Escape Pod: Difference between revisions

[[File:EscapePodSpaceballs.png|frame|[[Abandon Ship]]! Abandon Ship! All personnel proceed to [[Escape Pod|Escape Pods]]! [[Spaceballs (Film)|Close down the circus! Evacuate the zoo!]]]

Sometimes called a [[Life Pod]], it is a nearly universal trope in [[Space Opera]], and a tried and true part of the [[Standard Sci-Fi Fleet]]. When your [[Cool Starship]]'s [[Faster-Than-Light Travel|Faster Than Light Drive]] is about to suffer a critical [[Phlebotinum Overload]], or [[Space Pirates]] are [[Attack Its Weak Point|targeting your exhaust port]] with [[Frickin' Laser Beams]], it's time to head for the Escape Pods, and take your chances drifting on the [[Space Is an Ocean|endless ocean of space]] in a tiny, fragile shell with no weapons, rudimentary engines, and in [[Locked in A Room|cramped quarters with people you may not like]].

* ''[[Wall E|WALL-E]]'' had a scene featuring an escape pod that, for some inexplicable reason, had ''its own [[Self-Destruct Mechanism]]''. The film's post-scriptum animation shows that ([[Fridge Logic|potentially explosive!]]) escape pods can also be used as makeshift shelters, and an escape pod plays a role in the related short ''BURN-E''.

* In ''[[Star Trek First Contact]],'' the Enterprise is trapped in the past, and the evil Borg are taking over the ship. Picard reluctantly agrees to destroy the ship to stop the Borg, and, aside from himself and Data, the entire crew flies down to Earth in escape pods with instructions to "stay out of history's way." The crisis is soon averted, and everyone returns to the ship... presumably using [[Teleporters and Transporters]], since it would be odd if the tiny pods could have taken off and made it back to orbit again themselves. Whether scattering future technology across the entire planet in the form of escape pods is a good idea when you're trying to keep history from changing is also never addressed.

* In the 2009 ''[[Star Trek (Film)|Star Trek]]'' film, Spock has Kirk [[Thrown Out the Airlock|thrown into an escape pod]] and marooned on a [[Death World]]. The pod helpfully advises Kirk not to go outside after landing, and wait for rescue -- advice he promptly ignores, of course. Which may be for the best, since when he finally made it to the Starfleet base, they seemed completely unaware that any rescue was needed... Why the computerized escape pod didn't call for help, or why it couldn't have tried landing a bit closer to the base, considering the environment, is not really clear.

** ''[[Escape From New York]]''

** ''[[Air Force One (Film)|Air Force One]]''

* ''[[Starship Troopers (Film)|Starship Troopers]]''. Carmen Ibanez and Zander Barcalow use one to get out of their starship after it's seriously damaged.

* ''[[Lifeforce (Film)|Lifeforce]]'' (1985). Tom Carlsen returns to Earth from the space shuttle ''Churchill'' in one.

* ''[[Serenity (Film)|Serenity]]''. The Operative bugs out from an exploding Alliance ship using a one-person version.

* ''[[Spaceballs (Film)|Spaceballs]]'': Dark Helmet, President Skroob and Colonel Sandurz all have their escape pods stolen by other crew members (and, in one case, [[Everything's Worse With Bears|a bear]]) as ''Spaceball One'' self-destructs.

* In ''Legends of [[Dune]]'', Xavier Harkonnen's adopted brother commands a ''Ballista''-class battleship is a battle with the [[Robot War|Thinking Machines]]. They manage to drive the machines away, but then the [[Brain In A Jar|cymeks]] show up. He decides to accerate ahead of the fleet in a true [[Leeroy Jenkins]] style, and, predictably, his ''Ballista'' is blown up. He manages to get to an escape pod, but the enemy picks it up first. They torture him for hours until he finally dies.

* ''[[Vorkosigan Saga (Literature)|Vorkosigan Saga]]'' has "bod pods", inflatable, single person, idiot proof life support modules for use by untrained personel in an emergency. Miles really dislikes them, because once you're stuffed inside one, you're stuck waiting helplessly for someone else to come rescue you.

* The ''[[The Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy|Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy]]'' 'trilogy' covered the subject in this memorable exchange from ''The Restaurant At The End Of The Universe'', when the characters find themselves trapped aboard a spaceship on course to crash-dive into the heart of a sun:

* ''[[Star Trek Enterprise]]'' had an episode in which rough-around-the-edges engineer Tucker and an alien [[Well, Excuse Me, Princess!]] were [[Locked in A Room|trapped in a cramped escape pod together]] after fleeing some evil aliens.

* ''[[Star Trek Deep Space Nine|Star Trek: Deep Space Nine]]'': During the war with the Dominion, a [[Big Bad]] orders her [[The Dragon|Dragon]] not to [[Sink the Life Boats]] from a destroyed Federation ship, so that the escape pods can make it home and spread fear of the Dominion.

* ''[[Red Dwarf (TV)|Red Dwarf]]'' plays with this one. The episode "Rimmerworld" features Rimmer using his crewmates to jump into an escape pod behind a Simulant which is attempting to attack them. {{spoiler|The other crew members use another method of escape and survive. Rimmer uses the escape pod and, as it's faster than the ship he was flying on, ends up falling into a wormhole}}.

* ''[[The White Chamber]]'' has one at the epilogue.

* The opening chapter screen in ''[[Marathon (Video Game)|Marathon]]'' shows you hurtling ''toward'' the eponymous colony ship in an escape pod. Where the pod comes from is, literally, [[All There in the Manual]]. (It's from a shuttle whose life support was compromised.)

* While only referenced in normal gameplay, ''[[Starcraft II (Video Game)|Starcraft II]]'' has the Hercules dropship equipped with those. This allows the cargo to survive the transport's destruction, although the units still take some damage.

* The mining ship 'Ishimura' in ''[[Dead Space (Video Game)|Dead Space]]'' has several, not that they helped, in fact one of them led to {{spoiler|an entire military ship being destroyed.}}

* ''[[Dead Space 2 (Video Game)|Dead Space 2]]'': not content with {{spoiler|being fired on a rocket chair and falling though space}} Isaac later ejects himself from {{spoiler|The Ishimura}} and crashes back into the sprawl.

* [[Unreal (Video Game)|Unreal]] and ''[[Unreal II the Awakening (Video Game)|Unreal II the Awakening]]'' {{spoiler|feature escape pods in the ending sequences. The first is to escape from a planet of doom, the second is to escape a ship about to crash into a star.}}

* Near the climax of [[Bulletstorm (Video Game)|Bulletstorm]] you need to make use of an [[Escape Pod]]

* ''[[Spelljammer (Tabletop Game)|Spelljammer]]'' has "Wreckboat", but a dedicated escape craft is luxury, since its engine is the same as on ships proper, where it's the most expensive part. So usually if a ship has any launches to use as shuttles, they'll double as lifeboats.

* They showed up in ''[[Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers (Animation)|Galaxy Rangers]]'' a couple times. Most notably, in "Phoenix" where Eliza puts her kids in one, has to go back for supplies (it had enough for two people, not three), and is attacked. [[Heroic Sacrifice|She orders it to blast off when she's attacked by one of the pirates]]. A second example is when the Rangers use one to evacuate from an exploding Crown base in "Queen's Gun."

* Two [[Reds With Rockets|Soyuz]] spacecraft (the same ships used to carry crew and supplies to the ISS in the first place) are always docked at the International Space Station and can function as escape pods in case of an emergency. Each one can hold three crew members. On two occasions, the crew took refuge in these ships when danger from space debris loomed. Originally NASA planned to build a dedicated escape vehicle capable of taking the whole crew, the X-38, but - predictably - [[Failure Is the Only Option|this was cancelled after early tests]].