Chained to a Railway: Difference between revisions

[[File:trax-2.jpg|frame|[[Dead Horse Trope|You don't see this anymore]].]]

 

 

The music is high tempo, the [[Damsel in Distress|damsel is in distress]], and the [[Dastardly Whiplash|mustachioed villain]] is [[Evil Is Hammy|mugging to the camera]]. Yup, she's been chained to a railroad track, and the express is on its way.

Usually the trains used in this trope would be powered by old-time steam engines, but a few modern uses/parodies would use more modern diesel locomotives instead.

 

 

See [[Chained to a Rock]], which is much, much older, but operates on the same basic principle. Compare [[Railroad Tracks of Doom]].

 

{{examples}}

== Advertising ==

* Spoofed in [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3IfzByT6f0 this Aflac insurance commercial].

 

 

* Played straight in the 202nd chapter of the manga ''[[JoJo's Bizarre Adventure]]'' when Joseph and Abdul are both magnetized to one of the rails (and each other) by their enemy. Of course, Abdul could have just melted away the rail with his power over fire, but since it would derail the oncoming train, they had to be a bit more clever in their escape.

* In the fourth episode of the ''[[Gintama]]''-anime, Shinpachi and Kagura (who is "introduced" in said episode) are pushed onto a train track while being stuck in a garbage can. They are saved by Gintoki... who just happened to be around because he managed to find that week's ''[[Shonen Jump]]'' at the station's newsstand.

 

 

 

 

 

== Music ==

* The Sue Fink song "Damsel In Distress" parodies this and the concept of the [[Damsel in Distress]] in general. (Video [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QyUnTWg0p8 here.])

* The music video for ''Don't Stop'' by Patrick and Eugene has one of the duo play a bad guy who ties a woman to the train tracks, and the other tries to stop him. It doesn't end well.

== Oral Tradition ==

* Played with in an old joke involving a guy discussing how he found a girl tied to a railroad track and, after untying her, had all sorts of sex with her. Upon being asked by the person he's talking with whether they had oral sex, the guy states, "Couldn't. Her head was missing."

 

 

== Video Games ==

* In the original ''[[Way of the Samurai]]'', the ''main character'' can end up tied to a railroad track if the player makes some bad decisions early on. It's also possible to get yourself ''killed'' this way by [[Too Dumb to Live|refusing the rescue attempt]].

** The player saved more than just the goblin; if Zanik were to have been run over, it would have started a war between the Dorgeshuun and the Dwarfs (who built the train) which was exactly what Sigmund (the villain) planned.

* The quote above is from the 70's Bond-parody level in ''[[Time Splitters]]: Future Perfect''. Where your sidekick's partner/girlfriend had been captured and tied to the tracks. After beating the boss, they manage to stop the train...nowhere near close to hitting her.

* [[Video Game Cruelty Potential|The player]] [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDL_GcXoQIQ can do this] in ''[[Red Dead Redemption]]''. There's even an achievement for it.

* Played in ''[[Final Fantasy VIII]]'' with an optional GF the player can acquire. Literally flaming tracks appear after barriers appear on either side of the enemies and the background morphs into unintelligible [[Swirly Energy Thingy|space vortex-y swirly things]]. Then you see his light…um…light up and see him zooming down the tracks at a rate of knots, and seconds before contact is made it zooms in to give you a shot of his demon face before he slams through the enemies, and before long all returns to normal and the enemies receive damage and a huge number of additional status affects. You can see all of this [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4VjvBaMHJg here].

* In ''[[Nancy Drew|The Haunted Carousel]]'', the villain arranges for Nancy to get her foot trapped between the rails of a roller coaster's tracks, and she must free herself before being splattered by the oncoming train of cars.

 

== Webcomics ==

* A parody of this trope is part of an early scheme in ''[[Terror Island]]''—Sid requests Liln put on a frilly dress and be tied to train tracks, demanding Stephen save him by grocery shopping. Liln doesn't do it though.

* Played straight in ''[[Lackadaisy]]'', where the three redneck farmer brothers try to dispatch Rocky by tying him up in his own coat and nailing his necktie to the railroad tracks.

{{quote|Rocky: ''"I hope you boys are prepared to be disappointed, because being run down by something called the ''Sunshine Special'' is too ironic to be possible."''}}

** Especially [[Egregious]] since [[Complexity Addiction|one of them had a shotgun.]] Though they weren't too bright, it's still [[Justified Trope|justified]], as one of them explicitly stated they were interested in seeing what would happen when the train hit. Just shooting him wouldn't have been as much fun.

* Done semi-seriously in the ''[[Sluggy Freelance]]'' storyline [http://sluggy.com/comics/archives/daily/030203 Girls' Night Out], where some ridiculous gangsters tied Torg and Riff to train tracks. Lampshade-hanging ensues.

* ''[[Bob and George]]'' [http://www.bobandgeorge.com/archives/041025 along with a few other problems]

* Inverted in an ''[[Arthur, King of Time and Space]]'' [http://arthurkingoftimeandspace.com/2704.htm sketch], with Guenevere rescuing Lancelot.

 

== Western Animation ==

** This was also subverted in ''[[Looney Tunes: Back in Action]]'', when the Evil ACME Chairman, among one of the many classic tricks for D.J.'s father Damian to meet his doom, ties Damian to the railroad tracks, where the streamlined ACME Train of Death is hurtling towards him. If that doesn't kill him, the surrounding dynamite would. (Wile E. Coyote is also driving the train.) However, Damian is saved in the nick of time, and the train eventually crashes (thanks to it running into some dynamite).

* Parodied on ''[[The Simpsons (animation)|The Simpsons]]'' in ''The Itchy and Scratchy Movie'', in which Itchy does just this to Scratchy - however, Itchy discovers that the engineer won't let him in the engine of the train without proper training. So Itchy goes to college, passes his exams, gets his degree, finds a job as an engineer at a railway, and proudly rides the train right over Scratchy (who, being the [[Butt Monkey|poor luckless bastard]] that he is, had ''almost'' managed to free himself in the meantime before fate caught up with him).

* In Cordell Barker's cartoon adaptation of ''[[The Cat Came Back (film)|The Cat Came Back]]'' (see [[The Cat Came Back|trope]]), old Mr. Johnson drives a handcar over no fewer than ''seven'' (if not more) women and a cow, before derailing on a cockroach.

* In the 1948 ''[[Tom and Jerry]]'' short "Kitty Foiled", Tom tied Jerry to a toy railroad track. The mouse got saved by the canary, who bombed the toy railway with a ''bowling ball'', smashing straight through the floor and dispatching the onrushing train into the basement.

* Parodied in a segment on ''[[Mickey Mouse Works]]'', in which Peg Leg Pete kidnaps Minnie (apparently in a series of segments parodying the old "damsel in distress" cliches), and ties her to a set of railroad tracks. Unfortunately, Mickey's not that good at untying knots, so before long, both of them are tied to the track, just as railroad crossing signals begin flashing. Pete's driving the train, which consists of a large diesel locomotive and several passenger cars. But right before the train can run over them, Mickey manages to hit a switch conveniently located in front of them, and the train goes up this other track into a tunnel ("I KNEW I shouldn't have put in that second set of tracks!" Pete curses). Mickey and Minnie manage to get off the tracks, still tied up. The train then speeds by again, going the opposite direction, managing to cut the ropes and free our heroes.

* Played straight in the old ''[[X-Men (animation)|X-Men]]'' cartoon with Jubilee [[Bound and Gagged|tied up]] on the subway tracks. {{spoiler|It was only a mental image of Jubilee implanted in [[Wolverine]]'s mind so he'd get splatted trying to save her, though.}}

* Played straight on at least two instances in the ''[[Mega Man (animation)|Mega Man]]'' cartoon. Since he was a robot, he was electrified to the rail rather than tied.

* A ''[[Super Chicken]]'' episode had a melodrama villain actor believing he actually was a villain - naturally, he takes the damsel actress to all the usual spots - the railroad tracks, the sawmill, and the dynamite shack.

* The above-quoted ''[[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 1987|Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles]]'' episode has Bebop and Rocksteady doing this to Splinter. Of course, Splinter is eventually saved and the train winds up destroyed (thanks to Rocksteady cutting the brakes.)

* Happens to Batman in the ''[[Batman: The Brave And The Bold|Batman the Brave And The Bold]]'' episode "Emperor Joker!".

* This is how one [[Earthworm Jim]] episode opens; Jim and Peter Puppy are tied to a railroad, implied to be a consequence of switching bodies (But not heads) because Peter can't use Jim's super suit very well. Psycrow is meanwhile operating a express at them. Jim manages to get back inside the suit, free themselves, and bend the tracks so they're pointing up. The train is sent flying up, Psycrow falls out ("Maximum suckage.") and Jim and Peter walk off to have their bodies fixed. Then the train falls on Psycrow. Later on in the episode he still has that train on his back.

* Shows up in the [[Miscellaneous Disney Shorts|Miscellaneous Disney Short]] ''The Brave Engineer''.

 

== Real Life ==

[[Category:Vehicle Tropes]]

[[Category:Death Trap Tropes]]