Yippee-Ki-Yay, Mister FalconLists about action stars and characters who are eternally sweaty and smeared with dirty blood, having just leapt out of reach of another fiery explosion.
November 18, 2021 3.5k votes 772 voters 81.4k views
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Vote up the times when 'hotshot' movie heroes weren't so hot.
As much as we love to see our favorite action movie heroes kick butt and do generally awesome things, sometimes it's actually refreshing to watch them fail. We're not talking Avengers: Infinity War-level failing, but just little moments that remind us that most of these characters are actually human. Not every hero can be cool 24/7 and avoid making a fool out of themselves, and we love to see little bouts of vulnerability from otherwise intense characters.
Here are 12 times when action movie heroes tried to flex and failed miserably.
You've seen it a million times. Some obnoxiously skilled action hero prepares to make a jump so ridiculously high that any regular person would immediately perish upon impact. Yet, they manage to conveniently land in such a way that they walk away with just a scratch. It's absurd.
Thankfully, Adam McKay's The Other Guys finally addressed this glaring issue in a hilarious way. At the start of the film, two "superhero" cops try to make an impossible jump off of a New York City skyscraper and end up splattered on the ground below. Even though they were clearly never going to make that jump, we still expected them to because of our conditioning to suspending our disbelief for certain tropes.
One of the most annoying action movie tropes is when the good guys stand around giving motivational speeches despite a dangerous, looming threat. In this case, the threat is a trio of intelligent sharks, and the person standing around monologuing is Russell, played by the great Samuel L. Jackson.
In the film, Russell decides it's time to give a monologue about unity and sticking together as a group. After Samuel L. Jackson gives a captivating performance, a shark pops out of the submersible pool and completely devours him alive. It's hard not to feel bad for him - but couldn't he have stood 10 feet further from the pool?
One of the greatest moments in action movie history is that scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark. You know the one, where the swordsman threatens Indy by brandishing his blade and showing off how skilled he is with the weapon. Instead of engaging in hand-to-hand combat with the swordsman, Indy just draws his gun and shoots the man. Gun always beats sword. No scene could better showcase Indy as a character and how he values brains over brawn.
So, in Temple of Doom when Indiana comes face-to-face with more swordsmen, he instantly reaches for his gun only to realize he doesn't have it. It was a funny way to flip that iconic scene on its head.
Understandably, Deadpool has an extreme disdain for the X-Men in his movies. To be fair, his role in X-Men Origins: Wolverine is embarrassing at best, and not at all like the Deadpool we see in this movie. So naturally, when Ryan Reynolds finally got to do his own film, he wrote his character to hate everything about X-Men - especially Wolverine.
In Deadpool, Wade is approached by Colossus, one of the lesser-known X-Men who is tasked with capturing Deadpool. Enraged at the idea of complying with X-Men, Deadpool launches an attack on Colossus, only to break not one but both of his hands trying to bust Colossus's metal exterior. Suffice to say, it goes very poorly for Wade.
Thor: Ragnarok is all about knocking Thor down a peg or two before watching him rise to the occasion. Not only does he spend the opening minutes of the film captured by an enemy, but he also gets captured multiple times throughout the film, including being bested by Valkyrie while she is completely drunk.
Later in the film, Thor tries to convince Valkyrie to join his fight by giving a classic "superhero" pep talk. He then picks up a ball and throws it at the window, only for the ball to bounce off the reinforced glass and smack him directly in the face, knocking him down. It's little moments like these that remind us the God of Thunder is more human than we sometimes realize.
One of the greatest scenes from Kingsman: The Secret Service is undoubtedly the sequence where Harry beats the crap out of a bunch of thugs who insulted him in a local pub. He uses his umbrella to nail the leader in the head with a beer glass before taking them all out one by one. It's a great introduction to Harry's character - and the Secret Service as a whole.
However, in the sequel, Kingsman: The Golden Circle, Harry tries to pull the same stunt but winds up making a complete fool of himself. Having just recovered from being shot in the head, Harry launches the beer glass, but this time, it misses by a mile, leaving Harry standing there like a complete idiot. When he tries to talk his way out of it, they beat him up - forcing Whiskey to intervene.
