The act of taking an amount of any substance to a gathering which is obviously. Bringing less than adequate weaponry to either a military conflict or a poorly. 'Shit fool, that s.a. Brought a knife to this gunfight, whereas I brought a gun. Bringing In the New Year Bringing it All Home to the U.S.A. Bringing it around town. While switchblades are generally a big no-no, there is a notable exception– it’s perfectly fine to bring a switchblade home if you are a one-armed man (or woman). Knives, Daggers and Swords, all Legal.
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'When Eddie said he didn't like his teddy you knew he was a no-good kid But when he threatened your life with a switchblade knife...'
— Chorus, 'Eddie's Teddy', The Rocky Horror Picture Show
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When it comes to planning out the weaponry of a story, Good Weapon, Evil Weapon never fails to display itself. That said, the switchblade gets a particularly bad rep. The small size, concealability, and razor sharp edge make it almost impossible for the poor weapon to be seen in a positive light. This is especially the case with 'stiletto' switchblade, named for the similarly shaped dagger. Gangsters scare their targets with a single flick of their blades, and assassins slit the throats of unsuspecting victims who barely have time to hear the click sound given off by the weapon.
In real life, a lot of countries ban or severely restrict switchblades, flick knives and similar weapons such as Butterfly Knives. These weapons have such a bad reputation that even countries who allow more conventional knives to be carried without restriction have laws against them. The actual effects of the legislation range from prohibiting the use of switchblades to anyone outside the military (Hungary) to banning all switchblades with blades longer than a few centimeters (Japan) to banning the sale, use, or transport of the knives altogether (The Netherlands).
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A Sub-Trope of Knife Nut and Retractable Weapon. See also Sinister Scythe and Sinister Shiv, which are also bladed weapons associated with unsavory people.
Examples:
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- In Cowboy Bebop: Knockin' on Heaven's Door, Vincent uses a switchblade to cut Faye's top before brutally killing one of his own henchman.
- Highschool of the Dead has a crazed survivor holding up Rei with a switchblade.
- The ending of Ichi the Killer has Takeshi wielding a switchblade after being brainwashed into becoming an assassin.
- The murder weapon in 12 Angry Men is a switchblade, but the blade's reputation even extends to its non-usage; Juror #4 is appalled when Juror #8 pulls out an identical blade to prove that there are more copies of the supposedly rare knife than previously thought.Juror #4: It's against the law to buy or sell switchblade knives.
- Avengers: Infinity War has Thanos using a double-bladed switchblade to explain his perception of “balance”, and the slaughter it entails, to a young Gamora.
- The murderous Swinburne's first appearance in Bedknobs and Broomsticks has him threaten the main characters with a switchblade. Later on, his boss the Bookman orders him to shoot someone, and Swinburne that he'd rather use his switchblade.
- The final confrontation in Blackboard Jungle involves a delinquent with a switchblade. One of the protagonists manages to take advantage of the weapon's fragile lock to snap the blade off the handle.
- The switchblade is the villainous bookie Troy's weapon of choice in Circus. The first time it is seen, it appears seemingly out of nowhere as he holds the blade against Leo's neck. At other points, he whips it out while threatening to cut off various of Leo's body parts for non-payment of debts.
- A Clockwork Orange has the gang leader Billy-boy pull a switchblade in response to Alex's challenge to a brawl.
- Most of the knives carried by the Joker in The Dark Knight are switchblades.
- Played with in Dirty Harry, where the titular character carries a hidden switchblade when he goes to confront Scorpio and stabs him in the leg with it. Harry's not evil, but he's a definite Cowboy Cop who's not at all opposed to violence towards perps.
- The primary weapon of Henry Bowers in It (2017) is a switchblade. His fall to madness is punctuated by him killing his father with it.
- Edmund Slate tries to kill James Bond with an automatic knife in Quantum of Solace, but 007 fends him off and kills him with a pair of nail scissors.
- The Rocky Horror Picture Show has the song Eddie's Teddy invoking this.Chorus: You knew he was a no-good kid, but when he threatened your life with a switchblade knife...
- Inverted in the film adaptation of Sin City, where the heroic John Hartigan uses a switchblade to incapacitate the Serial Rapist Roark Jr., who wields a Bowie knife.
- The Terminator: The three punk hoodlums at the start pull switchblades on the Terminator when he threatens them. Obviously, since they're really Mugging the Monster, he doesn't even flinch from getting stabbed.
- The Cross and the Switchblade is David Wilkerson's account of his evangelism work among gang members.
- Switchblades are very common among the gangs in The Outsiders.
- In the Sonja Blue series, antihero and part-time monster Sonja Blue has a silver switchblade as her favorite weapon. Silver to help fight other monsters, and a switchblade because she's just that brutal.
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Live-Action TV
- In Arrow, Ricardo Diaz stabs Oliver with a switchblade in the middle of a fistfight.
- The close-range weapon of Al Capone's gang in Deadliest Warrior is a switchblade, referred to a 'stiletto.'
- Highlander: In the episode The Sea Witch one of Alexi's thugs carried around a classic Italian Stiletto as a back-up weapon to his Desert Eagle. It's seen quite prominently on screen when he draws it on Richie and later on Richie's girlfriend of the week just as Duncan arrives in a Big Damn Heroes moment. Both scenes make sure to highlight him clicking it open.
- Jay White from NJPW is nicknamed the 'Switchblade' and is certainly sinister enough, considering his Manipulative Bastard tendencies.
- Fallout: New Vegas has the switchblade as a holdout weapon (e.g. you can sneak it into casinos, which normally take your guns). It's typically used by the Fiends, Powder Gangers, and the infamously overaggressive Freeside thugs.
- Played with in Life Is Strange. When Frank is introduced, he threatens Max and Chloe with one, but he quickly proves to be something of a Paper Tiger, and that he tends to bring a knife to a gunfight means his switchblade marks him as a bit pathetic. Indeed, the worst that can happen is that Max and Chloe accidentally kill him in self defence in episode 4, if the player fails to convince him to join their investigation (and if Chloe ends up fighting him unarmed, she easily manages to stab him with his own knife). In the prequel his much more dangerous friend Damon threatens Chloe and Rachel in a similar scene (in the same place, no less) but uses a much scarier looking combat knife to make it clear that he's much more of a threat.
- In Gunnerkrigg Court, Jack is introduced leading the rest of the class to see a lake which (thanks to some crazy experimental science/magic) immediately boils away. He then proceeds to draw what appears to be a switchblade (from the way it clicks and the way the panels are framed), but is then revealed to be an umbrella (he didn't warn them it was about to come back down again).
- In Goblins one of the alternative Minmaxes carries twin flip-swords (or very large daggers).
- The Jontron video Love Is Like Drugs characterizes a drug dealer as evil nigh instantly by having him open a switchblade in front of our main characters, which sends them fumbling to find a magical analogy to get them out of the situation.
- Subverted in The Powerpuff Girls episode 'Schoolhouse Rocked': When the Gangreen Gang are forced to attend Pokey Oaks kindergarten, the girls tackle Lil' Arturo when he shows off what looks like a switchblade. Turns out it was just a switchblade-style comb.Ms. Keane: Girls! Girls! No fighting!
Blossom: But Ms. Keane! Arturo's holding a deadly—
(Arturo presses the switch)
Blossom: —comb.
Index
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NeverBringAGunToAKnifeFight
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Mr. Creedy: You've got nothing. Nothing but your bloody knives and your fancy karate gimmicks. We have guns.
V: No, what you have are bullets, and the hope that when your guns are empty I'm no longer standing, because if I am you'll all be dead before you've reloaded.
V: No, what you have are bullets, and the hope that when your guns are empty I'm no longer standing, because if I am you'll all be dead before you've reloaded.
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You think Never Bring a Knife to a Gun Fight always applies, right?
Not necessarily.
At times, either the knife-wielder is just so good, or the gun-wielder is just so bad, that the knife-wielder actually has the upper hand here. This can also be due to Arbitrary Minimum Range — once the knife-wielder gets within the gun-wielder's minimum range, the gun-wielder cannot attack them effectively.
Truth in Television in certain circumstances; as the Real Life section notes.
Subtrope of Implausible Fencing Powers and Heroes Prefer Swords. Contrast Never Bring a Knife to a Gun Fight. Related to Guns Are Worthless. May involve Parrying Bullets on part of the knife-wielder.
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Examples:
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- Fullmetal Alchemist: King Bradley is so skilled with swords that he can actually cut bullets and missiles in half.
- In Noir, occurs twice in a row in one episode. Mireille is a skilled assassin with a gun; the Intoccabile only has a dagger. Unfortunately, Mireille is absolutely terrified of her, having been threatened by her with that same dagger when she was just a little girl. So during their fight, as the Intoccabile runs towards her with the dagger, Mireille can only stand paralyzed with fear, uselessly pointing her gun at her but not shooting. Luckily, Kirika shows up just in time to shoot the blade in half, so that when the Intoccabile thinks she's stabbed Mireille, it turns out that the broken edge of her dagger is only pressing into her. With the other end of the dagger flung closer to Mireille, and Mireille's dropped gun lying closer to the Intoccabile, they both go for each other's weapons. Whether due to lack of experience, since it would seem she's never used any weapon other than her dagger, or shaken confidence, the Intoccabile points the gun uncertainly and doesn't shoot; after a moment's hesitation, Mireille finally overcomes her fear and stabs her.
- In his backstory, Souichi from Snow White and Seven Dwarfs was locked up in a room and forced to kill wave after wave of people who came after him. As Souichi only had a Blade Below the Shoulder, his opponents, who were armed with guns, were confident that they could win. Guess who won in the end?
- A Story Arc in Sword Art Online takes the The Ace gamer, Kirito, into a virtual MMO first-person-shooter world. Our hero has generally used only swords in prior games. But there is a 'lightsaber' in the game, and he decides to make it work to the amazement of all.
- In Sword Art Online: Alternative Gun Gale Online, main character LLENN is a Fragile Speedster who normally uses her P-90 and Super Speed to shred the opposition, but when pressed she's just as capable of using her combat knife in conjecture with that same speed to tear apart her gun-totting opponents before they can react, let alone shoot at her.
- Sin City:
- Every story featuring Miho, who brings a katana to a gun fight quite often.
- Marv also took out a SWAT team that were armed with automatic rifles while all he had was a hatchet.
- The Metabarons: Othon leads the Castaka troops into battle using bladed weapons against the Black Endoguard, armed with 'post-nuclear' weaponry. Othon announces that the Black Endorguard have forgotten how to fight 'man to man' and urges his warriors to rush in and overwhelm the enemy in hand-to-hand combat. They succeed.
- All-New Ultimates: One of the Skulls aimed to Dagger with a gun. She attacked him with a maze.
- The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen:
- Captain Nemo easily defeats a sizable squadron of mooks armed with machine guns using only his sword and bare hands.
Mook:[Brandishing machine gun] Draw your pistol!
Nemo: I walk a different path.- Dorian Gray prefers melee weapons to guns, though as an immortal, bullet holes don't matter much to him anyway.
- Resident Evil: Retribution re-enacts the Resident Evil 4 example below, but with Alice in place of Leon.
- The Magnificent Seven features Britt, a quiet man with a deadly fast, deadly accurate throwing arm. Challenged to a Duel to the Death by a Sore Loser of a speed contest, he effortlessly dispatches the gunslinger with a single lethal throw.
- Subverted in the final battle. After running out of bullets Britt draws his knife, and is shot and killed before he can throw it.
- In The Magnificent Seven (2016), Billy Rocks pulls the stunt that his counterpart Britt pulls in the original movie, only he uses the knife he keeps in his hair, leading to Faraday's 'You killed a man with a hairpin' joke.
- Yojimbo may be the Trope Codifier. During the big, climactic showdown, Sanjuro manages to overcome the pistol-wielding Unosuke by hurling a throwing knife into his shooting arm, completely destroying his aim.
- The Warriors has an example extremely similar to Yojimbo during its climax. As Luther takes aim with his handgun, Swan sidesteps and throws his switchblade, getting Luther right in his gun arm, which causes him to drop the gun and fall to his knees in pain.
- The villain in Surf Ninjas has a gun built into his cybernetic arm. The sword-wielding hero first uses Implausible Fencing Powers to parry the bullets, then cuts the arm off with his sword. At this point, the villain invokes Never Bring a Knife to a Fist Fight by complaining that it's no longer a fair fight because the hero is armed and he isn't. In a moment of Honor Before Reason, the hero actually goes along with this, puts his sword away, and the two of them finish the fight in a manner consistent with the film's PG rating.
- In the finale of Who's That Girl, the embezzling father of the protagonist's fiancée is actually able to disarm two cops using a fencing foil. (As in, the type of sword that would likely break if used against someone using a sword designed as a serious weapon. Yeah, it makes very little sense, but neither does most of the rest of the movie.)
- V for Vendetta has V take out numerous gun-wielding mooks along with Mr. Creedy with a pair of knives (he goes through a half-dozen knives in the course of the fight, but only uses two at a time).
- Potentially subverted in that V is wearing extremely heavy body armor and a hardened mask. And he dies from accumulated trauma shortly afterwards. But a Villain Ball is definitely being carried by Creedy and his minions.
- Star Wars: Throughout the saga, and especially in the prequel trilogy, a trained Jedi with a lightsaber can reflect blaster fire back at an attacker. Many droids died to bring us this information.
- In Rogue One, Chirrut Imwe takes out a cadre of Stormtroopers with only a Simple Staff.
- In Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Sam Wilson, armed with only a small hand knife, successfully ambushes and incapacitates a HYDRA mook wielding a large automatic weapon.
- A tragic Real Life example is captured in Rolling StonesRockumentary / Concert FilmGimme Shelter. Concert-goer Meredith Hunter pulls a gun, which is clearly visible in his left hand—it can be seen against the pattern of his girlfriend's dress. But the Hell's Angel motorcyclist knocks the gun aside, pushes Hunter away, and stabs him in the back. (His girlfriend's testimony and the toxicology report showed that Hunter was high on methamphetamine.)
- In The Big Gundown, this is how Manuel 'Cuchillo' Sanchez kills the Big Bad.
- Wonder Woman (2017): Not only does Diana easily beat soldiers with guns while wielding a sword and shield — it helps that she has Super Reflexes and her shield can block a heavy machine gun — but the Amazons themselves generally fare worse when they use bows against soldiers than when they go in for close range and apply this trope. They may be deadly shots, but firing bows leaves them open to get shot back, and several do.
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Literature
- In the Jack Reacher novel One Shot, Reacher takes on a group of gun-wielding henchman with a knife, and killed them all. However, Reacher was pissed that his ally at the time wouldn't give him a gun, and only used the knife due to having no other option.
- On The 100, Grounders have a cultural fear of/taboo against using guns, and so take on the gun-wielding Sky People and Mountain Men with swords, spears, and archery. They win many of their battles against these foes due to being highly skilled, having superior knowledge of the terrain, and outnumbering their enemies by about 10-to-1.
- Angel: In the episode 'Quickening,' Daniel Holtz makes his big entrance at the Hyperion Hotel by wiping out an entire team of Wolfram & Hart soldiers, all of them armed to the teeth with assault rifles and grenades, with nothing but a sword.
- In the episode of The X-Files where a serial killer is targeting psychics, an FBI agent coming out of the washroom gets attacked by the psychopath. While trying to pull out his gun, he gets knifed through the heart when the murderer charges him.
- The Flash (2014): In the episode 'Lose Yourself', Iris finds herself facing off with Marlize/The Mechanic, who's armed with a katana. Iris counters by pulling out a BFG... which Marlize easily blocks blasts from, before knocking it from Iris' hands. After a few moments of evading sword strikes, she gets the gun back, only for Marlize to cut it in half before she can fire again.
- A particularly notable example in Resident Evil 4 during Leon and Ada's brief skirmish in Salazar's castle; when Ada gets her gun knocked out of her hand, she acrobatically scrambles to get it back... but just as she starts to aim it, Leon has closed the distance and is holding his knife to her throat.Leon: Bit of advice: try using knives in time. Works better for close encounters.
- Metal Gear:
- Metal Gear Solid: During the Boss Battle with Gray Fox, he will automatically block bullets from every weapon in Snake's arsenal with his sword; Snake has to fight him hand-to-hand to advance the fight. The pre-boss cutscene The Twin Snakes even shows him cutting a bullet fired from Snake in two.
- Major Ocelot and his Ocelot Unit, armed with automatic pistols and assault rifles, are all thoroughly spanked by the knife-wielding Naked Snake during the Virtuous Mission in Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, and Operation Snake Eater proves that it wasn't just Cutscene Power to the Max: he really is that good with a knife. The basic CQC stance even invokes this, enabling one to switch between a gunfight and a knifefight on the fly.
- Part of Jetstream Sam's backstory in Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance is that he singlehandedly defeated a squad of ten mobsters armed with machine guns using only his sword, years before cyborg and high-frequency blade technology was publicly available.
- Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening: During the fights with Vergil, he's able to block Dante's pistol shots by spinning his sword.
- Only one type of mook, the Bayonet Runner, wields a knife instead of a gun in Spec Ops: The Line, but they are faster than any other unit in the game, surprisingly good at rolling out of the way when you try to shoot them, immune to melee attacks, always charge straight towards you, and always kill you in one hit. As such, they are surprisingly powerful enemies, even appearing late in the game at one point, at the same time as a powerful Heavy Trooper and several other mooks.
- The Spy in Team Fortress 2 uses a knife as the main weapon, unlike other classes which use multiple forms of guns. His butterfly knife provides an instant kill on any enemy he backstabs. While he has a revolver, it is used more for a surprise attack or a cover during an escape. There's even an achievement for stabbing to death an enemy spy armed with a revolver.
- For game balance reasons, this is the fate of Tau warriors caught in melee in Dawn of War. Their plasma rifles do horrible things to enemy infantry from offscreen, but do pitiful damage when used as blunt objects. Even worse, on the offchance that they do manage to kill an enemy in melee, one animation has them rapid-fire their gun in the target's face, at a rate orks would be proud of.
- Commissars use a Sword and Gun, but only the former in melee until the defeat animation, where they execute the kneeling target.
- Justified Trope in Mass Effect 2 with Kasumi Goto's Shadow Strike ability. Turns out, a Tactical camouflage and an Omniblade can kill enemies armed with guns pretty well.
- Vanguards can join in the fight too. By using their signature ability Biotic Charge, they can cover a distance of 50 meters in a second or two, recharge their shields, hit an enemy in the face and send him flying if his barrier/armor/Deflector Shield is depleted. And even if the enemy isn't send flying, taking advantage of the fact that both Biotic charge and melee attacks stun the enemy can lead to a heavily armed enemy being prey to a Stun Lock and beaten to death.
- In Wasteland 2, your gun-wielding squad members will shoot down most melee enemies in short order, but almost all unwieldy two-handed guns like rifles, sniper rifles and machine-guns take a pretty hefty aim penalty against an enemy standing right next to the user. So, if your sniper or heavy weapons specialist gets bum-rushed by multiple attackers or surprised by a guy with a traffic sign axe, they'll often get hacked to bits before they can bring down their assailant with a well-placed shot. For this reason, it's usually a good idea to make sure everyone in your squad has either a pistol (pistols don't have the modifier and can be fired in melee no problem) or a melee weapon themselves and is at least passably competent at using them. You may even want to have a dedicated close combat specialist yourself to deal with enemies who try to invade your squaddie's personal space.
- Iron Marines: Ranged units take extra damage from melee attacks, which is the reason why you must keep your fragile snipers behind your tankier units. The one exception are the Rangers, aka the typical space marines with assault rifles.
- ThisSchlock Mercenary strip invokes the trope by name.
- Numerous incarnations of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1987, 2003, 2012, etc.) often depict them as easily handling mooks and other villains wielding both conventional and more advanced firearms using their Weapons of Choice.
- Ulrich in Code Lyoko, and how! You'd think he was taught swordplay by a Jedi Master the way he can deflect laser blasts from Xana's minions with his katana.
- An episode of MythBusters determined that in certain circumstances, even an untrained average person armed with a knife would be a very credible threat to someone with a gun. This is based on the famous Tueller Drill, which is discussed more thoroughly on Sister Trope page Never Bring a Knife to a Gun Fight. Succinctly, at a certain distance, an individual with a knife can get to a person with a gun before the gun can be brought to bear. The distance required changes based on all sorts of conditions such as fitness, training, and where the gun is holstered (or if it's been drawn). However, wounds from a stabbing do not instantly incapacitate someone in most cases, so the knife-using assailant stands a high chance of being shot at point blank range even if he gets in there first, resulting in a Mutual Kill. Conversely, even if the gun user manages to shoot the charging knife attacker first, they might still be capable of reaching the shooter and stabbing them before collapsing.
- This trope has been demonstrated numerous times in close quarter combat, especially during World War I. Having advanced to the enemy position, soldiers quickly found that their standard-issue bolt-action rifle was practically useless: too long to be easily wielded in the tight spaces, and too slow to fire to be effective. Even with a bayonet, it was clunky and awkward, and so trench-fighting became dominated with knives, clubs, axes, shovels, handguns, and shotguns (to the point that the German government wanted them outlawed). At the end of the day, nothing was found to be as easy, instinctive, and effective as a simple combat knife.
- Most nations' Special Forces units spend large amounts of time training with and carry combat knives as well as guns. As previously noted, quite a bit of practical research shows that in the hands of a trained individual, a knife is the superior weapon at ranges less than two body lengths. In trench and urban warfare, knives also have the added benefit of being completely silent and easier to wield in confined spaces. That said, there is also the matter of pragmatism, hence Special Forces typically also carry rifles, handguns, flash grenades, and a number of other options into combat. Thus, this might be less a case of Never Bring A Gun To A Knife Fight, and more an example of Always Bring As Much Useful Dakka And Situation-ally Useful Weaponry As You Can Carry Without Hindering Yourself To Any Fight.
- One type of handgun training/shooting competition consists of drawing and accurately shooting a target while a dummy representing a person is pulled toward the shooter at running speed, the goal to get a shot or two off accurately before the dummy passes the shooter. At distance closer than 6-7 meters (20-23 feet), the dummy will almost always reach a shooter before a handgun can be pulled from its holster and fired accurately. It's known as the Tueller Drill.