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{{trope}}
[[File:
Any foot-based [[Chase Scene]] in the outdoors inevitably comes to a broad and incredibly deep chasm spanned only by a rickety rope-and-plank bridge. Naturally, the ropes on one end ''must'' be cut (or break due to their age) when the hero(es) are half-way across, so that they must hold on for dear life as the bridge swings down and slams into the side of a cliff. Never mind the [[Not the Fall That Kills You|predictable results]] of slamming into the cliff that fast.
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It's interesting in the field of [[Bamboo Technology]] that they can build [[Durable Deathtrap|elaborate death traps that work for a thousand years]], but can't build a rope bridge that will last for ten. Who knows, maybe it's the water or the sea air.
In ice-bound regions, [[A Crack in
{{examples}}
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==▼
▲== [[Anime]] ==
* ''[[Futari wa Pretty Cure]]'', episode 6, offers a subversion: The bad guy chases the girls onto the bridge, but he is too heavy for it; his first step snaps the ropes and breaks the planks, plunging him into the river below just as the girls reach the other end.
* Subverted in ''[[Sailor Moon]]'', episode 171. Sailor Venus and Pluto are being chased by [[Mooks]] across a
* [[Lampshaded]] in episode 33 of ''[[Detective Conan]]'': The kids get to the other side a rope bridge without a problem and Conan [[Tempting Fate|comments that this kind of bridge would always fall if it was in a movie]]... at which point, the old ropes suddenly come apart and the bridge completely collapses, leaving them with no way back.
** In the seventh movie, Hattori Heiji ''rides a motorbike'' over a collapsing rope bridge.
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* The first ''[[Pokémon]]'' example occurred in the episode, "Bulbasaur and the Hidden Village", the protagonists attempt to cross a rope bridge, but the wind rips the bridge apart. Brock loses his grip and falls into the river while Ash manage to keep his grip and pulls himself to safety with Misty and Pikachu clinging on him.
** Later episodes feature rope bridges and none or very few of them end without the bridge being destroyed.
** ''[[
* Variant in [[Rurouni Kenshin]]: Kenshin purposely destroys the ''wooden'' bridge he and Misao are trapped on in order to avoid a fight and make the quickest getaway.
* ''[[Inuyasha]]'': Jaken and Rin are confronted by a villain in the middle of a rope bridge. In a subversion, the bridge breaks because Jaken's attempt to defend himself and Rin relies on fire which burns the ropes and breaks the bridge causing all three of them to plunge into the gorge below.
== [[Film]] ==
* Subverted in ''[[Shrek]]''. It does collapse, but only after being set ''on fire'' by a dragon (never mind that it was [[Convection, Schmonvection|suspended over a lava pit]]). Previously it held up just fine despite a several-hundred pound ogre rocking back and forth on it to prove a point.
* ''[[Indiana Jones and
* ''[[Romancing the Stone]]''
** Though that was really a trestle bridge. It was a hazard anyway.
* ''[[The Amazing Panda Adventure]]''{{context}}
* Averted in ''[[Pirates of the Caribbean]]: Dead Man's Chest,'' where the rope bridge does not sway dangerously, snap, or get cut. It's just a bridge.
* ''[[The Phantom (
* In the film version of ''[[Horton Hears a Who!]]'', Horton has to cross a bridge to Mt. Nool with the entire Who planet dangling on a speck of dust on his trunk!
{{quote|
* ''[[
* [[Lampshaded]] in ''[[The Librarian]]''. {{spoiler|While crossing a large wooden bridge, he expresses surprise that it would hold the weight, and bounces on the board. He falls through, and is rescued. Cue the bridge collapsing.}}
* In the climax of ''[[The King and I]]'' animated movie.
* Bully cuts down one while being chased by the natives that were chasing him in ''[[Nate and Hayes]]''.
* ''[[Monty Python and
* ''[[Pandorum]]'' has a sci-fi take on this trope, with the old and damaged platform leading to the reactor. But instead of a ''[[Star Wars]]''-type abyss the platform passes low over a horde of sleeping carnivorous mutants.
* A rope bridge over a river of lava serves as the entrance to Atlantis in Disney's ''[[Atlantis:
== [[Literature]] ==
* Subverted but [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshaded]] in ''[[Narnia|The Silver Chair]]''. Eustace, Jill, and Puddleglum come to a giant stone bridge spanning a canyon. Puddleglum, who [[The Eeyore|sees a down side to everything]], is reluctant to take it, theorizing it's just too convenient and will probably vanish into thin air or something when they're halfway across.
* Subverted in ''[[
* ''[[His Dark Materials|Northern Lights]]''{{context}}
* In ''[[
* One of the first signs that something's up in ''[[Matthew Reilly|Temple]]'' is the existing, already cut rope bridge. Several characters note that it's new, but Incan rope bridges rarely lasted more than three years. Not only is there a native tribe in the area, but they want to keep ''something'' on the tower of rock the temple is on.
* In [[Tamora Pierce]]'s ''The Realms of the Gods'', Daine and Numair are attacked while crossing a rickety rope bridge (says Daine: "It could be worse. It could be raining!"), although it doesn't actually collapse.
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* There ''used'' to a rope bridge spanning the great gorge in the ''[[Redwall]]'' series, but [[Big Bad|Slagar the Cruel]] burns it once he's finished crossing. The heroes then cross the gorge with a makeshift zipline, and later in the series a gigantic tree trunk is used as the bridge.
* ''[[Ketrin]]'': The entire (non-erotic) second half of [http://www.p-synd.com/ketrin/ketrin7.htm Part Seven] involves Ketrin's friend Sherinel having to cross a bridge with four lupinoid companions to get to the side of the river where he thinks Ketrin is. Subverted to the extent that it's not a rope bridge but a huge decaying wooden structure, but that just means that a) it takes a lot longer to get across, and b) it's slowly falling to bits while they're crossing it. And yes, it's hundreds of feet above a raging river.
* In the ''[[
== [[Live
* ''[[
** It is possible that Hurley strained the bridge enough to weaken it so that it could break when Charlie tried to cross it.
* In ''[[
** In ''Voyage of the Damned'' they have to cross a sort of rickety-bridge. It's not made of rope, but {{spoiler|one of the people shocks us by falling off before he gets on the bridge, and one jumps off voluntarily, taking the host with her}}, so it seems to fit the trope, or at least subverting it.
* The ''[[Hercules: The Legendary Journeys]]'' episode "Hero's Heart" starts with Iolaus having a crisis of confidence after failing to save a woman from falling from one of these.
*
== [[Video Games]] ==
* Dusky Bridge in ''[[Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney]]: Trials and Tribulations''.
** Which, unlike most examples of the trope, it actually stood up despite missing large gaps...
* ''Original Adventure'' (''[[Colossal
* The cast of ''[[Eternal Sonata]]'' make quite a scene about going across a fairly sturdy bridge that comes to nothing until a boss a little later in the game destroys it in a final blow.
* ''[[Prince of Persia]]: The Shadow and The Flame'' had a fight with an invincible skeleton on a rope bridge. The ropes hold, but the planks don't.
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* There's a rope bridge near the start of ''[[Metal Gear Solid]] 3''. Surprisingly, it remains intact. {{spoiler|but a traitor does throw Snake off it.}}
** It's also possible to cut the rope bridge yourself. Here's a hint: don't cut the rope bridge yourself, or wait until you're off the bridge and shoot the ropes. Makes a good ambush tactic because when the bridge falls or wobbles it'll send the enemies on it flying to their deaths.
* ''[[
* Used for dramatic effect in ''[[X-Men
* [http://blockland.us Blockland]: This is true of virtually every rope bridge. Ever. It actually got to the point where a rope bridge was built and advertised simply because it ''didn't'' collapse.
* ''[[Super Mario Bros. (
** It's debatable whether they're meant to be rope bridges, since they're always parallel to the bottom of the screen and they never sag or sway, although this may be due to gameplay limitations. The graphics leave a lot of ambiguity as to what material they're made of. At any rate, definite rope bridges appear in ''[[
** And Hightail Falls from ''[[
* ''[[Donkey Kong Country]]'' and its successors get lots of mileage out of this trope (although the bridges are usually sturdy).
* Unsurprisingly, the last levels of ''Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom'' and the "Temple of Doom" segment of ''[[Indiana Jones
== [[Web Original]] ==
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== [[Western Animation]] ==
* Mercilessly parodied
* ''[[The Simpsons (animation)|The Simpsons]]'':
** Parodied and subverted in
** In the episode "The Boy Who Knew Too Much," Bart crosses then tears down a rope bridge while playing hookie, in a futile attempt to evade Principal Skinner.
** Played around in "Thirty Minutes Over Tokyo" when the Simpsons went on a Japanese game show to win plane tickets back to Springfield. After humiliating and painful tasks, they family must grab the tickets off a rope bridge suspended over a volcano. The bridge snapped and the family fell into the lava, which turns out to be orange juice loaded with wasabi.
* For no apparent reason, one episode of ''[[Dungeons and Dragons (
* In ''[[The Emperor's
* On ''[[Beavis and Butthead]]'', an angel comes to Butthead on a stormy night and tries to kill him by goading him into walking over one of these. In an inversion of the [[Stock Parody]] of "It's a Wonderful Life." he shows Butthead how much better the world would be without him, which bores Butthead so much he ignores the bridge and goes home.
* ''[[Jonny Quest]]'' TOS episode "The Devil's Tower". While making their escape from the title place, our heroes have to cross a rope bridge while an insane World War I German war criminal is throwing grenades at them from a biplane. One of the grenades hits the bridge and breaks it while Dr. Quest is crossing it, requiring him to be pulled to safety.
* ''[[The Flintstones
* In one episode of ''[[X-Men (
* Subverted in ''[[
* An episode of ''[[Gummi Bears]]'' centered around replacing an old rope bridge. The replacement is ''too'' durable, and leaves the Gummis open to an invasion.
* These popped up all the time on ''[[
* An episode of ''[[Captain N:
* The ''[[Duckman]]'' episode "Short Plush and Deadly" manages to feature one of these ''and'' an [[Inevitable Waterfall]]
* In the [[Batman:
* ''[[My Little Pony]]'': Shows up in the pilot. Part of the first route the focal ponies and their human ally Megan attempt to take to Midnight Castle involves a rope bridge that collapses with Megan and Applejack on it, dropping them into the river mouth below. They are rescued (and treated to a [[Busby Berkeley Number]]) by the Sea Ponies.
* In homage to the above, in the second part of the pilot to ''[[My Little Pony:
* ''[[George of the Jungle]]'': George has to cross one of these but Ape doesn't think it's sturdy enough to hold Shep<ref>George's pet elephant who he thinks is a dog</ref> - so George carries Shep over instead.
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{{reflist}}
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[[Category:Action Adventure Tropes]]
[[Category:Chase Scene]]
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