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{{trope}}
{{quote|''"I'm ashamed of you, dodging that way for simple bullets. They couldn't hit an elephant at this distance."''|[[Beam Me Up, Scotty|Said to be]] '''[[Trope Namer|John Sedgwick]]'''{{'}}s [[Famous Last Words]] before being [[Tempting Fate|shot in the head by a sniper]]}}▼
▲{{quote|''"I'm ashamed of you, dodging that way for simple bullets. They couldn't hit an elephant at this distance"''|'''[[Trope Namer|John Sedgwick]]''''s [[Famous Last Words]] before being [[Tempting Fate|shot in the head by a sniper]]}}
A fierce battle is about to ensue. One brave [[Red Shirt]] will step forward and give an uplifting speech, only to be paid for his efforts by getting brutally killed. [[Killed Mid-Sentence|Bonus points if he is killed before he finishes the speech]].
The speech in question will either be an idealistic plea for peace to an implacable enemy, or an attempt to boost morale by emphasizing how the heroes will [[Rousing Speech|never give up, never surrender]], with bonus points if the character in question actually apes Churchill's manner of speech. This can be a chilling [[Kick the Dog]] moment to show just how inhuman the enemy is, a comedic moment to show how ineffective wide-eyed idealism is against violence, or, disturbingly, [[Black Comedy|both]]. Or it could simply be a moment of overconfident gloating on the part of a [[Genre Blindness|genre blind]] villain who hasn't read the [[Evil Overlord List]]
This is often a result of the [[Tempting Fate|Temptation of Fate]].
{{deathtrope}}
{{examples}}
== Anime and Manga ==
* In ''[[
▲* In ''[[Death Note (Manga)|Death Note]]'', Matt is cornered by Takeda's Kira-worshiping bodyguards. He starts telling them why they wouldn't dare shoot him. Cue barrage of bullets.
* ''[[Fullmetal Alchemist]]''. "It's not like they have tanks." Cue {{spoiler|the Briggs brigade}} deploying [[Tank Goodness]] for one ''hell'' of a [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]].
* Subverted in ''[[One Piece]]'' during the war at Marineford. When Coby made a passionate plea to stop the fighting [[Shut Up, Kirk|Admiral Akainu tried to kill him then and there]], only to be stopped by Shanks.
* Russia in ''[[Axis Powers Hetalia]]'' doesn't actually die, but comes close when he jumps from a plane with no parachute. Beforehand, he claims he'll be fine because the snow on the ground is soft enough to break his fall. China asks if he's sure, and Russia says "I'm Russian, I know everything about snow!" Too bad he knows nothing about parachuting.
== Comic Books ==
* Happens to [[Captain America (comics)|Captain America]] during the Korvac saga, ''[[The Avengers (Comic Book)|The Avengers]] Under Siege'', and ''Infinity Gauntlet.''
* Used almost verbatim in [[The Losers]] (with "she couldn't hit..." instead of "they couldn't hit...")
* In ''[[Mars Attacks
▲== Film ==
* ''[[Deep Blue Sea]]'': One of the defining moments is {{spoiler|when [[Samuel L. Jackson|Samuel L. Jackson's]] [[Rousing Speech]] to the other survivors is cut short. [[Everything's Even Worse
▲* In ''[[Mars Attacks (Film)]]'', Martians embark on a humorously vicious invasion of Earth. When they've reached the President of the United States (played by [[Jack Nicholson]]), he makes a moving speech, ending with an impassioned, "Why can't we all just get along?" The Martians appear convinced, for just a moment -- then they skewer him. Martians are one bunch who just cannot give peace a chance. The same scene also features the film's blatant Patton parody delivering a direct quote of Churchill's famous "we will fight them on the beaches" speech and firing his pistols wildly. The alien leader shrinks him down and squishes him.
{{quote|
▲* ''[[Deep Blue Sea]]'': One of the defining moments is {{spoiler|when [[Samuel L Jackson|Samuel L. Jackson's]] [[Rousing Speech]] to the other survivors is cut short. [[Everything's Even Worse With Sharks|By a shark.]] [[It Makes Sense in Context|While indoors.]]}}
▲{{quote| '''Russell:''' Enough! That's enough now, from all of you! You think water's fast? You should see ice. It moves like it has a mind. Like it knows it killed the world once -- it got a taste for murder. When the avalanche came, it took us a week to climb out. And somewhere, we lost hope. Now I don't know exactly when we turned on each other, I just know that seven of us survived the slide... and only five made it out. Now we took an oath that I'm breaking now. Swore that we said 'twas the snow that killed the other two. But it wasn't. Nature can be lethal, but it doesn't hold a candle to man. Now you've seen how bad things can get and how quick they can get that way. Well, they can get a whole lot worse! So we're not going to fight anymore! We're going to pull together and we're going to find a way to get outta here! First, we're gonna seal off this- {{spoiler|'''''CHOMP!'''''}}}}
* ''[[War of the Worlds]]'': A classic example is Pastor Collins in the original film version, who goes out to the Martians to try and communicate, and gets a heat-ray in answer.
* ''[[The Chronicles of Riddick]]'': A lone dissenter in New Mecca says the Necromonger Warlord is an intolerant conqueror rather than the "enlightened" liberator he presents himself as and... gets his soul ripped out for it. Ouchies.
* Sergeant Farrell in ''[[
* [[James Bond|Boris]], ''[[
** Tracy, ''[[
* In ''[[The Bourne Supremacy]]'', {{spoiler|Marie's}} last words: "You have a choice". Subverted somewhat because {{spoiler|Bourne does, in fact, take them to heart, and refrains thereafter from killing in cold blood}}.
** In ''[[The Bourne Identity]]'':
{{quote|
* Brother Jacobus in ''[[Dragonslayer]]'' tries out a pre-beta version of the power of Christ on a dragon: "Unclean beast! Get thee down! Be thou consumed by the fires that made thee!" Though nonverbal, Vermithrax's response translates, approximately, to "no u lol".
* Pretty much exactly the same thing happens in the movie ''[[Outlander (
* In ''[[The Day of the Jackal|Day Of The Jackal]]'', Bastien-Thiry, failed assassin of Charles De Gaulle is shown remarking that he is a patriot and no firing squad will dare shoot him. The next [[Incredibly Lame Pun|shot]] is immediately after his execution.
* In a bit of [[Moral Dissonance]], the movie of [[Return of the King]] had Aragorn cheerfully kill Sauron's spokesperson while the latter was discussing the terms of peace. Though knowing Sauron, they were probably more like "terms of unconditional surrender".
** It wasn't cheerful, it was a classic [[Shut UP, Hannibal]]. Dude was ''pissed''.
* In the CG movie pilot to [[Star Wars:
* The [[Live Action Adaptation]] of ''[[Golgo 13]]'' (the second one, with Sonny Chiba as Duke Togo) shows a mook spying on Golgo with binoculars see him look their way. He turns to his partner and says, "Ah, who cares? It's over 300 yards!" Anyone familiar with the series will know how short that mook's lifespan is.
* ''[[Tropic Thunder]]'': While they weren't going to a war, but to film a movie about one, the director Damien Cockburn died this way. He stepped into a mine after giving a speech about filming the best war movie of all time.
* Near the end of ''[[Three Amigos]]'', a bunch of El Guapo's men run off. As El Guapo yells at them for being cowards, Jefe says, "Cheer up, El Guapo... you still have me!" Guess who gets shot immediately thereafter.
* ''[[The Cabin in
== [[Literature]] ==▼
* ''[[Discworld]]'' series:▼
▲== Literature ==
** ''[[
▲* ''[[Discworld]]'' series
** ''[[Night Watch (Discworld)|Night Watch]]'': Reg Shoe says, "They can take our lives, but they can never take our freedom!" At which point he's shot about seventeen times. Subverted in that Reg keeps going anyway, but his body quits before his mind makes itself up to be a zombie (that happens later). It's specifically noted that [[Braveheart|it was]] possibly [[Take That|the most stupid battle cry]] ever spoken.▼
▲** ''[[Discworld (Literature)/Guards Guards|Guards Guards]]'': After Ankh-Morpork gets taken over by a dragon, a group of citizens start complaining about the new ruler, and Sergeant Colon tries to rally them. When the dragon shows up in person, one inspired citizen stands defiantly in front of the beast and starts to make an impassioned speech. The dragon burns him to cinders in mid-sentence. So much for "The people united can never be ignited!". Although this is unusual in that the momentum wasn't lost when the dragon incinerated the man. People were already starting to question what, precisely, was being proposed to stop the dragon from just killing them all and moving to a different city if they didn't cooperate.
▲** ''Night Watch'': Reg Shoe says, "They can take our lives, but they can never take our freedom!" At which point he's shot about seventeen times. Subverted in that Reg keeps going anyway, but his body quits before his mind makes itself up to be a zombie (that happens later). It's specifically noted that [[Braveheart|it was]] possibly [[Take That|the most stupid battle cry]] ever spoken.
* In [[Lois McMaster Bujold]]'s ''[[Vorkosigan Saga|Barrayar]]'', the villain's last words are "You're a Betan, you can't do-". Turns out she can. Later, another character thinks of "the general whose last words were reputed to have been, ''Don't worry, Lieutenant, the enemy can't possibly hit us at this ran--''"
* ''[[Slayers]]'': Kanzeil from the light novel version. His exact last words are "Don't waste your time! I'm more powerful than any of your paltry parlor tricks!" A second later, he gets vaporized. The anime version of Kanzeil is somewhat different, but he still dies with a Sedgwick Speech.
* In the ''[[Star Trek:
* In John Scalzi's ''[[
* A pair of girls in ''[[Battle Royale]]'' attempt to convince everyone to lay down their weapons and refuse to fight any more with the aid of a megaphone, and promptly get slaughtered by the token psychopath who's armed with a sub-machine gun.
* In the ''[[Doctor Who]]'' episode "[[Doctor Who
▲== [[Live Action TV]] ==
▲* In the ''[[Doctor Who]]'' episode "[[Doctor Who/NS/Recap/S3 E5 Evolution of the Daleks|Evolution of the Daleks]]", the leader of Hooverville attempts to show the Daleks that they're [[Not So Different]] than him, and gets [[X-Ray Sparks]] through his body for the trouble.
** "Whadda you, Daleks?"
** "Exterminate!"
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* In ''[[Sharpe|Sharpe's Peril]]'', a priest tries to convince the villainous leader not to fight because it's the Sabbath. The villain replies that "you of all people should know that God does not work on a Sunday" and shoots him.
* In the series finale of ''[[The Wire]]'', during a meeting of the remaining high-ranking drug dealers after the Stanfield Organization collapses, Cheese Wagstaff (the sole high-ranking member of the Stanfield group left standing) goes into an impassioned tirade about how "there ain't no back in the day" and how it's now ''their'' time to shine, inadvertently implying that he was in on the coup that led to the death of his uncle, the former kingpin of the Baltimore drug trade. He never gets to finish the speech, as said uncle's right-hand man shoots him in the head point blank mid-sentence.
{{quote|
* In the second episode of ''[[Firefly]]'' , Crow makes such a speech. Also inverted in the first episode, when Mal gives a short speech to one of the last members of his platoon about how they're "too pretty to die!" and then they both stand up...and the other guy gets shot down.
* One episode of Dad's Army has Jones comparing Mainwaring to an officer he had in World War One who didn't like crouching in the trenches and one night decided to walk on the parapet to show the Germans he was not afraid and to set an example to his men. {{spoiler|He got shot. In a very awkward place. Did a lot of crouching after that.}}
== Web Comics ==
* [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0611.html This] ''[[Order of the Stick]]'' comic proves why you should never [[Tempting Fate|tempt fate]] when Belkar is around. With a healthy dose of [[Killed Mid-Sentence]] on the next page, no less.
== [[Web Original]] ==
* Josh Goodman in ''[[Survival of the Fittest]]''
{{quote|
** Kathleen Martin too.
{{quote|
* South Dakota in ''[[Red vs. Blue]]'': "Come on, Wash, what are you going to do, shoo-" Wash: "Yes."
* Yamcha in ''[[Dragon Ball Abridged]]''.
== [[Western Animation]] ==
* In the ''[[Futurama]]'' episode "A Taste of Freedom", Old Man Waterfall stands up to the Decapodian Oppression Palace and declares, "Do your worst, you sea devils! I'll make my stand with Old Freebie! You can crush me but you can't crush my spirit!" No points for guessing what happens next.
{{quote|
* In ''[[The Simpsons]]'', a statue of a general is seen with the words "I'll die before I surrender, Tim" engraved on it. Tim is presumed to be the man next to him before he was shot. The more likely explanation is that Tim killed the general, then surrendered.
* ''[[South Park]]'': "Cheeri-o! My name is Pip. I would like to see if you wouldn't mind not smashing our little town to bits."
== [[Real Life]] ==
* The trope is named for John Sedgwick, a Union general in the American Civil War, who, during the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, said "I'm ashamed of you, dodging that way for simple bullets. They couldn't hit an elephant at this distance!" seconds before being fatally shot by a sniper.
** Sedgwick's words are sometimes recorded as being "They couldn't hit an elephant at this dist--", implying that he was [[Killed Mid-Sentence]]. This is [[Beam Me Up, Scotty|not accurate]]. It is, however, [[Rule of Funny|much funnier]].
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** Part of the reason for Sedgwick's overconfidence came from the fact that, up until the Civil War, most troops were armed with smoothbore muskets that were wildly inacurate beyond 50 yards or so. He simply wasn't prepared for the new reality that standard-issue rifles were imposing on the battlefield. (He wasn't alone in that regard; part of the reason Pickett's Charge at Gettysburg was such a slaughter was because General Lee underestimated what a line of men with rifles could do to an advancing army.)
** The [[Horrible Histories]] book about the era includes a cartoon which depicts two soldiers looking at Sedgwick's corpse, one saying "Pity he wasn't an elephant."
* A [[World War Two]] example, although the guy wasn't killed, comes from Operation Chariot, the St. Nazaire
* The British writer [[Saki (
* There is an instance of a King inviting dinner guests to eat on the edge of a battlefield and assuring them they were out of range only to have a cannonball rip two of the guests in half and blind another. Reportedly he ordered that servants remove the two bodies and bring out the wine.
* A variation of sorts, in the battle of Queenston Heights during the War of 1812, one of the American commanders was struck 9 times just after getting off his boat and trying to rally his troops. He survived somehow though.
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[[Category:{{PAGENAME}}]]
[[Category:Last Words]]
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