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Cartoon Bomb: Difference between revisions
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If you ask a person to draw a bomb, this is probably what you get. A spherical black object about the size of a bowling ball with a fuse sticking out of it. Sometimes it may have the word "Bomb" (or "Boom") written on it in bold letters. Very common in cartoons and comic books, and somewhat surprisingly in the relatively new medium of video games.
This actually has a basis in history: Before the mid-19th century, contact or proximity fuses for detonating explosive payloads had yet to be developed. The only means by which an explosive shell or bomb could be feasibly detonated from a distance was by a slow-burning match cord. In Western militaries, these weapons often took the shape of an iron sphere with a match cord sticking out of one end. The resemblance to cannonballs is not coincidence; they were often designed to be fired out of cannons. (The "bombs bursting in air" from "[[National Anthem|The Star-Spangled Banner]]" were of this variety.)
Early hand grenades also took this shape, as did mortar bombs. In fact, the "pineapple" grenades used by American and British soldiers during [[World War II]] were variations on this type of bomb. There were only three major differences. They included a built-in fuse lighter for convenience. (That's the handle-and-pin assembly made famous by the [[Pin-Pulling Teeth]] trope.) They were oblong, and they had grooved skin so that they would fragment more easily and disperse shrapnel. (That's why they're called "frag" grenades.)
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* ''[[To Love Ru]]'': Saki Tenjouin [http://www.onemanga.com/to-LOVE-ru/84/11/ uses one] in the sports festival.
* ''[[D.Gray-man]]'' filler episode "Lenalee's Love" features two of these: first a small one used by a (rather pathetic) akuma to attack Lenalee, and later a gigantic one by her overprotective brother Komui.
* ''[[Ranma ½]]'': [[Improbable Weapon User|Happo]] [[I Know Kung Faux|Fire]] [[Supernatural Martial Arts|Burst]]. Exaggeration and combination with [[Hyperspace Arsenal]] means Happosai is able to pull bombs ''bigger than himself'' from his shirt. All these tropes may be "[[Justified]]" with the idea that they're actually a [[Ki Attacks|Ki construct]].
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* ''Zelda''
** The bombs in ''[[The Legend of Zelda (video game)|The Legend of Zelda]]'' are pretty much like this, only due to NES colour restrictions and tradition, respectively, they're deep blue rather than black.
** Link uses smaller, hand-grenade sized bombs of a similar style in the [[Super Smash Bros.]] series. Unlike the main Zelda games, they're small enough to be carried in one hand, though [[Hyperspace Arsenal|where he pulls them from]] remains a mystery.
** And where Mario has Bob-omb, Zelda has Bombchu: mouselike explosives. There are enemy versions called Real Bombchu (apparently what the regular bombchu are based on?) whose tails end in cartoon bombs. (They can walk up walls just like the bombchu item. You... basically want to ''not'' get their attention in close quarters.) And now, ''bombfish,'' which look like fish with cartoon bombs in their mouths. (The advantage is that they can be used underwater unlike normal bombs.)
** What's more, a common plant in the franchise is the "Bomb Flower", which is [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin]]: it's a Cartoon Bomb-shaped flower that explodes. It's heavily implied in several games (and pretty explicit in ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword|The Legend of Zelda Skyward Sword]]'') that the Cartoon Bombs Link uses are made from Bomb Flowers.
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* One of the first, if not ''the'' first, video arcade game to use this imagery was the [[The Golden Age of Video Games|Golden Age]] arcade game ''[[wikipedia:Kick (arcade game)|Kick]]''. You had to catch falling balloons on your head, but you had to avoid the similar-looking falling bombs. (During development, the dropped-things-to-avoid were [[Anvil on Head|anvils]], but the game's designers didn't think the average player would recognize anvils.)
* Peacock in ''[[Skullgirls]]'' uses many of these, decorated like billiards 8-balls. [[Action Bomb|They walk, drive cars and fly planes]], and one of her super moves involves a bomb large enough to blow both her and her opponent clear across the screen if they get caught in the blast.
* In ''[[Thief]] 2'', the Mechanists' steampunk robots and cannons fire this kind of bomb. What's strange is that in gameplay, the bombs tend to hit the player character with full force and then ''rebound off you'' in the other direction, and ''then'' explode a few seconds later. The initial impact tends to kill you before it even explodes. It's at once terrifying and hilarious.
* ''Beach Spikers'' for the Nintendo Gamecube had a mode called "Countdown" where the ball was replaced by a cartoon bomb. When the players hit the ball, it caused a "timer" to count down; whichever side had the ball/bomb when it exploded lost.
* In ''[[Okami]]'', one of the brush techniques creates one of these. It's meant to be a firework, rather than just a bomb, but it looks almost the same.
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* In the ''[[Batman: The Brave And The Bold|Batman the Brave And The Bold]]'' episode "Game Over for Owlman!", in the big climactic fight scene, [[The Joker]] basically pulls out a big Cartoon Bomb and runs around, giggling like the maniac he is, for the entire fight.
* ''[[Inspector Gadget]]'': In the opening sequence, Gadget thinks he's arresting Dr. Claw, but then the chair spins around, it's a phony arm, and guess what's on the chair? Then the explosion forms the title, with the Inspector himself forming the "I".
* ''[[The Tick (animation)]]'': A favorite of The Evil Midnight Bomber What Bombs at Midnight. For bigger jobs, though, he uses a more advanced, disc-shaped [[Incredibly Obvious Bomb]], complete with visible timer and beeping.
* On ''[[Jimmy Two-Shoes]]'', used by Heloise on Lucius, and by a weevil on Beezy in the same episode.
* ''[[The Simpsons]]'': Not surprisingly, these are occasionally seen in some "Itchy and Scratchy" segments, although they tend to do a lot more damage to poor Scratchy than to the majority of other victims on this page.
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