High Altitude Interrogation: Difference between revisions

'''[[Thou Shalt Not Kill|Batman]]:''' [[Torture Always Works|I'm counting on it.]] ''(drops Maroni)''|''[[The Dark Knight]]''}}

 

 

In [[Real Life]], however, this is perhaps the '''''SINGLE''' Worst Interrogation Technique'' imaginable, taking the [[Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique]] to new [[Incredibly Lame Pun|heights]] in terms of unreliability. Since this method relies so much on threatening to kill the person with the information that the hero is looking to gain, that means following through with the death threat if the mook is non compliant would leave the interrogator without the information he is after or any new leads to follow. Dead men tell no tales, after all, so anyone with any bit of common sense should realize that he would need to keep his man alive if he's ever going to get some answers. Even worse, the informer may believe his interrogator will let him fall to his death no matter ''what'' he might say, anyway, which gives him even ''less'' incentive to want to cooperate. Torture may make someone committed to their ideals think their interrogator is weak; a death threat makes him look like a huge idiot.

 

 

Compare [[Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique]], [[Torture Always Works]], and [[Dramatic Gun Cock]], which also relies on making death threats during interrogations.

 

See Also: [[Disney Villain Death]]

 

== Comics ==

* The [[Flash]] once did this to a mook. The mook taunted that Flash was trying to copy Batman, but Flash drops him, uses his superspeed to catch him, and then continues dangling him.

* [[Spider-Man]] occasionally does this.

** Probably the only time in which this trope was used sensibly was when [[Magnificent Bastard|General]] [[Complete Monster|Zakharov]] was doing this to [[Smug Snake|Rawlings]]; he had no intention of letting the latter live anyway unless Rawlings came up with an epic [[Plan]] under fear of death -- if he wasn't able to, well, then no skin off the General's nose.

* [[Superman]], [[The Cape|surprisingly]], has done this.

** And his first ever usage of this trope back in the Golden Age was to ''throw'' the mook to a high altitude and then catch them on the way down (why being caught by Superman at five feet above ground level is safer than hitting the ground is never mentioned).

* In the sister series to ''[[Irredeemable]]'', ''Incorruptable'', the main character, Max Damage at one point needs to score information from Origin, a mad scientist who specializes in giving people super-powers. He does so by dangling him over a vat of chemicals containing a tentacled monster (in actuality his last client). Afer Damage gets his information, Origin attempts to blackmail him over some information involving his powers. Max responds by blowing up his hideout.

* In the ''[[Nikolai Dante]]'' story arc "The Great Game," when a spy suggests to Jena Makarov the existence of a superweapon that the Makarov Dynasty does not know about as a means of raising his "bargaining power," Jena responds by hanging the spy over a high balcony ''by his nostrils'' and demanding he tell her everything he knows about the weapon or be dropped. The spy is killed by intervening assassination droids shortly after he begins spilling the beans.

 

* In one episode of ''[[The Cape (TV)|The Cape]]'', Vince dangles a corrupt cop by dangling him over a bridge with his cape. [[Subverted Trope|It doesn't work]].

* In ''[[Burn Notice]]'', Michael and Sam use this technique on two men to try to find the boss of a medical scam ring. The interrogatees, however, were in no real danger as they were tied to the ground; Michael and Sam's plan was just to pretended they dropped one of them so the other would squeal from terror.