Red Shirt: Difference between revisions

== [[Advertising]] ==

''The unsung hero of anime

''Hip hooray for Soldier A

''He only has one line but saves the day

''He's called upon to grunt or yell or scream

''Even if his mouth is never seen

''Through the fray with ne'er to say

''He'll lead the way, he's Soldier A'' }}

* ''Transformers: Last Stand of the Wreckers'': The whole mini-series is basicllybasically a ''Transformers'' story told from the viewpoint of a bunch of Red Shirt second stringers. In fact a large part of the characterscharacter's protrayalsportrayals are built around the fact that this trope applies. Pyro fears that he'll die a meaningless death so he's spent most of his life trying to plan the perfect death. Ironfist is basicllybasically in complete denial about his role as a Red Shirt until later in the story where he seems to almost quietly accept his percievedperceived unavoidable death.

* In a recent{{when}} ''[[Taskmaster]]'' mini-series, the main villianvillain is former mook turned leader how actually CALLS himself Red Shirt. He's the only one that doesn't get the joke.

== [[Fan Works]] ==

* The Finnish ''[[Star Trek]]''/''[[Babylon 5]]'' spoof ''[https://web.archive.org/web/20050901042111/http://www.starwreck.com/ Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning]'' puts the ''Trek'' redshirts against the B5 security forces. The carnage was horrible. The redshirts throughout the ''Star Wreck'' series are also given [[Meaningful Name|names that reflect their expendable nature]], such as "Lt. Suicide", "Sgt. Manshield", and "Lt. Cannonfodder".

== Films[[Film]]s -- Live-Action ==

* This trope was parodied very effectively in ''[[Galaxy Quest]]'' in the character of Guy Fleegman, "Crewman Number Six"—who is the only cast member NOT''not'' shot or killed during the climactic final battle! (Although [[Reset Button|a bit of time travel makes everyone else better]]). [[Lampshade Hanging]] at its finest (also see [[Plucky Comic Relief]]). In the end, he gets a major role in the new ''Galaxy Quest'' series, in a reference to the fact that ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation]]'' featured a Security officer as a main character throughout its entire run and in general saw far fewer redshirt deaths.

* The countless native African servants and carriers in the ''[[Allan QuartermainQuatermain]]'' movie adaptions exist only to be eaten by crocodiles or killed by traps so that the danger can be demonstrated without killing off a main character.

* ''[[The Mummy Trilogy|''The Mummy'' (1999)]]''. In the end, {{spoiler|the only people who make it out are the four protagonists}}.

* Subverted in ''[[Smokin' Aces]]''. Though many nameless cops bite it in the various shootouts, our hero is so distressed by the mass carnage that it sends him into a [[Heroic BSOD]]. He laments "So many people are dead!" even as his superiors try to get him to callously brush it off and do his job.

* The [[X-Men (film)|''X-Men'' film franchise]] averts this a few times:

* "Chapter 3: Lucky Red Shirt", from Hell’s''Hell's Children'' by Andrew Boland. The Shirt does not turn out to be lucky.

* The African porters of ''[[Congo]]'', the movie or the Crichton novel, seemed to regenerate like clones. "Oh, look, there are three left. Oh, wait, the apes just killed them all. Hey, where did those other two porters come from?"

* Utterly spindled, folded and mutilated by ''[[Night of the Living Trekkies]]'', where the hero encounters a terrified man in a red shirt at a Star Trek convention attacked by the living dead. Turns out that "Ensign Willy Makit" has lost the rest of his group, several trekkies who claim to be from the U.S.S. Expendible...Expendable ''who died in ways completely unrelated to the zombies''. (Willy didn't even ''know'' about them until the hero showed up.) It gets better: Willy's real name is {{spoiler|[[Punny Name|Kenny Dyes]]}}, and {{spoiler|he ultimately dies... in a way ''completely'' unrelated to the zombie attacks}}.

* Averted in ''[[The Name of the Wind]]'', where the Adem, a warrior race whose mercenaries wear all red outfits, and are pretty unlikely to even be wounded.

* Parodied by [[John Scalzi]] in his book ''Redshirts,'', told from the point of view of an ensign on a space exploration vessel:

* Later incarnations of ''Trek'' (''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation]]'', ''[[Star Trek: Deep Space Nine]]'', ''[[Star Trek: Voyager]]'') invert the term by switching uniform colors. Command staff in ''[[Star Trek: The Original Series]]'' wore yellowish uniforms and operations staff (such as security) red; from ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation]]'' on this was swapped, making gold shirts the new target of preference while red shirts were usually safe and secure on bridge duty if not for the [[Explosive Instrumentation|usual exploding console]].

** The aversion is justified because of Voyager's premise. They are on the opposite side of the galaxy from Earth and 75,000 lightyears away from the closest starbase, so they don't have a practically infinite number of Starfleet recruits to replace them and they only have about 150 crew members, 100 being stated as the minimum to run the ship (though proven false on multplemultiple occasions). Thus they can't afford to have crew members [[Dying Like Animals]] all the time. However, they shaved about 1/7th of their time off every season, and got a few more crew in later, so the writers could start being more lenient and allow more deaths a few seasons in.

* ''[[Blake's 7|Blakes Seven]]'', having been designed in response to ''[[Star Trek]]'', features a character announcing, "I am not expendable, I am not stupid, and I am not going."

* In ''[[Stargate Atlantis]]'' any character who makes a premier appearance just as something is discovered is destined to meet a quick demise. The Red shirt du jour is introduced that episode, often by name. As the series' regulars investigate new technology or a recent discovery the newly introduced Red shirts keeping watch get toasted/Wraith-ed/introduced to the [[Monster of the Week]].

{{quote|''{{'}}Tis a gift to wear a gold shirt or a blue, you see

''But look, my dear, what they have done to me

''Even Engineering would a blessing be

''But no, they've made me Security

''Whe-en the landing party's gone

''I'll be there with my red shirt on

''I'll make sure my estate's all orderly

''Because that is the last that you'll see of me'' }}

* [[Jonathan Coulton]] wrote the song "Red Shirt" as a theme to ''Redshirts,'', a book by [[John Scalzi]] mentioned above.

''Get in, get out again and no one gets hurt

''Something is dragging me up a hill

''I look down in my red shirt

''I look down in my red shirt'' }}

== [[Professional Sports]] ==

== [[Theater]] ==

* Parodied with the [[Tortuga Twins]] live show "''[[Tortuga Spies"]]'' where the show's villain has two minions in pink shirts. During the second act, a third minion wearing a red shirt is added and immediately shot and killed. It's then [[Lampshaded]] in that the villain comments about getting the joke as the minion is dragged off stage.

* ''[[Star Trek: Voyager]] - Elite Force]]'': The game lampshades this by giving the "Redshirt Award" to the teammate who died the most during a Capture the Flag or Team Deathmatch game.

** Carmine (whose name is a shade of red) is a rookie squadmembersquad member who is the only character to wear a helmet and mask. He's also the first squad member to die in the game (and actually one of the only two characters who die), shot in the head by a sniper after the first couple of levels.

*** Parodied in the ''[[VG Cats]]'' webcomicweb comic [http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=218].

** Also in ''Gears of War'', the member of Alpha Squad who runs off and is instantly killed by the berserker is listed in the credits as Redshirt Gyules. ([[Genius Bonus]]: "Gules" is heraldic language for "red".)

* Parodied in ''[[Space Quest]]|Space Quest 5]]'', where miscellaneous crew members all wear blue shirts, and Roger Wilco, the protagonist (and ''ship's captain'') is the one who wears a red shirt. Guess who gets shot at all the time?

* In ''[[Mass Effect]]'', the introductory mission on Eden Prime begins with a squadmatesquad mate named Richard [[Leeroy Jenkins|L. Jenkins]]. Guess what happens the first time you encounter any enemies. Go on, guess.

* ''[[Quest for Glory]]|Quest for Glory 5]]'' has "Kokeeno Pookameeso" as one of your competitors for the throne. This translates into "Red Shirt". Guess which of your competitors is first to die? (If you do the side quests, Kokeeno acts a bit more like a [[Mauve Shirt]], getting a good amount of dialog that shows him to be a good and honorable man with admirable reasons for entering the Rites of Rulership. Sadly, it doesn't do him a lot of good.)

** ''[[Final Fantasy VIII]]'' has the Galbaldian soldiers, who in a funny way look like Shinra Army, who are also easily cut down. This really shines bright in the SeeD final exam part of the game when the anxious Galbaldians who attempt to ambush your party try to fight at obviously unwinnable odds. Their are even soldiers in Red uniforms as well as the blue.

* In the ''Cataclysm'' expansion of ''[[World of Warcraft]]'', there's a quest named "Madness" in which you are to accompany a Horde Negotiator to speak with the leader of the Dragonmaw clan of Orcs. You're informed that two have already been sent and not returned, but the quest giver feels assured that if you accompany the negotiator, the clan leader will respect your strength. Along the way, the developers attempt a trope overload, as the Negotiator lampshades [[Retirony]], informs you that "After these negotiations, I am looking forward to a long and prosperous life." If talked to, he questions you "Hey, does this red shirt make me look expendable?" Once you begin negotiations, as one might predict from the quest name, the following conversation eventually takes place: [[Punctuated! For! Emphasis!|"This is madness!" "This is... DRAGONMAW!]]" with an accompanying sparta kick into the fire for the poor ''Red Shirt''.

* In the ''[[Team Fortress 2]]'' "Meet The Videos" this trope is inverted with the RED team mercenaries regularly defeating BLU mercenaries.

* The Gallian army in ''[[Valkyria Chronicles]]''. If the raw deal a Red Shirt normally gets is a sushi platter, the one these guys get is still flopping on the deck with its eyes bugging out. For starters, their only representative is an asshole and none of them have faces, defining traits, or redeeming value (when their enemy counterparts get two cutscenes to show how human they are). Then the vast majority gets burnt alive in an explosion, which is par for the Red Shirt course, except the explosion was a [[The Woobie|''woobiefying'']] moment for the person who blew them up, and [[A Million Is a Statistic|no one cares that they're all dead afterward.]] And as if that wasn't enough, if the player somehow manages to kill off all the distinct personalities of Squad 7, they'll start filling slots in the militia, and still have no faces or final words, fully prepared to die in thankless, anonymous droves (and if the player didn't care about Squad 7, they probably won't mind killing off what amounts to ordinary, faceless [[Player Mook]]s). Apparently the difference between the militia and the army is that the army can train soldiers to be more disposable than toilet paper.

* Heavily subverted and parodied in the ''[[The Order of the Stick|Order of the Stick]]'', where two nameless redshirts manage to survive ([[Mauve Shirt|and even become secondary characters]]) by the rule of [[Nominal Importance]]. Belkar even referred to them as "the two redshirts" at the beginning.

== [[Web Original]] ==

* The French Web writer ASP Explorer, in the 9th story in his work ''Les Fantastiques Aventures de Morgoth l'Empaleur'' (not related to ''[[The Lord of the Rings|this]]'' Morgoth), plays with this hilariously: the adventuring party meet in jail a young and idealistic 1stfirst-level mage called [[Star Trek: The Original Series|Tiberius K. Redshirt]]. He wishes to accompany them when they escape, and shortly later we learn that his middle name is ''[[South Park|Kenny]]''. One of the main characters explains stealthily to the hero that nobody else expect him to last alive very long, because he doesn't have the ''[[Plot Armor|thing]]'', whatever it is, that make an adventurer. He open doors, he pull levers, he press switches and not only lives through the dungeon, {{spoiler|which ironically is not the case of the character who distrusted him, though it is unrelated,}} but gains enough XP to become 8th-level innkeeper when he quits adventuring. He then lives a long and peaceful life until the age of ninety-three years, when he dies by falling from a staircase.

* The [[College Humor]] short ''Jurassic Park Character's Awful Realization'' is explicitly about this, wherein the main cast are arguing over who should distract the T-rex with a flare. Gennaro is elected for this, and accuses the others, "I'm only here to die, aren't I?" The other characters fail to reassure him ("[[Blatant Lies|You're a very important character!]]") and an argument ensues wherein [[Genre Savvy]] Gennaro insists it's unfair to ask the most obviously doomed character to go out there, saying Grant and Ellie are both needed experts, Malcolm is the tension-relieving comic relief, and Tim and Lex [[Infant Immortality|are kids]], and he's simply "[[Acceptable Targets|the lawyer]]." The others try and convince him maybe he's a [[Mauve Shirt]] instead. {{spoiler|Malcolm ultimately [[Kick the Dog|tosses him out of the Explorer]] and after a failed attempt to persuade the T-rex he's plot relevant by saying [[Blatant Lies|he's Tim and Lex's real father]], he gets nommed.}}

** Many clones who DO''do'' have names also die. Their death is just [[Mauve Shirt|more noticiblenoticeable and sudden]], and gives a name for the main characters to scream out in sorrow. ''Matchstiiiiiiick!!!''

* Spoofed mercilessly in ''Sev Trek: Puss in Boots'' (thean Australian CGI spoof of ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation]]''). An alien asks the ''Enterforaprize'' to supply [[Face Full of Alien Wingwong|hosts for its young]], as they're reputed to have "endless supplies of expendable ensigns". After the offer is curtly refused ("Each ensign is a valuable member of our crew!") the alien runs rampant on the ship causing the death of 47 ensigns, mainly due to [[Failsafe Failure]]s and the lousy aim of the main characters. The ensigns have names ranging from Ensign Anonymous to (naturally) Ensign Expendable. One dying ensign laments the fact that he would have been promoted to lieutenant in a few days, therefore becoming immune.

== [[Real Life]] ==