho form: a 12-foot, six-armed monstrosity in a state of frenzy for the spell's duration and wielding a flaming sword in each hand. Um yeah, one of multiple reasons why Vampires were never strong in India.
    • In the Promethean: The Created setting, Pandoran transmutations are capable of granting extra limbs. There is also a Sourcebook which provides a multi-armed fighting style. The title of the Prometheans who work to cause decay, the Centimani, means "Hundred-Handed". Most Centimani are usually content with a few extra pairs of limbs, tentacles and maybe some redundant organs, but there isn't much that stops a truly ancient, powerful and horrific Centimanus from adopting a hundred arms and fifty heads like Hecatonchires, their namesake monster.
    • Two examples from Vampire: The Masquerade. First and foremost are the Tzimisce, whose clan specialty, Vicissitude, allows them to mold living beings — higher levels and sufficient skill could allow them to grant extra limbs to whatever they desire. And their clan-exclusive Path of Enlightenment encourages experimentation. One such experiment was the bloodline called the Blood Brothers, who were created in packs and had an ability that, at higher levels, could allow them to "borrow" body parts (frequently limbs for attacking) from others in their pack.
    • Demons from Demon: The Descent can buy several sets of extra limbs for their demon form at character creation, with the option to buy even more as they increase in power, although "limbs" in this case is a bit of a stretch as they includes things like lengths of chain with butchers hooks on the end, industrial vices that orbit the demons body and crab pincers attached to its back by lengths of plasma. Bonus points for being able to manifest these in human form with only a slight amount of effort.
  • Pathfinder introduced the kasatha (mask-wearing tribesfolk), the shobhad (effectively Green Martians), and the witchwyrd (enigmatic arcane nomads), all of which have four arms. Starfinder made kasatha a core race, re-introduced the other two as playable options, and added the skittermanders (adorable, cooperative downplayed Heavyworlders with six arms).
  • Rifts (and also Palladium Fantasy) has Rahu-Men, four-armed giants who can wield giant-sized weapons in each hand.
  • RuneQuest:
    • In the default world of Glorantha, the giant Grotarons (a.k.a. Trimanes and Maidstone Archers) have a third arm where their head would be (and eyes on the backs of their hands and a mouth in their solar plexus...) They use massive bows, held in their left and right arms and drawn with their top arms.
    • Supplement Dorastor: Land of Doom. The Chaos creature Yeachi has four arms. It uses them to fire arrows from two bows at once in ranged combat or hit opponents with the bows (attacking with them as if they were staffs) in melee combat.
  • Old-school Talislanta has the Ahazu, a four-armed jungle-dwelling Berserker Proud Warrior Race.
  • Varanae:
    • Green Giants have four arms.
    • Nara-Simha are humanoids with the heads of lions and six long arms that end in powerful claws.

    Toys 
  • BIONICLE:
    • Nocturn, with two arms for holding swords, one for holding his Squid Launcher, and one that's just his tentacle. He used to have two tentacled arms, but one was cut off by Pridak, which regenerated without the tentacle.
    • Gorast, thanks to shapeshifting herself into an insectoid form.
    • The Frostelus species in its entirety.
    • And in the 2015 reboot, Skull Slicer.
  • Hero Factory: XT4 and Speeda Demon.
  • LEGO Space Police: Frenzy (even described in a log video as "multi-armed and dangerous")
  • The Transformers has had a few figures with extra arms over the years, either deliberately or as a result of fans being able to tweak the transformation. For example, the G1 Autobot Repugnus could have his mantis-like monster arms unfolded and deployed when he was in robot mode while Insecticon Kickback had four arms normally. In the "War For Cybertron: Siege" subline, Shockwave came with extra bits that let him add a second pair of arms that each ended with an Arm Cannon instead of a hand, while the Brunt could form an extra set of arms with large claws that attached to another character.

    Visual Novels 
  • One of the Bloodmetry scenes in Spirit Hunter: NG reveals that Kakuya has two extra arms stored in her traditional garb, larger and more bloody than the delicate ones she usually has on display. At the end of the game, when she's trapped Akira and plans to have 'grown-up' fun with him, she transforms into a Humanoid Abomination that has three claw-tipped arms.
  • In We Know the Devil, Jupiter gains these when possessed by the devil, and in the True Ending.

    Web Animation 

    Web Comics 
  • The main characters in the furry webcomic At Arm's Length come from a race of magical beings that naturally is four-armed. The ladies kick monster behind to protect mortals while keeping their magical origins secret from society at large.
  • In Champions of Far'aus, Digressa, one of Sarengal’s Zealots, has two arms hanging off of her back that become functional after she dies and becomes undead, giving her a total of four swords to fight with at once. Daryl realizes he can’t get close enough to land a hit during their fight as the extra limbs allow her to both defend and attack at the same time. Rom’s Imagine Spot implies this is the case for Sarengal’s other zealots as well.
  • In Coga Nito, Niko gains an additional pair of arms as Smooth Criminal when combining with two robots at once.
  • In El Goonish Shive, the spider-like Aberration has 3 pairs of arms which he uses to wield 6 knives.
  • In Fite!, Lucco grows six extra arms when in "God of Boxing" mode.
  • Girl Genius:
    • Baron Wulfenbach's secretary Boris wields four swords to great effect against the Hive Engine bugs.
    • Similarly, the four-armed English noblewoman Ariadne Steelgarter is able to wield a combination of bladed weapons and guns; whether there is any connection between her and Boris remains unknown. She is also able to stab two soldiers when she changes her mind about surrendering, because they forgot they had to hold all her arms.
  • The Nemesites in The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob!, being insectoids, naturally have four arms.
  • Nikitaks, from the Inhuman universe, have 4 arms, all of which can also be used as legs. And razor-sharp claws on every arm.
  • An unusual example in I Was Kidnapped by Lesbian Pirates from Outer Space!!! in that Jane is a four-armed alien who fights with a single pistol. Though her extra arms do come in handy in other dangerous situations.
  • Jagganoth's Yenenman Mantle form in Kill Six Billion Demons has a seemingly near-infinite number of arms, each one wielding a weapon (mostly swords) and extending behind their body akin to that of the Thousand-Hands Bodhisattva. The true number is unknown, but according to the (somewhat contradictory) lore the number could be 500, 1000, or 80,000.
  • Leaving the Cradle has a whole species of multi-armed aliens. Of whom, Nea Khtara certainly qualifies as a badass, being able to swing humans around like ragdolls and bending a steel pipe with one hand.
  • Metompsychosis Union: Mag has four arms, which he uses to quite effectivley disarm and beat up guards while escaping the docks.
  • In The Order of the Stick, this is one of Durkon's (as well as all the other dwarves thus far appearing in the strip) fears concerning trees: they have so many "arms" that they'd be able to attack you dozens of times per turn. That trees don't actually move doesn't dissuade his fears. They're just waiting for the right moment to overthrow us all.
  • Several cosmic entities in Problem Sleuth have multiple arms, most definitely inspired by Hinduism. Most notable are Godhead Pickle Inspector and Black Hole Mobster Kingpin, although GPI doesn't exactly fit the "dangerous" part.
  • Ruby Quest: Tom has an extra pair of arms. They're much smaller than his main pair and are usually concealed under his shirt, but give at least one opponent a very nasty surprise.
  • Schlock Mercenary
    • Subverted when it's pointed out that a four-armed alien has the same type of eyes as a human, and as a result, even if he can handle four guns at a time, he can still only aim at one target, same as everyone else.
    • Played straighter with the title Sergeant Schlock who can extrude additional arms as needed. We never did get to see the twin sawn-off multi-cannon and plasma gun combo in action, though.
  • Sleepless Domain: The monster that breaches the Inner Barrier in Chapter 8 is a massive, formless amalgamation of body parts, with any number of arms attached to its amorpheous "body" at any given time. What's more, each of these abnormally long limbs branches off into a web of numerous smaller arms, constantly shifting and reforming and extending to pull its victims in closer.
  • Sparklecare: Dr. Doom has 4 arms and 4 legs. Although it's kind of ambiguous how innocent he is, his limbs are definitely the creepiest parts of his design.
  • The heroine of the Krakow Studios comic Spinnerette cribs another hero's origin story and gets four new arms out of the deal.
    • Another character in another Krakow comic is a demon schoolgirl naga who also has six arms. Maybe the creator just likes ladies with extra arms?
  • During her recovery after her transformation the main character of Surprising Octeal is attacked by a mad super the author affectionately dubbed "Machamp Norris".
  • Val and Isaac has the four-armed mercenary Space Dread.
  • Grontar in the webcomic Zap!!: a huge four-armed mechanic.

    Web Original 
  • 4chan gives us Ball of Arms Man, created from a Mutants & Masterminds DM's complaint about a player who wanted to make a character who'd spent all his powers on Additional Limbs. He's a sentient portal to the Elemental Plane of Arms, meaning that he has pretty much an infinite supply of arms.
  • Chuck Norris Facts: There is no chin beneath Chuck Norris's beard; there is only another fist.
  • SCP Foundation:
    • SCP-1420 ("Tartary Eggs"). A creature that hatched from SCP-1420 grew to large size and sprouted large arms ending in bird beaks. It killed several people before being terminated.
    • SCP-1788 ("The Adults"). Adult forms of SCP-1788-1 appear to be extremely obese human beings with two extra arms located below their main ones. Their bones are reinforced with heavy metals and their muscles have been interwoven with carbon nanotubes, giving them superhuman strength, speed, and durability.
  • The Slender Man Mythos: Slendy, Humanoid Abomination that he is, is often shown with lots of arms/tentacles / branches/whatever they are.
  • Jack from What Is This Black Magic You Call Science'' can have up to eight arms, each one representing one of his eight tails, since his human form is an illusion covering his true form.
  • In Worm, the Endbringer Tohu has four clawed arms.

    Western Animation 
  • In the Æon Flux animated series, there was a very very brief shot of Trevor with a four-armed assassin. However, she was beset by bees almost immediately upon her introduction and was killed shortly (due to an allergic reaction to bee stings). Talk about one-shot.
  • In the Buttons and Mindy Superhero Episode "Super Buttons" from Animaniacs, Buttons battles a carnivorous spider person (the mayor's own words) atop City Hall, an anthro spider supervillainess with four arms. She puts all four hands to use operating a giant fly swatter to put Buttons out of commission.
  • Avatar: The Last Airbender has a really weird "daydream" of Aang's that had Appa standing on his backmost pair of legs while the other four each had a katana. He also saw Guru Pathik with six arms.
  • Ben 10 has a few multi-armed alien species. The ones Ben uses both have two sets of eyes to match their arms.
  • The Bots Master: The robot Ninjzz is a three-armed asymmetrical variant. He only has one right arm, which is a crossbow Arm Cannon, while he has two left arms designated for wielding his various ninja weapons.
  • In an episode of Danny Phantom, we are introduced to Pandora, a ghostly version of her Greek counterpart, but with an additional pair of arms.
  • In Duck Dodgers, Martian gophers (including Martian versions of Mac and Tosh) have six limbs. Since they're Funny Animals, this makes them multi-armed rather than hexapod.
  • In the episode "The Crawler" of the Extreme Ghostbusters, secretary Janine gets abducted by an insectoid king and was transformed into a moth-like creature with four arms. She later leads the king into thinking that she's truly transformed, and unleashes a ghost trap right in front of him by hiding it with her second pair of arms and wings that she acquired through said transformation. She gets better.
  • Zigzagged with Elzar, the four-armed Neptunian cooking show host in Futurama. It was revealed in one episode that during the 3007 economic depression, he made something called "Human Broth" to feed impoverished citizens. (It doesn't take a genius to figure out what it was made of.) Of course, whether that makes him dangerous to humans personally isn't known, and he probably doesn't do that anymore. (Well, probably. Stranger things happen on this show.)
  • Gadget Boy & Heather introduces a villainess with six arms and uses a spider theme. Unsurprisingly, she goes by the name of Spydra.
  • Another show by the same creative team of Ben 10 that features a multi-armed character is Generator Rex, where the character Breach, a psychotic-emo girl dressed in a sailor suit uniform with her hair draping over her face who underwent mutation with the activation of nanites that resided within her body, has a another set of arms protruding below her original set of arms (while the forearms of her original set has grown monstrously huge!). Strangely, she doesn't really seem to use her additional limbs all that much even while in combat. They usually just like to hang around while her upper limbs get the job done. Occasionally, she has been seen using those extra arms of hers... to only mimic and move in concert with the gestures her upper arms perform. To be fair, her overly humongous upper arms kinda blocks the use of her lower pair of arms for anything but making gestures. And besides, she also has the ability to generate and create numerous portals on a whim.
  • Jackie Chan Adventures:
    • In one episode Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy Hak Foo obtained the Bands of Shiva, a pair of bracelets that when worn made him grow extra arms.
    • Also, one of Shendu's siblings, Tso Lan, has two smaller arms underneath his main arms, and he's one of the strongest enemies on the show.
  • Several characters on Jimmy Two-Shoes, such as Molotov's unnamed wife, the Gnomans, the Racing Fleas, and a sizable number of background characters. A few of them also have multiple legs as well.
  • In the Megas XLR episode "DMV - Department of Megas Violations", Darklos the bounty hunter has an army of what seem to be humongous four-armed rhinoceri.
  • Four arms are a recurring element with Ninjago villains. There's Samukai, the Skullkin general in the first season, Stone Army General Kozu in the third season, Nadakhan and the Giant Stone Warrior in the sixth season, and Mr. E in the eighth season. Long-running antagonist Lord Garmadon gains an extra set of arms for a time in the third season, and this is referenced in The LEGO Ninjago Movie, where these are a feature he's had since he became Lord Garmadon. This tendency is because each line the villain was featured in had a MacGuffin corresponding to each of the four main ninja, and so having a four-armed villain poses the threat of them wielding all of them at once.
    • It became so much of a recurring element that Jay lampshades it when Mr. E uses the stolen Oni Mask of Vengeance to gain four arms.
      Jay: Four Arms? Like that's new.
  • Regular Show features two four-armed characters, a wrestler going by the name of Four-Armageddon, and Death's Wife.
    • Mordecai and Rigby also become merged into a two-headed, four-armed form during "Video Game Wizards."
  • In Samurai Jack, Jack had to defeat all nine of the champions at the Dome of Doom to survive and free the prisoners that were forced to fight. One of the champions is named Ganeesh, a Hindu deity-like creature with stereotypical Arabian clothing and swords, who has six arms and a sword in each.
  • Star vs. the Forces of Evil:
    • In the episode "Mewberty", Star's Bizarre Alien Biology-induced transformation into a purple butterfly-like being gives her six arms.
    • "Game of Flags" reveals Star's mother, Queen Moon, undergoes a similar transformation into a multi-armed humanoid butterfly when she "dips down" and taps into her full magical potential.
  • In Steven Universe, having extra sets of body parts (usually arms or eyes) is a common trait of fusions. Of the Crystal Gems' fusions, five out of seven have multiple arms. Then there's Malachite, a two-Gem fusion with THREE sets of arms, two of which function as legs.
  • In the canceled series Stripperella, a supervillainess going by the name of Pushy Galore has two (hidden) extra sets of arms due to, in her words, the fringe benefits of being a genetic physicist. After revealing her six-armed frame, she even tells Stripperella to call her Octo-Pushy. Sadly, she only gets screen time in one episode, though the slight perk is that she actually uses her six arms to do a multitude of actions that are lacking in many other animations featuring multi-armed characters (such as piloting and controlling a blimp with all six of her arms).
  • In Sweet Sea, Squidney can turn his tentacles into many different things, including a human hand, cages, and simply elongating them to steal things.
  • In Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1987), the turtles get attacked by an alien four-armed female assassin in the episode "Divide and Conquer." Living up to this trope's name, she quickly mops the floor with them.
    • Fists, a Gladiator Games competitor from "The Arena" has four very muscular arms and uses them to Drop the Hammer with great force.
    • In the 2012 turtles the mutant Spider Bytez has several spider arms on top of his head, which proves quite effective for fighting the turtles.
  • 3Below has Krel and Aja who have four arms each, and while nice, are not to be underestimated.
  • Totally Spies! had a villain of the week who was a ringmaster that wanted to use a mirror device to mutate and deform the masses into a freakshow as revenge for being mistreated. He was a sideshow himself, known as Octo-boy because he had two extra sets of arms, a fact he reveals as he physically confronts the spies for thwarting his plans. The girls can't help but compliment his tailor for making a suit that completely hides that fact.
  • The evil Dr. Killemoff from Toxic Crusaders was a four-armed pollution-breathing alien from the planet Smogula, and his two sets of arms is a trait shared by his fellow Smogulans.
  • An unused (read: toy-only) character from the Beast Machines / Transformers: Robots in Disguise cartoons named Bruticus (not to be confused with the G1 gestalt of the same name) could pop out a second pair of arms in robot mode. Appropriate, since his alt-mode was Cerberus.
  • Mecha-Shiva from The Venture Bros., at least according to the eponymous characters' court testimony against The Monarch.
  • The Third Arm Sash in Xiaolin Showdown acts as, well, a third arm for grabbing onto things. However, it is only used for its secondary ability to extend out to an arbitrarily long distance, so the characters can grab things out of reach. The only times it gets used in addition to both other arms is when the Monks use it to do chores.

 
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Goku vs. Caterpy

Goku's first opponent in the Otherworld Tournament is a giant caterpillar man, whose specialty is tickling his opponents into submission.

Example of:
Tickle Torture

Cordie becomes ...

General Grievous

Amygdala

Doctor Octopus

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Goku vs. Caterpy

Goku's first opponent in the Otherworld Tournament is a giant caterpillar man, whose specialty is tickling his opponents into submission.

How well does it match the trope?

4.8 (5 votes)

Example of:

Main / TickleTorture

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Goku vs. Caterpy

Cordie becomes ...

General Grievous

Amygdala

Doctor Octopus

Loptr