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Flaming Death
"Flaming Death is a huge hit!"
P.T. Flea

Flaming Death is P.T. Flea's grand finale in A Bug's Life. It involves lighting a trail of matches end on end.

A Bug's Life[]

P.T. Flea begins by showing off a match that he's holding, which he will use to light a trail of matchers towards a large flypaper covered in lighter fluid that Slim, Francis, and Heimlich are setting up. Tuck and Roll introduce themselves after jumping down from a trapeze swing, who will act as the cannonballs for the nearby cannon, followed by Dim, who will jump from a high platform to fire the cannon. Manny and Gypsy set up a timer for 15 seconds to signal when it is time for Dim to jump. P.T. finally introduces Rosie, who is standing on a high platform. Her role is jump down between two poles to spin a web to catch Tuck and Roll before the timer runs out. To brighten up the event, he has the circus troupe blindfold themselves after lighting his match; this was enough to get the audience to come back. As he provides safety warnings to the audience, the act goes horribly wrong when Tuck and Roll get into a fight and one of them knocks over P.T., making him drop his match onto the match trail. After P.T. yells "No!", Rosie mishears this as "Go!" and jumps down and starts spinning the web. One of the pill bugs bumps into Manny, he stumbles backwards and bumps into the timer, knocking Gypsy over and pushing its knob back to zero, setting it off too early. Dim then jumps onto the cannon, which fires the other pill bug at P.T., who is then sent flying past the incomplete web and onto the flypaper, to everyone else's horror. Upon seeing the flame on the match trail getting closer, he panics and struggles to free himself. Meanwhile, Slim, Francis, and Heimlich try to find some water to put out the flames, but bump into each other; the audience find this amusing. P.T. eventually frees himself, but before he can leave, the flypaper falls on him and the flames, causing a large fire that makes both the flypaper and the matches disappear, leaving P.T. severely burnt. It's the only part of the show that the flies enjoy. As a result, P.T. Flea fires them all just as Slim, Francis, and Heimlich return with balls of water and drop them on him, until he discovers a foot-long line of flies lined up outside the circus tent wanting to see the Flaming Death act again.

Later on, when P.T. comes around to Ant Island, he finds his missing circus troupe and attempts to hire them back, after stating that Flaming Death was a huge hit. He also mistakes the fake bird for a real one and uses the Flaming Death act to set the bird on fire, ruining the plot.

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