Tropes Media Browse Indexes Forums Videos Ask The Tropers Trope Finder You Know That Show... Trope Launch Pad Wishlist Reviews Tools
Cut List New Edits Edit Reasons Launches Images List Crowner Activity Un-typed Pages Recent Page Type Changes Changelog
Tips
Creating New Redirects Cross Wicking Tips for Editing Text Formatting Rules Glossary Edit Reasons Handling Spoilers Word Cruft Administrivia FAQ
Tropes HQ
About Us Contact Us Advertise DMCA Notice Privacy Policy Report Bug
Go Ad-Free Changelog
  • Show Spoilers
  • Night Vision
  • Sticky Header
  • Highlight Links
 

Follow TV Tropes

Following

Scary Teeth

Go To

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/christopher_walken_teeth.jpg
With chompers like those, maybe it's for the best his head was cut off...

Makoto: Nagisa, [Rin] called you a loser!
Nagisa: Ay yo, homeboy looks like Shark Week, I ain't messin' with that.
— 50% OFF

A character smiles, and it is revealed that his or her teeth are... disturbing.

This trope manifests in myriad ways, from teeth being all askew to being rotten, from being a mouthful of sharp fangs to metallic prostheses, and sometimes even there not being any teeth at all (cute in an infant, disturbing in an adult).

This trope works for a variety of reasons. One of the biggest is that trauma to the teeth is a Primal Fear for most people. Also, teeth are very much associated with youth, vigor and hygiene, so nasty teeth instantly give an image of sickness, dirtiness and malevolence. Sharp, fanged teeth are an universal identifier of a predator, too, so anyone who sees fangs or a maw full of sharp teeth will instantly feel threatened.

Can be an indicator of an evil character, although good ones aren't disqualified (though even the good characters with teeth like this will typically still have some bestial, brutish traits).

Related to Tombstone Teeth, and Fangs Are Evil. Sub-Trope to Monster Mouth. Super-Trope to both More Teeth than the Osmond Family and Jagged Mouth, where the teeth seem to be rigid extensions of whatever passes for the lips.

Examples:

    open/close all folders 

    Advertising 
  • In one of ABC's Saturday Morning Bod Squad PSAs, a character called the Yuck Mouth shows the result of not taking care of your teeth, as he has only a few teeth left in his mouth, and one of them is severely rotted.

    Anime and Manga 
  • Black Butler: Sebastian's true form has a mouthful, and he stills shows them sometimes in his butler guise.
  • One Piece:
    • Arlong and Hody Jones. Justified as they're both shark fishmen (a sawshark and a great white shark respectively).
    • Anyone can have these whenever they're angry or irritated at something (usually Luffy). Mostly Played for Laughs.
    • Of the Doflamingo Family, Dellinger shows these during his fight with Ideo revealing he is a fishman of fighting fish descent.
    • Losing his mask reveals that Jack the Drought has these, due to being a fishmash.
    • The half-mermaid Charlotte Praliné also has these, and it's justified as her father is said to have been a hammerhead shark merman.
    • Charlotte Katakuri has a mouth full of fangs under his scarf. It's unclear if it's hereditary (many of his siblings are Half Human Hybrids), but he hides it because of past mockery. His two triplet brothers, Daifuku and Oven, don't have those though.
  • Viral from Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann is a shark-type Beastman with feline genetics, and has the choppers to match.
  • Naruto:
    • Kisame Hoshigaki has pointed teeth, among other shark-like characteristics. Other members of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist also have such teeth, though unlike Kisame they usually look like normal humans in all other respects. And Kisame is the most prominent example because he has far more screen time than all of the others.
    • When Naruto initially taps into his Jinchūriki powers, his teeth — particularly his canine teeth — start changing into fangs.
  • Gyro Zeppelli in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Steel Ball Run is a rare protagonist example. His teeth are metallic and have "Go! Go! Zeppelli!" engraved on them. Most of the time his teeth are drawn normally, but when he throws a mischievous smile, the engravings can be seen, which can be a little jarring.
  • The titular character of Soul Eater and Giriko both have mouths entirely full of pointed teeth, neither of which is ever commented on.
  • Emperor Ganishka from Berserk looks like an Indian Santa Claus with a bear trap for a mouth.
  • Rin Matsuoka from Free! has pointed teeth for some reason (as a child he only had Cute Little Fangs). It's because his representative animal in the series is a shark, but in-universe no explanation is given.
  • Moral from Hamatora has shark-like teeth.
  • Nanana from Bleach has regular-shaped teeth, but they're colored black and gold (in a checkered pattern).
  • Kubera: Despite looking almost entirely human, Yuta actually has rows on rows of teeth in his mouth. We get an even clearer picture when we see Yuta hide Leez in his sura-form mouth to protect her from a hail of energy blasts. After their attacker leaves, Yuta anxiously wants Leez to come out but she's remarkably casual about getting stuffed into a mouth full of sharp, pointed teeth. She even cuts herself while climbing out but manages to keep her reaction to mild surprise/interest, going to show how hard she's trying to show she trusts her friend.
  • Yoichi Hiruma from Eyeshield 21 has these, and there's no in-universe explanation for them.
  • My Hero Academia:
    • Eijiro Kirishima has shark-like teeth, to fit with how his entire body gets sharp-edged whenever he uses his Hardening quirk.
    • The villain Moonfish really takes the cake as this is his Quirk. Specifically it's known as "Blade-Tooth" and lets him grow and control his teeth, with his preferred usage making LONG branching sharp fangs to stab people and move around with them. Combined with him being a Ax-Crazy death row inmate who may be a I Am a Humanitarian, and you got some very scary teeth.
    • One of All For One's old customers had a monstrous set of teeth as his Quirk. He, however, recieved scorn for this to the point of being disowned by his parents, causing him to seek All For One's aid to remove them in exchange for loyalty.
  • Hawk from Goemon Ishikawa's Spray of Blood has large metal teeth that would make Jaws proud. He rarely smiles, but when he does the effect is very intimidating.
    • Chlo, an assassin from Lupin III: Part 5, which is part of the same franchise, has filed teeth that can chew through metal. She even manages to catch Goemon's sword in her mouth.
  • Hime Mishiro from Mishiro-san to Yamada-kun has a mouth full of sharp teeth. They aren't pointed out too often, but it's revealed that a fair number of people find them unattractive (alongside her eyes, which combined with her teeth make her look a bit shark-like), and it upsets her when she hears people say it, though her friends don't think so. It's eventually revealed she inherited them from her mother. Presumably, people can just look like that naturally in this universe.
  • Helga's mouth in How to Treat a Lady Knight Right looks like a miniature bear trap. This does not in any way detract from her role as a Shrinking Violet.
  • Misago from Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou is a mermaid-like being that has a hard time making friends despite being kind, loving and good-natured because she has shark-like teeth. She actually is carnivorous, but the only flesh she eats is fish.
  • Hitomi from Hitomi-chan Is Shy with Strangers is drawn with this kind of teeth to emphasize her misleadingly scary face.
  • Frederica and Garfiel from Re:Zero have such teeth. Subaru once noted that Frederica would probably be a really pretty woman if she didn't have teeth like that. Both have such teeth because they are hybrids of humans and beastmen. Despite the creepy teeth, both are good guys, even if Garfiel isn't always the nicest.
    • The Gluttony triplets, Lye Batenkaitos, Roy Alphard, and Louis Arneb, who are collectively the Sin Archbishop of Gluttony, all have shark-like teeth.
  • The main character of Fire Force, Shinra Kusakabe, has sharp teeth that makes his smiles look far more malicious than they actually are. This is actually a hereditary characteristic, as his mom has similarly sharp teeth.
  • ST☆R: Strike it Rich: Ichika is drawn with shark-like teeth to emphasis the fact she is a rude Dirty Cop.

    Comic Books 
  • Batman:
    • In Batman: The Dark Knight Returns the leader of the Mutant gang has filed his teeth to points. He nearly bites a chunk out of Batman's shoulder during their first fight, and later uses them to rip out the mayor's throat.
    • This trope is also played with regarding the Joker and his teeth — depending on the artist, his teeth can be a nasty yellowed color (implying he probably doesn't brush them), drawn unevenly, drawn longer than or as being more prominent than normal, share space with far too many teeth for a normal human being, or a combination of more than one of these.
    • Robin (1993): Robin and Spoiler fight a gangster with uneven teeth one of which he's incredibly proud of which grew bizarrely long and which he had filed to a point to look like a tusk. Robin kicks it right out of his mouth.
    • Minor foe the Mirror Man has crooked uneven teeth that are a major part of his distinctive look.
    • The Batman Who Laughs from Dark Nights: Metal, as befitting a Jokerized Batman, as this, though Depending on the Artist, they can run the gamut from simply discolored to outright fangs.
    • Killer Croc, being a man born with crocodilian features, has a mouthful of fangs.
  • Gargamel in The Smurfs mostly appears with only one top tooth in his mouth in most comic book and cartoon show appearances.
  • Spider-Man: Tombstone has pointed teeth, because he purposely filed them that way to make himself look scary. The Power Man and Iron Fist series demonstrates in a flashback that he did this with other criminals as a part of conception for the Fang Gang, following the example of a piranha-like mutate on their team.
  • Wonder Woman:
    • Wonder Woman (1942):
      • The enforcer Milo sharpened his teeth to points, after his madness caused him to think his dentist had planted a receiver in one of them.
      • The "Earthworm"'s lips are shrunken and pulled away from his death like those of a dried corpse.
    • Wonder Woman (1987): Sakritt, like all Dominators, has long jagged teeth which she uses to great effect when she wants to be intimidating.
    • Wonder Woman: Warbringer: Fear gods Phobos and Deimos both have long sharp pointed teeth.
  • Gertrude of I Hate Fairyland is consistently drawn with crooked and mangled teeth.

    Fan Works 
  • By the Sea: Cody, like all merfolk, has a mouthful of sharp, pointed teeth, which is a helpful evolutionary adaptation when your diet consists primarily of raw seafood. Because of this, kissing (as humans understand it) and oral sex are not a custom in his culture, and he's initially horrified when he realizes that Obi-Wan seems to be moving his mouth towards his penis... until he discovers just what his lover can do with his mouth. Cody later declares the experience to be even better than chocolate and strawberries.
  • Subverted in The Keys Stand Alone: The Soft World by Mattagandas Bullslayer. He's got creepy pointed teeth that make the four uncomfortable, but they also feel he's being straight with them. He ultimately does turn out to be one of the few reasonably honest people they meet—not that it matters, since circumstances preclude their working with him.

    Films — Animated 
  • Scar, at least once, in The Lion King. The hyenas too. "Yes our teeth and ambitions are bared!"
  • Jafar from Aladdin, in his old man disguise, has jagged teeth of varying size and direction.◊
  • In Beauty and the Beast
    • While the servants instruct Beast on making a good impression for Belle, Mrs. Potts suggests that he smile. The Beast tries to, but we see The Unsmile showing More Teeth than the Osmond Family.
    • While Maurice is describing the Beast to the villagers, one of them asks "With a long, ugly snout?" and puts a glass mug over his mouth, which magnifies his crooked teeth.
  • Hades in Hercules has a lot of sharp teeth.
  • In Turning Red, when enraged Mei's fangs become very sharp.
  • King Candy in Wreck-It Ralph has sharp teeth after getting assimilated by a Cy-Bug.
  • One aspect of the unique look of Don Bluth's animated films is how the characters' mouths and teeth are designed: while pretty much all of Don Bluth's characters have very expressive mouths and lips, the "good" characters tend to have smaller, less visible teeth while the more villainous characters' teeth are far larger, sharper, and more animated to give them a more "predatory" look. Most Don Bluth villains, such as Drake, Carface, or Jenner, wear big, toothy grins most of the time and tend to snap their jaws as they speak.

    Films — Live-Action 
  • Carved (2018): The pumpkin gains a mouth full of sharp teeth as a part of its Nightmare Face not long after coming to life.
  • James Bond:
  • Jack has one for a moment in Fight Club, when he smiles at a fellow coworker during a meeting and his mouth is a bloody mess.
  • Shanghai Knights: During a chase scene, Roy runs into a demure-looking street vendor and starts putting the moves on her... then she smiles, revealing hideous rotting British Teeth. He understandably panics.
  • In Coneheads, the titular characters have this until they fix their teeth to blend better amongst humans: not only are their teeth shark-like, when they open their mouth wide, it shows endless rows of them.
  • Seth Brundle in The Fly (1986) slowly loses his teeth as the transformation progresses, making him look more inhuman and threatening. It also distorts his voice to the point that eventually his computer doesn't recognize it.
  • The Lord of the Rings:
    • Orcs have sharp, jagged teeth, made more horrifying by their lips being constantly pulled back, giving them a snarling expression.
    • If his slightly insulting behavior at the beginning of The Fellowship of the Ring hasn't suggested to you that Saruman might be a bad guy, his rather filthy teeth (compared to Gandalf's fairly healthy ones) really ought to have. They are, in fact, Christopher Lee's natural set, but they are made more pronounced by making his otherwise white beard dark around his mouth.
    • When the Mouth of Sauron appears in The Return of the King, his helmet covers up every part of his face except for his mouth, which often grins with elongated, pointy teeth covered in black ichor. Eugh. Special effects trickery was used to enlarge the actor's mouth to make it look even more freaky and uncanny. It is strongly implied that the reason the Mouth's teeth are so horrible is because hundreds of years of repeating Sauron's evil words was enough to rot his mouth and teeth.
  • Winslow Leach in Phantom of the Paradise had his teeth replaced with sharp stainless steel teeth while he was in prison.
  • Suicide Squad (2016) has both Killer Croc's jagged, pointy crocodile teeth, and a version of the Joker with unnerving metallic prostheses for teeth, which we get to see quite a lot thanks to a nigh permanent Slasher Smile.
  • In Sleepy Hollow (1999), the Hessian who would become the Headless Horseman has a mouthful of almost shark-like teeth, making an already vicious killer even more menacing.
  • In Snuff Movie, Teeth — one of the trio of teenage killers — has filed her teeth into points. She uses them to tear out Jack's throat.
  • Damage: John's first opponent in the underground fighting circuit is Scary Black Man Mr. Wolf. In addition to Animal Eyes, his sharpened like fangs and he likes to bite. He bites John in the forearm in their fight, leaving a nasty mark on his arm. John pays him back by knocking out one of his teeth, but it pierces his knuckle in the process.
  • Sputnik: The alien has teeth that can rip a human head open in order to feed on the hormones in the victim's brain. This doesn't help when the protagonist is Up Close with the Monster and trying not to feel fear to avoid generating those same hormones.
  • Ouija Mummy: Chase's teeth turn sharp and curved when he's turned into Ahotep the 1st's servant.
  • The Northman has a valkyrie with filed and colored teeth◊, based on actual Viking remains.
  • A subdued example and visual cue in Spider-Man to show whether it's Norman or the Goblin the audience is seeing: Norman has "perfect" teeth, and the Goblin has Willem Dafoe's natural smile, gap and all.
  • Alexa, the villain of Death Factory, has sharp metal teeth like a shark's.

    Literature 
  • In the Animorphs book The Escape, when the gang acquires a hammerhead shark morph, Marco becomes so obsessed with it he decides to try the morph out in the high school's swimming pool. He's only just started morphing, and the first thing that changes is his teeth turn into shark teeth. Then two bullies named Drake and Wu dive into the pool, and Wu insults Marco's (not actually) dead mother. Insulting his mother is such a Berserk Button for Marco that he seriously considers tearing Wu's throat out with his shark teeth. Luckily, Jake arrives and manages to talk him down.
  • Artemis Fowl
    • Mulch Diggums, like all dwarves in the setting, has some very large and intimidating teeth, described as looking like enamel tombstones. At one point, he intimidates a human mobster by giving him a good look at them.
    • Arno Blunt, The Dragon from The Eternity Code. After getting his teeth shattered early on in the book, he gets a number of interesting - and somewhat disturbing - prostheses.
  • The Conquerors Saga 's Lada (a female imagining of Vlad the Impaler) has small, sharp teeth that she uses in her fighting.
    • Another, different set of scary teeth, in the sequel Now I Rise, are those of Princess Vasilisa, Lada's mother: her teeth are eerily shattered from years of abuse at the hands of Lada's father.
  • Every time Vlad in Count and Countess is about to take a bite out of someone, he grins. The glimpse of artificially sharpened teeth serves as the victim's first and last warning.
  • In Discworld, Cohen the Barbarian has dentures made out of diamonds. In the Disc, diamond teeth are associated with trolls, so anyone who sees Cohen's is understandably disturbed.
  • The book In A Dark, Dark Room, by Alvin Schwartz of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark fame, features a retelling of a classic horror story simply titled "The Teeth." In the tale, a young boy asks a stranger for the time; the stranger then smiles to reveal a mouth full of teeth three inches long (for comparison, the average human tooth is a little more than half-an-inch long). The boy runs for it, only to encounter other strangers who, in a case of Serial Escalation, show longer and longer teeth (to the point where the third man's teeth are about an entire foot in length). Other versions of this story have the tale be All Just a Dream...until the boy calls for his parents and tells them about it, at which point they laugh and ask "Were they this long?", revealing even larger sets of choppers.
  • Pennywise in It can morph his teeth into a fanged maw.
    • Also in IT, Henry Bowers has "rotting, Maine back-woods teeth," described like the headstones in a graveyard gone to disrepair.
  • Hydrites from Maddrax also have creepy fangs. But they are essentially a peaceful and good-natured species. However, sometimes a person is frightened when a hydrite smiles at him and shows him its fangs in the process.
    • There is also a species of mutant vampire. They actually have ordinary teeth, but they file them to look like fangs so that they can bite their victims more effectively to get at their blood. Although there are some good people among them, these vampire mutants, unlike the hydrites, are a real threat to humans.
  • A Poison Dark And Drowning: When describing Callax, Henrietta says that his mouth is full of broken yellow teeth.
  • Red Dragon : The Tooth Fairy, for obvious reasons. Francis Dolarhyde likes to bite his victims, using a plate from his dead grandmother, who had terrible snaggle-teeth.
  • The Kahlirash'im are a religious sect that worships the eponymous destroyer god, The Rifter. They are known to file their teeth into points.
  • Apparently Randall Flagg in The Stand. "There were worse things than death. There were teeth." (illustrated rather well with a big lamprey-mouth sketch in the comic.)
  • Villains by Necessity: Nathauan have shark-like teeth, fitting as they eat their kind or humans, and it's very unsettling if one grins.
  • Elphaba from Wicked was born with a row of sharp teeth. She however is otherwise a subversion because she wasn't any crueler than any other baby. Elphaba's teeth and green skin are a side-effect of a potion given to her mother used to knock her out by Elphaba's biological father. As an adult, Elphaba's teeth are normal.

    Live-Action TV 
  • Storm of the Century: When he's doing something evil, Linoge will ocassionaly flash a mouth full of viper's teeth.
  • The Ferengi of Star Trek have a mouth full of pointy teeth that often stick out at odd angles. The predatory look complements their overall trollish appearance and racial hat as sleazy businessmen. In one episode of Deep Space Nine it's shown that they actually sharpen their teeth as casually as we humans might consider brushing.
  • The savage mercenary Essa from The Outpost has sharp pointy teeth, which she uses to tear apart and feed on those she kills, even during combat.

    Music 

    Music Videos 
  • One of the last mouth close-up shots of the "Weird Al" Yankovic's "Bedrock Anthem" (a parody of Music/ Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Give It Away") has dinosaur teeth. A memorable, and hilarious left-field gross-out moment. Al also has a scary set of teeth in the latter end of the video for "I Love Rocky Road".
  • The Guy of Disturbed has this and Glowing Eyes of Doom as his trademark appearance.

    Video Games 
  • All the bosses in Bendy in Nightmare Run have jagged cartoon teeth and are constantly frowning. Titular protagonist Bendy - a demon - not so much.
  • Killer Instinct has Hisako, the spirit of a child who died protecting her village hundreds of years ago. She can open her mouth to inhuman lengths, but doing so also reveals a bunch of monstrous teeth in said mouth.
  • In The Elder Scrolls, the Bosmer within their homeland of Valenwood are bound by the Green Pact, a deal their ancestors struck with the forest's patron deity promising to never harm the plant life within. As a result, they live on an almost exclusively carnivorous diet, including other sentient races under certain circumstances. As a result, some of the "less civilized" Bosmer who still live deep within the forests have been known to sharpen their teeth into points.
  • Death Park: The Monster Clown has a mouth of sharp teeth.
  • Friday Night Funkin': One of the Monster's disturbing traits are his pink/red teeth that contort in grotesque ways as he sings about cooking the protagonist and his girlfriend.
  • Funtime with Buffy: Buffy has a mouth full of sharp teeth.
  • The sorcerer from Intrepid Izzy has a mouth full of sharp teeth.
  • The Legend of Zelda:
    • In The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, the Zora all have sharp, carnivorous teeth, but they're generally nice and unintimidating people, with Prince Sidon's teeth in particular being very sharp and shark-like but veering more toward Cute Little Fangs thanks to his Nice Guy personality and friendly Twinkle Smile. It's played more straight with the elderly royal adviser Muzu, whose teeth are more spaced out due to age in a way that gives them an appearance similar to an angler fish's, and who starts off with a brusque personality and an intense prejudice against Hylians.
    • In The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, the Zonai, a race of long-snouted Beast Men, have sharp, carnivorous teeth. Much like with the Zora, the "scary" part is usually deemphasized due to the Zonai characters we see being very benevolent, but Rauru's enraged teeth-baring when Ganondorf mocks him over the murder of his wife Sonia shows how they can look intimidating when the situation calls for it.
  • Yakushi Nyorai from Namu Amida Butsu! -UTENA- has a mouth full of shark-like teeth, which doesn't show up much until he randomly snaps and becomes a Laughing Mad berserker with a terrifying Slasher Smile.
  • Persona 5 provides at least two examples.
    • Official artwork of Ryuji in his Skull costume tend to portray him with sharp, shark-like teeth, which is most noticeable in his All-Out Attack portrait.
    • It's hard to see in-game, but the Traitor's true Persona, Loki has a set of pointed red teeth.
  • Persona Q2: New Cinema Labyrinth: The offical artwork of Futaba portrays her having sharp teeth.
  • The Aumaua of Pillars of Eternity are known for their unusual skin tones, towering physique, and the row of shark teeth they have. The portrait for one companion, Kana Rua, display these prominently, and a few characters comment they're glad someone with such intimidating teeth and size is a Gentle Giant and Wide-Eyed Idealist.
  • SongBird Symphony: While some real life birds have some kinds of almost teeth, they are NOT shark-like. Or able to create a "smile" literally ten times larger than their beak. Guess the Big Bad never heard of that, though.
  • Kazuichi Soda from Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair has a set of jagged teeth. They might be natural, or he might have filed them himself in order to look intimidating.

    Webcomics 

    Web Original 
  • The Big Dad Wolf: When Holan finds himself in the hospital nursery in werewolf form, one of the babies is stirring and making noise. Holan tries telling him it's gonna be okay and smiling at him... showing off a huge mouth full of sharp teeth, which frightens the baby, causing it to cry.
  • DSBT InsaniT: Ice Beasts have teeth that resemble icicles.
    • Killer Monster's jagged teeth give him a constant Slasher Smile.
  • In Hazbin Hotel all demons have maws filled with sharp teeth, though some of the more benevolent ones somehow keep the teeth human... most of the time.

    Western Animation 
  • The Batman:
    • The Joker, as mentioned above, has a gaping mouthful of bright yellow teeth with jigsaw-like protrusions and holes, causing them to slot together in a highly unnatural fashion.
    • The same series also gives these to Oswald Cobblepot, the Penguin, with a frankly shark-like array of jagged, pointed fangs.
  • Kuki Sanban (Numbuh 3) of Codename: Kids Next Door sometimes slips into this when she gets into her more vicious moods.
    Numbuh 3: Don't worry, mister fuzzy, (pulls out an electric razor menacingly) this won't hurt a bit!◊
  • On Dexter's Laboratory and The Powerpuff Girls, some characters will briefly have sharp teeth if they're really angry or malicious.
  • On one of the The Fairly OddParents! pilots, Cosmo and Wanda lose control of their magic and accidentally give Tootie bear trap teeth... right as she got Timmy at Spin the Bottle.
  • In My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic Nightmare Moon has fangs...which tend to look slightly creepy on a horse.
  • Ren in Ren & Stimpy. Especially in "Ren's Toothache", where he refuses to brush his teeth and they eventually rot and fall off.
  • The Secret Show: Doctor Doctor's teeth have rotted to the point that they wiggle every time she speaks above a whisper.
  • The Smurfs: The Legend of Smurfy Hollow gives us a nice close-up view of the few teeth that are left in Gargamel's mouth.
  • In the SpongeBob SquarePants episode "SB-129", Patrick's Precambrian ancestor gives Squidward a big smile for no apparent reason.
  • In both Time Squad and Hudson Hawk, this is why Leonardo da Vinci ends up painting the Mona Lisa with a closed-mouth smile.
  • The unsuccessful pilot for the Wacky Races revival series Wacky Races Forever depicts the villains, Dick Dastardly and a new character called Viceroy, as having ugly and neglected-looking teeth.

    Real Life 
  • Domestic dogs, with their cute wet noses and wagging tails, also have incisors and sharp, outward-pointing canine teeth that can really scare people, especially those who fear dogs, when they snarl or even just grimace or grin. Even "toy" breeds such as Chihuahuas have this. This is rarely used in fiction except with Hellhounds and Mr. Muffykins.
  • Pretty much any animal in the order Carnivora has these. Even the ones that rarely eat meat at all, like pandas, still have fairly sharp canines.
  • Sharks are the living version of this trope. Certain species can have hundreds of teeth in their mouth at once. Sharks regularly lose their teeth, but they are constantly regrowing and replacing their teeth, so they never run out. A single shark can produce many thousands of teeth over its lifetime.
  • Even though they’re not technically teeth, the sharp beak of Dunkleosteus was designed to slice through armor and bone, and they constantly sharpened themselves by rubbing together. Just take a look.◊
  • Thylacoleo, an extinct carnivore related to wombats, had teeth similar to both its relatives that also vaguely resembled the beak of the aforementioned Dunkleosteus. However, Thylacoleo's teeth were made for hunting, and was speculated to act like a guillotine.
  • Basal cetaceans, such as Pakicetus, had rows of sharp teeth similar to a shark's.
    • Modern toothed cetaceans aren't much better.

 
Feedback

Video Example(s):

Cordie becomes an outlaw

Waylon teaches Cordie to be a gunslinging outlaw. Cordie, being a spider monster, turns out to be far more terrifyingly effective at this than he'd anticipated.

Example of:
Gone Horribly Right

The Trope Namer

The Grotesqueries

Alternative Title(s): Nasty Teeth

Previous

Index

Next

  • Show Spoilers
  • Night Vision
  • Sticky Header
  • Wide Load

Important Links

Ask The Tropers Trope Finder You Know That Show... Trope Launch Pad Wishlist Reviews Go Ad Free!
Crucial Browsing
Resources
Top

Cordie becomes an outlaw

Waylon teaches Cordie to be a gunslinging outlaw. Cordie, being a spider monster, turns out to be far more terrifyingly effective at this than he'd anticipated.

How well does it match the trope?

5 (6 votes)

Example of:

Main / GoneHorriblyRight

Media sources:

Report

Cordie becomes ...

The Trope Namer

The Grotesqueries