Red Shirt: Difference between revisions

 

== Comics ==

{{quote|'''Jason:''' I decorated my gingerbread men in little ''[[Star Trek]]'' uniforms.

'''Paige:''' Good lord, could you be a bigger geek? ''(Jason eats a cookie)'' Why are they all wearing red shirts? }}

 

== 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".

* Cleverly spoofed in a short ''Star Trek'' parody film, [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Y39gHihP74 ''Steam Trek: The Moving Picture''] (premise: ''Trek'' as it would be done 100 years ago by George Melies), where the expendable member of the away team wears a shirt with a target on the back. Also, this character is listed in the opening credits as "Ensign Expendable". For some reason, the opening credits were cut out of the [[YouTube]] version, but the full parody film can be seen [http://www.sisterson.co.uk/ here], under "Films."

* ''Spirit of the Century'' has minions. In a bit of a switch these are mostly for the villains, but they go down right quick, and, if they are attached to a character, must quite literally die before the character can even be hurt.

* Given that there was [[Trading Card Lame|inevitably]] a [[Collectible Card Game]] based on ''[[Star Trek]]'', and given [[CCG Importance Dissonance]], there were inevitably actual Red Shirt characters you could deploy. Having said that, once players hit on the idea of sending in a single character to [[Schmuck Bait|set off all the opponent's traps]], that tactic was inevitably called "Redshirting" as well.

 

== Theater ==

** [http://sluggy.com/daily.php?date=971011 "We'll be sending some expendable crewmembers to investigate..."]

** [http://www.sluggy.com/daily.php?date=971014 "Wow! It knows to go after the extras first!"]

{{quote|Shipman. You know when a monster or ninja or something sneaks on board and attacks a crewman to show how evil it is? Well, the person it attacks is McFipt, and he's getting pretty tired of it. }}

* Parodied in ''[[Legostar Galactica]]'' where one of the main characters is Ensign Red Shirt and is continually being killed yet is always brought back to life. It's to the point that a laser shot ''in the opposite direction'' will actually ''bend'' just to hit him. It is subverted later, however, when a series of accidents fall on another character while sparing Ensign Red Shirt, who's the first surprised.

* 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.

* Referenced in [http://freefall.purrsia.com/ff1800/fc01775.htm this] ''[[Freefall]]'' strip.

* Finding creative ways to kill off redshirts was part of the fun for some of the writers of the ''[[League of Intergalactic Cosmic Champions]]'' (other writers thought they were sick).

* [http://www.thinkgeek.com/tshirts-apparel/unisex/popculture/9722/ This shirt.]

* 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 1st-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.

** And his death is later retconned away when he gains another bunch of levels and {{spoiler|more-or-less ascend to godhood}}.

** It's also played with in the episode ''Star Trekkin'' just about everyone but Kirkstone, Sprock, and RcKoy dies, though Sprock is transformed into one of the creepy jellyfish (his head on their tentacles).

* Lampshaded in ''[[Worms Trek]] Rhapsody''. One gets hit by a Klingon missile (Scotty's line "Hit by Klingon missiles, no!"), another gets fired out of a torpedo bay ("Photon torpedooooooos!").

* 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.}}

* On ''[[Smosh]]'', in this [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NL9lQ-DiL80&feature=relmfu video].