I Will Only Slow You Down: Difference between revisions

You have a group of protagonists, one of whom has been injured or disabled. Either that person is literally slowing the group down, or [[Someone Has to Die]]. Naturally, the "damaged" party member volunteers to sacrifice themselves and/or be left behind: after all, being permanently injured is a [[Fate Worse Than Death]] and well..they'll just slow them down.

Often leads to [[You Shall Not Pass]], [[Self Destructive Charge]] or [[No One Gets Left Behind]], but also covers other situations such as quietly going off to die when no one's looking.

* Subverted in the first season two episode of ''[[Stargate SG-1]]'' in which Daniel is badly wounded. Thinking that this will likely kill him anyway, he tells Jack to take the others and go on without him while he plans to [[You Shall Not Pass|stay behind and cover their escape]]. However he ends up meeting no resistance and instead hauls himself to a Goa'uld sarcophagus to get healed.

* ''[[Lost (TV)|Lost]]'': This is given as the reason Charlotte and Daniel stay behind while the rest of the left-behinds travel to the Orchid. Of the group, Charlotte is suffering the worst effects of time-traveling. This also allows the pair a poignant death scene, which motivates Daniel's actions for the rest of the season.

* In ''[[Deep Space Nine]]'', a few examples:

** Humorous example in "The Ascent", where Quark hauls the injured Odo (during the period when he had become a "solid") up a mountain on a stretcher. When Odo protests, Quark emphasizes his reasoning: Odo's along for emergency rations; if he dies, he's food.

** Worf yells "leave me!" to Ezri when he's shot as they try to escape the Dominion. She just tells him to shut up.

* In [[Recap/Blackadder S 4 E 4 Private Plane|one episode]] of ''[[Blackadder Goes Forth]]'', Blackadder and Baldrick have been captured by the Germans and sentenced to spend the rest of the war [[Cool and Unusual Punishment|teaching young schoolgirls in Heidelberg home economics]]. Edmund is far more comfortable with this fate than with being sent back to the front again. When his companions come to rescue him, he attempts to invoke this trope in order to be left behind, claiming to have "splintered his pancreas". It doesn't work.

* In the HBO film ''Deadly Voyage'' (based on a true story), Kingsley Ofosu and his brother are trying to escape from the murderous crew of the ship they have stowed away on (who have already killed their seven companions). As they reach the deck, his injured brother, knowing that the two of them will never escape together, pushes Kingsley away from him and staggers off on his own. Sure enough, the crew quickly catches him and throws him overboard, but the separation and the distraction gives Kingsley the precious extra few minutes needed to escape.

== Real Life ==

{{quote| "[[Crowning Moment of Awesome|I'm just going out]]. [[Gallows Humor|I may be some time]]."}}

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[[Category:I Will Only Slow Youdown]]