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heads will roll

Idioms  

  1. Someone will be severely punished, as in If no one meets the chairman's plane, heads will roll. This hyperbolic expression alludes to the punishment of being beheaded.

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

President Ferdinand Marcos Jr said Wednesday that "heads will roll" after officials admitted Alice Guo had left the country undetected one month ago and travelled to Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia.

From BBC • Aug. 21, 2024

He does not anticipate any other heads will roll.

From Seattle Times • Mar. 23, 2023

DeFazio told Fox News that "heads will roll" at the FAA "if they're not confident in their data and the safety of this plane."

From Fox News • Mar. 11, 2019

His chief of staff delivered a buck-’em-up message that no heads will roll — for now.

From New York Times • Mar. 16, 2018

Now, we're going to have a year that will not be forgotten by those who handle wheat and flour, and the men with the long heads will roll the money in.

From Winston of the Prairie by Dunton, W. Herbert

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.