A Gas Chamber would be any room or facility where the victim will suffocate to death or be asphyxiated. An actual equivalent to the Gas Chamber might be used, a room where [[DeadlyGas noxious or poisonous gas]] is being fed through the ventilation system. Or, it could be a room with a vacuum sucking all the air out, or people could just be [[AlmostOutOfOxygen left in a sealed room]] to eventually choke on their own carbon dioxide.

Serious NightmareFuel, with the extra horror of being TruthInTelevision for several million people during [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarTwo The Holocaust.]] A villain contemplating using one has usually crossed the MoralEventHorizon of villainy.



[[folder: Anime ]]

* ''Anime/SaberRiderAndTheStarSheriffs'' had an episode in which Sabre Rider went to the Outworld and confronted the main baddie, who proceeded to suck the oxygen out of the room, as he himself didn't need it.
* This is what happens to [[spoiler: Hinamizawa's population under the "Disaster of Hinamizawa" natural disaster coverup]] in ''VisualNovel/HigurashiWhenTheyCry''.
* In ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamWing'', [[TheLancer Duo]] and [[ArrogantKungFuGuy Wufei]] are trapped in a little cell along with [[MadScientist Professor G]]. The amount of air is limited (they are in space, after all), and Professor G says something along the lines of "If anyone wants to die, they should do so, and save some oxygen for the rest of us!"
* In an early chapter of the Manga/LupinIII manga, a guard said Lupin would be heading to the GasChamber. [[SympatheticInspectorAntagonist Inspector Zenigata]] knows that the method of execution at this particular joint is the electric chair and any guard would've known that. He has just enough time to figure out the guard is actually Lupin in disguise before Lupin [[XanatosBackfire uses this knowledge against him]] and he sets off to rescue the guard Lupin sent to be electrocuted in his place. This story was adapted into the Anime/LupinIIIGreenJacket episode [[Recap/LupinIIIS1E4 "One Chance to Breakout"]].


[[folder: Comic Books ]]

* ''{{Tintin}} in America'' had bandits drop Tintin into one through a TrapDoor, before dropping his corpse in the Michigan. In the comic, they [[DeusExMachina unintentionally used the wrong gas]] (a soporific) instead; in the animated version, there is no mention made of the soporific being a mistake ([[MakeItLookLikeAnAccident a drowning looks more "accidental"]]), and Tintin is rescued from the Lake by Snowy instead.
* In ''Comicbook/ThePunisherCircleOfBlood'', Punisher is dropped through a TrapDoor into Trust's brainwashing chamber, and sedative gas is there to greet him. However, he easily escapes since he was dropped in with his gear, and the room was built with defenseless targets for "reidentification therapy" in mind.


[[folder:Fan Fic]]
* In the ''WesternAnimation/KimPossible'' fanfic ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/9565191/1/An-Old-Foe-Returns An Old Foe Returns]]'', Mastermind attempts to test his formula that would diminish humanity's mental capacities on Kim and Ron through this manner. It's only through quick thinking and creativity that they escape.


[[folder: Film ]]

* ''Film/SawII'' had a gas '''house'''.
* ''Franchise/StarWars Episode I: Film/ThePhantomMenace'' features at the beginning the Nemoidan Trade Federation trying to gas the ambassador Jedi (or heavily-armed religious fanatics, depending on your perspective).
* ''Film/IWantToLive!'' [[spoiler: Barbara is executed inside a gas chamber.]]
* The unseen BigBad of ''[[Franchise/PoliceAcademy Police Academy 6]]'' pulls this on Lassard when he reaches the meeting room, and Lassard is a little surprised he'd use such an old one:
-->'''Lassard:''' Oh, ''come on''! Poison gas??
-->'''Villain:''' Yes, melodramatic I know, but effective.

[[folder: Literature ]]

* The original ''Literature/SherlockHolmes'' short stories:
** The "Devil's Foot" had a character place the title root--an obscure poison from Africa--into an oil lamp. The lamp was then lit, releasing the poison into the air and causing death and brain damage to the killer's victims. [[spoiler:The murderer is later killed in the same way himself.]] This one nearly killed Holmes and Watson when Holmes (in a rare moment of holding the IdiotBall) experimented with the root to see if it's the culprit.
** In "The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter", the baddies attempt to kill their victim with charcoal gas.
* Another murderer used the poisoned candle M.O. in Creator/EdgarAllanPoe's ''The Imp of the Perverse''.
* The poisoned candle trick shows up again in the Literature/{{Discworld}} novel ''Discworld/FeetOfClay''.
* ''[[Literature/DreamPark The Barsoom Project]]'' has a sealed room with a window air conditioner which runs backwards to suck the air out.
* In Creator/RobertEHoward's Franchise/ConanTheBarbarian story "Literature/RoguesInTheHouse", a glass wall falls down in a room, and the dust of the gray lotus is used, which drives them murderously insane.
* The vacuum version is used in ''Literature/InHeroYearsImDead'' involving a memorabilia room that the heroes are trapped in.
* The Creator/RaymondChandler short story "Nevada Gas" uses the well-sealed backseat of a limousine.


[[folder: Live Action TV ]]

* ''Series/ThePrisoner'' episode "The Girl Who Was Death" had a room filled with poison-releasing candles that would explode if extinguished. [[spoiler:The Prisoner escaped - this trap, at least - by placing all of the candles against the outer door and blowing them out with bellows.]]
* A ''Franchise/SherlockHolmes'' mystery ("The Case of the Exhumed Client", with Ronald Howard as Holmes; one of the many mysteries specially created for one of the many TV series) involved a person who died from a candle he didn't know was poisoned. [[spoiler:Holmes flushed out the murderer by closing everyone in a small room and lighting the candle. The murderer, preferring a blown cover to death, broke the window.]]
* One of the urban legends busted by Series/{{Mythbusters}} involves a man who, after a particularly starchy dinner, falls asleep in a small unventilated room and asphyxiates on his own flatulence.
* In an episode of ''Series/{{Angel}}'', an angry client tries to kill Gwen and Angel with a modified elevator and poison gas. Luckily, vampires don't need to breathe.
* ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'' had Angel rescuing Giles, Willow and Buffy from the high school basement, where they were locked in with the gas turned on by an angry invisible girl.
* In the ''Series/StargateSG1'' episode "Dominion," Daniel gets caught in a room that is accidentally being flooded with toxic gas. Despite trying to breathe through his clothing, he inhales the gas for several minutes before the leak is shut off, but he seems to suffer no side effects whatsoever.
* In ''Series/{{Farscape}}'' the Scarrans use a chamber flooding with paralytic gas. On learning he's trapped in one John yells, "Staleek, this is very unoriginal!"
* One stunt on ''FearFactor'' involved enduring a sealed chamber that filled with CS gas longer than anyone else.
* ''{{CSI NY}}'' -the taxicab killer turned his cab into a mobile one of these.
* One episode of ''Series/MidnightCaller'' had Jack Killian interviewing a condemned man before his execution via gas chamber.
* An episode of ''Series/ThePretender'' had Jarod as a prison guard, trying to clear a man before he can be executed via gas chamber. He gets the real killer to talk by locking him in the gas chamber during a practice run, then releasing gas (it wasn't really poisonous, but the baddie didn't know that) until the guy confessed.
* ''Series/{{Batman}}'' had a cliffhanger were Batman and Robin were tied up in a room while the Penguin's mooks sucked all the air out using a "Giant Reversing Bellows".


[[folder: Roleplay]]

* In ''Roleplay/DinoAttackRPG'', the entire XERRD Fortress became a facility-wide version of this trope once the DeadlyGas defense system was activated.


[[folder: Tabletop Games ]]

* In the 1E [[TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons AD&D]] module ''The Hidden Shrine of Tamoanchan'', the entire ''dungeon'' is this trope, at least until the [=PCs=] manage to open up some blocked ventilation passages.


[[folder: Video Game ]]

* The videogame adaptation of ''VideoGame/TheThing'' has a scene where the protagonist is lured into a room quickly being filled with poison gas. The message left on a computer screen in the room is a nice touch:
-->Breathe deep, Blake. Breathe deep and die.
* ''VideoGame/StarFoxAdventures'' had such a room: you had to [[BlockPuzzle push blocks around]] while a special meter started emptying. This troper has never seen whether an empty meter means your life gauge starts emptying, or whether you got a failure cutscene, or whether you lost a life, but when you succeeded, the door would open, letting good air in[[spoiler:, and also dropping the bars holding the Queen [=CloudRunner=] captive]].
* ''VideoGame/{{Portal}}'' ends with [[spoiler:[=GLaDOS=] attempting to flood the final battle area with a deadly neurotoxin after Chell destroys her [[RestrainingBolt morality core]]. She's quite nasty about it too, taunting Chell about her impending death from the deadly neurotoxin (along with jabs of a more personal nature.)]]
* ''[[VideoGame/{{Onimusha}} Onimusha 3]]'' had a gas chamber trap where you had to unlock the door by completing a "simon says" minigame before you succumb to the fumes.
* ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublic II'' features the Jekk'Jekk Tarr, a bar for aliens on Nar Shaddaa where the atmosphere is toxic to humans. It also had the HK-50 unit turn the entire dormitory section of the Peragus mining facility into one of these by sabotage. Both games let ''you'' use computer terminals to release poison gas on enemies as opposed to fighting them directly.
* ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid'' does this for a few spots if you get caught and one room where it will happen as a part of a storyline. In each case, gas fills the room and you quickly lose oxygen, but having an O2 mask equipped will slow it down. In two of these cases, there is no way to escape, and in the first, you don't even have the O2 mask. There is one room where gas is already there and you're forced to go through. Said area also has electrified floors, just in case, apparently.
* The original ''VideoGame/MetalGear'' and ''VideoGame/MetalGear2SolidSnake'' also had gas-filled rooms that you had to traverse.
* Tifa of ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII'' gets tossed into a gas chamber for a public execution midway through the game, and has to pick up the conveniently dropped key to her shackles with her feet to escape. Unlike other segments in the game, there is no time limit on this sequence - no matter how long you struggle, Tifa cannot be killed.
* MetalWolfChaos turns the entire city of Chicago into one big GasChamber for our hero. He needs to destroy the antitoxin canisters and seal the generators before the toxin level reaches lethal levels.
* ''VideoGame/{{Doom}} 3'': An entire level is made into one of these, and you have to find the ventilation switch.
--> '''[[spoiler:Dr. Betruger]]''': There's nothing left for you but a slow death as your lungs fill with toxic gases.
* In the original ''VideoGame/PerfectDark'', you must flee a room flooded with nerve gas during your escape from {{Area 51}}.
* In ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion'', several [[RuinsForRuinsSake Ayleid ruins]] contain an interesting variation on this: step into an empty portion of a large room, and walls will slam down, temporarily trapping you while the room is pumped with gas. There are also rooms that simply have vents that always emit toxic gas.
* The original ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil'' had a couple of poison gas {{death trap}}s that activated if you did a puzzle wrong. In ''VideoGame/ResidentEvilCodeVeronica'', a gas leak [[BrokenBridge blocks your progress]], and you have to find a way to activate the ventilation system to clear it.
* In ''VideoGame/TheJourneymanProject'', the NORAD VI installation is flooded with sleeping gas, requiring you to obtain an oxygen mask before you go there.
* There are three rooms in ''VideoGame/BatmanArkhamAsylum'' that end up getting filled with Smilex, forcing Batman to find a way to activate the ventilation system to purge the gas.
* Parodied in ''VideoGame/BarkleyShutUpAndJamGaiden'', where at one point your party is trapped inside a cabin which is slowly filled with sugar substance[[note]]Sugar is treated as deadly in this game. The fact that diabetes is a status effect speaks for itself.[[/note]]. [[spoiler:The trap fails.]]
* ''VideoGame/{{Prototype}}'' has it in the form of Bloodtox, a gas harmless to anyone not infected by the virus. Alex, a man made up entirely of infected material, discovered this fact when it was announced to a room full of soldiers he had infiltrated, that they had been exposed to the gas for the last ten minutes. His disguise didn't last long.
* ''VideoGame/RatchetAndClankUpYourArsenal'' invokes this with an entire arena, requiring you to beat all the enemies before Ratchet succumbs. It's just sleeping gas, but it works by [[FridgeHorror depleting your health bar.]]
* There's a whole level dedicated to this in ''VideoGame/DeadSpace''. Standing too close to one of the Wheezers for too long will cause Isaac to die. Also, Isaac sometimes has to go out into the vacuum of space.
* In ''VideoGame/DinoCrisis'' there is a scientist trapped in a room filled with gas. You need to resolve a puzzle to neutralize the gas and open the door. If you're successful, the dying scientist gives you a key you need to advance. After that, if you search at his corpse, you find an extra key that you can use to get some goods. You can kill the scientist by accident, or [[VideogameCrueltyPotential on purpose]], flooding the room with letal gas, but doing that, you only get the first key. After getting the key, you get ambushed by a velociraptor. You must survive a [[PressXToNotDie button-mashing event]] to escape from the room, leaving the dinosaur trapped. After that, you can kill the raptor using the computer to fill the room again with gas, poisoning him.
* ''TheSuffering'' takes place in a haunted Maryland prison. One of the characters is the former executioner, Hermes T. Haight. Hermes enjoyed his work, and his favorite method of execution was the gas chamber. He altered the gas to retain it's color and odor, so that he could watch the prisoner's reactions as the chamber was flooded. Eventually, he became so obsessed with the gas, that he decided he needed to experience for himself. In the game, Hermes returns as a gaseous ghost who's always breathing in his own fumes. Late in the game he becomes a boss who tries to kill you with his gas, and you need to find ways to block the sources of it before taking care of him.
* At one point in ''VideoGame/{{BioShock|1}}'', Andrew Ryan kills [[spoiler:Julie Langford]] by sealing the door to [[spoiler:her]] lab and flooding the room with poison.
* In ''VideoGame/{{Gradius}} V'', the first-half of stage 6 has lots of this. You may shoot the DeadlyGas produced by them, before you getting into them and getting destroyed.
* One sidequest in ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}'''s ''Point Lookout'' {{expansion pack}} leads you into a radioactive gas trap.
* ''VideoGame/RiseOfTheTriad'' has a few levels with touchplates which when triggered flood the area with poisonous green gas. Hope you either found a gas mask before you triggered it, or at least manage to find one before all your health is gone.
** One of the quit messages reads "Press Y to release the cyanide gas." and is accompanied by an appropriate sound effect.
* ''VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas: Dead Money'' takes place in a ghost town covered in a toxic red gas cloud. On both normal and Hardcore modes, there are concentrated clouds that drain health rapidly, while on Hardcore, you slowly lose health throughout the general outdoor area.
* In ''VideoGame/KZManager'' [[VillainProtagonist you]] must send there your [[POWCamp inmates]] so thet the "lesser races" be [[FinalSolution exterminated]].

[[folder: Web Original ]]

* In ''LookToTheWest'', gas chambers called "phlogisticateurs" are employed by the alternate French Revolutionaries to execute the more prominent enemies of the Republic, including King Louis himself. They are invented due to the work of Antoine Lavoisier, [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone who takes his own life]] upon realising this. They use carbon dioxide and are not very efficient, only being used for particularly cinematic cases - most of the time the Revolutionaries use the Chirugeon, the in-timeline name for our guillotine. In a twist, the phlogisticateur technology later becomes used to create test greenhouses that allow the widespread cultivation of cinchona trees, meaning a ready supply of quinine to combat malaria in Africa. This is intended to be a similar case to the fact that in our own history, chemotherapy drugs came about as a result of research into poison gas in UsefulNotes/WW1.
* An improvised version is done in the WebAnimation/{{Mastermind}} series. The Mastermind locks his minions in the same room as him and [[{{Fartillery}} orders a burrito]].


[[folder: Western Animation ]]

* ''WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'' had villain Clock King trap Batman inside a bank vault with a vacuum pump that was rapidly sucking in the available air. (Clock King is GenreSavvy enough to point out that he knows Batman [[CrazyPrepared would carry a gas mask with him]], so he's opted to just remove ''everything''). It's also [[TimeBomb wired to blow]] if it's picked up to try and prevent Bats from fiddling with it.
* In ''SupermanTheAnimatedSeries'', the episode "The Late Mr. Kent" reveals that Metropolis uses this in administering the death sentence. As a result, [[RuleOfDrama after the killswitch is thrown, Superman still has a few seconds to swoop in and save a falsely-accused man.]]
* ''CaptainPlanetAndThePlaneteers'': Though the DrowningPit and SealedRoomInTheMiddleOfNowhere also made an appearance or two, the most popular DeathTrap hands down for the Planeteers was a room slowly filling up with poisonous vapors. Makes sense from the villains' point of view, since the protagonists' rings stop working if the area is heavily contaminated with environmental pollutants. Otherwise, they could just call the [[WebAnimation/ZeroPunctuation blue man in his underpants]] to get them out...

[[folder: Real Life ]]

* In the United States, this was once a common method for executions, mostly in the West. It has since fallen out of favor, and is currently allowed as an alternate method of execution in only six states. The last person to be executed by asphyxiation was German national Walter [=LeGrand=] in Arizona in 1999. The federal courts declared this method as unconstitutional "cruel and unusual punishment", unless chosen specifically by the inmate. Today, the executions are made with lethal injection. (In 2014, when prisons were faced with a shortage of sodium thiopental due to the EU export ban, several states attempted to revive the gas chamber. As of this writing, they've not succeeded.)
* UsefulNotes/NaziGermany used two main types of this.
** There were the well known death camp "showers" where people were sent into fake bathhouses and gassed to death. In some places, such as Auschwitz, they used Zyklon B gas, a cyanide-based pesticide. At Treblinka, where the Jews of Warsaw and other parts of Poland were annihilated, they used carbon monoxide. Less well known and not used much were trucks where the people were loaded into the back, airtight doors shut and the truck exhaust pumped in. These were not economically practical and were discontinued.
** [[Literature/GotzAndMeyer The latter]] as well as the former have shown up in fiction.
* Schrodinger's Cat is a thought experiment in quantum physics, that imagines a cat is locked in a box with a flask of poison gas, and a radiation-detector that will break the flask if a radioactive atom emits a particle.
* Finnish Army uses gas chambers to train the recruits to use gas masks. The recruits are taken to a sealed airtight building, the sergeant sets off a tear gas charge, and the recruits are to put on their gas masks. Nobody is allowed to enter out until the gas has dissipated.
* Similar training had been performed in Eastern Bloc armies throughout the UsefulNotes/ColdWar: a large field tent had been used for the chamber, the recruits inside were to put on their masks at the instructor's signal and at the same time the instructor would set off the tear gas charge. Things would go nasty if the filters on some masks had been previously damaged, which often happened. That's why a tent was used, to roll up the fabric sides and release quickly those unfortunate recruits to open air.
* At [[UsefulNotes/YanksWithTanks US military basic training]] recruits must go through the "Confidence Chamber", where the recruit's division goes into a room, the instructor sets off a tear gas capsule and the recruit must take off their mask and recite whatever the instructor tells them too. [[SarcasmMode Oh joy]].
* The US Air Force and US Army do this same thing as part of NBC training. They will only let you out of the chamber if you [[TheStoic manage not to panic.]] The idea, of course, is to show you that A) Your chemical warfare gear ''will'' protect you if you are wearing it, and B) Show you why you want to make sure you wear it when needed.
* There is also the need to be sure [[FridgeBrilliance a future sailor or airman confronted with a messy, smoky and incendiary malfunction of the ship or plane]] will stay calm and proceed to do the needed repairs instead of panicking.
* Mandatory prep for a trip on NASA's Vomit Comet, the KC-135 weightlessness simulator, involves being put in a room that the oxygen is lowered in, then being required to remove your oxygen mask and answer math questions to see how your brain holds up. It's to help prepare people for what could happen if the thing loses pressure at 30k feet. It was even required for the cast of the movie ''Film/{{Apollo 13}}'' before their trips.
* Herman Mudgett, better known as H. H. Holmes, had one of these built into his hotel in Chicago in the 1890s. Numerous people ended up killed in there, as Holmes became perhaps the first SerialKiller on American soil.
* Sadly, too many of these are still used in animal shelters, though it's hoped new laws will stop the practice.