hit list

hit list (plural hit lists)

1. A roster of potential victims, especially a list of people to be killed.

   Coordinate terms: blacklist, shitlist

   • 2017 July 23, Brandon Nowalk, “The great game begins with a bang on Game Of Thrones (newbies)”, in The Onion AV Club‎:

     After all this time, the little girl who watched her father get beheaded, who was captured and impressed as her enemy’s servant, who was captured again and taken to the site of her family’s massacre, who enrolled at assassin school, who went blind, who dropped out to pursue vengeance, the woman who endured all that by focusing on her hit list can be swayed from her course by the prospect of her family and her home.

   • 2020 April 8, Howard Johnston, “East-ended? When the ECML was at risk”, in Rail, page 69:

     London's Marylebone station was also on the Minister of Transport's hit-list for closure, with High Wycombe/Aylesbury services diverted to Paddington and closure of the Northolt-Neasden link via Wembley Park. (Both Marylebone and the lines to it are still open in 2020)

2. A similar list of people to be approached for a charitable donation.

   Coordinate term: wish list

3. Any list of things to be acquired or conquered.

   Coordinate terms: shopping list, want list, wanted list

   • 2005, Byron Criddle, The Almanac of British Politics, page 601:

     Three of these were highly unexpected and narrow: Kettering, Wellingborough and Northampton South. Two were high on Labour's hit list and won by five-figure majorities, Corby and Northampton North – in the latter case by exactly 10,000.

4. Synonym of hotlist.

• hitman