Made of Iron: Difference between revisions

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Simply put, damage is done to characters that really, really should hurt them but is easily shaken off. Nobody ever breaks a rib or other bones unless [[Chekhov's Gun|that specific broken bone becomes important later on]]. Note, this isn't [[Super Toughness]] or [[Nigh Invulnerability]], where the character actually ''is'' supernaturally protected from harm. This is the ability to shrug off blows that would disintegrate a human body when you technically shouldn't be able to. So Robots, Mutants, Mages, [[Ki Attacks|Ki using Martial Artists]] ''do not count.'' Having a story-enabled reason for not being a bloody smear immediately takes one out of the running for this trope. It can also be argued that certain [[Required Secondary Powers]] may also induce this. (For example, how can someone whose sole power is [[Playing With Fire|throwing flame]] take being thrown off a multi-story building?) If someone does not literally have "increased strength and endurance" in their portfolio, then they count. The line really gets fuzzy between [[Badass Normal]] and [[Charles Atlas Superpower]] where somehow a "normal" person has become something that does not exist in [[Real Life]].

 

If a person has this kind of durability as a superpower, it's [[Super Toughness]].

 

== Anime & Manga ==

* Almost every character in ''[[Chaosic Rune (Manga)|Chaosic Rune]]'' can count. Each character fights with creatures that give them sympathy damage of equal magnitude whenever harmed. Since the battles between the creatures usually involve dismemberment, crushing, eating, and acid attacks, most fights end with the characters covered in the most terrifying wounds ever seen in a manga. Since the winner of the battle gets fully healed afterward, the damage usually doesn't stick, though they still have to feel ''all of the pain every time it happens''. The loser usually leaves a horrifying corpse, if they leave one at all. Oddly enough, crosses over with [[Made of Plasticine]].

* Spike Spiegel from ''[[Cowboy Bebop (Anime)|Cowboy Bebop]]''. Over the course of the series, he's taken considerable amounts of pain, among other things he was thrown out of the tower window of an old-style cathedral after a gutshot and then stabbed through the shoulder with a sword. In fact, this, coupled with the demonstrated and implied effectiveness of futuristic medicine in the series, is one of the reasons why some fans believe {{spoiler|he survived the final episode}}.

** Ranma Saotome, specifically, hovers somewhere on the border between this and [[Nigh Invulnerable]]. He has survived massive [[Kamehame Hadoken]] [[Ki Attacks]], falls from fantastic heights, being blown up, and enough general physical abuse to turn a battleship into worthless scrap metal, and always manages to shrug it off and keep on going -- even before [[Healing Factor|simply healing the damage]]. Fans have theorized, after seeing him survive with mere fleshwounds against Ryû Kumon's [[Razor Wind|Vacuum Blade]] attacks (which, for comparison, cut a 10 meter tall solid bronze Buddha statue into pieces), that he is, for all practical purposes, bulletproof. Perhaps one of the best examples might be the Golden Pair story arc: when Ranma [[Disproportionate Retribution|attacks]] [[Handsome Lech|Mikado Sanzen'in]] for stealing [[Gender Bender|his]] [[First Kiss]], the resultant "battle" has Ranma headbutt the ice-rink so hard he buries himself in it up to his shoulders, pull himself out without even being fazed (which startles the hell out of his opponent), trip over when making an attack and skid across the length of the rink, ''on his face'', at such speed that he smashes through the rink-wall when he crashes into it, and finally getting pulled into Mikado's "Dance of Death", in which he is repeatedly pummeled on for several minutes straight before being ejected out at high speed and landing hard on his head. He still manages to somersault back onto his feet when asked to stand up, only to slip and fall back down again. By the time he's gotten home, he's fine save for an assortment of scrapes and bruises, needing just a bit of disinfectant and a few bandaids.

** When he first enters the series, Ryôga doesn't really seem to be much tougher then Ranma (though he does evidently have more stamina, courtesy of always having to spend days doing nothing but walk to [[No Sense of Direction|get to the fight]]), but then he learns the [[Nigh Invulnerable|Bakusai Tenketsu technique]]... in his first battle with it, Ranma's strongest punches have no effect on him, and it takes a focused burst of [[Rapid Fire Fisticuffs]] to be able to hurt him at all. Though Ranma does subsequently train himself to be able to punch hard enough to get through Ryôga's defense, he remains the hardest opponent for Ranma to lay out with physical attacks afterward.

* ''[[Black Lagoon (Anime)|Black Lagoon]]''. One of the main characters takes an RPG at point blank (not the ''explosion'', but getting hit by the physical object) and escapes with lightly burned skin and a concussion. At a later date, another character survives getting shot in the gut, falling from a second story window and then having the building she fell from collapse on top of her ''while it's on fire'', though she admits that the injuries are more or less fatal and she was lucky to be alive long enough for help to show up. And then there's [[Implacable Man|Roberta]], who isn't Made of Iron so much as [[Nigh Invulnerable|diamond on a solid titanium-tungsten alloy base]].

* Every character from ''[[One Piece (Manga)|One Piece]]''; characters seem only to die in flashbacks (or if you watch the [[Four Kids Entertainment|4Kids]] [[Macekre|dub]], [[Never Say Die|never]]).

* ''[[Cloverfield (Film)|Cloverfield]]'': Much of the plot revolves around several people {{spoiler|traveling across the city to rescue a friend they know is injured. Said friend has rebar through her upper right shoulder. Holed-Woman then runs amok with this injury, arms akimbo and ''survives'' a helicopter crash.}} More than the people, we'd say the camera is made of iron, as it survives as much and more than they do.

* The ''[[Evil Dead (Film)|Evil Dead]]'' series. Ash is a normal human, but takes enough punishment from the dead and from the sets, {{spoiler|at one point even cutting off his own hand}}, to put anyone into shock. However, this is mildly subverted in that he seems vulnerable to wood.

* ''[[Halloween (Film)|Halloween]]'': Michael Myers started out Made of Iron, but it was later [[Retcon|retconned]] into supernatural [[Nigh Invulnerability]].

* ''[[Transformers Revenge of the Fallen (Film)|Transformers Revenge of the Fallen]]''. Sam Witwicky gets dropped a few stories, tossed around by giant robots, caught in the middle of friendly fire -- only the latter actually has any effect on him. Despite having a Mk84 bomb which causes lethal fragmentation up to 400 yards dropped about 100 feet behind him.

* The heroes in ''[[Watchmen (Film)|Watchmen]]'' don't have any superpowers, with the exception of Dr. Manhattan. Still, in the movie, they take (and deal) some kicks and punches that ought to break bones and somehow don't, unless they're fighting mooks, [[Made of Plasticine|which tend to snap much easier]].

* ''[[Urban Legend (Film)|Urban Legend]]'': {{spoiler|Brenda Bates}} is shot in a shoulder, then in the chest, falling from a third-story window. Then, she tries to axe down the good guys, only to fly through the windscreen and falling off a bridge. Seconds after, she's shown in another college, telling THE tale.

* ''[[Three Stooges]]'' Curly is famous for his harder-than-average head. In various shorts, Moe would use a saw or a pickaxe on Curly's cranium, only to find that the points of said tools bent afterward.

* The titular ''[[Darkman (Film)|Darkman]]'', who gets caught in an explosion and loses all sense of touch. His body overproduces adrenaline as a result, giving him [[Super Strength]] and super-endurance as side effects. He ''can'' get hurt, but he tends to ignore it most of the time.

* [[Colonel Badass|Colonel Quaritch]] from ''[[Avatar (Film)|Avatar]]'', obviously.

* [[Cats Have Nine Lives|Catwoman becomes this at the end of]] ''[[Batman Returns (Film)|Batman Returns]]''. We had previously seen her survive falls from three separate tall buildings, but two of those falls were played for dark comedy, making her an [[Iron Butt Monkey]]. What shifts her into this trope is her [[Crazy Awesome]] act of defiance in the movie's climax, where the [[Big Bad]] shoots her four times but she ''just keeps coming'', and then uses a stun gun, an exposed fuse box and her own saliva to electrocute them both....and ''lives''.

* ''[[Iron Man (Film)|Iron Man]]''

* Spotted Horse in ''[[The Quick and The Dead]]''. How many times do you have to shoot a man to kill him?

* ''Botany Bay''. This is an oldie loosely based on the sending of the First Fleet to Australia, and what the hero had to endure aboard ship should have turned him into shark-bait. Not just mercilessly flogged. but keelhauled ''twice over'', and then confined in a leaky brig with icy seawater constantly seeping in! To cap it off, the actor wasn't a big hulking man, but slightly built and delicate-featured Alan Ladd.

* Marv from ''[[Sin City]]''. Hit several times by a speeding car without a single broken bone.

** Hartigan also qualifies, [[Beat Still My Heart|except for a detail]].

* Implied with Eric in ''[[Mystery Team]]'', who tells {{spoiler|Jason}} to shrug off a bullet wound, stating he had been shot three times. Keep in mind that Eric is seven.

* In Act III of ''[[Con Air (Film)|Con Air]]'', Cameron Poe doesn't even flinch after getting shot clean through the bicep; instead, Poe effortlessly disarms the shooter and knocks him out. The wound is adequately dressed with a very thin strip of fabric, and Poe's arm retains full mobility through the rest of the movie.

{{quote| '''Inigo:''' Offer me everything I ask for!<br />

'''Rugen:''' Anything you want!<br />

* [[The Dresden Files (Literature)|Harry Dresden]]. Seriously. In ''Fool Moon'' alone, he gets chin-decked, shot in the shoulder, pistol-whipped, beaten with a tire-iron, slammed into various walls, savaged by a werewolf, knocked out by overuse of magic, stomped to a pulp, duct-taped to a pillar from which he rips himself free, tossed over a wall, dropped out of a moving car on the Interstate, and tossed down into a 20-foot pit, yet still manages to use powerful magic, climb hand-over-hand up a 20-foot rope, and otherwise kick the living shit out of the bad guy by the end. His friend Murphy also somehow manages to climb up a rope and rapid-fire a .38 mere hours after sustaining a compound fracture to her right arm. And that's just in Book 2!

* Woodrow Lowe from ''Man of the Century'' by James Thayer. In the course of the book, Woodrow is whipped raw by dervishes, bloodied by a sadistic lover, knocked off a boat by an incoming boom, kicked by a horse, trampled by a bull, stabbed within an inch of his life more than once, shot multiple times, some very close to the head, has the snot beaten out of him by at least five famous 19th-century prizefighters, and is imprisoned for 368 days in a Chinese torture pit. He is a Dakotan cavalryman, a Rough Rider, an opium trader, the (deposed) ruler of China, an Amazonian sex slave, and the assassin of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. And he lives to tell about it all. [[Cool Old Guy|At the ripe old age of 108]].

* ''[[Conan the Barbarian]]''

** In [[Robert E Howard]]'s story "A Witch Shall Be Born", the witch survives exposure as a baby.

** The End of Time. {{spoiler|Never mind the fatal radiation poisoning, the fall from the Vinvocci ship should have had him ready for his next regeneration.}}

** Jack Harkness, who keeps dying and getting better. Whatever keeps him tethered to life is Made of Iron.

* ''[[Farscape (TV)|Farscape]]''

** The series has an entire ''race'' of Made of Iron's, the Scarrans. To drop just one takes [[More Dakka|a whole lot of firepower]]: God help you if you run into more than one of them.

* This can happen in many games due to glitches or unexpected game engine behavior, for example falling from a great height, but glancing off a vertical surface so the fall distance resets and the drop counts as much shorter.

* ''[[Final Fantasy]]''

** The Turks from ''[[Final Fantasy VII (Video Game)|Final Fantasy VII]]''. While they are supposed to be not enhanced unlike their SOLDIER counterpart, they seem to live through everything while SOLDIER members drop like flies. In the original game members of the Turks are seen surviving through being beaten up by the heroes several times (once hard enough for the Turk to be hospitalized), being stabbed in the stomach in the middle of an abandoned temple (though strangely you find that Turk at the entrance of the temple when the flashback showed him in the center of it - indicating that he possibly traveled through the booby trapped and monster infested temple with a stab wound), getting shot then experimented on then shoved in a coffin for 30 years, being shot down in a submarine to the bottom of the WEAPON-infested ocean, being on a plane that got attacked by a WEAPON which then crashed to the bottom of the ocean and got infested by super strong monsters and a Meteor nearly crashing on the city.

** The trend continues in the movie sequel and remake ''Advent Children'' and ''Advent Children Complete'' when two Turks get captured and tortured by the villains (but still live to make an appearance near the end). Meanwhile the two remaining Turks (Reno and Rude) get beaten by the big bad, hit in the face by a metal rod, being pummeled by the henchmen (which included being thrown from the top of a building) and {{spoiler|falling a great distance from a crashing helicopter onto pavement}} but being appearing perfectly fine in the next scene to attempt a near-kamikaze moment with dynamite (which they also survive and appear at the end of the movie unharmed). The most injuries seen on the Turks were a few bandages, a small cut and a bloody nose (the two latter which were gone a few scenes later).

** See Also: Arado Balanga. People claim he's [[Born Lucky]], and they may be right. However, like Heero Yuy above, he's not only withstood one of Kushua's drinks, he actually ''liked it!''

** But even Arado had to admit he loses out to Kyosuke Nanbu. He has survived TWO explosions while being human (the second explosion he is in a mech that burnt down, fell over and sank into water, and he only comes out with just a few broken ribs.

** {{spoiler|Though much of this is handwaved by the supervirus he takes following the Tyrant incident; a forced overdose in ''RE 5'' removed said abilities, leading to his eventual defeat, and according to [[Word of God]], death.}}

** The player characters are pretty Made of Iron as well. Things you can survive in ''[[Resident Evil]] 4'' include a direct hit from a rocket launcher and [[Impaled With Extreme Prejudice|getting a hug from an Iron Maiden]].

** Being Made of Iron seems to be hereditary, as Wily's son, {{spoiler|Dr. Regal, manages to survive high-voltage electrocution and subsequent fall off of a very high roof}}. He goes on to survive the same explosion and eruption that Wily survived after having his mind and memories completely drained.

* Everything that ever lived in any ''[[Tomb Raider]]'' game. In the first games you have to shoot any human being for minutes for it to die, not because they are hard to hit. Every. Single. Shot. Is a hit. Count the amounts of bullets you have to put through each enemy (taking into account the player uses tow pistols at the same time. You'll be surprised how much stronger than 50 cent each little monkey in the jungle is.

** Perhaps the best example is also the first example, the one and only [[Doom|Doomguy]], who manages to survive everything hell can throw at him.

*** On the subject of Doom, there's the Cyberdemon in the original games.

* Every [[Fighting Game]] ever. ''[[Street Fighter]]''? Just as one example, the piledriver is capable of breaking necks in the real world when done in the somewhat controlled environment of [[Professional Wrestling]]; Zangief can perform one from effectively 20' in the air, and the victim can get up. Then there's ''[[Samurai Shodown]]'' and ''[[Soul Series|Soul Calibur]]'', where you can shrug off a sword aimed through the chest. Somewhat needed, though, otherwise these games could be very, very short.

** For the aversion, see ''[[Bushido Blade]]'': weapon-based fighter like the two above, but one clean hit kills you automatically.

** There are some ''ridiculous'' stage effects in the ''[[Dead or Alive]]'' series that can range from being thrown into explosive containers to literally dropping over 10 stories below. Worst that happens is a KO and otherwise everyone just gets up like nothing even happened.

* In ''[[Super Smash Bros (Video Game)|Super Smash Bros]]'' the characters are more likely made of [[Living Toys|plastic.]]

* King K Rool in ''[[Donkey Kong Country]]''. In the first game it's fairly standard punishment, but in the second, he gets his gun explode on him about ten times, gets punched out the window of an airship by a captured Donkey Kong, hits every single cliff face on the way down, torn apart by sharks, sinks into the ocean, has his gun explode AGAIN in the [[True Final Boss]] battle, flies into the island core, is presumably there when it sinks like Atlantis and sails away on his ship afterwards. Then, in the third game, he gets electrocuted like ten times from his mad science laboratory equipment, and has a giant egg dropped on his head by the freed Banana Bird queen... Then gets beaten up by all five Kongs in ''[[Donkey Kong 64 (Video Game)|Donkey Kong 64]]'', hit by a rocket powered boot shot by Funky Kong, thrown straight through the roof of the boxing roof and into K Lumsy Island, where said giant locked up Kremling proceeds to beat K Rool senseless for locking him up. He's perfectly fine in later appearances.

* In ''[[Assassin's Creed Brotherhood (Video Game)|Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood]]'', {{spoiler|the Cardinal in the St. Peter's Basilica Lair of Romulus sidequest}} can take multiple crossbow bolts or blows from a heavy weapon, damage that would crumple a [[Heavily Armored Mook|Brute]], despite apparently wearing nothing more protective than cloth robes.

*** Compounded in the extended trailer (and the second opening cutscene) of ''Revelations'', when Ezio freefalls from several stories high only to make a [[Three Point Landing]] ''with no negative physical effects'', and all of his acrobatic abilities intact.

* Luka Redgrave in ''[[Bayonetta (Video Game)|Bayonetta]]'' suffers some pretty nasty abuse but is none the worse for wear by the ending. [[Butt Monkey|Enzo]] takes a few bumps, too, like being thrown head-first into the driver's seat of his car.

** Bun-Bun has shrugged off attacks that would kill an ordinary human being, made all the more impressive by the fact that he's a ''rabbit''. At one point he was actually eaten alive by an alien, and simply burst his way out of the alien's stomach and proceeded to kick its butt. Bun-Bun has an origin even he is not clear about; he was bought from a Magical Store.

** Oasis might also count. She's been through many [[No One Could Survive That]] moments, including two explosions and a sniper bullet to the head. How she does this is not yet explained, and may or may not be a superpower she was given by Dr. Steve. Her "sister" Kusari has also survived being stabbed through the chest and even ''decapitated'', again by means unexplained.

** One member managed to survive having '''Australia''' dropped on them. That one member? The '''''[[Squishy Wizard|SQUISHY FREAKING WIZARD]]'''''.

** Fighter himself has survived several stabs to the back of the head courtesy of black mage and it isn't likely he's ever felt a thing. Hell, he even had one used as a lightning rod to channel a Lightning Spell directly into his brain. That particular spell actually INCREASED his intelligence instead of dealing any damage whatsoever!

** Considering what he HAS survived, Othar Trygvassen (GENTLEMAN ADVENTURER!) is only boasting a little in the page quote.

** Also a defining characteristic of the [[Super Soldier|Jaegers]], along with their [[Funetik Aksent|thick Germanic accents]] and [[More Teeth Than the Osmond Family|teeth]]

* [[The Ace|Ms. Jones]] from ''[[Gunnerkrigg Court (Webcomic)|Gunnerkrigg Court]]''. Trick one: [http://www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=380 a sword bounces from her face]. Trick two: [http://www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=721 place a palm on a wall.] Close the fist, excavating what concrete happened to fit under the fingers. Who she is wasn't revealed yet, only that she's ''not'' a robot and [http://www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=515 probably] not a "normal" magic-user either. We already saw one god and one valkyrie at the Court, though... And remember, androids aren't robots, and golems don't count as robots either.

* [[VG Cats (Webcomic)|VG Cats]] parodied this with (amusingly enough, considering the Trope Picture) Zoro from ''[[One Piece (Manga)|One Piece]]''. Zoro blows off some physical damage taken by earlier attacks... only for Chopper to tell him that he's taken such internal damage from the attacks that [http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=226 most of his colon has to be removed].

** Just about all the main characters get blasted, smacked, slammed, falls, and runs through other notable dangerous hazards with nothing more then scrapes. Valerie's future self fell ''hundreds of feet from the sky and lives!''

** Danny himself, though partially justified through his ghost abilities. Still, given the number of times he gets shocked, blasted, slammed into walls or the ground and overall smacked around by every ghost EVER, he definitely falls into this trope.

* ''[[Duckman]]'' has Big Jack McBastard, who is trampled by a horse, eaten by vultures down to a skeleton, and then buried. At the end of the episode, he shows up to congratulate them on completing their job. When asked how he survived, he takes a drag on his cigar, and says "[[Noodle Incident|Long story]]."

* Pretty much any character from ''[[Ed, Edd n Eddy]]''.

** Averted with {{spoiler|[[Complete Monster|Eddy's Brother]]. He delivered a pretty sickening [[No Holds Barred Beatdown]] on Eddy and Eddy survived with bruises and marks. In his brother's case, one hit with a door and he was out cold.}}

** {{spoiler|[[Fridge Brilliance|Though Eddy must have built up resistance from the years of abuse.]] And [[Word of God]] said that [[Glass Cannon|his brother never took a hit in his life.]]}}

* [[Evil Old Folks|Grandfather]] from ''[[Codename Kids Next Door (Animation)|Codename Kids Next Door]]'' is an extreme example. He survives {{spoiler|''[[Nigh Invulnerable|getting a giant flaming metal treehouse dropped on him]]''}} and shrugs it off like it were no big deal. Naturally, it's [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshaded]].

{{quote| "Did you honestly believe that a mere 39 gazillion tons of red hot metal and duct tape would crush me?"}}

 

** Based on "Sonic Rainboom", ponies in this show can sustain ''over 1600 G-forces''. This is demonstrated by Rainbow Dash turning on a dime at Mach 1.

** And later we see a flashback where she does it as a young filly. She is a pegasus, and is implied that the earth ponies are the ones more physically able than the other races. If they have health/safety regulations, they are for other animals as the cows and donkeys they live with, because ponies surely doesn't need them.

== Real Life ==

* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audie_Murphy Audie Murphy]. There's no way to list the ways in which this man was made of Adamantium without repeating everything on the linked page.

* Shaolin monks practice a rigorous regimen known as "Iron Body Technique", allowing wooden clubs to be broken across their bodies, limbs and ''heads'' with little effect, as well as great resistance to piercing weapons. One of the most extreme examples involved a single monk bending two spears (with metal heads) almost double against his throat and having a baseball bat broken on his back at the same time.

** Those clubs are weakened to avoid breaking bones. (They still hurt like hell, though.)

[[Category:Plot Armor]]

[[Category:Made Of Iron]]